Barbarian 1/Monk X build... help

[Dankus Memakus]

One of my players wants to build a Barbarian monk mainly for a strength rage brawler. I am really concerned that this build is really sub optimal and I don’t want my player to be a horrible character. Will they still be effective in combat? I’m mostly worried about AC due to their extreme madness. Is there any other way the player can build this archetype? (Tavern brawler is a no because that feat is not good at all) they basically want a strong raging fist fighter that can punch through magic resistance. Please help me, they came to me with this idea hoping for help and i do not know what to do.

Also, please no home brew. We need to stay AL legal please

[Yunru]

So what do they want from Monk?
Obviously Martial Arts to be able to punch as a bonus action, and maybe bigger dice if they go deep into Monk.

But what else? The ability to ignore magic resistance? Just slap that on the Barbarian if you want, by the time they reach level 6 they're expected to have a magic weapon anyway.
EDIT: Saw your edit after posting. AL legal makes it slightly harder. How do you feel about running Horde of the Dragon Queen so they can pick up an Insignia of Claws?

Tavern Brawler's also really quite good (at least past level 4); You shove them prone, punch them, and then grab them with your bonus action so they can't stand up.

[JackPhoenix]

Why is Tavern Brawler "not good at all"?

Play a tortle. +2 Str and +1 Wis is a perfect ability bonus for this build, AC 17 no matter what (so you can ignore both Dex and Wis beyond the mandatory 13 required for multiclassing monk if you decide go that way, so you're reducing the MAD considerably), and claws for 1d4 slashing unarmed damage on top.

[Lunali]

If they're starting barbarian, they can sacrifice their stunning strike saving throw and go with dex+con for their armor to reduce the MAD.

Personally, I would suggest going pure barbarian and using unarmed in situations that call for it (such as a tavern) and switching to a weapon when you're out in the wild.

[Dankus Memakus]

Why is Tavern Brawler "not good at all"?

Play a tortle. +2 Str and +1 Wis is a perfect ability bonus for this build, AC 17 no matter what (so you can ignore both Dex and Wis beyond the mandatory 13 required for multiclassing monk if you decide go that way, so you're reducing the MAD considerably), and claws for 1d4 slashing unarmed damage on top.

Tavern brawler doesn’t bypass magic resistance and stays at a d4. He wants monk to be able to get higher damage and more attacks as well.

I’m not quite sure what the insignia of claws is

Edit: I see they make fists a magic weapon which makes tavern brawler a lot more viable. I will talk to him about this but I dunno if it will satisfy his want for more attacks/higher damage

[Lunali]

Insignia of claws is essentially a +1 magical unarmed strike.

[Quoz]

Straight Battlerager is a good option, a magic spiked armor would cover most of your concerns. A grappler is a lot of fun to play, but it requires some cooperation from the GM. Your best damage moments come from terrain - tossing opponents through windows, off of cliffs, or into an active demon-posessed gnomish grain thresher. If you are feeling permissive, any of the 'nearly large' races like goliath and firbolg are tall enough that just holding an enemy over their head and dropping them is enough to trigger fall damage. More if they do it as a leaping suplex. Add in fast movement and a climb speed and it adds up fast.

Otherwise look at races that have natural weapons. Warforged and lizardfolk would be good options. Resistance to mundane attacks is going to be a problem, and if you want to stay AL legal and be able to punch dragons in the face for massive damage your options are limited. Monk is the most obvious. Bladelock with improved pact weapon (unarmed) would not be too much of a stretch. Or you could just infect him with lycanthropy.

[Yunru]

Tavern brawler doesn’t bypass magic resistance and stays at a d4. He wants monk to be able to get higher damage and more attacks as well.

I have some bad news for him.
There's no way to cleanly multiclass Barbarian and Monk without gimping yourself while also being AL legal.
Also damage die makes almost no difference. The difference between 1d4 and 1d8 is just 2 damage per attack. You'll more than make that up from rage damage when compared to sinking so many levels into Monk.

[Dankus Memakus]

I have some bad news for him.
There's no way to cleanly multiclass Barbarian and Monk without gimping yourself while also being AL legal.
Also damage die makes almost no difference. The difference between 1d4 and 1d8 is just 2 damage per attack. You'll more than make that up from rage damage when compared to sinking so many levels into Monk.

I think he wants flurry of blows though. Not just higher dice and also bonus action attacks with all the rage damage. It’s a shame. It sounded really cool. I’ll have to chat with him I guess

Edit: can forge clerics enchant fists with blessing of the forge.

[Yunru]

I think he wants flurry of blows though. Not just higher dice and also bonus action attacks with all the rage damage. It’s a shame. It sounded really cool.
I think that a level or two won't hurt too much, although it's mostly getting the stats to qualify for multiclassing that'll hurt hardest.

[Dankus Memakus]

I think that a level or two won't hurt too much, although it's mostly getting the stats to qualify for multiclassing that'll hurt hardest.

Yeah I’ve noticed. I think his AC will always suffer and he will be very sub optimal

Edit: would it be unwise for him to just go straight monk and then maybe we could get him a belt of giants strength and he could take the level later?

[Yunru]

Yeah I’ve noticed. I think his AC will always suffer and he will be very sub optimal

Edit: would it be unwise for him to just go straight monk and then maybe we could get him a belt of giants strength and he could take the level later?

It depends how much he wants to be a raging monster. Monk is also much more of a hit and run playstyle.
If he had 14 Str, 16 Dex, 16 Con, 8 Int, 12 Wis, 8 Cha he could have an AC of 16 (18 with a shield), which is okay, but you'd have to boost Wisdom at level 4.
If he's willing to slog through a harder first three levels, he could start 13 Str, 16 Dex, 16 Con, 8 Int, 13 Wis, 8 Cha. It'd allow him to multiclass at any point.

EDIT: If you want to be really scummy (and it's a shame that this is the extent you have to go to in order to get a good unarmed build), find out how Natural Weapons are treated. If they're treated as weapons, I might suggest Barbarian/Warlock, manifesting his Pact Weapon as a punchy natural weapon.

[Dankus Memakus]

It depends how much he wants to be a raging monster. Monk is also much more of a hit and run playstyle.
If he had 14 Str, 16 Dex, 16 Con, 8 Int, 12 Wis, 8 Cha he could have an AC of 16 (18 with a shield), which is okay, but you'd have to boost Wisdom at level 4.
If he's willing to slog through a harder first three levels, he could start 13 Str, 16 Dex, 16 Con, 8 Int, 13 Wis, 8 Cha. It'd allow him to multiclass at any point.

I dunno. I think I’m gonna advise him against it and tell him to take the Barbarian background and go straight monk for some of the flavor he wants. I would love for him to be effective with this build but our restrictions make it a bit hard

[Dankus Memakus]

It depends how much he wants to be a raging monster. Monk is also much more of a hit and run playstyle.
If he had 14 Str, 16 Dex, 16 Con, 8 Int, 12 Wis, 8 Cha he could have an AC of 16 (18 with a shield), which is okay, but you'd have to boost Wisdom at level 4.
If he's willing to slog through a harder first three levels, he could start 13 Str, 16 Dex, 16 Con, 8 Int, 13 Wis, 8 Cha. It'd allow him to multiclass at any point.

EDIT: If you want to be really scummy (and it's a shame that this is the extent you have to go to in order to get a good unarmed build), find out how Natural Weapons are treated. If they're treated as weapons, I might suggest Barbarian/Warlock, manifesting his Pact Weapon as a punchy natural weapon.

I am really not sure if we can do this in AL honestly but I dunno how it would be game breaking

[bid]

If they're starting barbarian, they can sacrifice their stunning strike saving throw and go with dex+con for their armor to reduce the MAD.
They'll have to, since the monk's unarmored defense feature "doesn't exist" for you when get the barbarian's first. And since the barbarian feature is a trap for Str users, it's really a bad deal.

You are better to fluff some rage RP over the straight monk.

[NaughtyTiger]

They'll have to, since the monk's unarmored defense feature "doesn't exist" for you when get the barbarian's first.

i was ready to drop a "you are wrong", but holy cow, i just got schooled.

[TripleD]

Barabarian Monks are good at something I call “package delivery”. Barbarian are great grapplers, while monks give bonuses to speed. Grapple with advantage while raging, use your bonus action to dash (Eagle Totem or Step of the Wind), and literally move enemies where you want them to go. If you’re fighting unarmed you can even move two enemies at the same time.

This leads to one extremely niche (but oh so fun) build based around Barbarian 3/Monk x: the battle jumper.

Disclaimer this will need a bit of magic-item help to really shine, but the basic idea is this:

1. Barbarians get advantage on all STR checks while raging. This includes grapple checks.

2. Tiger totem gives bonuses to jumping.

3. Monks get a lot of bonus movement.

4. “Step of the Wind” doubles your jump distance.

With +5 to STR a character can jump 8 feet in the air. Tiger totem increases that to 11 feet. Using “Step of the Wind” pushes it to 22 feet. If you grapple an enemy, jump, and drop them that’s 2d10 damage with no save on top of any unarmed attacks you make against them.

If you can snag a Ring of Jumping and Boots of Springing and Striding though? Suddenly your jump distance becomes 88 feet! Granted the boots have the caveat that you are limited to jumping your remaining movement. With the mobile feat and the monks extra movement, that works out to 100 feet (50ft * 2 for dashing). When grappling that is halved, and you will need 10 to get a running start, so that works out to 40 feet for 4d10 damage.

Like I said it’s niche, and needs some DM help in the form of items, but there’s something about jumping 80 feet up to grapple a devil in mid-flight that never fails to amuse me.

[JackPhoenix]

Again, tortle makes it viable. With standard array:

Str 14 (16)
Dex 13
Con 15
Int 8
Wis 12 (13)
Cha 10

That's enough for multiclassing monk and barb, he'll have AC 17 regardless of his Dex or Wis score, so he can more or less ignore both (it doesn't scale, though, so he'll be a bit behind pure monk who improved both Wis and Dex at higher levels, and he may need Wis to improve saves on his abilities, depending on the chosen monk subclass) and put ASIs into Str and Con (Con because it sounds like he'll want to stay in melee instead of playing a skirmisher, like pure monk should, so he'll need extra HP). On the downside, he'll be a turtle.

Alternative is to start as a monk (so his AC is based on Dex + Wis instead of Dex + Con, put mandatory 13 in Str so he can multiclass into barbarian), increase Dex and Wis for AC as normal monk would and get Gauntlets of Ogre Strength/Belts of x Giant Strength.

Also, magic resistance generally gives advantage only on saves against magic, fists ignore it by virtue of not being spells.

[Zigludo]

I think you're worrying too much about how difficult this is going to be for your player.

Does he have a preferred race? As long as he can get a +3 to his Strength modifier at 1st level, +2 to his Dexterity, 13 Wisdom and +1 or +2 Constitution, he'll be more than fine. His only issue will be AC, which can be solved in one go by rolling a Tortle. Alternately he can go Minotaur and just wear armor. Yeah, that doesn't sound very monk-like, but it actually satisfies his criteria of doing lots of damage with unarmed and going through magic resistance. He'll still be able to attack with Flurry of Blows and add Rage damage. He won't get unarmored movement, scaling damage dice on unarmed strikes, or the Martial Arts bonus attack, but all of the other Monk features will still apply. He can Flurry after attacking twice with a Greatsword, that's pretty freaking good. Besides, his unarmed strikes will deal 1d6+ Strength mod, and he can spend his bonus action on other monk features like Dodging. I would recommend Kensei with each of these paths. (Kensei in armor using Dodge is insanely hard to hit.)

If he really doesn't want to go a "nonstandard" race just for the sake of making his build work, I would recommend going Human: 16 Strength, 14 Dexterity, 16 Constitution, 13 Wisdom. He gets 15 AC with no shield which is actually alright, slightly below a standard Monk, but can use all of his Monk features no problem. A mountain dwarf can also hit these stats with point buy. This build is actually pretty optimized. I might take a second level in Barbarian at some point to get Reckless Attack. Maybe 3 for Bear Totem?

All three of these builds are note totally optimized but still quite powerful. I could draw up a leveling path for any one of them if your player wants more help, but I don't think you have much to worry about unless you're running a very challenging, highly optimized game with super minmaxed characters in the party.

[bid]

i was ready to drop a "you are wrong", but holy cow, i just got schooled.
Yeah, I went through the same path when I heard that. :smallwink:

[Deathtongue]

If you're playing AL, the easiest way would run a Tier 1 adventure that drops the Gauntlets of Ogre Power and just start with a STR of 13 while putting points into the standard monk stats. They'll be slightly suboptimal (emphasis on slightly) but should otherwise be good.

There are several such adventures that drop Gauntlets of Ogre Power.

[qube]

I'd go full zealot barbarian, reflavoring 2 short swords as unarmed strikes. because, well ...
I don't think you can off-hand attack with an unarmed strike (unless monk)
we're talking about 1+ vs 1d6+ ... not a insignifcant difference
you can use STR anyway on the attack (nothing says you MUST use dex for finesse)
As for optimisation ... well ... consider the greatsword barbarian
does 1 attack of 2d6+STR+rage bonus damage
has 1 die (2 if reckless) of chance to hit (and thus do the bonus damage of zealot)
While the dual wielding barbarian does
does 1 attack of 1d6+STR+rage bonus damage
does 1 attack of 1d6+rage bonus damage
(a.k.a. a net of +rage bonus worth of damage)
has 2 die (4 if reckless) of chance to hit (and thus do the bonus damage of zealot)
.. a net 2d20 bonus
only downside: rage is a bonus action - so no dual attacking while you rage.

Other then that ...if you fear AC .. if you can muster 13 dex - take defensive dualist is a feat :)

[Man_Over_Game]

I mean, it's really not as bad as people think it is.

Barbarian 1/Monk X can actually wear a shield and armor just fine. The only thing you miss out on is Unarmored Defense and Unarmored Movement. If you don't plan on hitting level 10, you'll never be able to walk on water/walls anyway. This allows you to play a Barbarian with low stats and still rock a high AC. The best part is, you get a Bonus Action attack while still having a weapon and shield, which is rarely possible.

Alternatively, for a Barbarian "Monk" feel, you can pick up Mobile and Tavern Brawler on a Barbarian and play almost exactly how a Monk does.

Lastly, if your DM is even willing to look at homebrew, I created a collection of balanced options for using alternate attributes for specific builds, and gave detailed analysis as to why each option was balanced. One specific example was changing the Monk from using Dexterity on all of its features to Strength, and restricting the Monk to only be able to take the Open Hand subclass. This is balanced because:
Using Strength on a Monk isn't relevant in almost any circumstance, because Strength is only used by heavier weapons and armor, neither of which the Monk can benefit from. The only reason using Strength instead of Dexterity on a Monk might matter is if considering Barbarian Rage as part of the build. That being said:

Monk + Rage is inherently weaker than Barbarian + Rage, due to the -2 less HP per level that the Monk would get.
Open Palm uses Wisdom, dividing the Monk between Strength, Constitution, and Wisdom in order to make use of both Rage and subclass features.
Open Palm's Sanctuary clashes with Rage's mechanics.
Unless you are willing to lose out on the Strength+Wisdom AC, you cannot take the Barbarian as your first level for the +4 starting HP.

Monk's Evasion now uses Strength instead of Dexterity Saving Throws, which is a major loss.
Dexterity is a more versatile stat, involving more skills and is usable by weapons with longer range. Changing the Monk to Strength sacrifices a lot of versatility.


With more info in the Prestige Options link in the signature, if anyone's interested. The idea of the Prestige Options isn't to give you an idea of what to build, but rather provide a counter to when your DM says that you shouldn't play a homebrew multiclass build, and you want to prove him otherwise.

[Rukelnikov]

I mean, it's really not as bad as people think it is.

Barbarian 1/Monk X can actually wear a shield and armor just fine. The only thing you miss out on is Unarmored Defense and Unarmored Movement. If you don't plan on hitting level 10, you'll never be able to walk on water/walls anyway. This allows you to play a Barbarian with low stats and still rock a high AC. The best part is, you get a Bonus Action attack while still having a weapon and shield, which is rarely possible.

This only works with Flurry of Blows, martial arts BA requires you to not be wearing a shield, also you would be hitting for 1+Str, since shield negates your martial arts which is what increases your unarmed damage.

[Man_Over_Game]

This only works with Flurry of Blows, martial arts BA requires you to not be wearing a shield, also you would be hitting for 1+Str, since shield negates your martial arts which is what increases your unarmed damage.

Ah, crap, you're right. Must have skipped over the Martial Arts rules.

Nevermind then.

[Rukelnikov]

Ah, crap, you're right. Must have skipped over the Martial Arts rules.

Nevermind then.

I guess you could go for a race that gets some natural attack? Most of those are worded "that you can use to make an unarmed strike", you would still need to spend ki but at least damage wouldn't be that horrible :S

[Man_Over_Game]

I guess you could go for a race that gets some natural attack? Most of those are worded "that you can use to make an unarmed strike", you would still need to spend ki but at least damage wouldn't be that horrible :S

Centaur Barbarian with Mobile. AKA, "Monk".

[Rukelnikov]

Centaur Barbarian with Mobile. AKA, "Monk".

That's... not so bad, you'd have 0 monk fluff, but a good amount of martial arts mechanics, and 60 ft movement.

I can't accept the half ponies though, I don't wanna play a half-man half-pony, I wanna play a half-man half-horse.

[Man_Over_Game]

That's... not so bad, you'd have 0 monk fluff, but a good amount of martial arts mechanics, and 60 ft movement.

I can't accept the half ponies though, I don't wanna play a half-man half-pony, I wanna play a half-man half-horse.

Viashino would work well as a Barbarian, the problem is that you don't have any method for a Bonus Action attack, but you instead have a Reaction-based attack. This would work well if you were a build that focuses on using your Bonus Action (like using Tavern Brawler, using TWF, Storm Herald, Shield Master, Battlerager, etc).

Weirdly enough, I could see a Storm Herald doing well as a Viashino, since having a Reaction-based attack that punishes enemies for attacking you means you can sit in the middle of enemies teams more comfortably, and you can afford more ASIs to bump up your Con (since you won't be getting Sentinel).

[JackPhoenix]

Neither race works in AL.

[Man_Over_Game]

Neither race works in AL.

Are Ravnica Races not AL legal?

[Edit] Double Checked, guess not!

[Rukelnikov]

Viashino would work well as a Barbarian, the problem is that you don't have any method for a Bonus Action attack, but you instead have a Reaction-based attack. This would work well if you were a build that focuses on using your Bonus Action (like using Tavern Brawler, using TWF, Storm Herald, Shield Master, Battlerager, etc).

Weirdly enough, I could see a Storm Herald doing well as a Viashino, since having a Reaction-based attack that punishes enemies for attacking you means you can sit in the middle of enemies teams more comfortably, and you can afford more ASIs to bump up your Con (since you won't be getting Sentinel).

I hadn't checked the UA races, attack on reaction from lvl 1 sounds really good, even if its only a d4. I guess those guys could work, toem for bonus Dash would also bring some monkness ot the build.

[Rukelnikov]

Neither race works in AL.

Why don't centaurs work?

[Man_Over_Game]

Why don't centaurs work?

Ravnica is not AL official material. Or they're not considered AL official races? Not entirely sure if the Spore Druid/Order Cleric are allowed in AL yet.

[Phoenix042]

One of my players wants to build a Barbarian monk mainly for a strength rage brawler.

This is a potentially REALLY effective character concept, and there's an easy and fun way to build it: go straight barbarian and grab tavern brawler. There are a LOT of good things about this:

1) You can fight with a shield and nothing in your other hand. Hit them, then grapple them with your bonus action and your insane athletics (with advantage from rage).

2) While people are grappled by you, they can't stand up from prone. Knock them to the ground, and now they have to break your grapple or they're stuck there. At 5th level, you can hit someone, shove them to the ground, and grapple them all in one turn, plus drag them 20ft in whatever direction you want. Then each round after that you just bash them with the shield, drag them around the battlefield (maybe through a spike growth spell? Into a wall of fire? Over a cliff? Into a river of lava?), and keep them from hitting your allies.

I'm a big fan of the idea of using a Lizardfolk for this; start with 15 str and 16 con, bump str at 4th by taking tavern brawler, and now by 5th level you've got a bite you can use to grapple people with and do 1d6 + str + 2 damage. Carry a shield and use your chomp to heal every once in a while. Grapple people and drag them down into the water with you like a goddamn crocodile. You can hold your breath for 10 minutes; they can't.

But monk barbarian as a multiclass will be harder to make work.

[Rukelnikov]

Ravnica is not AL official material. Or they're not considered AL official races? Not entirely sure if the Spore Druid/Order Cleric are allowed in AL yet.

I can get why, those backgrounds are seriously OP compared to any other bg