Ran into a issue with the HTTPClient, even with the suggestions still could not get it to authenticate. Turns out I needed a trailing '/' in my relative path.
i.e.
var result = await _client.GetStringAsync(_awxUrl + "api/v2/inventories/?name=" + inventoryName);
var result = await _client.PostAsJsonAsync(_awxUrl + "api/v2/job_templates/" + templateId+"/launch/" , new {
inventory = inventoryId
});