D&D 5E Barbarian Fighting Styles

[Paul Farquhar]

My only concern with this is it opens the door to other swaps, like could a Fighter who just obtained 10th level substitute in Reckless Attack instead of taking a 2nd fighting style?

It's a power differential. Reckless Attack > Fighting Style, so you can substitute the weaker for the stronger but not visa versa. Having said that, I would allow a Champion Fighter to choose reckless attack as their second fighting style.

 

[NotAYakk]

I would allow a barbarian to select a fighting style instead of reckless attack.

I wouldn't. Modifying the rules to permit a player to take a trap option seems like a bad idea.

I mean, I might, but I'd also want to give the barbarian something else.

Having said that, I would allow a Champion Fighter to choose reckless attack as their second fighting style.

The Champion fighter has problems long before that in my experience.

In fact, by around that level, the Champion fighter is starting to close the gap with the alternatives. A Champion with reckless attack, 4 attacks, and 18-20 crit range is going to be a beast at level 20. It might be a little too good.

It definitely overshadows every other choice at that level.

I mean, at level 10, the Champion could probably get every single fighting style in the game and it wouldn't really break things. That would be weaker than Reckless Attack.

Fighting Style Mastery (Alternative subclass feature)
At 10th level, once on her turn the Champion can change her fighting style. In addition, the Champion can draw a weapon as part of an attack with it, and sheath a weapon before she makes an attack.

 

[Earth2Carnifex]

It's a power differential. Reckless Attack > Fighting Style, so you can substitute the weaker for the stronger but not visa versa. Having said that, I would allow a Champion Fighter to choose reckless attack as their second fighting style.

It is cool that you are willing to work with your players to make the game more interesting and fun for them.

IMHO, Fighting Style does rise to the level of a Feat and there is a Feat available to those who want to take it without a dip into Fighter. There might be some concern that a Fighting Style is not worth an ASI, in that case, I would be more inclined to add a +1 to Str or Dex to Fighting Initiate as a house rule, rather than give it to a non Fighter class.

 

[DEFCON 1]

If you are a barbarian player and you want a Fighting Style instead of Reckless Attack... it's because the story of your character wants a more stylized way of fighting rather than being wild and reckless. They are both low-level abilities and you're doing the swap because it makes sense for your character, so I'm not going to bother wasting either of our times white-room simming your DPR down to the point.

 

[The Grassy Gnoll]

For me, a fighting style is something consciously patterned down into an unconscious habitual skill; barbarians’ Rage/Reckless/Frenzy seems more like an unconscious instinct tapped into and given full, no memory afterward, rein. So in that sense, it is the barbarian fighting style.

 

[Stormonu]

Thanks for all the input so far folks.

I'm leaning towards replacing the Reckless Attack feature with a Fighting Style, and including Reckless Attack as a fighting style itself. For my homebrew rules, this gives the barbarian access to these fighting styles:

Archer
Brawler*
Defense
Grappler*
Great Weapon Fighter
Mounted*
Reckless Attack
Thrown Weapon Fighting
Two-weapon Fighting
Weapon and Shield

* custom fighting style from homebrew, also available to Fighters