Fighter vs Barbarian question

[Therigar]

Either is a good choice if you want to limit the number of hotbars you keep visible at any one time. It is pretty easy to simplify gear so that there is almost no need for hot switches. And, it is relatively easy to simplify combat techniques as well.

Warforged barbarian has the bonus of not becoming fatigued following a rage so you can avoid cool-downs or lesser restore potions.

With barbarian you have only the standard 7 feats to work with meaning you need to be more careful about combat techniques. Is it stunning blow and great cleave? If so, what is needed for pre-reqs? Do you have feats left for the THF line and toughness?

With fighter you get bonus feats so end up with an abundance of options. Of course, all those combat techniques need to be on the hotbar someplace so that you can trip, cleave, sunder, stunning blow, great cleave....

You also need to think about the weapon choice if going Kensai. Falchion does more damage in the non-autocrit calculations due to the bigger crit range. Great axe does more damage in the autocrit calculations due to the bigger multiplier. Which represents the end game you will play?

If you will run epic with characters using mass holds and stuns then go great axe. If not then you should go falchion. And, don't forget that with either barbarian or fighter you are limited as a THF build to blunt or slashing -- there is no two-handed piercing option (unless you want to go for ranged weapons).

Build philosophy is pretty simple with either. All STR and CON. Be sure to have a healer around because you won't have any AC worth talking about.

[Monkey_Archer]

Both fighters and barbs are capable of doing among the highest damage in the game (and are roughly equal in base damage). The reason fighters are considered by many to be higher dps endgame is the following:

-endgame involves alot of auto critting, and short term boss fights
-A fighters main source of extra dps (that differs from a barb) is haste boosts and seeker bonuses, both of which multiply on auto crits, and are more valuable in short term fights.
-A barbarian's main source of extra dps (that differs from fighters) is an extra x3 multiplier (on 19-20 rolls) and frenzy damage, neither of which multiply on auto crits, and neither of which provide any additional damage in short term fights

The main reasons why this does not make barbs obsolete in even the slightest way is the following:

-even though the fighter might do slightly more autocrit or short term dps, the barb is still not very far behind in these areas
-fighters will run out of haste boosts in 4-7.5 minutes and run out of powersurges in 8-15 minutes (depening on AP/gear/race selections) and will not do as much damage as a barb after this time
-barbarians can maintain maximum dps for well over 30 minutes without rest


Typically, barbs do more dps "out of the box" so to speak (first life, basic gear, etc). Fighters can typically be built up to be better in certain areas (room for multiple past life feats, maxed out gear, etc). But, the main difference will always be time: Fighters are the best short term dps, barbs are the best long term dps.

[Consumer]

-barbarians can maintain maximum dps for well over 30 minutes without rest

Not true, for a Barbarian to be considered max DPS it has to take haste boosts anyway.

[Monkey_Archer]

Not true, for a Barbarian to be considered max DPS it has to take haste boosts anyway.

Which is irrelevant because the OP asked about pure classes...

[Rasczak]

Not true, for a Barbarian to be considered max DPS it has to take haste boosts anyway.

w00t Barbs get haste boosts?...I'm going to respecc asap............

*cough* Only damage boosts....and meh....to lazy to use them all the time.

[Consumer]

Which is irrelevant because the OP asked about pure classes...

However, not irrelevant when you are claiming sustained DPS to be an advantage of a Barbarian.

[painindaguild]

answer is a question: are u running with a competent caster?

fighter for bosses and non-helpless

barbarian for helpless.

simple as that if u only care bout max dps. makes fighter generally the most usefull choice.
as soon as u start caring about the stuff that really matters (stunning dc's, boosts/speed etc) u get a different answer.

[Monkey_Archer]

However, not irrelevant when you are claiming sustained DPS to be an advantage of a Barbarian.

Sustained dps is the advantage of a barbarian. If you choose to sacrifice hp/stun DC, strength and some long term dps for more short term dps (+evasion or 2 feats) a splash barb will still do higher sustained dps then a fighter when both are out of boosts... so yes its still irrelevant...

[Consumer]

Sustained dps is the advantage of a barbarian. If you choose to sacrifice hp/stun DC, strength and some long term dps for more short term dps (+evasion or 2 feats) a splash barb will still do higher sustained dps then a fighter when both are out of boosts... so yes its still irrelevant...

What % of quests do you need that sustained DPS for?

Also what % of quests require haste boosts to be activated back to back?

[Chai]

However, not irrelevant when you are claiming sustained DPS to be an advantage of a Barbarian.

I have seen spreadsheet gamers make claims about fighters being on top to the point where a barbarian wont catch up unless they have something like 26 minutes more fight time to do so.

I havent seen this proven in application yet. Ever.

You can show me the plans and tell me it will fly all you want. When it blows an o-ring and ends up in the ocean, we can have this quaint little conversation about theory -vs- application. I can make anything look good on paper to support the stance I am bantering. Lets see how it performs in the field.

The fighter -vs- barbarian debate has always been sustained DPS -vs- burst DPS. Trying to compare 20 second party poppers to 30+ minutes of rage is an apples to oranges comparison.

[grodon9999]

The fighter -vs- barbarian debate has always been sustained DPS -vs- burst DPS. Trying to compare 20 second party poppers to 30+ minutes of rage is an apples to oranges comparison.

But at the same time, how many fights that actually matter last more than 5 minutes?

[grodon9999]

Wow, did I kill this thread? It had SO much potential. Tis a shame . . .

[Kamo]

Hey consumer I heard monkey_archer called you a wussy, continue.

[Ninety0ne]

The fighter -vs- barbarian debate has always been sustained DPS -vs- burst DPS. Trying to compare 20 second party poppers to 30+ minutes of rage is an apples to oranges comparison.

This one seems intellectually dishonest. Its not 30 min rage vs 20 sec poppers. Its 30 min of rage vs 11x20 seconds (could have more actikns boosts even). Or its "Raged" vs a haste boost for non sustained engagements.

[Cetus]

Both fighters and barbs are capable of doing among the highest damage in the game (and are roughly equal in base damage). The reason fighters are considered by many to be higher dps endgame is the following:

-endgame involves alot of auto critting, and short term boss fights
-A fighters main source of extra dps (that differs from a barb) is haste boosts and seeker bonuses, both of which multiply on auto crits, and are more valuable in short term fights.
-A barbarian's main source of extra dps (that differs from fighters) is an extra x3 multiplier (on 19-20 rolls) and frenzy damage, neither of which multiply on auto crits, and neither of which provide any additional damage in short term fights

The main reasons why this does not make barbs obsolete in even the slightest way is the following:

-even though the fighter might do slightly more autocrit or short term dps, the barb is still not very far behind in these areas
-fighters will run out of haste boosts in 4-7.5 minutes and run out of powersurges in 8-15 minutes (depening on AP/gear/race selections) and will not do as much damage as a barb after this time
-barbarians can maintain maximum dps for well over 30 minutes without rest


Typically, barbs do more dps "out of the box" so to speak (first life, basic gear, etc). Fighters can typically be built up to be better in certain areas (room for multiple past life feats, maxed out gear, etc). But, the main difference will always be time: Fighters are the best short term dps, barbs are the best long term dps.

One major advantage that barbarians have is the ability to be 100% effective against all enemies. Fighters obviously have to specialize- turbine starts releasing other weapon types or a higher variety of enemies- such as more endgame bludgeon DR types, and the fighters efficiency will be under constant threat.

Barbs are much simpler to play, and they are way more resilient in terms of adapting to change. Gotta put your thinking caps on when trying to optimize a fighter.

[ninjaeli]

Fighters capstone is worth going pure, + 20% attack speed.

ITS +10% to double strike now

[Vanshilar]

It really depends on where you're at and what you want to do with your character.

DPS:
From a realistic standpoint, the damage between barbarians and fighters will be fairly similar; it will really come down to how equipped the character is and how you play. For similarly equipped barbarians and fighters, fighters hold a slight (~5%) advantage in terms of damage output while they have haste boosts remaining, but be aware that this is only if the player can maintain perfect twitch (continually interrupting your attack animation sequence by moving slightly then standing still, to increase your attack speed), which is what the spreadsheets assume. Messing up a twitch means that the character goes into the slower animation sequences and therefore decreasing their DPS, so it is up to you to decide if you are able to maintain perfect twitch in the middle of combat when you are surrounded by other groupmates (thereby obscuring your avatar) and monsters, combat effects, etc. Certainly it's doable by those who have put in the time to practice, but you will have to consider if you are able to do it or put in that amount of practice. Otherwise, a fighter that doesn't twitch will more or less match a barbarian's DPS -- then the DPS advantage of a fighter more or less disappears.

However, what I said above is also applicable only for if you're fighting against 0% fort monsters. When the target has 50% fort (such as many raid monsters i.e. devil bosses), barbarians tend to come out ahead because their sources of damage (such as frenzy/death frenzy and glancing blows) do not depend on a low monster fortification and maintain their damage regardless of it, whereas a fighter is more reliant on crits. A fighter's damage comes largely from doing relatively (to a barbarian) weaker hits with the main attack, but doing it fast enough (due to haste boosts, doublestrike, and twitch) to overcome the DPS of the barbarian's relatively slower but more powerful hits. Once the target has fortification however, that advantage largely disappears. So once the monster has fortification, barbarians will start looking better and better.

In short, the DPS of both classes are pretty comparable; it will depend on what situation they're in and what you intend to do with them. It is likely that if you're planning to play at the end-game, you will encounter both situations with 0% fort (epics, trash) as well as situations with 50% fort (raid bosses) frequently, so you will encounter both situations where a fighter would come out ahead and situations where a barbarian would come out ahead. And ultimately, when the theoretical DPS for both builds are that close, your actual DPS will come down more to your gear and playstyle rather than which class you choose.

Having said that:

Leveling:
I think both of them are fairly similar in terms of DPS when it comes to leveling. Barbarians do mature fairly late (death frenzy at level 18), but fighters also get some of their stuff pretty late (+1 crit range at level 18, capstone 10% doublestrike at level 20). The barbarian does have a faster natural running speed and sprint boosts though so it makes it easier to get through those quests where you're just running from place to place (or as is your wont, running through red alert).

Gear:
Both classes are pretty dependent on the gear. For both of them, if you're going THF, at some point you'll want to be getting the Epic Sword of Shadows, which means having the Vault of Night pack and running with people who do epic VoN6 regularly. For the fighter, because of the kensei enhancements that are weapon-specific, this also means that you will likely be looking for a particular kind of weapon (greatswords) to stock your arsenal, since you lose some of the enhancement bonuses when using other kinds of weapons, whereas the barbarian can more or less use any slashing weapon he comes across.

Overall:
Again it sort of depends on what you want. I prefer barbarians for the following reasons:
1) High pool of hit points. This coupled with barbarian DR means that tough situations are more forgiving if you're still learning the game -- you effectively have a bigger safety cushion. However, fighters can always take multiple toughnesses with all the feats that they get.
2) Easy to play. As mentioned above, fighters have to twitch to maintain an edge in DPS over barbarians, and the edge is minor. For barbarians, it's just a matter of remember to rage every 3-4 minutes, and frenzy/death frenzy once a minute. The rest of the time you just need to have auto-attack on and swing away (in raid fights). It's a lot easier to learn the game when you're not so focused on getting your character to work right, and can focus on taking in the broader situational awareness. Fighters rely on a lot more "active" combat, in terms of managing your power surge/haste boost cooldowns and twitching (and also, knowing when to not twitch to maximize your DPS).
3) Easy to build. It's fairly difficult to make a bad barbarian (unless you're purposely intending to). The only big choice you need to make, as a non-human barbarian, is if you prefer toughness (defensively, for more HP) or stunning blow (offensively, to have a way to auto-crit monsters aside from the group's caster's mass hold). Otherwise, the feats that you take (THF, ITHF, GTHF, power attack, improved critical: slash, and cleave as a pre-req for FB) are pretty standard. A fighter though will have more versatility due to the number of feats; so if you are looking for non-standard builds or being able to do something specific, a fighter may work better for that. If you're looking just for a general DPS class though, it's hard to go wrong as a barbarian.
4) Easy to get into groups. This may be peculiar to the Orien server, I don't know if other servers have this tendency. But when people are looking for DPS, they'll tend to look for barbarians a bit more so than fighters. Barbarians are more or less a known quantity: a group leader will pretty much know that a barbarian no matter how bad will generally do a certain amount of DPS and a certain amount of survivability (HP). For a fighter, though, it depends on how the person built the character (keep in mind that all this talk about DPS assumes the fighter is using the kensei prestige enhancement and taken the usual DPS feats/enhancements, which may or may not be the case with a random PUG since fighters can perform other roles as well and have so many choices available to them to take for feats). Since group leaders generally try to decrease the amount of unknowns in their group (people generally look for stable, predictable runs), if they're looking for a pure DPS, a barbarian will more readily fit the ticket.
5) Barbarian run speed and sprint boost. I like battlefield mobility. With sprint boost on, a barbarian will be running some 34% faster than a fighter (or any other class that doesn't have speed modifiers) with everyone under the effect of haste. Sometimes it's helpful to also run through quests or be able to run + jump to places, to get through quests more quickly. How useful this is depends on your style of play however.

However, fighters also have their advantages: potentially higher DPS when twitching, and more versatility and player choice in terms of customizing your build the way you prefer (due to the number of feats available to you) being ones that come readily to mind. If you are a fairly proficient DDO player and believe you can handle the intricacies of building a fighter (choosing which feats you want to take for the some 18 feats that a pure fighter gets) and playing a fighter (i.e. keeping track of your cooldowns and being able to actively twitch and still know what's going on during a fight), then fighters may perform better for you. If you're looking for an easy-to-play class that is more forgiving of mistakes and will allow you time to understand melee roles and DPS (i.e. being able to read the current fight situation since the class is not demanding in actively managing the character), then barbarians may be better for you.

[Consumer]

IFor similarly equipped barbarians and fighters, fighters hold a slight (~5%) advantage in terms of damage output while they have haste boosts remaining,

Vague lol, a 5% difference is about that between my 18/1/1 build and my 20 Fighter build. The THF Barbs DPS will be much lower, 10% on an 18/2 Barb/Fighter.

I'm pretty sure you've downloaded A-O's calc so I would be interested to see where the differences arise. If you could post the DPS calc you did for this comparison I would be grateful.

but be aware that this is only if the player can maintain perfect twitch (continually interrupting your attack animation sequence by moving slightly then standing still, to increase your attack speed), which is what the spreadsheets assume. Messing up a twitch means that the character goes into the slower animation sequences and therefore decreasing their DPS, so it is up to you to decide if you are able to maintain perfect twitch in the middle of combat when you are surrounded by other groupmates (thereby obscuring your avatar) and monsters, combat effects, etc. Certainly it's doable by those who have put in the time to practice, but you will have to consider if you are able to do it or put in that amount of practice. Otherwise, a fighter that doesn't twitch will more or less match a barbarian's DPS -- then the DPS advantage of a fighter more or less disappears.

Practice makes perfect. Position also makes perfect. For example Shrouds has a few situations in which twitching is difficult but can be fixed.

Portals - standing in the middle of everyone makes it hard to see your swords vertical drop making you guess the timing. Instead standing at 90 degrees to the normal of the portal and hitting the sides means no one is in your way.

CC and trash - if you're in the middle it can be difficult to see what you're doing, however you're twitching so you can easily move to the outside of the mobs. Twitching with a vorpal in a PUG will mean you easily out kill the rest of the melee as well, often more than doubling their kills.

Harry - Harry is the hardest to twitch on imo, if a wing covers you you're going to miss a swing, however it is easier to twitch to the side than it is to twitch forwards into Harry, while you move away from the wings. Once someone else or you has agro you don't have the wings getting in the way and there is no problem.

It is also much better to twitch against lailat as while you are moving anyway avoiding having to worry about getting the full attack chain.

The main problem with twitching is once Haste Boost IV is introduced. While hasted I can for example maintain perfect twitch on the training dummy until it is dead with my eyes shut. However once haste boost IV is introduced the margin for error is smaller and it becomes more difficult to get a rhythm going.

And ultimately, when the theoretical DPS for both builds are that close, your actual DPS will come down more to your gear and playstyle rather than which class you choose.

Agree completely with this.

[Goldeneye]

The way I see it: as long as Fighters are using their specialized weapon, they will have the slight edge on dps (haste boost pulls them ahead). Barbarians on the other hand have the ability to swap weapon types for different situations (ex: bludgeoning, weighted... etc)

[Consumer]

Barbarians on the other hand have the ability to swap weapon types for different situations (ex: bludgeoning, weighted... etc)

As shown by my Fighter build you can get rid of that advantage to a large extent by using the massive amount of feats Fighters get to pick up multiple chains.