The Tavern Brawler feat in Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition enhances a character's ability to fight effectively in unconventional, often chaotic, combat scenarios, particularly those relying on fisticuffs and makeshift weaponry.
Core Mechanics
The feat provides the following benefits:
- Ability Score Increase: You can increase your Strength or Constitution score by 1, to a maximum of 20. This allows for immediate character improvement in relevant statistics.
- Improvised Weapon Proficiency: You gain proficiency with improvised weapons. This means you can add your proficiency bonus to attack rolls made with objects not typically designed as weapons, such as a broken bottle, a chair leg, or even a frying pan. The DM typically determines the damage die for such weapons (often 1d4).
- Unarmed Strike Enhancement: Your unarmed strikes use a d4 for damage. This is an improvement over the standard 1 + Strength modifier damage for characters without other features buffing unarmed strikes (like a Monk's Martial Arts).
- Bonus Action Grapple: When you hit a creature with an unarmed strike or an improvised weapon on your turn, you can use a bonus action to attempt to grapple the target. This significantly improves action economy for characters wishing to control enemies through grappling.
Strategic Applications
Grappler Builds: Tavern Brawler is a cornerstone for many Strength-based grappler builds. The ability to attack and then attempt a grapple as a bonus action is highly efficient. Combined with feats like Grappler or a class with grappling advantages (e.g., Barbarian with Rage providing advantage on Strength checks), this can make a character exceptionally skilled at controlling single, powerful targets.
Resourceful Combatants: It allows characters to remain effective even when disarmed or in environments with limited access to traditional weapons. Any nearby object can become a viable tool for combat.
Flavor and Roleplaying: The feat is excellent for characters with a rough-and-tumble background, bar bouncers, or anyone who frequently finds themselves in spontaneous altercations. It mechanically supports a specific character archetype.
Considerations
While versatile, Tavern Brawler's damage output from improvised weapons and d4 unarmed strikes may not scale as well as dedicated weapon users or Monk unarmed strikes at higher levels without further investment or specific class features. Its primary strength lies in the bonus action grapple and the utility of improvised weapon proficiency rather than raw damage increase in all situations.
It synergizes best with Strength-based characters. While Constitution can be chosen for the ability score increase, the grappling and improvised weapon attacks will still rely on Strength for attack and damage rolls (unless the improvised weapon has the Finesse property, which is rare and DM-dependent).
