Brawler type character using unarmed fighting style

[Snig]

Hey guys so I'm trying to make a brawler type character with the new unarmed fighting style. I'm thinking of going 2-3 fighter to pick up the style, and then Barbarian, with Half-orc as my race.

One thing that confuses me when I read about these builds, is that almost everybody recommends getting expertise in athletics with Rogue or an expertise feat.

I see the necessity with this with the Barbarian already getting advantage on athletics when raging? 🤔.

Anyone care to weigh in?

Also any thoughts on optimizing around the unarmed fighting style / tavern brawler?

[JackPhoenix]

Expertise and advantage are not mutually exclusive and you won't be raging all the time. It's not strictly necessary.... just proficiency and high Str should be enough for most enemies, as NPCs rarely have skill proficiencies beyond Perception... but more is always better.

If you're going to take 3 levels of fighter, I'd recommend Rune Knight as your subclass. Giant's Might allows you to grapple creatures up to huge size and the extra damage is always nice, and the number of uses is based on your proficiency bonus, so it improves even if you don't take more fighter levels. The advantage on Str check is redundant with Rage, but other benefits more than make up for that.

[Unoriginal]

Hey guys so I'm trying to make a brawler type character with the new unarmed fighting style. I'm thinking of going 2-3 fighter to pick up the style, and then Barbarian, with Half-orc as my race.

You can get Fighting Style with one level of Fighter, if you want to go Barbarian I suggest using the Fighting Initiate feat to get Unarmed.

Only going to lvl 3 is going to hurt your progression to ASI and Extra attack *a lot*.



One thing that confuses me when I read about these builds, is that almost everybody recommends getting expertise in athletics with Rogue or an expertise feat.

I see the necessity with this with the Barbarian already getting advantage on athletics when raging? 🤔.

Anyone care to weigh in?

It is not necessary, just proficiency is pretty nice by itself, but Expertise make the grappling *extremely* hard to escape by basically anyone else.



Also any thoughts on optimizing around the unarmed fighting style / tavern brawler?

If you do go Fighter 3, I suggest Rune Knight. But I really don't suggest doing that.


Which Barbarian subclass did you want to go for?

[Snig]

You can get Fighting Style with one level of Fighter, if you want to go Barbarian I suggest using the Fighting Initiate feat to get Unarmed.

Only going to lvl 3 is going to hurt your progression to ASI and Extra attack *a lot*.



It is not necessary, just proficiency is pretty nice by itself, but Expertise make the grappling *extremely* hard to escape by basically anyone else.



If you do go Fighter 3, I suggest Rune Knight. But I really don't suggest doing that.


Which Barbarian subclass did you want to go for?

Berserker looks good?

[Unoriginal]

Berserker looks good?

What do you want in the Berserker?

EDIT:

I'm asking because the Beast Barbarian is the best unarmed Barbarian.

[sophontteks]

Expertise in athletics is extremely important. You can just take skilled as a human, or brawney if the allow UA feats.

You be better off going straight barbarian and using fighting initiate for the unarmed fighting style. Multiclassing fighter and barbarian isn't good.

[animewatcha]

If you go beast barb and pick up dual-wield, can use claw for bonus action attack.