Benefits of going for a grappler build with a battlemaster?

[Corran]

I started thinking of a character with the unarmed fighting style, because I like the idea of a character who can put up a fight even when unarmed. The d4 bonus damage when grappling someone is not much, but since I am imagining this character to be mostly using a longsword and not shield, I started tinking about grappling a little bit.

My first thought was of an oath of glory paladin, followed by a rune knight because spending a feat on the unarmed fighting style didn't sit well with me, followed by a battlemaster because the maneuvers seem the more interesting button.

So, battlemaster fighter with the unarmed fighting style and a longsword. How much can we squeeze out of grappling? And yes, I know, the real value of grappling with rely on pushing enemies off cliffs, into walls of fire, etc etc, but let's ignore all these.

Here's what I've got:

1) Tripping attack & grappling strike:
I use the trip maneuver with my first attack to knock an enemy (large or smaller) prone. If successful, I follow with the grappling strike maneuver to attempt to grapple with my free hand as a bonus action. If the enemy was knocked prone but the bonus action grappling didn't succeed, I follow it up with a grapple from an attack granted by action surge or by the extra attack feature. This basically allows me to shove prone and grapple someone much like anyone would but with the option to spend superiority dice so that I dont miss on any attacks (not that the attacks with just a longword will do crazy damage, but eh, that's something).

2) Disarming attack (& grappling strike):
This is more of a direct benefit of the unarmed fighting style and the lack of specialization into a specific weapon, than a benefit of playing as a grappler. Because, while after disarming an enemy weapon user it's a logical move to grapple them and move them away from their weapon, but what's even better is picking up that weapon yourself and using it to fight your now unarmed opponent (definitelly imagining this character as a former gladiator now; I must make room for the maneuver that boosts performance now). I just have to use disarming strike with an unarmed attack.

3) Ready to switch to ranged:
Going with no shield means I can switch more easily into a bow. And since I am not overspecializing in melee with feats like PAM and GWM not do I need the STR bumps so desperately as such builds, this leaves a little room for a decent ranged attack (longbow, probably 14-16 DEX, fighter's extra attacks and potentialy trip attack, seem ok eough).

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I am wonderng if menacing attack is worth it. Any ideas about other maneuvers that would be useful for such a build?

My main worry is that the build is neither that good in dealing and withstanding damage. It's versatile enough and it has some fun buttons, but I would not be against adding some more oomph to it. I really want to go for two rogue levels (dont care too much about not making the most of the d6 sneak attack) and add skulker as a feat just to be able to switch to a stealthy fighter when I think it's a good idea (I cannot justify MAM just for being able to switch approach mid combat, I prefer to keep the feat and decide beforehand). Also because cunning action dash would be nice on a grappler. But I am thinking that perhaps a single level of barbarian might be more useful because 2 rages per day would help making up for probably coming a bit short (compared to what I could have done with a more specialized fighter build) on the not killing faster and/or not dying harder front.

Also, I am looking at the feats tavern brawler and grappler and I am not too impressed. Am I missing anything?

If you have other build ideas about a character using the unarmed fighting style and using a longsword but no shield, those are welcome too.

[Ir0ns0ul]

Some time ago I was thinking about a “street fighter” build. It’s not necessarily good in grapple, but the aesthetics count.

Monk 1 / Battlemaster X.

The background I thought was a failed monk who never had the necessary discipline to manifest Ki and then decided to create his own fighting style.

DEX first, CON second. Resilient Wisdom has even more synergy. You’ll be attacking 3x times at level 5 with a 1d8 damage die.

[Rukelnikov]

Consider this, if you were using no longsword at all you 'd do the same damage, and you could use a shield and do slightly less damaga 1d6, but get +2 AC.

[strangebloke]

Tavern brawler is great. It gives a ba grapple for half a feat (no superiority dice used, no grapple strike taken) and iirc the conditions for the grapple are more lenient. You really want to get the most out of your superiority dice here. Every time you're using grapple strike is a time you're not using ambush or commanding present or trip attack or such.

Personally not a fan of stealth here. You're a slow controller type character, it's going to be hard to get into melee to do your thing and your ranged play isn't that great. Plus you're already a strength build and you'll want good AC so stealth is going to pull you in weird directions.

But really the build is wide open. That's the real strength of the fighter class. You are by default pretty tough and pretty high damage, and even if "power feats" are out of reach there's still loads of amazing options available to you. With only one feat at most required, you are fully online by level three and can do whatever. Rogue? Sure. Paladin? Why not?For feats there's ritual caster, ham, lucky, alert.

I MCed into wildfire druid for utility and teleports after level six with this build. Had a great time. The hexadin outshone me in the niche of martial but otherwise I never felt weak.

[sithlordnergal]

Something you should be wary of when making a Grapple focused build: You can only grapple creatures up to one size larger than you.

You should be fine most of the time, but if you're playing something like Against the Giants, Storm Kings Thunder, or just know you're facing a bunch of Huge enemies, you miiight wanna rethink your build cause you're not going to be able to grapple anything.

[Derges]

Consider this, if you were using no longsword at all you 'd do the same damage, and you could use a shield and do slightly less damaga 1d6, but get +2 AC.

Shield master is also a great grappler feat. Shove prone as a bonus when taking the attack action (either making an attack to trigger a manoeuvre or initiating a grapple itself) is very nice. The other two bits are okay but you're not liley to pumop dex

[Corran]

Some time ago I was thinking about a “street fighter” build. It’s not necessarily good in grapple, but the aesthetics count.

Monk 1 / Battlemaster X.

The background I thought was a failed monk who never had the necessary discipline to manifest Ki and then decided to create his own fighting style.

DEX first, CON second. Resilient Wisdom has even more synergy. You’ll be attacking 3x times at level 5 with a 1d8 damage die.

This is a neat idea. Both the concept and the mechanics. The monk dip is certainly worth it. With expertise in athletics from a feat and with the many attacks from being a fighter(and potentially maneuvers), grappling would not be out of the question either.

Hmm, but I haven't reached yet the point where I'd want to play someone who primarily would fight with unarmed strikes (although the synergy of the monk level to your battlemaster idea is pretty tempting, hmm, maybe I could do that anyway).

Did you have any particular martial art in mind for your character's idea fighting? I am still undecided, anything between Austin Power's style karate chops to a brutal martial art could do I suppose, but I am still looking for suggestions on that (ie what to watch at youtube and then style the character accordingly).

Consider this, if you were using no longsword at all you 'd do the same damage, and you could use a shield and do slightly less damaga 1d6, but get +2 AC.

I know, I know. And it hurts. But I have to fight against my shield addiction.

Tavern brawler is great. It gives a ba grapple for half a feat (no superiority dice used, no grapple strike taken) and iirc the conditions for the grapple are more lenient. You really want to get the most out of your superiority dice here. Every time you're using grapple strike is a time you're not using ambush or commanding present or trip attack or such.

Hmm. I thinkt of it as a way to spare myself a feat. But maybe you are right. Because now I am looking at the maneuvers without fixing on grappling, and there are a lot that I'd like to get my hands on. 15 of them to be exact. Difficult decisions are ahead. Not 100% sure what I'd want to spend my feats on yet, but once I start thinking about them it wont be hard to come up with 6-7 feats that I'd definitely want, lol.

My attack damage wont be all that high, so the opportunity cost of spending one more attack on grappling is not too high. Maybe I could go with grappling strike for a few levels (3-5 or 3-10) and eventually swap it out when I have enough attacks (2 or 3 w/o action surge). Because at that point the bonus action grapple would not be too important for achieving both a shove (prone) and a grapple during the same turn, but it would be important for just not missing on (m)any weapon attacks, which is not a huge deal if my base attack is 1d8/d10 + str. Then again, it's a half feat, so I will keep it in mind for when I start taking a more extensive looks at possible feats.

Personally not a fan of stealth here. You're a slow controller type character, it's going to be hard to get into melee to do your thing and your ranged play isn't that great. Plus you're already a strength build and you'll want good AC so stealth is going to pull you in weird directions.

Yeah, stealth and the rogue levels was probably me trying to cling to my current character. Besides, I cannot think of a creative way to use stealth while grappling (I mean, how to present it). Thinking of it more, my main motivation is to go for something somewhat unexpected for the general idea that I have in mind (big strong fighter) and stealth was just the first thing that came to mind. But I am now thinking speed. Probably go for a goliath, but who has enough about them so that some NPC would be abe to say something along the lines "dont be fooled by his size, he is unexpectedly fast", or something like that. I guess a high number of attacks would help with speed during combat. Then I may look at the mobile feat or the expeditious retreat spell or something along these lines.

But really the build is wide open. That's the real strength of the fighter class. You are by default pretty tough and pretty high damage, and even if "power feats" are out of reach there's still loads of amazing options available to you. With only one feat at most required, you are fully online by level three and can do whatever. Rogue? Sure. Paladin? Why not?For feats there's ritual caster, ham, lucky, alert.

By required feat you mean tavern brawler or perhaps one that could get you expertise in athletics? Or something else perhaps?

I MCed into wildfire druid for utility and teleports after level six with this build. Had a great time. The hexadin outshone me in the niche of martial but otherwise I never felt weak.

How far did you go with the druid levels? How was the build defensively, taking into account the group (eg number of melee's, DM style at distributing damage or no, etc).
Also, what do you think of a barbarian 1 dip? With it I could maybe skip defensive duelist (plus, keeping my reaction open for parry would be nice, as this is one of the maneuvers I am eyeing, mostly due to the cool effect) and a feat for athletics expertise. Plus, rage would make me tankier even against more than one (the grappled) enemy or against enemies with multiattack. Also, it could help even when not grappling.

Something you should be wary of when making a Grapple focused build: You can only grapple creatures up to one size larger than you.

You should be fine most of the time, but if you're playing something like Against the Giants, Storm Kings Thunder, or just know you're facing a bunch of Huge enemies, you miiight wanna rethink your build cause you're not going to be able to grapple anything.

Yep. I wish enlarge was a 1st level spell now. Or that goliaths got something for that. Or maybe I need to start looking at a duergar (yak) or a 3rd level dip (yak!!!). Not a huge fan of the aternative grappling rules either. Thanks for reminding me though.

[sithlordnergal]

Yep. I wish enlarge was a 1st level spell now. Or that goliaths got something for that. Or maybe I need to start looking at a duergar (yak) or a 3rd level dip (yak!!!). Not a huge fan of the aternative grappling rules either. Thanks for reminding me though.

I actually made this sort of build with a Fairy. They get Enlarge/Reduce as a racial spell, and I went Rune Knight/Cleric in order to gain some spell slots.

[Ir0ns0ul]

This is a neat idea. Both the concept and the mechanics. The monk dip is certainly worth it. With expertise in athletics from a feat and with the many attacks from being a fighter(and potentially maneuvers), grappling would not be out of the question either.

Hmm, but I haven't reached yet the point where I'd want to play someone who primarily would fight with unarmed strikes (although the synergy of the monk level to your battlemaster idea is pretty tempting, hmm, maybe I could do that anyway).

Did you have any particular martial art in mind for your character's idea fighting? I am still undecided, anything between Austin Power's style karate chops to a brutal martial art could do I suppose, but I am still looking for suggestions on that (ie what to watch at youtube and then style the character accordingly).

BJJ (Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu). This martial art was created to enable “weaker” people to fight against physically stronger opponents by taking advantage of their superior strength through pressuring points and maneuvers based on joint locks and body levers. This martial art is also the base of modern MMA because covers both straight stand-up fighting and regular ground submission with several techniques. You can customize Trip Attack, Menacing Attack, Grappling Strike and many others battlemaster maneuvers to BJJ.

[Amechra]

Austin Power's style karate chops

I think you mean JUDO CHOP!

Another possibility to consider would be going Barbarian and picking up Tavern Brawler (which is, conveniently, a Str half-feat) for the BA grapple. The main advantage is that Rage gives you consistent advantage on Strength checks, which is super nice. If your group allows UA content, there's also the option of the Path of the Giant, which makes you get bigger while raging (increasing the range of creatures you can grapple). Screw magic — you're a GIANT!

The only problem would be that your damage would be poor... but if you're planning on grappling, a laser-focus on dealing damage probably isn't your main focus in the first place.

[Waazraath]

I started thinking of a character with the unarmed fighting style, because I like the idea of a character who can put up a fight even when unarmed. The d4 bonus damage when grappling someone is not much, but since I am imagining this character to be mostly using a longsword and not shield, I started tinking about grappling a little bit.

My first thought was of an oath of glory paladin, followed by a rune knight because spending a feat on the unarmed fighting style didn't sit well with me, followed by a battlemaster because the maneuvers seem the more interesting button.

So, battlemaster fighter with the unarmed fighting style and a longsword. How much can we squeeze out of grappling? And yes, I know, the real value of grappling with rely on pushing enemies off cliffs, into walls of fire, etc etc, but let's ignore all these.

Here's what I've got:

1) Tripping attack & grappling strike:
I use the trip maneuver with my first attack to knock an enemy (large or smaller) prone. If successful, I follow with the grappling strike maneuver to attempt to grapple with my free hand as a bonus action. If the enemy was knocked prone but the bonus action grappling didn't succeed, I follow it up with a grapple from an attack granted by action surge or by the extra attack feature. This basically allows me to shove prone and grapple someone much like anyone would but with the option to spend superiority dice so that I dont miss on any attacks (not that the attacks with just a longword will do crazy damage, but eh, that's something).

2) Disarming attack (& grappling strike):
This is more of a direct benefit of the unarmed fighting style and the lack of specialization into a specific weapon, than a benefit of playing as a grappler. Because, while after disarming an enemy weapon user it's a logical move to grapple them and move them away from their weapon, but what's even better is picking up that weapon yourself and using it to fight your now unarmed opponent (definitelly imagining this character as a former gladiator now; I must make room for the maneuver that boosts performance now). I just have to use disarming strike with an unarmed attack.

3) Ready to switch to ranged:
Going with no shield means I can switch more easily into a bow. And since I am not overspecializing in melee with feats like PAM and GWM not do I need the STR bumps so desperately as such builds, this leaves a little room for a decent ranged attack (longbow, probably 14-16 DEX, fighter's extra attacks and potentialy trip attack, seem ok eough).

========================================

I am wonderng if menacing attack is worth it. Any ideas about other maneuvers that would be useful for such a build?

My main worry is that the build is neither that good in dealing and withstanding damage. It's versatile enough and it has some fun buttons, but I would not be against adding some more oomph to it. I really want to go for two rogue levels (dont care too much about not making the most of the d6 sneak attack) and add skulker as a feat just to be able to switch to a stealthy fighter when I think it's a good idea (I cannot justify MAM just for being able to switch approach mid combat, I prefer to keep the feat and decide beforehand). Also because cunning action dash would be nice on a grappler. But I am thinking that perhaps a single level of barbarian might be more useful because 2 rages per day would help making up for probably coming a bit short (compared to what I could have done with a more specialized fighter build) on the not killing faster and/or not dying harder front.

Also, I am looking at the feats tavern brawler and grappler and I am not too impressed. Am I missing anything?

If you have other build ideas about a character using the unarmed fighting style and using a longsword but no shield, those are welcome too.

I think it can be solid, and you already nailed most of it. Free action (trip) / bonus action (grapple) action economy advantage to lock down an enemy where everybody gets advantage on attacks is really nice. With a decent str score (maybe 14, even when going for a dex build), a feat for expertise (or mc in Rogue) athletics, and you won't need Tavern Brawler imo. With the races Loxodon or Simic Hybrid you even can grapple and keep 2 hand free, for 1d10 instead of 1d4 when attacking with your longsword (though this is oviously better for a max str./gwm fighter).

As for other BM maneuvers, I'd consider the maneuvers that can be used out of combat, that inprove skill checks (ambush, tactical assessment). More ooomph in combat is always nice, but tbh I think a build like this is very fun and good for what it does (locking down enemies, giving advantage on attack for allies, hampering enemies by disarming them) - if you really want you can pick maneuvers that give you a reaction attack, but then again, you don't have that many dice to fuel your maneuver so that might hamper your grappling effectivity.

[strangebloke]

Hmm. I thinkt of it as a way to spare myself a feat. But maybe you are right. Because now I am looking at the maneuvers without fixing on grappling, and there are a lot that I'd like to get my hands on. 15 of them to be exact. Difficult decisions are ahead. Not 100% sure what I'd want to spend my feats on yet, but once I start thinking about them it wont be hard to come up with 6-7 feats that I'd definitely want, lol.

Okay, but there are zero feats you need. Tavern Brawler is a half feat. So lets say that you do something like clineage + tavern brawler + HAM + skill expert (athletics). You'll have 20 STR by level 6 and pretty much everything you need to be tanky and grappling constantly. If you MC to rogue you can skip skill expert, or you can go goliath instead of clineage and skip HAM and end up with better CON but worse STR.

Tavern Brawler's effect is actually pretty much unique. The only comparable thing is grapple strike, but you can't use that every turn.

My attack damage wont be all that high, so the opportunity cost of spending one more attack on grappling is not too high. Maybe I could go with grappling strike for a few levels (3-5 or 3-10) and eventually swap it out when I have enough attacks (2 or 3 w/o action surge). Because at that point the bonus action grapple would not be too important for achieving both a shove (prone) and a grapple during the same turn, but it would be important for just not missing on (m)any weapon attacks, which is not a huge deal if my base attack is 1d8/d10 + str. Then again, it's a half feat, so I will keep it in mind for when I start taking a more extensive looks at possible feats.

Well again, I'm not saying you need TB, but consider what the opportunity cost really is. Lets say you attack+trip attack and get them prone. With TB you can then BA grapple and attack with advantage. 1d8+4 with advantage is actually pretty good damage, especially against high-AC targets! And at lower levels you can't grapple-prone at all without a source of a BA grapple. Sure, you can take grapple strike, but that lowers the times you can grapple prone at low levels to 2 times per short rest versus 4 times per short rest with TB.

TB is not a good feat, but that's because grappling is a niche strat, not something you really want to build for. If you are accepting that grappling is niche and you are building for it anyway, TB is one of the best feats in the game.

Yeah, stealth and the rogue levels was probably me trying to cling to my current character. Besides, I cannot think of a creative way to use stealth while grappling (I mean, how to present it). Thinking of it more, my main motivation is to go for something somewhat unexpected for the general idea that I have in mind (big strong fighter) and stealth was just the first thing that came to mind. But I am now thinking speed. Probably go for a goliath, but who has enough about them so that some NPC would be abe to say something along the lines "dont be fooled by his size, he is unexpectedly fast", or something like that. I guess a high number of attacks would help with speed during combat. Then I may look at the mobile feat or the expeditious retreat spell or something along these lines.

Mobility in general is good, but I wouldn't recommend Mobile the feat. There are cheaper ways of getting fast movement like a rogue MC or race choice (centaur FTW) or longstrider.

Stealth is fine in theory and you can get good at it via rogue MC and ambush, but there's no way to really synergize this with grappling. Ideally there's be some kind of trick that'd let you silence an enemy when grappling them and you could do stealth takedowns of an enemy garrison 1 by 1 Solid Snake Style. But alas, that's not supported really, outside of maybe the silence spell.

By required feat you mean tavern brawler or perhaps one that could get you expertise in athletics? Or something else perhaps?

Tavern Brawler. Though you're right its not "required" I just think its one of the most efficient grappler feats.

How far did you go with the druid levels? How was the build defensively, taking into account the group (eg number of melee's, DM style at distributing damage or no, etc).

Campaign died at BM 6 / Druid 3. Druid did a lot for the character. Absorb Elements made him tankier, Longstrider and Wildfire spirit made him faster, cantrips gave him ranged options (specifically magic stone is pretty good here.) I had lucky to offset some of my weaker saves. It was overall quite solid, though I don't think it'd wow anyone at higher levels, nor would it wow anyone at a more optimized table. The hexadin at the table waaaay outperformed me in both damage and durability.

But overall the character was fun? I was pretty strong? Getting the Eldritch Claw tattoo really helped a lot, as did getting non-metal plate. Those aren't things you can easily assume at most tables.

Also, what do you think of a barbarian 1 dip? With it I could maybe skip defensive duelist (plus, keeping my reaction open for parry would be nice, as this is one of the maneuvers I am eyeing, mostly due to the cool effect) and a feat for athletics expertise. Plus, rage would make me tankier even against more than one (the grappled) enemy or against enemies with multiattack. Also, it could help even when not grappling.

Barbarian is definitely great along with rogue and druid. Approved.

Elk and Eagle totem give you a LOT of speed if you want to go that route, and you don't actually need more than 3 levels of BM.

Yep. I wish enlarge was a 1st level spell now. Or that goliaths got something for that. Or maybe I need to start looking at a duergar (yak) or a 3rd level dip (yak!!!). Not a huge fan of the aternative grappling rules either. Thanks for reminding me though.

Get the giant barbarian from the UA lol.

Otherwise.... well lets be real here. You're not a wizard. You're not a sorcerer. You won't always need to grapple huge things. You should not take 3 levels of sorc or wis purely to grapple huge things once in a while. Just ask the party wizard/bard/sorcerer to take it for you, or buy them a scroll with it. Note that even if you can't grapple, you're still a fighter and you can still send enemies prone. A lot of times that's good enough.

Builds are not and should not be constructed purely in a vacuum.

[Corran]

Thanks a lot for your ideas and suggestions.

The one shot (technically two-shot(s)(?) cause I think we'll continue it next weekend as well) starts today. We'll play at level 4 and so far we have a halfling warlock and a halfling rogue (one more player undecided). It sets me up nicely to play a halfling path of the giant barbarian (with 1 level of fighter for the unarmed fighting style maybe). I'll probably refluff a custom lineage (small size) so I can squeeze in a feat and go for tavern brawler. Unless we start with a free feat that is (not likely). I think I'll go for the BJJ idea along with some shield smashing.

I am banking the rest of the ideas for some other time. Going from small to large and grappling enemies to the ground followed by some punches or shield smashes sounds too fun to pass up at this point.