Tavern Brawler

Tavern Brawler is a passive feature granted by the feat of the same name. It increases the accuracy and damage of Unarmed Strikes, Throw attacks, and Improvised Melee Weapon attacks.

Description

When you make an unarmed attack, use an improvised weapon, or throw something, your Strength Modifier is added to the damage and  Attack rolls an additional time.

How to learn

Granted by the feats: Tavern Brawler (Feat)

Notes

• This feat always adds the  Strength modifier. For example, if an  Unarmed Strike is made with  Dexterity, both Dexterity and Strength modifiers will be added a single time.
• Druids in  Wild Shape receive the bonus to damage, but not to attack rolls. No bonus is applied when wild shaped as a Fire, Water, or Air Myrmidon.
• Characters (and  Wild Shape forms) with negative Strength modifiers have their attack and damage rolls reduced an additional time by this feat.
  • This does not apply to damage from  Throw and  Improvised Melee Weapon attacks, however, because Tavern Brawler adds a separate damage source which cannot deal less than 0 damage.
• When a creature is  Thrown, it takes extra damage from Tavern Brawler when it lands.
• This feat, especially in conjunction with high Strength, is considered to be one of the strongest in the game, as it significantly increases both the likelihood of a hit and the damage dealt. It also benefits from a number of synergies:
  •  Halfling Luck, which significantly reduces the odds of a critical miss when an attack's modifiers alone equal the target's AC, as Tavern Brawler enables. Normally, there is a 1 in 20 chance of a miss on such an attack, but for Halflings it is only a 1 in 400 chance (or 1 in 8000 with advantage).
  •  Devilfoil Masks, all four of which are available relatively early in the game. If all four party members are wearing the masks, they each gain +3 Strength. The masks can allow Strength-based characters to avoid using  Elixirs of Hill Giant Strength and  Elixirs of Cloud Giant Strength and instead use other elixirs, such as the  Elixir of Bloodlust.
  • When making a  Throw attack or  Improvised Melee Weapon attack, the additional damage of Tavern Brawler is treated as a DRS.

Bugs

• As of Patch 8, bonus damage from this feat bypasses  Sturdy and similar conditions when attacking with  Throw.
• As of Patch 8, this feat applies to the damage of several spells and effects while the caster is in  Wild Shape, including spells like  Spike Growth and items like  Noxious Spore Grenades. Wild Shapes with low  Strength have a penalty applied to the damage rolls of these spells and effects.
  • Additional elemental damage from attacks while in  Wild Shape, such as ⁠Acid damage from  Corrosive Spit or ⁠Thunder damage from  Grounded Thunder Strike, will receive an additional damage bonus, even in Honour Mode.
• The additional damage of Tavern Brawler applied to  Throw attacks,  Improvised Melee Weapon attacks, and certain attacks in  Wild Shape^[verify] has no damage type and therefore can never be resisted, even by an  Elixir of Universal Resistance or  Warding Bond (In this case, both the caster and target take full damage). Flat damage reduction effects still apply.
• In Honour Mode,  Improvised Melee Weapon attacks do not receive extra damage from Tavern Brawler. They receive a bonus to attack rolls as expected.
  • Although using  Throw on anything but  Thrown weapons behaves similarly to  Improvised Melee Weapon,  Throw attacks always benefit from both the attack roll and damage benefits of Tavern Brawler. However, when throwing a creature in Honour Mode, the creature will not receive extra damage from Tavern Brawler when landing.