05-25-2012, 12:55 PM
I wouldn't mind a critique of my current build (level 53) by any Barbarian experts out there.
My goal is to tank and provide cover/protection for any glass cannons partied with me. I find the build is decent enough for soloing, at least through Act I Hell, despite its total lack of offensive powers. It features many snag-and-grab abilities to cluster enemies in bunches to be mowed down by my groupmates, along with CC (stuns and snares) and survival cooldowns. Ironically, the build just completely ignores one of the key mechanics of the Barbarian class (Fury), because only one skill actually uses Fury at all.
I go sword and board, trying to find the fastest decent weapon that I can, since higher speed attacks help to proc more Frenzy stuns and just get monsters' attention faster.
The problems I encounter are ones that I don't think are unique to my build. When those champion packs come a-callin', I run into one of two scenarios:
1) My gear and spec give me enough survivability to stand toe-to-toe with what I'm tanking (sans moving out of fire/plague/etc, of course), allowing me enough healing through dropped health orbs to stay alive.
2) My gear and spec don't give me enough survivability to stand toe-to-toe with what I'm tanking, which means I have to keep retreating, which means I don't even get any health orbs, which means I'm essentially dead weight to my party.
There are very, very few occasions where I get that happy medium - the ability, via skilled play and good use of cooldowns, to sort-of tank a boss or champion pack enough to allow my teammates breathing space. So it's either "I've got this, blast it down" or "AHHH, RUN AWAAAAAY!"
I'm pretty sure this is just due to the design of the game. The health orb mechanic forces a melee tanker to either be able to stand their ground and eat the orbs to heal back moderate damage, or not be able to even enter melee range at all. It's disappointing. I can Ground Stomp a pack to stun them, use my Ignore Pain cooldown, quaff a potion, and then I'm generally out of options besides the occasional Ground Stomp.
Also, the Frenzy stun rune is supposed to give me a 20% chance to stun my opponent, but I don't see it working against many boss types in Hell difficulty. I assume this is intended, but it also seems random - like it'll work on some bosses, but not others. How reliable is this rune?
Should I change War Cry's rune to Veteran's Warning for the 15% dodge chance? I pondered this as the health gain of Invigorate is soooo nice, especially with the Inspiring Presence passive.
Passives: how good is Superstition? Bloodthirst (3% of damage returned as life) seemed quite lame compared to the health regen of War Cry/Invigorate, so I dropped it.
My goal is to tank and provide cover/protection for any glass cannons partied with me. I find the build is decent enough for soloing, at least through Act I Hell, despite its total lack of offensive powers. It features many snag-and-grab abilities to cluster enemies in bunches to be mowed down by my groupmates, along with CC (stuns and snares) and survival cooldowns. Ironically, the build just completely ignores one of the key mechanics of the Barbarian class (Fury), because only one skill actually uses Fury at all.
I go sword and board, trying to find the fastest decent weapon that I can, since higher speed attacks help to proc more Frenzy stuns and just get monsters' attention faster.
The problems I encounter are ones that I don't think are unique to my build. When those champion packs come a-callin', I run into one of two scenarios:
1) My gear and spec give me enough survivability to stand toe-to-toe with what I'm tanking (sans moving out of fire/plague/etc, of course), allowing me enough healing through dropped health orbs to stay alive.
2) My gear and spec don't give me enough survivability to stand toe-to-toe with what I'm tanking, which means I have to keep retreating, which means I don't even get any health orbs, which means I'm essentially dead weight to my party.
There are very, very few occasions where I get that happy medium - the ability, via skilled play and good use of cooldowns, to sort-of tank a boss or champion pack enough to allow my teammates breathing space. So it's either "I've got this, blast it down" or "AHHH, RUN AWAAAAAY!"
I'm pretty sure this is just due to the design of the game. The health orb mechanic forces a melee tanker to either be able to stand their ground and eat the orbs to heal back moderate damage, or not be able to even enter melee range at all. It's disappointing. I can Ground Stomp a pack to stun them, use my Ignore Pain cooldown, quaff a potion, and then I'm generally out of options besides the occasional Ground Stomp.
Also, the Frenzy stun rune is supposed to give me a 20% chance to stun my opponent, but I don't see it working against many boss types in Hell difficulty. I assume this is intended, but it also seems random - like it'll work on some bosses, but not others. How reliable is this rune?
Should I change War Cry's rune to Veteran's Warning for the 15% dodge chance? I pondered this as the health gain of Invigorate is soooo nice, especially with the Inspiring Presence passive.
Passives: how good is Superstition? Bloodthirst (3% of damage returned as life) seemed quite lame compared to the health regen of War Cry/Invigorate, so I dropped it.
Quote:Considering the mods here are generally liberals who seem to have a soft spot for fascism and white supremacy (despite them saying otherwise), me being perma-banned at some point is probably not out of the question.