Based on Lorekeepers builds, I built this brawler (undead skeletal champion template) for a fight against my group.
The are in the Dark Keep of Book 3 of the Shattered Star AP, and I replaced the
The Pale Stranger
Female human brawler 10, skeletal champion template (UNDEAD)
NE medium humanoid
Init +4; Senses Perception +13
-=DEFENSE=-
AC 28, touch 22, flat 21 (armor +6, deflection +2, dex +4, dodge +3, insight +1, natural +2)
HP 126 (10d10+10, 2d8)
Fort 13; Ref 14; Will 9
-=OFFENSE=-
Speed 30ft
Melee unarmed attack +21/+16 (1d10+10 20/x2) Type: Bludgeon; Size: Medium;
Melee brawler's flurry +19/+19/+14/+14 (1d10+10 20/x2) Type: Bludgeon; Size: Medium;
+20 to grapple, +18 to disarm, +16 on other maneuvers
-=OTHER=-
Str 24, Dex 18, Con --, Int 13, Wis 10, Cha 10
BAB +10; CMB +17; CMD 32
Feats weapon focus (unarmed), toughness, combat expertise, power attack, combat reflexes, dodge, intimidating prowess, iron will, hammer the gap
Traits reactionary, threatening defender
Favored class brawler
Favored bonus 10 hit points
Languages common, varisian, shoanti
Brawler abilities martial maneuvers 5/day; brawler's flurry (two-weapon fighting, improved two-weapon fighting); maneuver training (+2 disarm / +1 grapple); AC bonus +2; brawler strike (magic, cold iron, silver)
Trained acrobatics 16(10); climb 14(5); escape artist 16(10); intimidate 19(10); perception 13(10); sense motive 13(10); swim 14(5)
Untrained bluff 0; diplomacy 0
Martial Maneuvers
By far the funnest part of the brawler, the Martial Maneuver ability. The core feat selection on Berklyn (and to some extent the skill ranks) ensure a broad range of feats that can be acquired on the fly with martial maneuvers
complete style trees for Boar Style, Crane Style, Dragon Style, Snake Style, Snapping Turtle Style, and Tiger Style for many varied situations
Improved Trip, Greater Trip, Vicious Stomp when in need of putting some meaning behind your intimidate
Improved Sunder/Disarm/Steal/DirtyTrick/Drag/BullRush/etc, Greater [...], [...] because these come in handy
Cleave, Great Cleave, Cleaving Finish when hordes of goblins invade
Improved Grapple, Greater Grapple, Rapid Grappler when facing certain types of casters
Step Up, Following Step, Step-up and Strike when facing certain other types of casters
Catch Off Guard, Throw Anything, Improvised Weapon Mastery when in the fun type of barroom brawl
Blind-Fight, Improved Blind-Fight, [...] when an imp pulls a darkness prank
Varying AC
AC is perhaps the hardest part to safeguard on a brawler. An unarmored brawler is almost untennable without some tricks. A brawler with light armor is still very vulnerable due to the lack of shields. A brawler of any type needs to think hard whether she uses an amulet of mighty fists or amulet of natural armor.
Using Combat Expertise (-2 attack, +3 dodge)
Using Crane Style: AC 32, touch 26, flat 21
Using Snapping Turtle Style: AC 29, touch 23, flat 234
Combining Combat Expertise and Crane Style (-3 attack, +8 dodge) will grant 35 AC; which is quite a lot for level 10; albeit at a big hit to damage output
Equipment:
* +2 brawling mithril chainshirt (10100)
* +3 cloak of resistance (9000)
* +2 belt of physical perfection (16000)
* +2 ring of protection (8000)
* dusty rose prism ioun stone (5000)
* various consumables
Onto the play test.
The creature was in a room by herself. They tried diplomacy, but it didn't work, so the fight was on. Party consists of dwarf fighter 9, human fighter 9, catfolk oracle (life) 9, human sorcerer (aberration) 9 and dwarf bard (archeologist) 9.
The two fighters kept trying to hit her, but the dwarf fighter kept missing (lousy rolls all night long). The human fighter keep chipping away, since she did not have a bludgeoning weapon. The only one doing real damage was the sorcerer and that was mostly with magic missile. He kept missing touch ac with scorching ray. The oracle keep healing the human fighter as she was taking a pounding. The bard was actually useless mostly in the fight other than the occasional cure serious wounds.
Out of the four attacks per round the brawler hit at least twice, usually three times each round (I was rolling quite well), and doing good amounts of damage. I used the martial maneuvers at least three times, crane style feats, and managed to deflect an incoming critical and counter attack. Player was NOT happy. heh.
Overall, the class feels about right, and fills a good, non-monk, non-flurry niche. This class has so many options, especially in the maneuvers chains, that it can do lots of things. Careful builds are a must.
-- david
I noticed there is no Brawler discussion thread. Is that something that is new? A friend just pointed me to the playtest. We're going to do a module, levels 6-8, with only hybrid characters and post our thoughts on these forums. I'm going to try and remake some of the NPCs in to these hybrid classes to give everyone a good feel for the characters.
Brawler discussion thread is here. It's located in the Class Discussion threads; it just might not be visible from the first page, since there are other incidental threads that have also been started and bumped it down.
@DM Papa:
I think the numbers are generally right, however, I know that "The Hammer" (which you used for the playtest) should have 1 less to attack; that was a slip-up late in the build when I changed from amulet of mighty fists to natural armor.
@LoreKeeper
hmmm.. He should have 4 attacks. Two Primary (main & off-hand) and two iterative (main & off-hand) because of two-weapon fighting & improved two-weapon fighting.
Right?
-- david
@DM Papa:
Yep, 4 attacks (when doing a brawler's flurry).
But as I said, all attacks should be at -1 to hit (and damage), thus:
Melee brawler's flurry +17/+17/+12/+12 (1d10+8 20/x2)
You can use Martial Maneuvers to acquire Weapon Specialization and Greater Weapon Focus to make the flurry
Melee brawler's flurry +18/+18/+13/+13 (1d10+10 20/x2)
One of the things I've been curious about is how necessary these 'advanced classes' are and whether or not the same things can be accomplished (possibly better) with existing classes.
In our Rise of the Runelords campaign we had someone play a Goblin Brawler (the Fighter archetype) with a two level dip in Monk for Master of Many Styles - think Tasmanian Devil meats Yoda from Ep. II.
This is how he looked at 11th level (the build does make a pretty big jump in power level at 12th level though):
Goblin 9th level Fighter (Brawler) / 2nd level Monk (Master of Many Styles):
Str-10, Dex-26, Con-14, Int-14, Wis-12, Cha-5
HP 95 (9d10+2d8+31), Fort +15, Reflex +17 (w/Evasion), Will +10
Armor Class: 33 w/Crane Wing, Menacing Stance -1/-4
10 +6 [Dex] +1 [Small] +7 [Chain Shirt] +5 [Shield] +4 [Defensive]
Attack: +24/+24/+19/+19, Snake Fang w/Combat Reflexes, Crane Riposte
+10/+5 [BAB] +8 [Dex] +1 [Small] -2 [TWF] +1 [Trait] +2 [Brawling] +2 [Close] -1 [Defensive] +2 [Greater Focus] +1 [Amulet]
Damage: 1d6+15 bludgeoning or piercing
1d6 +2 [Brawling] +8 [Dex] +4 [Close] +1 [Amulet]
Feats:
Weapon Finesse, Two-Weapon Fighting, Improved Unarmed Strike, Stunning Fist, Snake Style, Snake Fang, Combat Reflexes, Dodge, Crane Style, Crane Wing, Improved Two-Weapon Fighting, Weapon Focus: Unarmed Strike, Crane Riposte, Greater Weapon Focus: Unarmed Strike, Stand Still (w/No Escape)
Skills:
Acrobatics +22, Climb +4, Swim +4, Survival +6, Disable Device +23, Perception +19, Stealth +23
Equipment:
Brawling Mithril Chain Shirt +3 (17,000), Bolstering Mithril Heavy Steel Shield +3 (17,000), Agile Amulet of Mighty Fists +1 (16,000), Cloak of Resistance +4 (16,000), Belt of Incredible Dexterity +4 (16,000)
So that's a higher AC, better saves and a higher attack bonus for more damage. Four attacks per round (six at 12th level) plus the first melee attack against him automatically fails and provokes a counter-attack while every other missed melee attack thereafter also provokes a counter-attack. Menacing Stance, Standstill and No Escape make life miserable for opposing casters and the character has some extremely useful secondary skills when out of combat. Now I'm obviously not as well versed in the Brawler advanced class as the OP, but it looks like a pretty significant advantage using the old-school method if you know what you're doing.
@Wiggs:
That is an apple-orange comparison. A brawler min-maxed to achieve the roughly the same results as the demonstrated goblin is readily possible. Where a fighter-based character usually gets an advantage is weapon training (and the associated duelist gloves). A brawler, in comparison, "only" gets the damage bonus from increasing damage die for his unarmed strike.
AC and the like are wide open, see for example Mikiko Konda who has AC 34; without Crane Style. Rebuilding her to make use of Crane Style grants her nigh untouchable AC 39, at level 10. That character isn't optimized all-round for the most potential output possible.
I've currently posted 4 builds for the brawler. Each build is optimized to be playable and viable (but not min-maxed to the limit), and each build is intended to demonstrate a different possibility with the brawler.
...
However, looking at the question you are actually raising: "One of the things I've been curious about is how necessary these 'advanced classes' are".
Different of the hybrid classes have different levels of justification at this stage. The Swashbuckler looks like it will quickly become a staple in PFS for example, featuring fun and powerful mechanics. The Brawler, on the other hand, could very well have been either a fighter or a monk archetype and nobody would notice. The only innovation on the brawler is "Martial Maneuvers", which has brilliant potential but (I think) requires some improvement still.
The bottomline is that the "advanced" classes are not intended to have higher numbers than the existing classes; they are simply different. Paizo hopes that they can find a sweet spot where the hybrids allow for new character concepts that aren't as easy to realize in existing classes.
Thanks for your playtest feedback, DM Papa! :)
@DM Papa:
Something I just realized... keep in mind that the CR of your pale stranger increases by +1 on that brawler build, due to using PC-level wealth, instead of NPC-level wealth.
@ Lore Keeper - Yup. I figure she is a CR11 creature, and with a party of 5 level 9 characters while not a walkover, still a challenge
@Sean - Your welcome. It was fun. My guys/gal and I talked about it afterwards, and they liked the class concept, especially the martial maneuver feat ability.