Fighter Grappling Options ~or~ Remember the Basics of CQC

Hi, apologies for this not being a Fully Researched Thread, but I was looking into Snagging Strike and related grappling feats on fighter, and noticed that few or any of them seem to actually require Athletics checks to apply their conditions.

Would therefore a more dex-focused melee build work just as well with those sorts of feats, while avoiding the need for the heavier armors in order to keep oneself mobile? I could see it maybe mixed in with some of the dueling hand-free feats as well. Is having a strength-based Athletics score valuable for other combat reasons, such as actually having a chance at critically succeeding on a grapple check?

Dex based is fine and if you use an finesse weapon with stuff like trip or disarm you can use dex instead of str for these maneuvers.

Combat Grab just need you to hit the opponent to work as well.

Thanks! I'm still a tiny bit wary of dex-to-Athletics via a finesse weapon, just because I play in Society games and might encounter a strict ruling at a given table in the absence of a FAQ or errata. I'd still have options even if that wasn't allowed, however.

I'm halfway wondering about a thief rogue, multiclassing fighter just for snagging strike/combat grab to enable sneak attacks solo. Hmmmmm...

For PFS, bring a copy of the thread.
Or of the rules. The line of reasoning is very clear because of the way PF2 uses specific terms.
Use Dex on attack rolls w/ weapon? Yes w/ Finesse.
(And that's the wording, not Strike or something similar.)
Use weapon for Trip maneuver? Yes w/ Trip.
Is Trip maneuver an attack roll? Yes, explicitly.
So you can use Dex w/ that Trip/Finesse weapon to make the attack roll to Trip.
Same is true for other maneuver/Finesse weapons, like Disarm.
Given the difficulty of Disarm, you practically need to use a weapon to get the weapon's bonus.

A Dex-Fighter's main issue is they do less damage for little gain (since the Dex caps to armor are low and special materials likely won't ever get around that.)
I'd go Rogue/MCD Fighter like you were wondering, or just be a strong Fighter w/ high Dex.

That said, Assurance (Athletics) needs no Strength and is surprisingly good. Maybe even broken except many monsters have auto-success-maneuver abilities too!

You can start w/ your main attacks and on your third action (when you likely have a bad MAP) you can do a maneuver w/ Athletics and Assurance wipes out MAP (as well as whatever stat it usually uses). Your "roll" will be under average, but I've scanned through the Bestiary and it works often.
At level, once you get Expert, you can auto-trip clunky creatures like Giants, Zombies, etc. (though often just barely).
For minions, you can try it once. If it works, it'll work on all of their clones. If not, try an Intimidate or something. (Assurance on that works pretty well too, and means you don't need Cha.)
Grabbing is difficult w/ Assurance, and Assurance w/ Deception for Feint seldom works at all.

Hope that helps.
Cheers.

Thanks, this is a great summary. I could see going Rogue/Thief and then picking up a number of assurance feats to prop up average or low strength and charisma scores, as you mention. I believe I can get athletics to expert at second level, with intimidate sometime later for demoralize.

Alternatively, I could go ruffian with a good strength score, medium armor with a little dex to round it out, and gain some extra demoralize uses from those feats. I'd like to be able to roll intimidate occasionally, but maybe it's best just to try assurance and save the stat points for strength, dex, or con. Anyway, plenty to think about!