Maybe Barb Masteries need a bump up

[WarBlade]

Hmm, I need to find WarBlade's original quote.

My new barb I was playing with got 20 seconds of shout at L1.  I'd like to know where the 1 minute 30 seconds came from.

All I had was one point in Shout. Battle Orders also had a point. Battle Command had 12 points invested and at +5 seconds per level those three Warcries can really stack up. I find this quite dissappointing because for the price of maxing on skill, a Barbarian can now run three stackable Auras, and all for a total of 23 skill points invested asuming one maxed skill and even that much is not necessary.

I appologize if my other post was misleading.

[WarBlade]

The damage isnt even close to a paladins potential - through several builds. And only the concentrate barb barb maintains his high survivability.

Meanwhile the Paladin in most cases has no hope of actually reaching what many would assume would be his potential and your assertion of survivability is just plain wrong.

The bezerk barb losses life leach. And for the freny barb now  will give up signifigant survival skills to get damage which is still less than a paladin.

In my 1.09 experience Berserk was either a primary skill to use in conjunction with Concentrate as another primary skill or as a PI alternative when Frenzy was set to fail. While he doesn't lose Life Steal (because he never had it) you are right in pointing out his reduced survivability from no leech and also hsi defence reduction which you didn't mention. At the same time the answer is as it always was: Warcries. One of them can quickly set your character up with 1.4 times his usual life and another provides a virtually limitless potion supply. BTW my old Concentrate, WW, Berserk Spear Barb was operating at reasonable effectiveness, considering the old Lord's Lance of the Locust he's lumbered with at present. I predict he'll be back up to full effectiveness once the pig poker is awapped out with a weapon worthy of 1.10 Hell.

The Frenzy Barb I've been running around Hell level proved to be one of the most highly resilient characters I've tried yet. Before 1.10 his 38% Life Steal was quite a bit over the top, but now it just plain rocks and his damage output was fine (with 29 skill points still to spend). My advice would be to play to a Barbarian's strengths. He has potential to do brutal physical damage and can use it to good effect for leeching purposes. Try comparing that against an Avenger who's leeching is as a standard unskilled attack, and guess which one is constantly reaching for the pots (both blue and red).

Perhaps WW will be viable now which would give barbs 1 good attack. I think Ill try to test it.

Yes, it still effective. Quite a good way to prevent a Barbarian from taking damage actually.

Maybe the thought is trade damage for survival. But if thats the case damage will probably win once people start designing builds

So far survival has not been a problem. OTOH keeping Might mercenaries alive is a tricky one and you might find a point or two extra Find Potion investment is the thing to do under 1.10. I can live with that.

[Kevin]

I just didn't recall your original post, there has been a lot of info flying around. I didn't know if the quote in this thread was complete or not, so I got curious on the issue since it didn't jive with what I saw.

Thanks for the clarification though, makes the argument much simpler to follow. :)

[Ignatz]

I hope you're right. I'd love to see a day that the Amazon isn't the king of pain any longer (I mean, come on, the REAL Lord of Destruction is the Amazon).

Still, regarding the Valk, I think it hardly matters that she do any damage at all or even have much of an AI. So long as she gets mobbed and lives for a few seconds, she serves her purpose.

As of now, even a Goldstrike Arch or Lycanders will mow down anything in A5 Hell 8 player, given a healthy amount of dex and a 8/2 attack. And with the new cube upgrades, both bows, and of course the Cheese Cannon will do significantly more damage. We'll cross our fingers that it still won't be enough. :P

[WarBlade]

After reading this thread I figured I'd go have a more extensive play around with Barbarian skills and noticed Leap Attack looked a lot more ponderous than I remembered. Taking a closer look, the animation has changed. In 1.09 a barbarian would start moving in the target direction as soon as the player clicked. Now he rises vertically for a moment before changing direction and moving towards the target area.

I can't say with 100% certainty, but I think this might mean LA has been slowed a little.

I suppose the upshot is Korlic might be just a tad easier to dodge too. :D

[Swarmalicious]

I noticed the same thing. When doing a short LA to a nearby enemy, who was at my barb's back, he did this awesome little in-air 180 and landed the hit behind him. :)

[Hammerskjold]

>I noticed the same thing. When doing a short LA to a nearby enemy, who was at my barb's back, he did this awesome little in-air 180 and landed the hit behind him.

I have this mental picture of a Barb doing an impression of Trinity from the Matrix. Is that even close or am I just misreading your text?

[Guest]

Im guessing there will be an assassin out there with every spelling you can thing of.

[Wrathraven]

I hope you're right. I'd love to see a day that the Amazon isn't the king of pain any longer (I mean, come on, the REAL Lord of Destruction is the Amazon).

I think the main problem with the Amazon is that Blizz WOULD NOT nerf anything for 1.10. They just tried to beef everyone else up, without dealing with the Ama's problems: namely that her weapons just dish out too much damage. They didn't nerf bow damage (which REALLY needs it IMO), they wouldn't nerf any of her favorite toys like Buriza, so her issue with dealing massive damage from afar is still there. Deciding not to nerf was a big mistake, and I hope they really do do something before they release this patch. And on the other side of the coin, Spearazons still suck, as nothing was done at all with Jab/Impale/Fend, they just increased her lightning abilities.



And just for the record, as a Barb player, all you guys maxing BO are pansies! :P