A few Barbarian questions

[Matt516]

So I've been playing with a Barbarian PC on Hard. 16 MIG/INT, 18 RES, and 8 PER. Having a blast.

 

Currently am lvl 4 (almost 5), with Barbaric Yell and Frenzy for abilities, Accurate Carnage and 2H Weapon Fighting for talents. I wear medium armor (padded or hide or Aloth's leather or Eder's scale, undecided as to a permanent set so far) and wield Justice (2H greatsword) with a Fine Quarterstaff for range and/or crushing.

 

Modus operandi is to run to the middle of a fight, Yell (generally catching all enemies), then Frenzy and go to town.

 

My questions:

 

1) Have I fallen prey to any "trap" picks? The character was designed as a blend of tanky and dps, with resolve dialogue options for RP and enough deflection/interrupt resistance to deal with the slow attack speed of 2H weapons.

 

2) Are there any "trap" picks coming up that I should be aware of? Really enjoying this character and not keen on restarting or cheating to "fix" my build later on.

 

3) Thoughts on Barbaric Yell? I'm of mixed opinions about it. It's a really nice debuff, but it makes it take a long time to actually get into combat due to the recovery time. And it looks like it might almost be redundant with the (minor spoiler) AoE frighten the PC gets and all the ways to apply frighten with other characters. Not to mention the Barbaric Shout acquired later. I dunno. If there's any build choices I'm really not sure about, it's Barbaric Yell. Am I undervaluing it?

Edited April 6, 2015 by Matt516

[Judicator]

18 RES

This is where you screwed up. RES is a tank stat and Barbarians are awful tanks, they're better off as DPS. I'm running a Barb with 21 MIG, 16 DEX, 15 INT and he's liquifying everything on Hard. Armor is similarly useless on a Barb since it only slows them down. Have a Fighter or Paladin tank, let the Barbarian kill stuff.

 

Also Barbaric Yell sucks.

Edited April 6, 2015 by Judicator

[Matt516]

There is a middle ground between tank and dps, as hard as that may be for some people to believe. ;P

 

If I were going for optimal dps I obviously would've pumped DEX. I'm not, so I didn't. Thanks for the input, though.. I guess? I wasn't asking about attributes, but talents and abilities. My 18 RES barbarian is liquifying everything just fine, thanks.

[Judicator]

Eh, if you say so, but in my experience the game encourages min-maxing and middle ground builds are mediocre at best.

[Duncan]

The game isn't all about combat. Combat is incredibly easy anyway. A strong resolve wouldn't surprise me for a barbarian. I'm sure he could intimidate his way out of conversations with weak minded npcs. I think his stats are good. alas for talents, I haven't made a high level barb yet so I can't help you there

[Matt516]

Depends what you mean by "encourage" - any game with build choices of any kind will always have a "best" way to do things for the min-maxers to discover/argue about/enjoy. PoE is no exception. But if you compare it to other systems (most notably 2e D&D that was used by the BG games), the player has considerably more freedom to experiment and/or use different playstyles. 

 

In any case - for this character I wanted 18 RES for the RP reasons/dialogue options, so 18 RES I took. It's not *optimal*, but nor is it bad (as it would be to have a high Int barbarian or high Charisma fighter in D&D, for example) because it does offer a bit more Deflection and Concentration. I play pretty suicidally (Barbarian is the most downed character), so it's not like I'm not using all of my health.

 

Anyway. The attributes are what they are and I'm happy with them. You say Barbaric Yell is bad - why? Just because it isn't DPS? Because although I'm a bit ambivalent about it, I do think its a good control ability in general. The AoE is huge and with my INT I can get a good 7-14 seconds out of it (hit or graze). My main issue right now is that my Accuracy isn't as high as I would like it to be - though other than taking a weapon focus group (which I'm hesitant to do because the focus groups for 2H are so heavily biased towards the Estoc group due to partnering with the Poleaxe, whereas I like the 2H greatsword and wish the Estoc would be nerfed). 

[Matt516]

The game isn't all about combat. Combat is incredibly easy anyway. A strong resolve wouldn't surprise me for a barbarian. I'm sure he could intimidate his way out of conversations with weak minded npcs. I think his stats are good. alas for talents, I haven't made a high level barb yet so I can't help you there

 

That was basically the reasoning. Indomitable itinerant warrior who doesn't take **** from anyone and doesn't let anything faze her... is what I was going for. Rather slow, but hits like a freight train and pops right back up when downed if wearing Eder's armor.

 

Speaking of.. anyone know if there are other ways to get Second Chance, or is it exclusive to Eder's armor?

Edited April 6, 2015 by Matt516

[Duncan]

I've come across a ring that had it. Most buffs aren't unique to a single item, you'll get them by other means later on. Though some might be random, some might be scripted :D

[Lasci]

High resolve isn't necessarily great, but you can utilize it for roleplaying encounters if you enjoy that.

 

Barbarian Yell isn't spectacular. Savage Defiance and its upgrade are more ideal.

 

You can also get really cheesy with One Stands Alone if you're willing to take some risks.

 

Otherwise? Unless you're playing on PotD, and even then, barbarian is good enough with carnage and a two-hander that you don't have to worry about 'trap picks'. I don't think barbarians have many abilities that are abjectly terrible. 

[tnc]

For top damage and accuracy you need these: 18+ might 18+ dex 10 cons 6-10 res 14+ int 6-10 per.

 

Abilities in order: Frenzy(upgraded), blooded, brute force, threatening presence, vengeful defeat, heart of fury or something else.

 

Do not get the self heal or shout abilities, you can apply those with casters. It's plain stupid to take them unless you don't mind gimping your character. Choices other than these seem really useless to me in terms of dps. One stands alone sucks dont take it. It gives you benefits for being engaged by 3+ enemies but you shouldn't be engaged by that many enemies since barbs aren't tanks. You'll go down in no time.

 

Talents: Take 2-3 class talents and 3-4 offensive talents of your choice. Like 1 weapon focus 1 two handed style 1 something else. Taking accurate carnage before taking weapon focus is stupid since focus gives you more accuracy anyway. For weapon focus the ones that give you estocs or two handed swords are best. They also give you good one handed weapons.

[Judicator]

Depends what you mean by "encourage" - any game with build choices of any kind will always have a "best" way to do things for the min-maxers to discover/argue about/enjoy. PoE is no exception. But if you compare it to other systems (most notably 2e D&D that was used by the BG games), the player has considerably more freedom to experiment and/or use different playstyles. 

 

In any case - for this character I wanted 18 RES for the RP reasons/dialogue options, so 18 RES I took. It's not *optimal*, but nor is it bad (as it would be to have a high Int barbarian or high Charisma fighter in D&D, for example) because it does offer a bit more Deflection and Concentration. I play pretty suicidally (Barbarian is the most downed character), so it's not like I'm not using all of my health.

 

Anyway. The attributes are what they are and I'm happy with them. You say Barbaric Yell is bad - why? Just because it isn't DPS? Because although I'm a bit ambivalent about it, I do think its a good control ability in general. The AoE is huge and with my INT I can get a good 7-14 seconds out of it (hit or graze). My main issue right now is that my Accuracy isn't as high as I would like it to be - though other than taking a weapon focus group (which I'm hesitant to do because the focus groups for 2H are so heavily biased towards the Estoc group due to partnering with the Poleaxe, whereas I like the 2H greatsword and wish the Estoc would be nerfed). 

I'd argue that it's a lot more limiting than BG and BG2. There warriors could give as good as they got, here you're either a glass cannon or a tank and if you try to build some kind of hybrid you're going to be mediocre. But it's your character and if that's how you want to play it then go ahead, the game is not hard anyway.

 

As for Barbaric Yell, well, it's kind of pointless to take when every spellcaster and his mother can cast fear spells and, like you said, you get a similar Watcher ability as well.

[bobthe]

I agree with the other votes that Barbaric Yell is not that great. I took it late game when pickings were few over the shout because the yell is per encounter and the shout is per rest, but honestly I don't use the yell every encounter anyway.

 

I went with a max Str (20 base with race) and a moderate Dex (for attack speed) and Con. I use medium armor (no armor is just TOO low DR) and the high HP and endurance is extremely helpful. It also helps with blooded, giving you a larger range to fight with the bonus.

 

I actually didn't bother with any of the weapon focus traits that give +6 accuracy. I use only 2H weapons but I switch a lot depending on what I find. I have not worried about losing out on that +6 accuracy potential. Although in hindsight, if I play a barbarian again I will take the one that gives a bonus with Pikes and use those exclusively. I found that the proc rate on Carnage is much higher with a reach weapon. Not in terms of hits vs misses or grazes but just in terms of how often and how many enemies are in range of Carnage.

[peddroelm]

Resolve gets used on some dialog/out of combat checks ... 

 

Also helps a bit not getting interrupted when getting hit and wasting eternities trying to wind up that huge 2 hander only to get hit and interrupted again ..

 

of topic 

I like pikes on my barbarian too - but that +6 accuracy from weapon focus traits helps each and every carnage roll (not to speak of the main attack which if it misses - no carnage whatsoever) .. Penalty of anything in offhand is -12 accuracy .. Penalty of carnage extra -10 accuracy.. Very early game much better to just use single 1h weapon IMHO..  Plus carnage attacks can also crit - the more accuracy - better the chance to get carnage crits .. Stack accuracy without mercy .. Flank/blind/cc (lower targets deflection)  FTW ..

Extended reach weapon (ex pike) can be great in tight quarters in a melee heavy party, and even on open terrain to keep the glass cannon barb safe from melee behind your tank line ..

Edited April 6, 2015 by peddroelm

[Luj1]

 

18 RES

This is where you screwed up. RES is a tank stat and Barbarians are awful tanks, they're better off as DPS. I'm running a Barb with 21 MIG, 16 DEX, 15 INT and he's liquifying everything on Hard. Armor is similarly useless on a Barb since it only slows them down. Have a Fighter or Paladin tank, let the Barbarian kill stuff.

 

Also Barbaric Yell sucks.

 

 

 

Agreed.

 

 

Matt 516, for a Barbarian you should go

 

 

 

Moon godlike

 

Max Might and Dex

 

15 Int for a neat Carnage bonus (+30% AoE)

 

10 Con (default)

 

Either dump Res and Per, or reduce each by 1-2 points

 

 

Cheers.

 

 

 

 

 

EDIT: For Talents/Abilities

 

 

 

Greater Frenzy

Brute Force

Barbaric Blow

Blooded

 

don't know about higher lvl abilities, still playing

Edited April 6, 2015 by Luj1

[Luj1]

There is a middle ground between tank and dps,

 

 

Currently not really

 

 

 

Maybe If you go Cipher .....and Moon godlike . (basically pick the most OP class and race)

 

This guy is the only one who did it (as far as I know) - https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/75905-ultimate-build-highest-dps-and-tankines-in-1-char/

 

 

 

 

Eh, if you say so, but in my experience the game encourages min-maxing and middle ground builds are mediocre at best.

Agreed

Edited April 6, 2015 by Luj1

[Matt516]

So I've been looking at One Stands Alone... you get the bonus if engaged by 2 or more enemies, not 3. And it gives you plus TWENTY damage when engaged by 2 enemies. 20. Two-zero.

 

Umm... is this a bug? This seems like a bug. No way can it be that good.

[Dongom]

So I've been looking at One Stands Alone... you get the bonus if engaged by 2 or more enemies, not 3. And it gives you plus TWENTY damage when engaged by 2 enemies. 20. Two-zero.

 

Umm... is this a bug? This seems like a bug. No way can it be that good.

 

It's probably bugged lol, but the most fun I've had in this game.

 

I'm totally face-rolling everything with a off-tank build built around it.  I go in first and Eder behind me.  Usually everything ends up killing themselves from Retaliation which works from OSA, before my party can even fire off a shot or before I can even Swing for even more obscene carnage damage.

Edited April 7, 2015 by Dongom

[gkathellar]

With respect to the whole wasted Resolve thing - the main issue is that the value of additional Deflection starts low and scales exponentially. Do to your low Perception, the bonus to Deflection from Resolve is pretty much wasted. Deflection becomes a lot more valuable when you stack it up really high, so conventional wisdom is that you should either dump both Res and Per, or go all out with both of them.

[KDubya]

Wouldn't the higher resolve help with avoiding interruption, which for a slow two hander would be pretty damn annoying?

 

 

I don't have experience with a two hander that gets hit a lot coupled with a low resolve stat. My main is a two hander dwarf fighter with high might, dex, resolve and per with dumped int and low con. He inflicts a lot of interuptions and does not get interrupted himself, or at least not that I have noticed.

 

With regards to the usefulness of the barbaric yell, the inflicted status of frightened would slightly lower the targets resolve and thus their deflection making them a little easier to hit. Also the reduction of the targets accuracy would reduce the amount of damage received.

 

For example,  if I understand the combat mechanics correctly, a monster has a 30 acc and you have a 30 deflection. The monster has to roll a 51 or higher to hit you. If you yell the monster has to roll a 61 or higher to hit you, if you frenzy he has to roll a 41 or higher to hit you and rolls of 91 or higher would crit. In this example you'd take 50% more damage with a frenzy compared to a yell.

 

The decision would be can you kill more than 50% faster with a frenzy? +4 might = +12% damage, x1.33 attack rate  => +33% damage, around +45% more damage.

 

In my pure theory craft thought process they seem fairly well balanced.

[Incendax]

With respect to the whole wasted Resolve thing - the main issue is that the value of additional Deflection starts low and scales exponentially. Do to your low Perception, the bonus to Deflection from Resolve is pretty much wasted. Deflection becomes a lot more valuable when you stack it up really high, so conventional wisdom is that you should either dump both Res and Per, or go all out with both of them.

Conventional wisdom is wrong. A moderate amount of deflection can mitigate critical hits, which can be generated when the attack roll of your opponent exceeds your relevant defensive score (deflection, fortitude, reflex, and will) by 20 or more. The only time it is acceptable to completely dump Per and Res is when you anticipate the character not being attacked with any regularity at all. That is not going to be the case with a melee barb.

 

To the OP: Your stats are perfectly acceptable for an offensive build, especially since you are min/maxing your dialog options. Barbarian Yell is the only trap you have fallen into. Frightened is not a bad debuff to stick on enemies, but it takes you out of combat too long for minimal gain.

 

You should probably stick with Frenzy > Savage Defiance > Brute Force > Threatening Presence.

One Stands Alone is an amazing alternative if you plan to go retaliation tank.

Edited April 7, 2015 by Incendax

[Kelstrom]

You know guys, with my first barbarians i was thinking like you. Using light armor, reach weapons and go behind the tank. Well it works ok, but i didnt like the tactic of cowardice. Then i made a new barb with a heavy armor and estoc.
 And as you know barbs have a low accuracy so i decided to use 3 chars to support him.
Priest with all the accuracy buffs, druid with the deflection debuff and paladin with aura. The paladin started to be very handy with that immunity to debuffs ability which makes the barbarian unstoppable dps machine

It turns out the buffs helps all the party and im able to do very well on POTD difficulty with all the premade NPCs and doing 2 floors of the endles dungeon without resting. No reloads on the bounty bosses so far The damage of the barb is so awesome the carnages go as high as 90 dmg on crit (at lvl8).

On the barbaric yell thingy - if you plan to be effective dps you need to use brute force / threatening presence. Then you dont really need the yell.

IMO the key class talents for dps barbs are:

Frenzy - dont upgrade it right away. If you dont have anything else to chose you can upgrade it at lvl11-12
Savage defiance - it scales with level and is awesome self-heal (no need to upgrade)
Brute Force - get this asap
One Stands Alone - get this before everything else when available
Blooded - its an ok ability, but you can get it later

The non class talents:

the accuracy one - estoc seems to be the best
modals with -5 dr and 1.2x dmg (i dont have the 20% dmg one, but i plan to get it)
2handed spec

Some tips on survival:

Use the heaviest armor you can get. The crucible knights vendor has a very nice one.
Get a belt with 5DR and an item that reduce crit damage.
When you are surrounded with mobs and using frenzy you cant see your endurance so use your self heals and the pally heal/debuffs remover. Dont bother with priest heals just for you - let the angry man buffs.

About the attributes. MIG and DEX should be maxed, CON can stay at 10, INT is a good stat, but you can do ok without maxed (my barb has 15 base). About the other 2, well you wont be so effective at interrupt so you can leave PER at 3, RES is the other stat that increase will save so it may be ok to help you not get dominated and is also good for some conversations (most things need 14, but 12 as a base is ok).

There is a good build floating on the forums that use retaliate items. With the estoc setup the barb could be even more devastating.

[bobthe]

So I've been looking at One Stands Alone... you get the bonus if engaged by 2 or more enemies, not 3. And it gives you plus TWENTY damage when engaged by 2 enemies. 20. Two-zero.

 

Umm... is this a bug? This seems like a bug. No way can it be that good.

 

Is this new? As of last night the description for this ability in my game did NOT say anything about bonus damage, only that you cannot be flanked unless there are 3 or more enemies. Where is the bonus damage from? Is it just missing from the in-game description for this ability?

[Matt516]

With respect to the whole wasted Resolve thing - the main issue is that the value of additional Deflection starts low and scales exponentially. Do to your low Perception, the bonus to Deflection from Resolve is pretty much wasted. Deflection becomes a lot more valuable when you stack it up really high, so conventional wisdom is that you should either dump both Res and Per, or go all out with both of them.

This is (possibly) straight-up incorrect. The amount of additional protection you get from one additional point in Deflection is dependent on which regime of "Accuracy minus Deflection" you are in. There are 2 significant "break points" for this value - when ACC-DEF equals 15 and when it equals 0. +/-50 are also break points, but less important since that's not super likely.

 

Anyway. The important thing is that within the range where ACC-DEF is between 15 and 0, each point in Deflection reduces average incoming damage by 1.5% of whatever the base damage is because it converts one roll out of 100 from a miss to a crit (or vice versa). 1/100*150%=1.5%. Outside of this range, you're converting grazes to crisis or misses to hits, so each point is only worth 1%.

 

Now - what I said above is correct. Factually and mathematically true. The reason I said you're *possibly* straight-up incorrect is that percentage of base damage isn't necessarily the best metric for measuring this since that makes up a different relative amount of how much damage you were taking in the first place - it's usefulness is not linear. The correct metric for this sort of thing is effective HP (or effective endurance, whatever) - which is literally how much incoming damage you can take before dying. The usefulness of 1 effective HP is the same no matter how much you had in the first place.

 

I know the equation for eHP in this case (worked it out during a class because.. yup), but I don't have the chance to put it into a spreadsheet until tonight. I'll do that and throw some graphs up here later tonight, and then we'll see what we see.

 

*yes, I know DR changes things. I also know exactly how it affects the eHP equation - it adds an additional (additive) term that results in a recursive equation due to the eHP from DR depending not only on enemy weapon attack speed but also your survival time (which is tied in turn to eHP). So my first graphs won't take that into account, but that's the price of easy algebraic answers. Might take it into account later.

 

**yes, I know that the minimum damage from DR changes things as well. For now I won't worry about that, because this discussion is about a tanky dps class that will be wearing Medium armor (and thus will hardly if ever actually reduce damage to minimum).

 

***fun fact, as your Deflection goes up the eHP you get from your DR decreases because enemies will be hitting you less often and therefore your DR won't absorb damage as much.

 

****that said, the above may be untrue because due to enemies hitting you less often your eHP (and survival time) goes up, meaning more chances to hit you and therefore let DR absorb damage. This is why recursive equations make things complicated.

 

*****last edit, I promise. I said "recursive" before - I misspoke. Just looked at the equation again and I'm pretty sure it just ends up being a quadratic equation in eHP. We'll see. Might be solvable analytically, though. This will be fun. It feels good to be doing PoE spreadsheets again.

Edited April 7, 2015 by Matt516

[Matt516]

 

So I've been looking at One Stands Alone... you get the bonus if engaged by 2 or more enemies, not 3. And it gives you plus TWENTY damage when engaged by 2 enemies. 20. Two-zero.

 

Umm... is this a bug? This seems like a bug. No way can it be that good.

 

Is this new? As of last night the description for this ability in my game did NOT say anything about bonus damage, only that you cannot be flanked unless there are 3 or more enemies. Where is the bonus damage from? Is it just missing from the in-game description for this ability?

 

 

It should mention bonus damage in the description, just without any specifics as to how much. You might check again? Perhaps it's been changed if that isn't in there anymore - but it was last night when I checked.

[bobthe]

It should mention bonus damage in the description, just without any specifics as to how much. You might check again? Perhaps it's been changed if that isn't in there anymore - but it was last night when I checked.

 

Ah, must be another one of those abilities where they forgot to flesh out the details. It took me a really long time to realize that some spells have details you need to know in the "flavor" text at the top. The effect description is NOT complete for a lot of stuff. I really wish they had done a sanity check on this stuff. For example there are a couple spells that say they deal 1000+ damage but don't qualify in the effect description that it only applies to enemies with low endurance, and even where it mentions this in the flavor text it still doesn't DEFINE "low endurance". These kinds of mistakes are frustrating when trying to learn the strategy of a game. Honestly I haven't even tried either of those two spells referenced because I have just assumed that there is more wrong with their descriptions that I haven't caught yet.