Tank barbarians seem pretty disgusting

[Jojobobo]

So given that my solo PotD Fighter playthrough is bugged for the near future, I cast my lustful eye over to the Barbarian to see what juicy goodies he might offer me on a new playthrough.

 

Being the fetishist I am, I decided to I wanted a Barbarian without Frenzy and with high Deflection, plus shedloads of healing and stuff which would make him a good tank.

 

I then realised that Barbarians have a mass of -10 accuracy effects through dazed and frightened/terrified, with Barbaric Shout being -20 - an effective buff to all your defenses in the form of a debuff of -10/20. Given the number of debuffs you have at your disposal, and the fact

 

I then tested this with Captain Viccilo's Anger, which works with Carnage and stacks with these affects - a further -10 debuff with in conjunction with its 5 deflection buff.

 

Leaving Resolve at 10 for the game (or you know, 8 with the Lost Periapt), with Weapon and Shield Style (going for bash shields, natch) if you use Dragon's Maw (healing plus a sweet bash) with Superior Deflection and the hatchet plus say Gauntlets of Deflection you hit a natural deflection of 105.

 

Add in the previous effects, and this becomes 125/135 depending on whether you're going for frightened/dazed or terrified - and that +20/30 is adding to all your other defenses too.

 

Then there's stuff like Heart of Fury, which is now per encounter! Also, while you're waiting on the late game hatchet, feel free to use the Vile Loner's Lance which falls under the same Weapon Focus and is standard Barbarian bread and butter.

 

Suffice to say, I think a tank Barb could give a paladin a run for its money. I'll give this bad boy a go and post up a character build when I'm done.

 

What are everyone elses' thoughts on (a) the new 3.03 Barbarian and (b) Captain Viccilo's Anger? To me that hatchet is hideous, especially in the hands of a Barbarian. I'm really not sure whether Barbarian stun/prone-locking or Barbarian Viccilo's Anger tanking is better in general, either for party or solo play.

Edited July 14, 2016 by Jojobobo

[Dr <3]

I like your approach, bit in terms of raw power i bet that a stunning weapon is far more effective than stacking accuracy penalities on enemies. I mean : if they are all stunned they can't even attack you, wich is more powerful than give them -30 accuracy. And they get -30 deflection too, so you get more crits, more dmg, more stuns. I'm not saying that your plan is not viable, for sure it is, just go for prone/ stunning weapons is better. Anyway things ar not mutually exclusive, for example i am a fan of the terrorizing shout , sine it give -20 accuracy in huge aoe for a long time, i like it in solo builds also if it is only 2/rest. So my suggestione is Godansthunyr> captain hatcet, but shouts can worth theyr slot. Just don't skip frenzy at all since is overall a very good ability, at least until you can't reach 0 recovery without it ( but at that point also the 1 lvl shout is Pretty obsolete)

 

Edit: btw with barb you can also stack lot of dr, combined with large health pool help a lot!

Edited July 14, 2016 by Dr <3

[Jojobobo]

I see what you're saying, but it seems like it can be a little tricky (at least more so than a Fighter, and remembering that Frenzy is a still short-lived to an extent even on a Barb) to maintain stun for an entire - and also you'll have to go for lower DR armor.

 

If you set the Barb up to tank on the other hand, then they are always going to be reliable and not let attacks hit for much damage on what would be your relatively lowish defenses in the other instance.

 

I don't know, this is my first time truly playing a Barb so if you can Stun/Prone lock people so easily maybe that would be a better option. On the flip side, if you only ever watch people being stunned and not able to attack for most of the fight - it seems a little boring/broken doesn't it?

 

As I'm only looking to solo play anyway, I think going for a tank role is certainly a bit easier - in terms of even if you don't bust through trash mobs quite so quickly in the bigger fights your defenses matter.

 

I'd be interested if someone else takes the instance DPS and CC route on solo with no respec-ing, I sure it would work in the long run but there'll be a lot of situations where sticking with that build over a tank is brutal.

[Boeroer]

I'm soloing with a 3 RES 2 DEX 20 CON dual wielding meatshield barb at the moment. Since I got Shod-in-Faith and Veteran's Recovery plus Savage Defiance I can take a beating without going down for minutes. Especially with healing-received bonuses from items and camping. If I think about this tanking power that works with high DR and high (rehealed) endurance alone I wonder how good he would tank with high RES, a shield, Stalwart Defiance (+10 to all defenses) and the things around frighten/daze/terrify/causing fatigue you mentioned. I once made that leech barb with Spelltongue and I still think that can be more powerful than causing fatigue. You can prolong all self buffs for minutes - even the ones from racials and scrolls and potions. I imagine a wild orlan barb (+10 after will attack) with Stalwart Defiance (+10) which will endlessly heal, too and some potions like Llengrath's or something and then add the ACC debuffs. Should work pretty well. Only thing is you have to hit stuff in order to debuff it. Paladin's and Fighter's defense bonuses work even with 2 PER.

[Kaylon]

To get the hatchet you have to kill Brynlod first...   

[Jojobobo]

I think that's where the Lost Periapt edges Shod in Faith, you can activate Consecrated Ground when you want, and it gives you Resolve plus a crap load of Concentration. Sure it's late game, but you know what you can be running early game when your defenses are low - Shod in Faith. As long as you don't dump your Resolve too hard (I'm pitching it at 8 for an even 10 with the Periapt) I think they can be a bit synergistic - and beside on PotD you'll always take a crit at some point anyway.

 

Concerning Stalwart Defiance - I'm not sure it's all it's cracked up to be. The duration isn't incredibly long (even with Barbarian's high Int) and you're only getting it once per fight. I guess where it might be interesting is with Dragon's Maw which gives you an extra Savage Defiance, but I'm not sure quite how you test Soulbound items in their later states through the console. With two activations and 25 Int you're looking at +10 defenses at around almost a minute and a half - which is pretty decent, especially in conjunction with all the other crazy stuff I mentioned. I guess I'll test it when I've levelled the shield.

 

To get the hatchet you have to kill Brynlod first...   

I'm sure it will be a piece of cake, or more like I'm sure through my hours of various efforts he'll eventually go down through attrition - either way it's a win-win 

Edited July 14, 2016 by Jojobobo

[Dr <3]

Stalwart defence is super strong from the beginning to the end of the game, if you have High str & int ( and as a barb you should have). When you combine it with +40% heal bonus from Camp or others healing item is like press "god mode" button for 20+ sec, unless you are completely surrounded.

 

Edit: @boeroer: do your build is paying off? How is going with your dual wield, slow motion but immortal barb? I'm doing wm with mine ( dual wielding Godansthunyr + clhanidilla lance) next step is mass duganization ( or find hellwax for dubling the hammer)

Edited July 15, 2016 by Dr <3

[dambros]

This discussion is rather interisting since I am currently doing my first ever solo potd playthrough with a paladin and even though I am hard as a rock, killing things take 10min... Only lvl 6 so far, but anything with big health pool like trolls take around 5 min with 21 perception (65 acc), maybe barbs would be faster or less boring.

 

Does rushing for the retaliation shield speed things up?

Edited July 15, 2016 by dambros

[MasterCipher]

6 person group: I've tried pally (still awesome as support) and fighter tanks, but prefer barb. I chose aumua for the +20 defense vs prone/stun, Mig 20 Dex 3 Con 18 Int 19 Per 15 Res 3. Savage defiance and chanter with passive heal was plenty before shod in faith. Vile loner lance still at level 6, just got stalwart. Will eventually add a stun weap for duel wield. Negative deflection when frenzied; the AI loves him. Plate armor + woodskin (later form of delegman) + armor of faith + belt that reduces crit damage by 27%. Carnage is effectively a utility aura for status effects like disorient and stun on top of the passive sicken aura. 

[Boeroer]

Edit: @boeroer: do your build is paying off? How is going with your dual wield, slow motion but immortal barb? I'm doing wm with mine ( dual wielding Godansthunyr + clhanidilla lance) next step is mass duganization ( or find hellwax for dubling the hammer)

At the moment it's relatively easy - I'm in Defiance Bay and gain level after level because of all the quests. Temple of Eothas was giving me a hard time. For the first time I had to let Raedric go and kill Kolsc. And wichts were a problem while Trolls were not. but since Act II it's easy - at least the main questline. I didn't even go for disabling weapons but for dual sabres. Felt better in most encounters because my ACC still isn't high enough to crit often - and I only have Asporant's Mark and that Wael-quest mail armor for debuffing.

Savage Defiance and Veteran's Recovery - paired with Shod-inFaith and my nearly 250 endurance at lvl 7 and something under 2000 health mean I only die after minutes of constant beating. If I wouldn't suffer a ton of interrupts all the time I would be steamrolling.

 

Edit: Hey, I just killed Visceris without any summons and buffs or debuffs at lvl 7. Just strolled by and thought "why not?" and it worked. Nice...

Edited July 15, 2016 by Boeroer

[Jojobobo]

Another point I forgot to mention in the OP is that Minor Fatigue shaves 10% off the enemies' endurance. While this may not be a big deal for weedy enemies, for high endurance enemies I'd say it's a pretty big deal - and another reason why it can potentially compete with the on crit weapons.

 

Hmmm, for the character I've started playing, I do want a bit of advice on the final ability. So far I've got:

 

1 Barbaric Yell

3 Savage Defiance

5 One Stands Alone

7 Blood Thirst

9 Barbaric Shout

11 Heart of Fury

13 Dragon Leap

15 Echoing Shout/Thick-Skinned/Barbaric Retaliation

 

1-13 are non-negotiable, explanation as follows (I'll hide it not to bore everyone):

 

 

As I said I don't won't Frenzy as it's not ideally suited to the tank ethos and it makes it tricky to gauge how low on endurance you are. I have missed out on some juicy plums here and there (Threatening Presence, Brute Force, Bloodlust, Blooded) but as I'm using a lot of debuffs anyway their deflection should be reasonably dropped to not overly hurt me for lacking the Threatening Presence/Brute Force Combo. Blood Thirst > Bloodlust, as it occurs after your first kill - besides Bloodlust doesn't last super long even with high Int. Blooded only benefits from you being low endurance, and ideally with a tank I'm more comfortable keeping my endurance on the high end so crits aren't as dangerous.

 

 

The issue is the last choice. It seems as though Dragon Leap > Echoing Shout as the Dazed duration is much longer (rather absurdly long with high Int) so I definitely want that, plus the manoeuvrability is nice. However do I need more CC from Echoing Shout (more Dazed CC targeting a different defense giving me more options against Frightened Immune enemies, but at a shorter duration) or would Thick-Skinned be better (it's one of those things that's slightly harder to gauge on the whole, but you'd imagine in a long fight against a large group 3 physical damage DR will save you hundreds of points of endurance). I guess lastly Barbaric Retaliation might be nice - but I'm leaning away from it as obviously it's only hurting the enemies hitting you in the first instance. I'm currently thinking Shout would be the best.

 

Any suggestions? Obviously there's no wrong answer here, so if anyone has a lot of Barbarian experience then I'm all ears. If someone convinces me on Thick-Skinned, obviously I'll take it sooner than level 15 and move most of the other abilities down.

Edited July 15, 2016 by Jojobobo

[Boeroer]

When you solo then Eye of the Storm is pretty nive now because you can just wlk away or reposition without eating any disengagement attack. It also means you don't get stopped by engagement. I a party it's probably not that important though. 

[Jojobobo]

I don't know, I never had too much problem with positioning in the first place on solo. Normally early game you don't take too much of a beating from disengagement anyway, mid-game you can use Aru-Brekr on a tank to find good positioning as needed, and mid to late game you get Boots of Speed in WM part I (or you can get them earlier in the Dyrford Ruins if you feel like you need them) or your Survival should be high enough to get a decent speed bonus out of it. Plus, with Dragon Leap it becomes a little redundant - I guess if you're okay respecing then you can get rid of later but I'm too hard-wired into old school RPGs where what you chose was what you chose to want to respec. It seems like the idea behind respecing, at least when it was first patched in, was so players could try several different talents and abilities and so they couldn't be locked in to one they found through experience they didn't like - so it seems to lower the difficultly a bit to tactically exploit it.

 

With regards to your build Boeroer, how are you handling the low concentration? Late game there is at least the Periapt on solo, but it does come very late. I know you can pop a Potion of Spirit Shield when you're desperate, but it seems like it'd be such a drag to do frequently. Personally I'll probably use +2 Resolve armor earlier game and the resting bonus, then when I get a +3 Resolve item likely just switch to the Int resting bonus. Still I'm starting at 8 Resolve, 3 seems a little brutal even if you do have a whale of a time with per crit items.

[Boeroer]

It is really hard before you get the disabling weapons which protect you from getting overwhelmed by interrupts - I got interrupted to death a lot at first. But when I placed a wall behind my back or retreated into a corner it was working ok. With my huge endurance and health pool a Potion of Flame shield and Retaliation is quite nice in combination with Combusting Wounds. I should have taken a Fire Godlike and Blooded - I'm under 50% endurance all the time . But a Boreal Dwarf is also good enough. In tough encounters I use a Potion of Spirit Shield as you said. This build is definetly not optimal for solo because it's all offense with my huge endurance and healing as my only defenses (and my stellar fortitude, which prevents the most nasty debuffs), but I knew that before. I could have started with more RES and DEX - but I want to drag this guy from lvl 1 to 16 without retraining (except when I feel that a talent/ability I took is totally useless. Like Barbaric Blow for example which cancels when you get interrupted and then sometimes the 1/encounter use is gone without any outcome). And it seems to be possible. I'm lvl 9 now and will soon finish the last quest from the Leaden Key Acolyte (Heritage Hill). Too bad I can't get the Celebrant's Gloves or the Swaddling Sheet. But besides that it gets more and more easy with every level I gain. I went down the Endless Paths and smashed the Drake without  any preparation - just my friend the wall, two nameless sabres and me. Ah, and the Forgotten also got their butts kicked.  

 

Bloodlust isn't as bad as I thought: it always kicks in when my frenzy wears off. Somethimes they both stack for nearly 0 recovery in my plate armor. Can't wait to get Durgan Steel...

[Jojobobo]

It sounds like you're becoming a solo-pervert like me!

 

Tbh, I still finding it difficult to make optimum builds without being Moon Godlike (or to a lesser extent, Fire Godlike, as you've advocated often). It's extremely hard to replicate that innate healing or damage solo. Though people may try and so "oh WIld Orlan pays off" but the amount of times people are realistically hitting your Will defense is minimal. I think the thing is, finding variation in builds is really nice with those limited options. On the flip side, it may be that I'm too unwilling to try DPS solo when I can just tank - honestly I'll look to that when I try classes more geared to that ideal (e.g. Wizards).

 

Taking down the Forgotten is always a pain, but I think the real proving ground it breaking into WM part I. You have a situation where you literally cannot rest, and you have 5 or 6 Figurines depending on whether you started Act III (I never count the Wurm figurine because it sucks). With my Fighter I kited the hard fights with Persistence, but with Rogue and a Deep Wounds Retaliation build (even before 3.03) I successfully tanked the fights with scrolls and guaranteed positioning given Shadowing Beyond (there is also an optimal route, snake south after the start, go west, then go north again to hit the boss ogre - for kiting there's a solo Ogre before the boss ogre to the north you can take out to make a circuit). From there, what I've experienced of WM I is much easier in comparison. But, my god, is it tough.

 

I'm kind of looking forward to the 6 party playthroughs I allow myself, where I'm presuming (perhaps wrongfully) I'll be annihilating everything. 

[mosspit]

Nice build Boeroer!

 

I tend to stay away from the idea of solo as I imagine it involves heavy pull-splitting. But if it involves mainly positioning, I might be open to the idea of doing one after my current playthough. Unless Obs decide to patch something and invalidate the build of course

[Boeroer]

Oh don't be fooled. At the beginning I had to do a ton of pull splitting and luring enemies into each other. Like the bandits who took the blacksmith's crate: just lured them into the trolls and so on. Temple of Eothas was a split-pull fest. But after that it got better. But as I said it's not optimal for solo. A setup with high RES and a shield plus retaliation would be way better - until you get Heart of Fury. But the enormous endurance and health are great.

 

I imagine a randged chanter with Shot on the Run and Fast Runner (later Boots of Speed) would be quite easy for all this pulling. Works in most cases. And a chanter can always damage things while running away even when not shooting, he can call a summon to distract, tank or stop foes. He has White Worms which is always awesome... Will have to try that out after this one.

[Jojobobo]

Personally I tend to avoid split-pulling quite a bit on solo and just come back to some encounters when I'm ready for them. There are a few tricks to get some quests done with minimal combat too, for example for the blacksmith's crate if you sneak from a north-easterly direction and time it right you can get the crate back without any confrontation (works even with no sneak investment) and for the Temple of Eothas, if you have reasonable mechanics, you can get finish the quest by heading into the room with the big spiders to left on the upper floor and pulling the hidden switch that gets you to the room with the bells and the big door, then on the lower floor you can just unlock the door that leads to the area where the remains are. You have to fight one Phantom, which is a pain, but other than that is relatively simple - then you can leave the rest and come back when you're a good level

 

Also, for the task at Madhmr Bridge, if you approach it from the Anslog's Compass direction you appear on the eastern side of the map and don't have to deal with that damn skirmisher. In terms of getting to Raedric, you can do it by killing just two guys, then agree to help him - then go to Kolsc and agree to help him again instead, then you can go back and kill Raedric as you please - but you get experience at a lot of these stages.

 

Stuff like this lets you level pretty rapidly, the trick is really just knowing where to go and what to do.

[Dr <3]

Nice build Boeroer!

 

I tend to stay away from the idea of solo as I imagine it involves heavy pull-splitting. But if it involves mainly positioning, I might be open to the idea of doing one after my current playthough. Unless Obs decide to patch something and invalidate the build of course

If you make a sturdy enough char you don't need to Split pull so much, just a bit at the beginning of the game. After, expecially if you let yourself use figurine, you just don't need it anymore, expecially with barb. With other char you just have to not be surrounded and you are fine, also if some fights will require some times.

My best solo playtrough where with chanter, monk, barb and an Ice variant of the bilestomper build of boeroer. The most needed thing is a way to do aoe DMG, in fact play with warrior or pala is doable but a bit boring since every fight is during veeeeery long

[Jojobobo]

I think the trick with Paladins and Fighters for solo is to focus on DPS while retaining some ability to tank, which isn't exactly hard to do given their innate defenses. Then the fights don't take half as long, and when you get to Sacred Immolation on a Paladin things should be much easier.

[mosspit]

 

Nice build Boeroer!

 

I tend to stay away from the idea of solo as I imagine it involves heavy pull-splitting. But if it involves mainly positioning, I might be open to the idea of doing one after my current playthough. Unless Obs decide to patch something and invalidate the build of course

If you make a sturdy enough char you don't need to Split pull so much, just a bit at the beginning of the game. After, expecially if you let yourself use figurine, you just don't need it anymore, expecially with barb. With other char you just have to not be surrounded and you are fine, also if some fights will require some times.

My best solo playtrough where with chanter, monk, barb and an Ice variant of the bilestomper build of boeroer. The most needed thing is a way to do aoe DMG, in fact play with warrior or pala is doable but a bit boring since every fight is during veeeeery long

 

 

Yeah I forgot to add I'm not to keen with kiting as well. But I get what you mean.

[Boeroer]

@Jojobobo: Thanks for the neat tricks with the crate and so on. Good to know for the next run. I didn't do a lot of solo runs so far. Normally - when I have a party - I roflstomp most of the game and kill everything that calls for it.  

 

Did you guys know that when you use a figurine at the end of the fight (when you're about to die) and the summon outlives you and vanishes, the game is not over? If you were smart enough to pull the enemy away from their usual spawn point they will return to that after the summon diappears. When the distance is big enough and the encounter ends you will stand up again. Saved my a** a few times. I just lure them away to a good spot - and when I feel I'm about to lose but don't want to reload because I already killed like 80% of them I just pop out that squishy animat or the wurms. It also works with Rhymer's Summun I suppose, making it a quite useful talent all of a sudden...?  

 

I also can imagine that a sneaky, stealthy rogue who tries to avoid fights can be fun when played solo.

 

Please report how the tanky barb behaves. I'm really curious.

 

@Dr <3: Would you mind to post your chilly bilestomper variant as a build (how do you call it? Ice Crusher? Rimeclomper? )? I would really like to read it - and more recent builds are always nice. As we already discussed I had to decide between poison and ice and chose poison because of stylish reasons and the wish to make mountain dwarves useful. But I would love to see what you did with ice.

Edited July 16, 2016 by Boeroer

[Kaylon]

Focusing on DPS when solo doesn't pay off as a melee. And I'm not sure the classes with

 

Personally I tend to avoid split-pulling quite a bit on solo and just come back to some encounters when I'm ready for them. There are a few tricks to get some quests done with minimal combat too, for example for the blacksmith's crate if you sneak from a north-easterly direction and time it right you can get the crate back without any confrontation (works even with no sneak investment) and for the Temple of Eothas, if you have reasonable mechanics, you can get finish the quest by heading into the room with the big spiders to left on the upper floor and pulling the hidden switch that gets you to the room with the bells and the big door, then on the lower floor you can just unlock the door that leads to the area where the remains are. You have to fight one Phantom, which is a pain, but other than that is relatively simple - then you can leave the rest and come back when you're a good level

 

Also, for the task at Madhmr Bridge, if you approach it from the Anslog's Compass direction you appear on the eastern side of the map and don't have to deal with that damn skirmisher. In terms of getting to Raedric, you can do it by killing just two guys, then agree to help him - then go to Kolsc and agree to help him again instead, then you can go back and kill Raedric as you please - but you get experience at a lot of these stages.

 

Stuff like this lets you level pretty rapidly, the trick is really just knowing where to go and what to do.

Yes, that's the best way to do a TCS with any class - you basically do a pacifist run until you reach a high enough level and then you return and stomp all the low level encounters with minimal risk (I have a playthrough with a solo rogue who's lvl8 in Defiance Bay with only 4kills - the hunters from the prologue) - and of course you don't scale the content. At lv16 you have basically a few tough fights left if you want to go for the ultimate, otherwise you go directly and stomp Thaos who's 4lvls lower than you.

 

But of course skipping content and doing it later is just another way to trick the difficulty... That's why all that matters in the end is if you're able to solo the dragons and the WM2 bounties.

[Jojobobo]

@Jojobobo: Thanks for the neat tricks with the crate and so on. Good to know for the next run. I didn't do a lot of solo runs so far. Normally - when I have a party - I roflstomp most of the game and kill everything that calls for it.   

Apart from when I first got the game, I've done nothing but solo on all my playthroughs - so I'm fairly practiced with what to do now, especially at the beginning of the game. I did think about making a guide for it at some point, or at least a guide for specific locations annotating the map (for example Stalwart, where there's a path you can take which avoids most of the fighting and gives you both good corner positioning for the final fight or a circuit to kite on if you're fast enough depending on your preference).

 

Did you guys know that when you use a figurine at the end of the fight (when you're about to die) and the summon outlives you and vanishes, the game is not over? If you were smart enough to pull the enemy away from their usual spawn point they will return to that after the summon diappears. When the distance is big enough and the encounter ends you will stand up again. Saved my a** a few times. I just lure them away to a good spot - and when I feel I'm about to lose but don't want to reload because I already killed like 80% of them I just pop out that squishy animat or the wurms. It also works with Rhymer's Summun I suppose, making it a quite useful talent all of a sudden...?  

I knew that they persisted when you were knocked out, but I never thought about luring the group away from you so you could survive. I guess it makes some sense logically as well (an enemy group could conceivably leave someone for dead) so I'll give it a try.

 

I also can imagine that a sneaky, stealthy rogue who tries to avoid fights can be fun when played solo.

 

Please report how the tanky barb behaves. I'm really curious.

Rogues are great solo because Shadowing Beyond means you can walk away from any fight any time you want to easily. Kill half a group, pop Shadowing Beyond, rest up - then come back and finish the others. It really gives Rogue's a massive advantage for solo (though it gives you a bit of a rude awakening when you first try Stalwart and you can't rest)!

 

I'll definitely keep people posted on the tanky Barbarian, and will write up a class build if it can take down the Alpine Dragon, etc. It'll take a bit of time for it to get going though, there's probably not much to say about it until after Defiance Bay. Savage Defiance is rather absurd early on - it's currently healing me in the region of 180 endurance, when my character doesn't even have 100 endurance yet! Considering you get an extra Savage Defiance with Dragon's Maw, the healing late game should be pretty crazy.

 

Yes, that's the best way to do a TCS with any class - you basically do a pacifist run until you reach a high enough level and then you return and stomp all the low level encounters with minimal risk (I have a playthrough with a solo rogue who's lvl8 in Defiance Bay with only 4kills - the hunters from the prologue) - and of course you don't scale the content.   At lv16 you have basically a few tough fights left if you want to go for the ultimate, otherwise you go directly and stomp Thaos who's 4lvls lower than you. 

 

But of course skipping content and doing it later is just another way to trick the difficulty... That's why all that matters in the end is if you're able to solo the dragons and the WM2 bounties.

To me, the game was built with some content skipping in mind. Very few builds are going to be able to solo the bears when they first meet them, so you're more or less intended to come back at a higher level. Normally I aim to clear every map in an act before progressing to the next act, I think that's a pretty fair standard to set.

 

Focusing on DPS when solo doesn't pay off as a melee.

I was doing fairly well with my Fighter going DPS on solo before they bugged Confident Aim. The DPS wasn't massive as I was using Hearth Harvest and the Vile Loner's Lance, but it was pretty consistent and the defenses were adequate for tanking.

 

All that said, a rather massive advantage of taking the Peasant Weapon Focus and Specialization plus Mastery is that you become a beast with Persistence too. Likely, when I got to things like the Dragons, I would have kited with Persistence rather than try the DPS route. I guess I'll have to wait to 3.04 to finish that up.

Edited July 16, 2016 by Jojobobo

[Jojobobo]

Sigh, bash appears to be bugged on Barbarians and hit more than once. I've made a bug report, but it seems like this is another build I'll have to shelve for the time being.