Barb Vs. 2h Ftr

[Riorik]

You guys do realize - all these calculations aren't really an IT problem OR something for a computer scientist. It's all really algebra and statistics.

In my opinion, introducing new topics to the discussion as new variables when they need to be kept as constants to provide any validity to the controlled test conditions, is a fallacious argument...not intended to really address the comparison, but to propose a whole new problem.

While I agree that there are a significant number of factors that could affect any given encounter between two players with these proposed builds, at some point you have to find a way to simplify the test or you'll never get it done. In my opinion, considering the similarity of these builds -- and an assumption of precisely equal player skill (more than that, we need to assume precisely the same responses) - what we're left looking at is a very concentrated distribution of results - swing by swing.

Nax

[bandyman1]

I still feel that DPS is very mixed in this game. Speed factors in, Actual damage matters, To hit, crit range and multiplier, all play a part in damage output. But the one alot of people forget is survivablity. If your AC is 12 and you don't have perm-displace your gunna be chugging potions more then attacking.

Now a barbarian does the extreme damage, but has the need for a wetnurse more often then not. A fighter can get DPS nearly as good (70-90% depend on builds) with an AC of 35-40ish, enough to prevent a good amount of damage.

BUT, as i said else where, a well built offensive paladin can outdo both these classes overall.

See, this is were your calculations go kapoot. 40 AC means zilch in the end-game elite. That is why barbs went to wearing robes. You have a 40 AC and the mob has +40 to-hit. Guess what happens? The barb has better saves and far more HPs. Were is this increased survivability?

Here's a simple breakdown for a TWFer

10 base
13 +5 MFP
4 pro. item ( far more common than a +5 )
3 DEX
30 base AC

Now the only thing a fighter can add to that, that a barb cannot, is +3 Armor mastery, possibly chaosguarde ( a rare drop ) and I'll give you the dodge feat too ( as fighter's have a lot of feats and barbs don't ). So, that's a 36 AC. Sure, it increases your chances to not get hit, but the barb still has more hit points, better saves, and better DR, and is still putting out better DPS.

You can't argue Combat expertise or going sword and board, as that will kill the DPS you have, which is already behind the barbarian.

Here's the kicker. In order to matain that 70-90% of the DPS of the barb ( your figures, not mine. ) you are using rage effects. So, that AC drops to the point of uselessness even on normal in the end game content. The barbs does too, but again the barb has better HPs, better saves, and better DR.

Not to mention the barb can hit uncanny dodge for a +6 boost when needed that doesn't effect his DPS at all.

[Grenfell]

(cross-posted to Fighter forums) When this thread is not descending into insults, there's some useful info all around. Getting back on track...

My take on it is that the two are different but fairly equal.

Get the easy stuff out of the way: Vs. Undead, Constructs, and anything that is crit-immune, the Barbarian advantage goes away as compared to a dedicated DPS THF. (Comparing some Tank-build Fighter to a raging Barbarian is pointless in the extreme).

Here's the base:

32 Str for the Fighter vs. 40 Str (raged) for the Barb.

Both can use Rage potions, both can use Madstone, etc. so leave those out for the time being.

Now, take GWS into account: +4, which is equal to +8 Str. Suddenly, we're at 40 Str vs. 40 Str functionally speaking (although the Barb does have a +2 to hit advantage, taking GWF into account). That is zero difference in plain-vanilla damage output.

But, the THF fighter can have nearly every DPS-oriented feat. For instance, my THF fighter has Greater THF and Cleave and Great Cleave. Those types of things are impossible to figure out numerically. But they do count, and they do matter.

If a Barb has GTHF, then he's missing Cleave/Great Cleave -- those DO add DPS, but how much and how often? Who can say. And vice versa. If a Barb has Cleave/Great Cleave, then he's missing GTHF -- and that adds significantly to glancing blows damage. But how much and how often? Impossible to predict.

But at base, without taking crits into account (as you would in an undead quest), we're really talking about +2 to hit for the raged Barb vs. the Fighter. In that scenario, I don't think it can be argued that the Fighter wins, although by the slightest of margins. You can easily check this out in Delera's or in WizKing by taking a THF DPS build and a Barbarian and giving them both equal weapons -- say a +5 Greataxe, no specials (of course, you have to assume equal player skill).

That's all fine and good, but hey, the Barb DOES have Critical Rage II. Now, of course, we have to take crits into account.

Crits vs. Barb Crits

According to that calculation (and I kept it as simple as possible by using non-magic weapons, etc.), the Barb has an enormous advantage thanks to the higher crit range on mobs that can be critted at all. But notice, the advantage decreases as the mob AC goes up.

At AC 20, there's almost a 20 hp per second difference between the two. At AC 60, there's no difference whatsoever (presumably, at some AC levels, it takes a 20 to hit and 20 to confirm, so an expanded crit range means squat if you still need to roll back to back 20's to land a crit). At AC 45, the difference is about 10 hp/sec.

Now, throw in Cleave/Great Cleave (or conversely, GTHF glancing blows) into the equation. Do they make up 20hp/sec difference? Hard to say -- I doubt the gap goes away entirely, but certainly the gap will narrow. Maybe the true difference isn't 10hp/sec but more like 5hp/sec? Maybe it's 2hp/sec? Maybe the Fighter actually has the advantage? At higher AC levels, which is what we expect to find at the endgame, is the gap 10hp/sec or is it closer to 2hp/sec? Is it no gap at all? Or does the Fighter actually have the upper hand? It's really impossible to say.

None of this takes any of the other ancillary things into account -- AC, saves, hp, etc. etc. It doesn't take Fighter Haste boost into account, which certainly increases damage output. It doesn't take the effect of specialty weapons like vorpals with Crit Enhancements, or Flanking bonuses, or any such thing into account.

But looking at just the damage output with the simplest assumptions, I think the gap is not as wide as people might think. Barbarians should still come out on top (if raged) but not by this enormous margin people think.

/gren

[mgoldb2]

Now, take GWS into account: +4, which is equal to +8 Str. Suddenly, we're at 40 Str vs. 40 Str functionally speaking (although the Barb does have a +2 to hit advantage, taking GWF into account). That is zero difference in plain-vanilla damage output.

I just want to correct this because way too many been saying this in regard too 2hf builds. This is only true in one handed build. In a 2 handed build 8 str = 6 damage. GWS remains at 4 damage.

It a +2 damage and to hit advantage.

At AC 20, there's almost a 20 hp per second difference between the two. At AC 60, there's no difference whatsoever (presumably, at some AC levels, it takes a 20 to hit and 20 to confirm, so an expanded crit range means squat if you still need to roll back to back 20's to land a crit). At AC 45, the difference is about 10 hp/sec.

This is true but I don’t recall fighting anything with 60+ ac except in the pvp arena. Another thing is that a sliding scale. Bards buff or other way to boost your too hit the scale shift to the right into ranges of ac we don’t usually see.

But looking at just the damage output with the simplest assumptions, I think the gap is not as wide as people might think. Barbarians should still come out on top (if raged) but not by this enormous margin people think.

Just talking damage on things that can’t be crited I can agree with the right build the dps not a huge margin. I do thing there other benefits to being barbarians such as speed as only one of many examples that make them a better choice for me personally.

[Mad_Bombardier]

(Crits vs. Barb Crits

According to that calculation (and I kept it as simple as possible by using non-magic weapons, etc.), the Barb has an enormous advantage thanks to the higher crit range on mobs that can be critted at all. But notice, the advantage decreases as the mob AC goes up.

Not sure why your Barb is 15-20 crit range when the Fighter is only 19-20. Crit Rage II only adds 2 lowering your Barb Crit numbers. And Thott's doesn't include Barb Power Attack enhancement, which raises it back up a bit (although, you can fudge it by checking other boxes for bonuses). And the point where damage output equalizes is 50+ AC, which really only applies to bosses. And that equalization point can again be pushed even higher with Greater Heroism, +5 weapon, etc. not included in your simplified example.

[Grenfell]

Not sure why your Barb is 15-20 crit range when the Fighter is only 19-20. Crit Rage II only adds 2 lowering your Barb Crit numbers. And Thott's doesn't include Barb Power Attack enhancement, which raises it back up a bit (although, you can fudge it by checking other boxes for bonuses). And the point where damage output equalizes is 50+ AC, which really only applies to bosses. And that equalization point can again be pushed even higher with Greater Heroism, +5 weapon, etc. not included in your simplified example.

Ahh, Thott's doesn't have Crit Rage... so I lowered the base crit on the axe, which got doubled. Let me try to fix that. A Greataxe will crit on a 17 for a Barb, right? So I'll just make it 19-20 crit range.

I'll also add in some additional measures, which all it does is shift the range to the right. The point, nonetheless, is that there is SOME AC at which both the Fighter and the Barb will only crit on back-to-back 20's.

Edited Fighter vs. Barb Chart

Still seems to be about a 15hp/sec gap between Barb and Fighter at around AC 45. Very significant, but not 150hp/sec gap either. Now throw in the "uncalculable" DPS from the fighting feats, such as Cleave, and who knows where that goes?

Again, there IS a gap; but as Mad points out, it's only a consistent +2 to hit and +2 to damage. Yeah, you can mess with PA enhancements, do more stuff to manipulate the DPS numbers, but what I get from all this research is this: Barbarians have an advantage. That advantage is not overwhelming. It makes a difference, but just from a DPS standpoint, the gap is not as huge as some might think.

This is not to say Barbarians don't have other advantages, nor to say Fighters don't have advantages. Simply that they're different, but not that far from each other in DPS.

/gren

[Mad_Bombardier]

This is not to say Barbarians don't have other advantages, nor to say Fighters don't have advantages. Simply that they're different, but not that far from each other in DPS.

Numerically, not that different. But, you're looking at a 33% or more DPS difference. Which is to say that a 2H Fighter has at best only 75% the DPS of a Barb.

P.S. Check this chart and compare the yellow to blue lines. I attempted to simulate Barb Power Attack II -2 to-hit/+4 dmg by subtracting 2 from Barb BAB and adding both Weapon Specializations.

[A_Sheep]

Since people are using the Thott calculator, I'd like to take this time to point out that the Power Attack feature is broken. It does not multiply power attack damage on crits as it should. This can be worked around by simply not using the power attack feature and just subtracting from to-hit and adding to base damage.

Done with +5 Greataxes:
Attack feature vs. manual.

Hope the link works!

[Grenfell]

Numerically, not that different. But, you're looking at a 33% or more DPS difference. Which is to say that a 2H Fighter has at best only 75% the DPS of a Barb.

P.S. Check this chart and compare the yellow to blue lines. I attempted to simulate Barb Power Attack II -2 to-hit/+4 dmg by subtracting 2 from Barb BAB and adding both Weapon Specializations.

No, my point is that it seems as if Fighter is 75% of a Barb, but once you take the "incalculable" damage into account, the gap is narrower than that.

There's surely a gap, but maybe (totally guessing) it's more like 90% of Barb DPS. That's the part we can't figure.

/gren

[Shade]

Since people are using the Thott calculator, I'd like to take this time to point out that the Power Attack feature is broken. !

Hah, i knew in my gut that nerd calc was busted and wrong. I didn't even look at it and I know its wrong.

And yea, GWS does not equal +8 str. Then theres power attack enhancements...

32 str vs 40 str = Barbarians rock and leave fighters in the dust as they are freakin +13 damage per hit ahead.
Want me to give you the breakdown on that? No. Just accept that its right, I know it in my gut, hell its probably more then that depending on how rounding is calculated.
Sorry but haste boost does not add up to 13 dmg per hit, so even vs crit imune stuff, fighters can go hide behind there shields where they belong.

Like I said, no one can properly and accuratley take into account the huge number of factors that play into DPS, so stop even trying and just accept barbarians are the best and multiclassing is a bad idea.

[Shade]

Then consider the future too..

Feats vs more power rage:

Once were lvl40 and have 100 strength with 12 types of rage going that last 2 hours - fighters will have 75 strength and epic weapon spec x10 or whatever, despite those numbers evenining out the base numbers barbarians will still always come out on top.

Because as you go up the scale, the 50% bonus dmg from str for two handed wins, and feats which arent granted that bonus lose.

Tho at that point our rage will be so power that any creature that comes near will have to make a will save or run away in feat.. And if we hit them they will just die with no damage roll, just instant death from the shock of our power (fortitude save on crits or death) And will be so scary and godlike when we intimidate the targets around will get paralyzed and take -10 to there saves! Our sprint boost will be +2000% so we will basicly be able to teleport around at will. Our will rage save bonus will be like +20, so +50 will save, fort probably around +90. Epic two handed fighting will let us glancing blow for 80% dmg of regular, and do all special effects on every single swing of our10 attack combo chain.. heh.

[NightbirdX]

One thing a Ftr has over a Barbarian, is that he will be able to multi class with paladin and use his Cha towards his saves which can tip the balance in the save department quite a bit. He can also get the AC bonus from the Pld levels. These are things a Barb will never be able to get due to the alignment restrictions. But, if we are talking about a pure class Ftr vs. Barb, then I would give the edge to the Barb in the saves department, though the Ftr could use his 1,3,6,9, or 12th level feats to take any of the save feats or all of them. A Barb could do the same thing, though he has to make his feats count a bit more than a Ftr does since he only gets 5 feats at the moment, unless he is human, in which case he gets 6. Just thought I would throw this out there to add to the discussion.

[teddok]

Fighters are obsolete at the moment.

Sense when. My fighters all do very well. Cant quite mach the Barb for DPS but i come pretty friggen close.

The difference really is critical rage II which increases the threat range of a weapon by +2. That is what the fighter cannot match. In general the Barb will also have more hit points, DR boost, and better will saves as well.

Well i will agree with cirt range but as for more hit points....hahahaha my main Perren sit on 460 unbuffed. That more then most barbs raged.

[Renegade66]

Sense when. My fighters all do very well. Cant quite mach the Barb for DPS but i come pretty friggen close.

Well i will agree with cirt range but as for more hit points....hahahaha my main Perren sit on 460 unbuffed. That more then most barbs raged.

Since they nerfed AC. DPS is king, not AC anymore. If you think your DPS is pretty friggen close to Barbarian DPS then you are grouping with broken Barbarians. I can guarantee you that we could run the top 10 highest level quests on elite and you would not even approach 50% of my kills. I know that my own DPS fighter wouldn't. IMO the difference between having 420 HP and 490 HP is negligable. The longer you take to kill a monster the more time it has to whittle away at your HPs.

This goes for the rest of you trying to justify your DPS fighter builds on false statements of approaching 90% of Barbarian DPS. A straightforward, easy to build Barbarian with a Sword of Shadows and a Bloodstone will bury even the best Fighter builds or any combination Fighter type build.

The only exception would be a dual wielding wounding of puncturing build (fighter or ranger). Then again, this build is by far best made as a Barbarian.

Anyway, this is just the ebbs and flows of gameplay. Fighters ruled through cap 12, now they are gimped compared to Barbarians. That's why you see so many Barbs now, versus before. The next cap may bring AC back as king. Who knows. All I know now is that there's no sense playing my gimped fighter, when I have two uber Barbarians to run with.

[A_Sheep]

Is why the TWF 12/2 bard/fighter does more DPS than the Barbarian!

Here.

While I think Shade is being a bit of a prick in this thread, it's true that it's tough for us to take into account a few things that this calculator doesn't: Glancing Blows (1st and 4th attacks gain +50% base damage, but also attacks while moving!) and GTWF (only 1 attack on first swing, but 2 attacks while moving, so you could get that extra attack in anyways if you hop around enough). Then, there's barbarian speed and the fact that the Bard will be hasted 99% of the time and the Barb likely will not.

You can fairly easily add some _estimated_ glancing blow damage in by hand. It's just 25% of the base damage (without extra damage dice and set crits on the calc to be 20/x1), which comes out to be +16 DPS in this specific situation. Now, if the Barbarian were always moving, it would be twice that (or +32 DPS).

The Bard's increase in DPS for moving all the time would be significantly less. All he gains is 1 more off-hand attack out of a regular of 4 main-hand and 3 off-hand attacks. (so, something in the neighborhood of +10% DPS)

(sorry to hijack the thread, you will now be returned to your regularly scheduled programming)

[Renegade66]

Is why the TWF 12/2 bard/fighter does more DPS than the Barbarian!

Here.

Thanks for the laugh.

[Grenfell]

Hah, i knew in my gut that nerd calc was busted and wrong. I didn't even look at it and I know its wrong.

And yea, GWS does not equal +8 str. Then theres power attack enhancements...

32 str vs 40 str = Barbarians rock and leave fighters in the dust as they are freakin +13 damage per hit ahead.
Want me to give you the breakdown on that? No. Just accept that its right, I know it in my gut, hell its probably more then that depending on how rounding is calculated.
Sorry but haste boost does not add up to 13 dmg per hit, so even vs crit imune stuff, fighters can go hide behind there shields where they belong.

Like I said, no one can properly and accuratley take into account the huge number of factors that play into DPS, so stop even trying and just accept barbarians are the best and multiclassing is a bad idea.

Welp, that's it. Shade has spoken. All discussion must cease.

I don't know why you even bother posting, Shade, on threads of mere mortals. Why don't you just Proclaim your Truth from some blog or something?

Since no one can properly and accurately take huge numbers of factors into account... we should just take your Word for it. Okay. Hey, I've got an idea. If we all agree to accept barbarians are the best and multiclassing is a bad idea, will your mission be complete and you no longer need to soil yourself by joining these inane discussions?

/gren

[EinarMal]

Quote:
Originally Posted by A_Sheep http://ddoimages.turbine.com/forums/...e/viewpost.gif
Is why the TWF 12/2 bard/fighter does more DPS than the Barbarian!

Here.

Thanks for the laugh.

The funny thing is that it is true sort of. A strength based TWF Bard does outdamage a max strength raging Barb considering only self buffs. That is how crazy powerful inspire courage is (and you get full credit on both hands when TWF).

Now the real trick is to make sure you don't sing next to the Barb

Ooops sorry Mr. Barbarian just missed you again

[Grenfell]

This goes for the rest of you trying to justify your DPS fighter builds on false statements of approaching 90% of Barbarian DPS. A straightforward, easy to build Barbarian with a Sword of Shadows and a Bloodstone will bury even the best Fighter builds or any combination Fighter type build.

Prove it.

Take your straightforward, easy to build Barbarian with SoS and Bloodstone and compare it to a straightforward, easy to build DPS Fighter with SoS and Bloodstone and show that you will double the kills every time in every quest.

That will be SOME mathematical model involved to take Cleave and Great Cleave into account (or Greater THF into account, whichever your Barb did not take), or Crit Accuracy enhancements, or Haste boost.

I say it's impossible, and that the best-guesses based on limited data and analysis suggest the gap is much closer than you chest-thumping Barb fanatics want to believe.

/gren

[Mad_Bombardier]

Since people are using the Thott calculator, I'd like to take this time to point out that the Power Attack feature is broken. It does not multiply power attack damage on crits as it should. This can be worked around by simply not using the power attack feature and just subtracting from to-hit and adding to base damage.

Thanks A_Sheep. I never thought the PA numbers looked right, but wasn't able to pin it down. Good analysis.