Barbarian Abilities in Heavy Armor

[Khyron]

I'm making a Min/Maxed Barbarian Build and it looks like with the enhancement system I'm better off Mixing in a few levels of fighter. But I was wondering about a few abilities in Heavy Armor in DDO. Specifically I just need to know if I can use my Sprint Boost, Uncanny Dodge, and Rage in Heavy Armor?

Anyone know off hand?

[Beherit_Baphomar]

You can, but dont take levels of fighter for heavy armour.
Completely useless.

Go look at the barb forum for some awesome info on building a barb.

Let me explain that a lil.
Barbarians can wear mithril fullplate, its medium armour. Also, as it stands now end game content AC is pretty much useless unless you can get a decent number. With a barbarian taking the hit he does when raging you'll never achieve those numbers. If your smart and you double rage (rage pot/clickie/spell & barbarian rage(they stack)) your ac will be even worse.

Taking levels of fighter used to be a killer for barbarians, as those that multiclassed missed out on a barbarians best enhancement, critical rage I & II. These enhancements give you a massive damage boost because your crit range is massive. With the next MOD we'll be getting two more levels, so those that took those 2 levels of fighter will pick up crit rage I & II come level 16.

Best advice is to build yer barbarian for damage. All the damage enhancements you can take.

Like I said, go look at the barb forums for some real good advice on barbarian building.

[Strakeln]

You can, but dont take levels of fighter for heavy armour.
Completely useless.Mostly true now. Too bad I made mine when +5 FP was ultra rare and +5 mith FP was unheard of. Not to mention that while I have three sets of +5 mith chain shirts and two sets of +5 mith BP, I still have never owned a +5 mith FP...

That's not to say that two levels of fighter won't gain you much. It gains you much more than any barb purist is willing to admit. Top three things, in addition to heavy armor proficiency: 2 feats, 15% fighter haste boost (HUGE for DPS), tower shield proficiency.

That said: I expect that in Mod6, barb 14/ftr2 will be "king" (barring some major game change like the Tempest Ranger... that may turn everything around). After the cap is raised beyond 16, MC barbs will be "gimp" compared to pure barbs. At least that's how it looks now.

[Strakeln]

A small note on AC being "useless": this is the case for end game elite content. But a mid-40's to low-50's AC (pretty easy to achieve with a barb/ftr combo) is great for pretty much all the rest of the content, or the end-game content on normal.

I don't know about you, but I cringe when I see some "uber" 8AC barbarian who can't step into the Twilight Forge without a cleric.

Really, the "AC doesn't matter" argument only applies if the main thing you run is end game elite stuff. From what I've seen, most people at end game are just raiding over and over and over. Twilight Forge on any setting is not end game elite content, but I sure do spend a lot of time there lately...

[GuitarHero]

Yeah, i hated playing my cleric when my buddy who shall remain nameless *cough* THRAXES *cough* was running his fighter. End game, yeah, he didn't need to worry about AC, but at the time he was level 8 and my cleric was out of mana by the second fight!!! My cleric is level 7 and is likely to stay that way for a LOOOOONG time now. End game, yeah, DPS and hitpoints over AC, but until you are AT end game, wear some friggin armor!!!!

[Mad_Bombardier]

One thing that needs to be noted is that DDO does not currently limit Barb class abilities based on armor. But, in PnP, Barb Fast Movement does not work in Heavy Armor, even if you take the proficiency feat (Rage and Uncanny Dodge work in all armors). I hope that DDO someday implements more armor restrictions. Not that it will affect many Barbs, but I'd rather see it working properly. :)

[KaKa]

Always plan for lvl 20. MC barbarian is never gonna be as good as a lvl 20 pure barbarian. It is one of the few classes that are going to be this way though.

[tihocan]

Always plan for lvl 20. MC barbarian is never gonna be as good as a lvl 20 pure barbarian. It is one of the few classes that are going to be this way though.
Planning to L20 is all good, but we have no idea if and when the level cap will stop increasing. I bet it'll go past 20.