Haplok

Rogue Withering / Perishing Strike.

Arguably the other monk flavors are now less attractive then the Shattered Pillar. 50% Fire damage lash was HUGE. It's much easier to pass on 10-20%.

I upped the Con to reduce the squishiness issue. With 18 Con (+5 Frenzy), Thick Skin and Frenzy AR bonus, my Ravager is decently durable. Granted I use Helwalker, so I needed more ability to soak damage. I also use the Woodskin Belt. +5 AR vs Pierce makes it difficult for ranged attackers to harm you. Also the amulet which activates at 25% Health and makes you almost unkillable for a while is handy.

You could also use Lord Darryn's Voulge, which applies Distracted in a wide radius on crit (after charging it with at least 1 hit). With Berserker Confusion, it provides Flanked, Distracted to the Berserker as well.

Should still be decent. That said, I definitely prefer the Berserker now.

There are other good options to clear Berserker Confusion: Devil of Caroc armor upgrade to Resist Intellect afflictions (its a VERY good armor, even after the nerf bat). Paladin PL 3 (I think) ability Aegis of Loyalty or some such, which clears confused/charmed/dominated status with a whack of his weapon (accessible early and you spend no resources / generate no additional recovery time). Plus the already known Modwyr, Enlightened Agony (but it activates a Recovery period, so you pay talent points, Wounds and recovery time) or maybe Paladin's Mental Fortress, if you'd be interested in that Multiclass. So yeah, Berserker is really good.

You can't simply compare +15% additive base damage and +15% recovery reduction. That's apples and oranges really.

It looks like you're comparing single 1H vs 2H. The speed makes sense then (but you do get +12 Accuracy 1H and can also get additional Hit-to-Crit conversion). You seem to ignore reduced Recovery on Duals. Base 30% reduction and another 15% for Dual combat style. So you swing them a lot faster then 2H.

Well, I'm finding that with all the speed bonuses stacked, I'm attacking rather fast even without Blood Thirst/Crushing Blow. Of course, I did start with 15 Dex (20 with Lightning Flurry). And yeah, I do plan to try Wahai Poraga out, when I find it. Sanguine Greatsword looks pretty nice for 1vs1.. then again, when fighting strong enemies, Lord Darryn's Voulge serves me well so far.

evilcat, I'm not sure that barbarians are truly designed to be tanks, assuming you define "tank" as a character who can hold a lot of enemies on the front line with a good number of engagements while taking or resisting lots of damage. Barbarians are much more offensively oriented than fighters or paladins. Barbarians tend to have poor Deflection (at least if they use Frenzy), but particularly Berserkers can soak a lot of damage. They get +3 Armor Rating (+2 Frenzy, +1 Thick Skinned) and that helps a lot.

Well, the static charge damage rolls are not visible, but it definately does damage. Also to my own party (Berserker here). Perhaps more importantly it dispenses Distracted/Flanked in a pretty wide area (so is great to set up sneak attacks).

I'm playing a similar character. Also a Heart Orlan Berserker/Helwalker. Little less base Might, more Con and Dex. With Helwalker increased damage taken, Frenzy Deflection penalty and low resolve, he certainly requires party support, especially early on. But after a few levels and few items he actually can become rather tough with all that health. It definitely pays to stack Armor on him. Frenzy gives +2 AR, I've also picked Thick Skinned for another +1. Being focused by ranged fire is sometimes a problem, so I'm using the belt that casts woodskin after being crit: another +5 Pierce AR means my Barb shrugs off most piercing damage. Regarding critique: I think I'm missing Brute Force in your build. Would fit thematically And should be rather good. I don't think I would choose Crushing Blow. I'd prefer to spam the Blow against weakened targets with Barbaric Smash. Especially when you're dual wielding and additionally stacking multiple speed bonuses (Frenzy, Bloodlust, Swift Strikes), your recovery should be short anyways. And you're eventually getting Blood Thirst too... Myself, I went two-handed for aoe capability. After PoE1 that's what Barbarians should specialize in for me. Cool thing is that multi-hit weapons, like Whispers of the Endless Paths, apply special attacks (Barbaric Blow, Torment's Reach, Force of Anguish) to each attack target (twice to primary target, at least in case of Whispers). Also going for Lightning Fists to have the 30% lash, more reliable vs high defense targets. and avoid endless attack cheese vs easier mobs (as well as possible nerf hammer). Also for Spirit frenzy for maximum CC, but here both choices should be good.

That's not correct. Soulbound weapons did use any Proficiency Accuracy bonuses in PoE1 (regardless of weapon type). However they did NOT use fighting style bonuses for category other then their own (2handed using 2 weapon style 20% speed bonus like in your example). They got the bonus relevant for their category instead (+15% damage). Now in PoE2 there are no proficiency accuracy bonuses, so.... And no, they can't use "any" weapon type modals.

Meh. So bump that Int a little. I do that anyway on my Barbarians. And so far Carnage is really not worth building around for me. It does negligible damage and doesn't proc effects.

"Regular Unique" upgrades are very expensive and require special material though. Soulbound upgrades are basically free if you meet the conditions. Can't complain about getting Lord Darryn's Voulge and quickly upgrading it to superb right after leaving Port Maje. Without spending even 1 gp.

Barbaric Blow (and seemingly all other active attack abilities) trigger for all attacks in the aoe.

Zerker/Monk IS damn good. I went with Helwalker, but of course Nalpazca would be much safer (and could still get the might bonus with drugs).

Yes, you can consider Empower being basically a caster ability. Well, you do get half of your encounter resources back. Quite useful for some resource hungry classes, like Fighters.

Eh, the bonus from Zerker Frenzy is so potent I can't see myself ever not picking the Zerker subclass. An all in one package: More attack speed, more damage, more penetration (=even more damage), more Crit rate, more health, more armor (=more damage soak). And out of those actually the Zerker upgrades are among the most important ones (alongside attack speed). I'd gladly trade regular 5 Con for +2 Armor Rating. Probably would also trade 5 Might for 2 extra Penetration. And I just love crits (and effects they can proc).

If you could find out what this poison is, and how to make it (if it can be crafted), I would greatly appreciate it. I'm thinking of doing a Ravager (Berserker/???) using Swift Flurry & eventually Heartbeat Drumming with carnage for lots of melee crits leading to more attacks. Of course, since I've heard that Swift Flurry may be nerfed, this build might never come to fruition. EDIT: Ah well. I appreciate the help from y'all. Carnage has been nerfed to the ground. It no longer procs on-hit/on-crit effects. The damage it does is pitiful. Also I don't think I have seen a Carnage crit yet. I'm not sure it even can crit and doubt it can proc Swift Flurry/Heartbeat Drumming. So far the only use for it is to proc Combusting Wounds or similar effects triggered by damage ticks. For melee I'd recommend Lightning Strikes instead. Much more reliable 30% multiplicative damage lash. Or you could use one on the unique 2H aoe weapons. But they are generally limited to a maximum of 3 targets at a time (but the primary target is struck twice, at least with Whispers of the Endless Paths). They are a bit like poor man's PoE1 Carnage. The good news is they proc special attacks vs every target in the aoe (so like 3-4x Barbaric Blow, 3-4x Torment's Reach, 3-4x Force of Anguish). Individual attacks with them are weaker though.. and you do loose the benefit of strong single-target damage with powerful double Full Attacks (Barbaric Blow). You can switch to dual-wielding when you want to focus on single target, though. With the 2H melee aoe weapons it MAY be worth it to use Swift Flurry. But I find Lightning Strikes to be more reliable overall - especially much better vs strong mobs, who are difficult to crit. Ranged is a whole another story...

Triggering ineed but without that full burn damage build it wouldn't do as much dmg as it does on video. Too many things trigger on abilities they should not :D Yeah. On the other hand they had to go and nerf Carnage to the ground, which used to carry all on-hit/on-crit effects, which was my main reason for choosing Barbarian in PoE1.

Well, I didn't see these Spirit Frenzy upgrades (or the final Blood Frenzy one) on Berserker skill tree when creating the character... but now I do see them on the tree during level ups. Sadly not there yet to tell one way or the other.

Thank you very much for your answer, Climhazzard. Its a bloody shame it doesn't scale. Seems like I'll need to reload my Moon Berserker/Helwaker too. Will need to decide if he stays a Helwaker or maybe make him a Shattered Pillar.

Climhazzard, can you please advise how much did your Moon Godlike's Silver Tide heal at level 18? I'd really appreciate this info.

I'm also very interested in this. Did anyone make a high level Moon Godlike character? If so, what is the effect of Silver Tide at higher levels? At level 4 (PL 2) it still heals for 10 (Base). If it does not scale later on, then Moon Godlike is probably not worth it.