Dual-wield sword Barbarian strategy?

[Draconis]

Back to the topic..

What stats should a dual sword wielding barb in D2c use? I'm a complete newbie at that stuff, but I notice that dex is good for to hit, which otherwise i'm missing....then again, I have about 54% to hit, no matter where I play.. :)

[Occhidiangela]

No rune words.

Frenzy tends to own Double Swing unless you have big desynch problems, since you get both Damage and to hit bonuses.

Sword Mastery: 1 point or maxed, depends on how your To Hit numbers add up. If you end up with an ITD weapon, well, there ya go.

Max Battle Orders. Why? Boost Life and Mana.

OK, now, what to do?

Hmm, no resists? Natural Resist and Iron Skin, at least a point, consider the Iron Skin Shout relationship above. Or, pump Warcry, see below.

Taunt: at least a point.

Dexterity: only as much as you need for the Weapon. Between your Combat Skill and Mastery, your To Hit should be OK.

Consider: Battle Cry and War Cry if your Mana leach can support it.

Let out a War Cry, this stuns themob, then yell a Battle Cry which lowers their DR, and Frenzy away. Rinse and repeat. For this approach, War Cry needs a lot of points.

Executioner's Blade with as much damage as possible. Two of them. Good hunting/shopping.

Best of luck.

[dta]

Dual-wield barbarian: which skills would benefit with using 2-weapon style?

I mean, if you use Concentrate, will it alternate using each sword for the Concentrate skill?

If not, then I think Frenzy is the best skill for Dual-wielding barbarians, isn't it? Although for crowd control, Whirlwind (which will alternate between the 2 weapons) with enough mana leech will do too.

So far, the three main skills I like to use for beginning Barbarian is Bash-->Concentrate or DoubleSwing-->Frenzy, and then when you have enough +mana and %mana-leech, use some WW.

[Occhidiangela]

Both are "uninterruptable" you'd be better off not using Concentrate when dual wielding. That skill is better used when using a two handed weapon as a back up.

For WW, I'd use a two handed weapon for the damage increase and hence bigger leech, however, swing speed break points and equipment selection can make a dual wield WW effective.

[pbrain]

Dual-wield barbarian: which skills would benefit with using 2-weapon style?

I mean, if you use Concentrate, will it alternate using each sword for the Concentrate skill?

Concentration doesn't alternate between your two weapons, it only swings the one in your characters right hand (same for Berserk, Stun, and Bash). You can use this to your advantage if you have a big slow sword you can pair it with a weapon that has a very fast base speed (only base speed matters for the left hand). When you use concentrate (especially if you charge up frenzy first), you end up swinging your big sword very fast. You're probably better off just using the sword two-handed style with concentrate, but it's something to consider if you like speed :D.

WW when dual wielding gets many more hits than a big 2-hander. If you've got alot of crushing blow, this can be a good way to go.

Occhi reccomended Executioner's swords for classic, but I disagree. They have the highest 1-handed damage, but I prefered Ancient, Rune, or Zwiehander's due to much lower reqs and higher speeds. Range is pretty irrelevant for frenzy. For WW, hitting the speed breakpoints is more important than range (PvM at least), so speed is where it's at imo :D.