Brawler

Brawler is a specialized tank class with heavy armor and powerfists weapon. Brawlers can block damage and quickly retaliate with devastating blows. As they use powerfists, they can build up rage which is used for unleashing powerful attacks.

Brawler was released in December 2015. Originally class was available only for human females. Male brawler was added in April 2018, Elin brawler in November 2018. Popori brawler was added in May 2019.

Official description
The brawler is an offensive dynamo with exceptional tanking capabilities, heavy armor, and massive powerfists that both dish out and block damage. She sends enemies sprawling and flying before her, helpless in the face of her fighting prowess.

General
Brawler is one of the "new" classes, released after Reaper and Gunner. Brawler release totally changed tanking in TERA. Before brawler tanks were very low damage. It was not uncommon for lancers to use only aggro crystals, since they were only meant to keep boss attention, not to do damage. After brawler tanking became much more active. Also other tank classes (except berserker which only got tanking half year earlier) were updated to new high damage spec. As released brawler was totally OP, doing usually more damage than DPS classes.

After several balance rounds and Apex skills damage difference between brawler and lancer is not so high anymore. In late 2020 devs decided to buff DPS classes compared to tanks (Kaia's Soul Gear alone had +5% damage to dps that tanks didn't get). This was hard time to brawler that mainly relies on doing damage to hold aggro. In late 2020 brawler got aggro buffs 3–4 patches in row. Also brawler got party-wide buffs to allow others do more damage, which it earlier didn't have, as a part of Apex (Rhythmic Blows gives boss a debuff) and Skill Advancementment systems.

Equipment
Brawler uses heavy metal armor and Powerfists as weapon of choice. Powerfists are worn over metal gauntlets.

Skills
Brawler is tank class and must keep boss' attention on dungeons and attack from front while also blocking attacks.

Main brawler damage dealing skills are, which also gives boss debuff to allow others to deal more damage, and  which is your main damage skill.

Brawler has special skill, after which next attack skill (of the three mentioned) will block damage. This allows brawler block boss attack and DPS same time.

Furthermore after raising their Rage to 100% (which can be done with skill ) brawler can activate. During the time brawler can keep their Rage up and this skill active every attack skill blocks. Spending some glyph points to let skills generate more Rage might be needed.

Brawler always blocks damage with. This can be used if Rage falls and brawler loses auto-block. It's also good damage skill with triple crit chance and high base damage. After aggro buffs this skill also draws high aggro. It should be avoided while in DPS mode.

Starting fight in dungeon goes like this:
 * 1) activate
 * 2) go to boss,  can be used to fast reach boss.
 * 3) cast, ,  after which your rage should be 100%
 * 4) activate
 * 5) cast Infuriate to enrage boss

Brawler is somewhat weak against non-blockable special attacks some dungeons have. is your only iframe to avoid those kind of attacks. It can be cast twice before cooldown happens. Glyphing this skill to lower cooldown is necessary in harder dungeons.

Brawler is very strong against huge groups of enemies. Mobs can be gathered together with Bull Rush, using Ground Pounder staggers the enemies who can't dodge. Third hit of Ground Pounder throws enemies into air, during which they can be caught to. Attacking multiple enemies quickly loads brawler's rage, which can be used to cast which also staggers enemies. Similar tactics are used in PvP.

Apex changes
Additional active skills that brawler gets when awakened are One-Inch Punch, Flying Kick and Rhythmic Blows. Brawler Apex changes are quite small and easy to learn and master.

One-Inch Punch works as high-damage filler skill, and must be chained after any other attacks.

Rhythmic Blows is high-damage ultimate that also works as boost skill brawler lacks. Skill has total 5 hits and action button should be pushed 5 times to finish the skill. This skill has high damage, it's basically auto-critting and has very long cooldown of 5 minutes. It should be always saved to boss enrages. Skill also gives target Internal Wounds debuff, which helps others to deal more damage. In addition Rhythmic Blows reduces cooldowns of all other skills by 5 seconds (when hit full 5 times).

Flying Kick is fast filler skill, that can be chained after any other attacks. It moves brawler forward and is therefore sometimes used to jump fast forward to gain distance or escape. Hit with this skill reduces Rhythmic Blows cooldown by 10 seconds.

Brawler also gets Self-Control passive, which increases damage 5 % while rage stays over 75%.

Racial traits
Only humans, Elins and Popori can become Brawlers, so there is no customization in regards to racial traits. Human Brawlers have and  which aid them in PvP fighting other players,  speeds up HP recovery after resurrection.

All brawlers get to teleport to.

Gearing and Attributes
Recommended weapon rolls are Damage vs. enraged monster; Damage vs. enraged monsters; Flat 6% damage, More damage vs. monster with highest aggro on you and Cooldown reduction. With low gear that has only 4 enigmatic lines keep Cooldown reduction as first roll. High-end brawlers also run double Cooldown reduction.

Recommended chest line is increased damage of Piledriver. This was changed when Piledriver got 2&times; crit chance glyph with Apex. Before Apex quest line is completed recommended line is increased damage of Jackhammer (Twistshard and lower gear).

With new Exodor gear brawler uses gear with physical amplification: Dauntless Azart or Annihilation gear. (Crystals, rollable weapon lines and chest line are not available on level 68/69 Exodor gear gear or on new level 65 Exodor Scout gear.)

Optimal crit factor for brawler is between 160–270. These values are within 1% of theoretical optimum for all gear between Guardian and Heroic Oath. (note this was before Exodor patch changes. Check discord for current info.)

On level 69 brawler also gets option to play as back-attacking damage dealer class.

With patch 93 new passives some brawler skills scale with physical amplification value. This is a stat that increases your attack anyway, so this doesn't make your gearing different.

Crystals
Brawler uses tanking Weapon Crystals: Wrathful, Focused, Pounding, Pounding. If crit rate is low, Pounding can be switched to Carving. If tanking for better equipped players, Threatening crystal is recommended.

Wrathful crystals are not available anywhere while leveling. You can still get low-level Wrathful with Crystal Fusion. Fuse extra crystals you got while leveling and keep Wrathful if you happen to get one. It's close to OP while leveling. May be that's why it was never added to crystal shops.

Glyphs
Specializing in glyphs like all classes means a great deal to customization. Notable glyphs are:

These are your main damage skills.
 * Empowered Haymaker: Increases skill damage by 25%
 * Carving Haymaker: Triples the chance to crit.
 * Persistent Haymaker: 20% chance to eliminate cooldown
 * Empowered Ground Pounder: Increases skill damage by 30%
 * Carving Ground Pounder: Triples the chance to crit.
 * Carving Jackhammer: Doubles the chance to crit.
 * Empowered Jackhammer: Increases skill damage by 25%

Roundhouse Kick is used for blocking and for damage buff.
 * Grounding Roundhouse Kick: Adds frontal defense effect to Jackhammer/Piledriver/Haymaker if the skill is used within 5 seconds
 * Powerlinked Roundhouse Kick: Increases all skill damage by 15% for 3 seconds after a successful hit.
 * Energetic Roundhouse Kick: Decreases cooldown by 25%

Piledriver becames good damage skill after apex glyph is unlocked. Before that it's mainly used to reset Roundhouse kick.
 * Opportunistic Piledriver: 60% chance to eliminate cooldown of Roundhouse Kick upon successfully hitting a monster
 * Empowered Piledriver: Increases skill damage by 25%
 * Carving Piledriver: Doubles the chance to crit. (Apex superior glyph)

More Rage is needed and some of these glyphs should be used to keep it 100% during Growing Fury.
 * Ardent Piledriver: Generates additional 2% Rage per successful hit.
 * Ardent Jackhammer: Generates additional 1% Rage per successful hit.
 * Ardent Ground Pounder: Generates additional 3% Rage per successful hit.

Growing Fury should always be on during dungeon fight.
 * Pumped Growing Fury: Increases power by 25 during the duration of effect.

This is definitely needed in hard mode dungeons.
 * Energetic Quick Dash: Decreases cooldown by 20%

This is main skill in PvP.
 * Energetic Meat Grinder: Decreases cooldown by 20%
 * Empowered Meat Grinder: Increases skill damage by 25%

Mainly used in PvP.
 * Empowered Rampage: Increases skill damage by 20%
 * Restorative Rampage: Recovers 1.5% of total HP per successful hit.

This is stun attack mainly used in PvP.
 * Lingering Flip Kick: Increases effect duration by 50%

Mainly needed in PvP, although skill is good in PVE too.
 * Energetic Bull Rush: Decreases cooldown by 20%

Enhancement Points
Strengthen Offense:
 * Mighty Attack, always max this first

Other options in this section are marginally useful. Might try Piledriver: Fatal Blow, Counterpunch: Pummel, Flip Kick: Chained Fatal Blow

EP Damage is generally not useful.

Speed Increase:

not really good options here

Resource Recovery:
 * Punch: Propulsion, very useful. If you run out of skills to use, just hit auto-attack
 * Haymaker: Reload, very useful
 * Roundhouse Kick: Reload, very useful
 * Retaliate: Turning Tables, somewhat useful
 * Meat Grinder: Reload, somewhat useful. Has good chance to reset skill when used on group of mobs.
 * Mounting Rage: Outrage, somewhat useful

Actually many options in this section are useful. Your pick.

Defense/Special:
 * Mighty Defense, max this
 * Mighty Phoenix, use 1 point
 * Provoke: Amplification, use least 1 point here
 * Regular: Lethal Lesson, maybe for PVP

Skill Advancementment
Haymaker: Resonance is option you generally use while tanking. It gives party +2% more damage on boss. Be sure to hit Haymaker least every 10 seconds to keep this buff up.

Haymaker: Weak Spot Thrust is part of DPS mode. It should be used with Growing Fury: Irregular.

Normally use Growing Fury: Sensation of Power.

Card Collection
Generally first max physical crit power, then max physical amplification.

Brawler uses similar card set up as DPS classes with no special needs.

See August 2021 card builds.

Example Keybindings
moved to Brawler/Example Keybindings