Barbarian - 2h or 2wep

[Vaneglorious]

So I know one of the well known options for this class is the Purgatory/Resolution combo.

 

But for some reason, for me this ain't cutting it (pun intended).

 

I'm doing pretty subpar damage somehow with both of them being superb, lashed and durgan refined. But when I bust out Hours of St. Rumbalt, I cut through mobs like butter.

 

Also, I've been using St. Ydwen's Redeemer and leveled it up to max during Galvino's workshop run, but for some weird reason it just stopped proccing altogether on vessels. I found myself using St. Rumbalt on everything, and it worked much better. It just doesn't proc anymore, which is strange. I was thinking maybe the procs can get resisted by defenses, but not proccing *once* is pretty strange.

 

Any ideas?

[Boeroer]

Get the Belt of the Royal Deadfire Cannoneer, also Forgemaster's Gloves, pick Two Handed Style and every other damage boost, pick Frenzy, Bloodlust and Blood Thirst and watch your jaw drop once you summoned Firebrand and hit once/twice. Seriously: jaws will drop.

 

Other weapons with the same tactic: Hours of St. Rumbalt, Tidefall (if you don't like Firebrand for some incomprehensible reason). Jaws will not drop though.

Edited April 2, 2018 by Boeroer

[Vaneglorious]

Should I take scion of flame with Firebrand?

 

Probably dumb question lol.

Edited April 2, 2018 by Vaneglorious

[Boeroer]

Yes. It's one of the best dmg bonuses for Firebrand. +20% of base damage (which is 20-30, so 5 bonus damage with every strike), no drawback (like Savage Attack's ACC maluses - which I would also pick).

 

With Scion, Two Handed Style, Savage Attack, One Stands Alone and Damaging III you already have +120% on base damage (=55 average dmg with hit, with an avg. crit 87.5, including Merciless Hand). Add MIG from Frenzy, maybe even Blooded and you can see where this is going.

 

However, a superb Rumbalt with durgan steel is as good. It's the early to mid game where jaws drop with Firebrand to be honest (because of the unexpected high numbers per hit). The damage per hit is higher with Firebrand, but the crit rate and speed of Rumbalt are higher. Still, the combo Blood Thirst + Firebrand stays to be great even in the late game. Blood Thirst does mitigate the drawbacks of Firebrand: that you can't enchant it with durgan steel for speed.

Edited April 2, 2018 by Boeroer

[Boeroer]

If you have problems with procs, then try to unequip, save, quit game, load savegame again and reequip. Sometimes that helps.

[Rooksx]

I've been using the DPS calculator spreadsheet to compare Rumbalt to Resolution/Purgatory for an 11 Might/21 Dex Rogue (https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1NKM6bX43pRHA8sGVJL_sTYMczYN3thKt-A-G_RrT37k/edit?usp=sharing). The Rogue is only relevant to these calcs for the Dirty/Vicious Fghting Hit to Crit. Assuming all else is equal, the dual-Sabre combo out-DPSes Rumbault against any DR. This was somewhat surprising to me (although I don't have a great grasp of the PoE maths) as I was under the impression that for an an average Might , high Dex build, the greatsword would outperform the sabres due to the higher base damage. 

 

This of course doesn't take into account the extremely useful Overbearing property of Rumbalt that will knock enemies prone. For a high perception Rogue, that's like getting a near-guaranteed critical sneak attack. But what's really striking is that if you chug a potion of DOAM, the dual sabre DPS moves way ahead of Rumbalt with the potion. It appears that the Annihiliation property of those two Sabres makes them more powerful than Rumbalt. 

[Boeroer]

I guess the spreadsheet has a flaw. As soon as you hit 0 recovery the two hander MUST do higher dps due to the higher base damage but same attack speed with auto-attacks.

 

But it's a lot easier to get to 0 recovery with dual weapons than with a two hander. Over the course of the whole game dual it will be the better alternative when it comes to dps. Also because of the rogue's Full Attack abilities.

 

Rumbalt is cool because of the prone proc (and how early you get that) and its synergy with Annihilation. And it's better for Runner's Wounding Shot and Sap - but that's it (until you reach 0 recovery).

 

Barbs with two handers are in a special place because of Blood Thirst.

[Rooksx]

So I tried changing the armour penalty to 15% and chugging a DAOM potion. This brings the 2h recovery down to 0.6. Somehow the sabres' recovery goes to -25.7 frames, leading their DPS to go through the roof. Clearly there's a mistake in the spreadsheet somewhere. 

 

Lord I hope POE2's UI has a DPS indicator. 

[Boeroer]

Nope.

 

But for correct attack speed calculation you can use this:

 

https://naijaro.github.io/poe-speed-calculator/

 

Calculating dps is easy once you know the frames.

 

But of course no tool can tell you how Blood Thirst influences dps.

Edited April 7, 2018 by Boeroer