Half orc beastmaster question

[riverothethief]

My dm is nice enough to allow me to take the two handed fighting style. I wanted to go with a melee build. Originally I intended to go with a great sword but after looking at the half orc racial and spells like hunters mark I began rethinking it. What would be best? Should I go with a pole arm and pole arm mastery/sentinel. (Id be able to use bonus action to hit with the butt of the pole arm for extra damage and trigger hunters mark) or should I go dual wielding something like battle axes.

If it matters I likely won't be tanking a ton. We have a barbarian for that.

[riverothethief]

I should probably mention also that my dm for some reason treats hunters mark as a cantrip.

[Balthasaurus]

As a beast master, you're going to have a lot of things competing for the use of your bonus action: duel wielding, polearm master or attacking with your beast companion. In my opinion, you're probably best off with a two handed weapon, but not the feat. Unless you are playing as a Revised Ranger, if you are attacking with the butt of your polearm every turn, your companion won't be doing anything. The same applies if you use your bonus action for duel wielding.

[riverothethief]

Thanks for the reply. I am playing with the revised hunter. So my animal companion will have its own turn. That frees up my bonus action once I cast a concentration spell. To get the most out of the half orc racial I assumed attacking more would be better (2x chance of critting). If I used a pole arm I'd get 1d10 and 1d4 on using the end of the weapon. With feats possibly more attacks of opportunity. Dual wielding would give 2x 1d8. But dual wielding feats aren't as good. Or just accept that I'll be wasting my bonus action sometimes and go with great sword and get the feat that adds +10 to damage at the cost of attack roll?

[Armored Walrus]

I think the main difference for you between using a polearm vs using a greatsword vs using two swords is that with a polearm you can combine PAM and GWM (and possibly Sentinel), but you can't do that with the other weapons. If you plan to burn two feats on your build, go polearm IMO. If not, TWF and PAM are equal - again, IMO.

Edit: to clarify, you don't get that bonus action attack using a polearm unless you take the Polearm Mastery feat, unless I'm mistaken. On the other hand, you can wield a sword in each hand with no feat whatsoever, and get a bonus action every turn.

[Throne12]

Yes a polearm is a good choice.

[riverothethief]

Thanks for the help. Polearm it is.

[Wryte]

General rule, as well; greatswords aren't... well... great for half orcs. Their racial ability lets you roll one of your weapon's damage dice an extra time on crit. This is why half-orcs prefer greataxes to greatswords: they get an extra 1d12 on crits with the axe, vs an extra 1d6 with the sword.