Barbarian - Frenzied Berserker Changes

[Qhualor]

I don't *want* them to be played very little. But there are still people (not talking about myself, to be clear) who enjoy NOT playing solo selfhealing zerg dps builds. I'd rather not alienate them even further than they already are.


Not every class should be an *equally* viable choice for every playstyle (such as BYOH). Even if it is the majority playstyle right now.

(This coming from someone who plays byoh exclusively right now)

Edited for clarity.

so you want them to be unable to reliably self heal which would keep things as it is now, hardly a barb around, because you are afraid they would be solo builds? im not asking for a heal like a cleric can cast. I just want them to be able to keep themselves alive through a fight without having to run around in circles or stand there after 4 hits and die. im not asking for anything OP. barbs are restricted to pots for self healing which means CSW or SF penalty pots. if a pot can heal them even for at least 600 hp as a pure, the class just became something other than a soulstone and can actually show off their dps power by being able to stand there and fight. people might actually play them again.

so only certain classes should be viable? that makes no sense.

[Qhualor]

How do you get from shrine to shrine? I don't understand.

teamwork and pots. when the game changed to BYOH I learned to play that way and adapted. it wasn't easy when sometimes you are in a group with blue bars and they stand there watching you chug pots to stay alive trying to beat down a mob and don't help.

[Wulverine]

so you want them to be unable to reliably self heal which would keep things as it is now, hardly a barb around, because you are afraid they would be solo builds? im not asking for a heal like a cleric can cast. I just want them to be able to keep themselves alive through a fight without having to run around in circles or stand there after 4 hits and die. im not asking for anything OP. barbs are restricted to pots for self healing which means CSW or SF penalty pots. if a pot can heal them even for at least 600 hp as a pure, the class just became something other than a soulstone and can actually show off their dps power by being able to stand there and fight. people might actually play them again.

so only certain classes should be viable? that makes no sense.

*sigh* You're not making any sense yourself. Read again what I posted.

"Not every class should be an *equally* viable choice for every playstyle"

I'm pretty sure Barbarians would get played a LOT more if they gave them a serious DPS boost with a minor boost in selfhealing. I'm talking crit range, crit multi, doublestrike, melee power. Stuff that matters. Not weaksauce d6's on hit.

[Qhualor]

And what would be the problem with them not being played much in a BYOH game? If your answer is "why have them in the game then?" then what would be the point of them being turned into a lesser version of existing classes/builds where they won't get played either?

I don't *want* them to be played very little. But there are still people (not talking about myself, to be clear) who enjoy NOT playing solo selfhealing zerg dps builds. I'd rather not alienate them even further than they already are.


Not every class should be an *equally* viable choice for every playstyle (such as BYOH). Even if it is the majority playstyle right now.

(This coming from someone who plays byoh exclusively right now)

Edited for clarity.

*sigh* You're not making any sense yourself. Read again what I posted.

"Not every class should be an *equally* viable choice for every playstyle"

I'm pretty sure Barbarians would get played a LOT more if they gave them a serious DPS boost with a minor boost in selfhealing. I'm talking crit range, crit multi, doublestrike, melee power. Stuff that matters. Not weaksauce d6's on hit.

you are contradicting yourself which is leading to not making any sense.

I didn't say that every class should be equally viable for every play style. I said every class should be viable and all good choices for when someone wants to roll up a build.

we can go back and forth all day saying barb dps is not good or it is good. I know for a fact that my Ravager and FB barbs have very high dps. compared to the paladin life I did, they were still much higher than the paladin with old skool named gear. certain tweeks here and there is all they really need for dps.

[depositbox]

compared to the paladin life I did, they were still much higher than the paladin with old skool named gear. certain tweeks here and there is all they really need for dps.

Currently paladins out dps barbs. Kings of dps crown belongs to the pallies since u23. Your pally build was either before u23 or something went terribly wrong with your build if it didnt out dps any melee after u23. SF pots on live now can heal barbs for 600 using human hamp line and some hamp gear or pally past lives. It never was lack of hamp that kept people from playing barbs in the first place.

[DrawingGuy]

Barbarian used to be my favorite class - the concept that you gave up self-sufficiency for pure raging DPS. It was ok that you were a mana sponge because that SP was being translated into damage. Unfortunately they hit a downward spiral. First was the loss of crit rage ages ago. Still good enough DPS to be worth it though. Then the enhancement pass came... Capstones that gave stats was replaced by the worst ability to ever be concepted (Storm Eye) on the Frenzy tree, along with other trees with clunky mechanics. This is compounded with enhancements with heavy feat requirements (such as Tantrum that requires CE + IT) on a feat starved class. The enhancement pass made a pure barbarian the weakest DPS option as you could gain more from other splashes (fighter, fvs, etc)... but then comes the major question: Why would you give up self-sufficiency as well as common support items (clickies, scrolls, etc), for LESS DPS than what you could gain from other multi-classes? While Barbarian DPS doesn't suck, Pally, Swash, Centered Kensei, etc are as strong or stronger and can keep themselves up. A Barbarian should be able to punch those guys in the throat DPS-wise so that a barbarian + healer would be a desired composition rather than a barbarian just being a back-pack trinket and a healer a DPS loss. Unfortunately the lack of DPS gain leaving them at just meh compared to other builds with all those trade-offs will be leave the Barbarian dead. If you are not willing to make Barbarian the undisputed king of STR/CON based DPS to make their trade-offs a cost worth giving, then they need to be fully self-sufficient. Even then, just being able to keep yourself alive and still losing a lot of utility due to rage lock still would put Barb on rocky ground.

I plan on commenting on each item for each tree, but as I'm pretty busy, might take me a while to tackle each tree... but here it goes:

Core abilities
Die Hard: (1 AP, Barbarian Level 1). You gain the Die Hard feat, and automatically stabilize when incapacitated.
I've always found abilities that have no value to you unless at a partial health or kissing dirt to be worthless. I don't build to die, I build either to stay alive or make other things die. However it's just a first ability core and fitting for a barb, so it's ok as is.

Toughness: (1 AP, Barbarian Level 3). +20 hit points, and +10 healing amplification.
Assuming Barb is brought to a level where people think you're worthwhile to bring along and heal, this works.

Frenzy: (1 AP, Barbarian Level 6). Activation Cost: 10 Hit Points. Cooldown: 30 seconds. Enter a frenzy, increasing your strength by +2 and adding Vicious to your melee weapons. You gain +30 hit points and +10 healing amplification.
It was brought up before - but the question of is the small DPS gain for the self-hurting worth it. Making this scale with melee power would be nice.

Toughness: (1 AP, Barbarian Level 12). You gain 10 Physical Resist Rating. You gain +60 hit points and +20 healing amplification.
This core really is much better than what it is on live

Death Frenzy: (1 AP, Barbarian Level 18). Activation Cost: 20 Hit Points. Cooldown: 30 seconds. Expend 20 hit points to enter a Death Frenzy for one minute. You gain 4 strength. You increase your crit multiplier by an additional 1 when raging. Your melee weapons gain 'Greater Vicious'.(+4d6 damage to your attacks while dealing 1d3 damage to yourself per attack.) Passive: You gain +100 hit points and +20 healing amplification.
The self-damage is a big factor of what is currently killing the barb (pun intended)... though this does bring more to the table than Frenzy does.

Storm’s Eye: (1 AP, Barbarian Level 20). Activate: You gain +1 melee damage. --- This damage bonus gains one stack every six seconds, up to 25 stacks. This ends when you are below 50% health. Activation Cost: 100 Hit Points. Cooldown: 3 minutes. Passive: You gain +4 Constitution. You gain +150 hit points and +40 healing amplification.
It is nice to see the worst enhancement, let alone capstone, have its STUPID penalty removed. This ability is now something someone might actually use! I do have mixed feelings as to whether the 50% health marker is the best - it's something that can be worked with, though does require inefficient support from others to keep going. Personally what I think would work is a mechanic similar to blitz, except when you take damage you gain 'x' seconds (where frenzy self damage would qualify), and all stacks are lost when time runs out. Another consideration if a DPS climb is acceptable for bard is to do Melee Power instead (so gaining 1 melee power per stack at a max of 25. Higher than the 10 from pally cap, but also not necessarily permanent.

The other item I would like to see changed is +4 STR instead of +4 CON. This is the barbarian kill at self-sacrifice tree isn't it? It should be grabbing at STR.


Tier One

Extra Rage: (1/1/1 AP). +1/+2/+3 Rage use per rest
Good - no change was needed

Cracking Attack: Melee Attack: Deals +1/+2/+3[W] extra damage. Damaging enemies reduces their AC by -1/-2/-3 for 20 seconds. ---(Activation Cost: 5 Hit Points. Cooldown: 30 seconds)
This was a crud ability and tree that was not boosted enough. I realize the top tier of the ability tree is what gives the 30s qualifier, but really that still falls short. What I'd like to see is either this cooldown be brought down to 15s or less, and/or be made AOE.

Die Harder: Your range of unconsciousness extends +5/+10/+15 HP. When you drop below 1 health, you gain 10/20/30 temp hitpoints. This can only trigger once every five minutes.
Once again the 'building for death' I find to be utterly weak and useless, but this HP should at the very least match the T1 racial Don't Count Me Out - 5/10/20

Power Rage: +1/+2/+3 Strength --- while raging
While the Barbarian is already pretty corked AC wise, so most didn't care about the penalty, still nice to see it go; Really, though, as it has a raging qualifier and rage has it's own load of penalties, does it really need to cost 2AP a rank? I'd gladly re-take the penalty to get the cost down.

Athletics: +1/+2/+3 Balance, Jump, Swim. Rank 3: When you activate Barbarian Rage, you gain +35% Action Boost bonus to movement speed for 20 seconds.
An interesting t3 trigger at the end of a line of skills most don't care about much - but still an enhancement I expect most will ignore... especially considering if they cared, they'd just use that AP towards Sprint Boost. Maybe gain 1 or 2% dodge at rank 3?


Tier Two (Requires Barbarian Level 2, 5 APs spent in tree)

Angry Arms: (Requires: Two Handed Fighting, 1/1/1 AP) +1%/+2%/+3% chance of triggering weapon effects on glancing blows and +3%/+4%/+5% glancing blow damage.
No change was needed

Body Blow: (1/1/1 AP) Damaging enemies with Cracking Attack reduces their Fortitude saving throws by 1/2/3 for 20 seconds.
A key part of the Crack tree, but still could care less as the ability has the 30s cooldown. Still want to see a shorter cooldown.

Blood Tribute: (1/1/1 AP) Gain +50/+100/+150 Temporary Health for one minute. This scales with 400% Melee Power. You have a stacking -1 penalty to constitution until you rest or die. (Cooldown: 3 seconds)
Curious as to how these numbers play with the melee power... though do find a semi-permanent CON penalty too heavy for any amount of temp HP. Maybe a 2 CON penalty that lasts 1 min and stacks (where it takes off 1 stack when the timer run out)? A temporary sacrifice for temporary HP...

Extra Action Boost: (1/1/1 AP) +1/+2/+3 additional Action Boost use per rest.
I really do think the Fighter one should only cost 1 AP as well, but a great ability for any that use boosts.

Sprint Boost: (1/1/1 AP) +35%/40%/50% Action Boost bonus to movement speed for 20 seconds. Cooldown: 30 seconds.
How else can a Barbarian run ahead to try and get the kill so he can be resurrected when the party catches up?


Tier Three (Requires Barbarian Level 3, 10 APs spent in tree)

Mad Munitions: (1/1/1 AP, Requires: Greater Two Handed Fighting, Angry Arms) +1%/+2%/+3% chance of triggering weapon effects on glancing blows and +3%/+4%/+5% glancing blow damage
No change needed


Blood Trail: (2 AP, Requires: Blood Tribute, Supreme Cleave) Supreme Cleave no longer has a hit point cost. You gain 2 Melee Power.
Nice change

Supreme Cleave: (1/1/1 AP) Tactical Melee Cleave: Expend 10 hit points to activate this ability to attack enemies around you. This attack deals +1/+2/+3[W] damage. (Activation Cost: 10 Hit Points, affected by Dungeon Scaling. Cooldown: 9/6/3 seconds)
Nice to see this minor boost to the cleave damage

Strength/Constitution: (2 AP) +1 Strength or Constitution



Tier Four (Requires Barbarian Level 4, 20 APs spent in tree)

Crazy Strike: (1/1/1 AP, Requires: Body Blow) When you score a --- hit with Cracking Attack, for 12 seconds you gain +0.3/+0,6/+1[W] damage and 1/2/3 Melee Power.
For less than 50% uptime, I still find this to be a hard 9AP buy in... though at least you took off the crippling penalty. Personally I'd like to see the uptime brought up, or the bonus(es) made stronger

Exhausting Blow: (1/1/1 AP) Melee Attack: Deals +2/+3/+4[W], 1d6/2d6/3d6 Strength, and 1d6/2d6/3d6 Dexterity damage. (Cooldown: 20 seconds)
Nice in heroics, meh in Epics as the target will just get that back. Maybe an Intim based DC Exhuastion that lasts 20s?

Wade In: (1/1/1 AP, Requires: Supreme Cleave) When you Supreme Cleave, you gain +1 Primal bonus to Attack --- per enemy damaged, up to 3/6/10 maximum. Lasts for 4 seconds.
Once again, thanks for taking off the AC penalty that made a weak ability useless. But, really, on a fully raging barbarian, they're not struggling for Attack. This would be much more useful if it was a primal bonus to damage.

Strength/Constitution: (2 AP) +1 Strength or Constitution


Tier Five (Requires Barbarian Level 5, Character Level 12, 30 APs spent in tree)

Focus Wide: (2 AP, Requires: Mad Munitions) When you score a vorpal hit, you increase your chance of triggering weapon effects with glancing blows by +10% and gain +10% glancing blow damage for 12 seconds.
I'm not sure this is strong enough to qualify the 2AP cost... maybe add melee power to the Vorpal trigger?

Focused Wrath: (2/2 AP) While raging, increases the critical multiplier of all weapons you use by 1/2 when you roll a natural 19 or 20 that is a confirmed crit hit.
No change needed

Lash Out: (1/1/1 AP) Supreme Cleave has a 50%/75%/82% chance to cause bleeding to damaged enemies, inflicting up to 1/2/3 stacks. This can stack up to 5 times. Your Supreme Cleave also reduces the AC of enemies by 1/2/3 for six seconds. This stacks up to five times.
Bleed damage is rather weak - would be nice to see this scale. My bigger question is - does this still have the stupid feat qualifiers, or will those be taken off?

Accelerated Metabolism: (2 AP) While raging you heal 2d6 hit points every 4 seconds. This healing scales with 100% Melee Power.
While every little bit helps, still a small pittance that would instantly vanish if the player were to Frenzy. Would it be possible to do an ability called "Heartless" where you no longer take Vicious damage?

Tantrum: (2 AP) Tactical Melee Cleave: Expend 25 hit points to activate this ability and attack enemies around you. This deals +5[W] damage and has a 50% to knock down each damage enemy briefly on a failed Fortitude save vs. 10 + Strength modifier + Barbarian Level. Abilities that trigger on Supreme Cleave also trigger on Tantrum. (Blood Trail, Wade In, Lash Out, Sundering Spin, Storm's Eye)
Several questions:
1) Does this still have an expensive feat qualifier that brings this out of range of most pure Barbarians?
2) How will Blood Trail play into this ability? No HP cost, or -10 to the HP cost?
3) The DC is a tough cookie for epic content. Adding Trip modifiers would fix that.

[Wulverine]

you are contradicting yourself which is leading to not making any sense.

I don't see any contradiction in what I posted.

I didn't say that every class should be equally viable for every play style. I said every class should be viable and all good choices for when someone wants to roll up a build.

And how is a current Barbarian not a viable and good choice for someone to roll up? Just because they might be less effective to zerg/byoh with, doesnt mean it isnt viable in a different group setting.

[Qhualor]

And what would be the problem with them not being played much in a BYOH game?

I don't *want* them to be played very little.

I don't see any contradiction in what I posted.



And how is a current Barbarian not a viable and good choice for someone to roll up? Just because they might be less effective to zerg/byoh with, doesnt mean it isnt viable in a different group setting.

do we now see the contradiction? I cant edit your posts more or I would delete the contradiction.

it is an option, but its viability in EE mainly is the issue. their defense and self healing is incredibly lagging behind. I don't understand all this about solo/zerg. im more concerned about them being able to survive a fight without being a burden to the group or running around in circles trying to stay alive while the rest of the group picks off the mobs.

[arkonas]

It probably should be. I'll bring it up with the team.

(It might be that it would boost the self damage as well.)

Sev~

i see no issue with that. barbs in epics will have a ton of hp from 800-1500hp ish. so for them to take extra damage for dishing it. it makes sense. with the new amp who cares right? as long as it scales correctly then i don't think anyone will complain.

as for the potion part ignore anyone who says they shouldn't get amp. barbs have always had the issue of self healing. that heal amp helps them big time. they were also a burden to heal as well because most didn't do any heal amp and they wonder why some had issues with them.

[arkonas]

Barbarian used to be my favorite class - the concept that you gave up self-sufficiency for pure raging DPS. It was ok that you were a mana sponge because that SP was being translated into damage. Unfortunately they hit a downward spiral. First was the loss of crit rage ages ago. Still good enough DPS to be worth it though. Then the enhancement pass came... Capstones that gave stats was replaced by the worst ability to ever be concepted (Storm Eye) on the Frenzy tree, along with other trees with clunky mechanics. This is compounded with enhancements with heavy feat requirements (such as Tantrum that requires CE + IT) on a feat starved class. The enhancement pass made a pure barbarian the weakest DPS option as you could gain more from other splashes (fighter, fvs, etc)... but then comes the major question: Why would you give up self-sufficiency as well as common support items (clickies, scrolls, etc), for LESS DPS than what you could gain from other multi-classes? While Barbarian DPS doesn't suck, Pally, Swash, Centered Kensei, etc are as strong or stronger and can keep themselves up. A Barbarian should be able to punch those guys in the throat DPS-wise so that a barbarian + healer would be a desired composition rather than a barbarian just being a back-pack trinket and a healer a DPS loss. Unfortunately the lack of DPS gain leaving them at just meh compared to other builds with all those trade-offs will be leave the Barbarian dead. If you are not willing to make Barbarian the undisputed king of STR/CON based DPS to make their trade-offs a cost worth giving, then they need to be fully self-sufficient. Even then, just being able to keep yourself alive and still losing a lot of utility due to rage lock still would put Barb on rocky ground.

I plan on commenting on each item for each tree, but as I'm pretty busy, might take me a while to tackle each tree... but here it goes:

Core abilities
Die Hard: (1 AP, Barbarian Level 1). You gain the Die Hard feat, and automatically stabilize when incapacitated.
I've always found abilities that have no value to you unless at a partial health or kissing dirt to be worthless. I don't build to die, I build either to stay alive or make other things die. However it's just a first ability core and fitting for a barb, so it's ok as is.

Toughness: (1 AP, Barbarian Level 3). +20 hit points, and +10 healing amplification.
Assuming Barb is brought to a level where people think you're worthwhile to bring along and heal, this works.

Frenzy: (1 AP, Barbarian Level 6). Activation Cost: 10 Hit Points. Cooldown: 30 seconds. Enter a frenzy, increasing your strength by +2 and adding Vicious to your melee weapons. You gain +30 hit points and +10 healing amplification.
It was brought up before - but the question of is the small DPS gain for the self-hurting worth it. Making this scale with melee power would be nice.

Toughness: (1 AP, Barbarian Level 12). You gain 10 Physical Resist Rating. You gain +60 hit points and +20 healing amplification.
This core really is much better than what it is on live

Death Frenzy: (1 AP, Barbarian Level 18). Activation Cost: 20 Hit Points. Cooldown: 30 seconds. Expend 20 hit points to enter a Death Frenzy for one minute. You gain 4 strength. You increase your crit multiplier by an additional 1 when raging. Your melee weapons gain 'Greater Vicious'.(+4d6 damage to your attacks while dealing 1d3 damage to yourself per attack.) Passive: You gain +100 hit points and +20 healing amplification.
The self-damage is a big factor of what is currently killing the barb (pun intended)... though this does bring more to the table than Frenzy does.

Storm’s Eye: (1 AP, Barbarian Level 20). Activate: You gain +1 melee damage. --- This damage bonus gains one stack every six seconds, up to 25 stacks. This ends when you are below 50% health. Activation Cost: 100 Hit Points. Cooldown: 3 minutes. Passive: You gain +4 Constitution. You gain +150 hit points and +40 healing amplification.
It is nice to see the worst enhancement, let alone capstone, have its STUPID penalty removed. This ability is now something someone might actually use! I do have mixed feelings as to whether the 50% health marker is the best - it's something that can be worked with, though does require inefficient support from others to keep going. Personally what I think would work is a mechanic similar to blitz, except when you take damage you gain 'x' seconds (where frenzy self damage would qualify), and all stacks are lost when time runs out. Another consideration if a DPS climb is acceptable for bard is to do Melee Power instead (so gaining 1 melee power per stack at a max of 25. Higher than the 10 from pally cap, but also not necessarily permanent.

The other item I would like to see changed is +4 STR instead of +4 CON. This is the barbarian kill at self-sacrifice tree isn't it? It should be grabbing at STR.


Tier One

Extra Rage: (1/1/1 AP). +1/+2/+3 Rage use per rest
Good - no change was needed

Cracking Attack: Melee Attack: Deals +1/+2/+3[W] extra damage. Damaging enemies reduces their AC by -1/-2/-3 for 20 seconds. ---(Activation Cost: 5 Hit Points. Cooldown: 30 seconds)
This was a crud ability and tree that was not boosted enough. I realize the top tier of the ability tree is what gives the 30s qualifier, but really that still falls short. What I'd like to see is either this cooldown be brought down to 15s or less, and/or be made AOE.

Die Harder: Your range of unconsciousness extends +5/+10/+15 HP. When you drop below 1 health, you gain 10/20/30 temp hitpoints. This can only trigger once every five minutes.
Once again the 'building for death' I find to be utterly weak and useless, but this HP should at the very least match the T1 racial Don't Count Me Out - 5/10/20

Power Rage: +1/+2/+3 Strength --- while raging
While the Barbarian is already pretty corked AC wise, so most didn't care about the penalty, still nice to see it go; Really, though, as it has a raging qualifier and rage has it's own load of penalties, does it really need to cost 2AP a rank? I'd gladly re-take the penalty to get the cost down.

Athletics: +1/+2/+3 Balance, Jump, Swim. Rank 3: When you activate Barbarian Rage, you gain +35% Action Boost bonus to movement speed for 20 seconds.
An interesting t3 trigger at the end of a line of skills most don't care about much - but still an enhancement I expect most will ignore... especially considering if they cared, they'd just use that AP towards Sprint Boost. Maybe gain 1 or 2% dodge at rank 3?


Tier Two (Requires Barbarian Level 2, 5 APs spent in tree)

Angry Arms: (Requires: Two Handed Fighting, 1/1/1 AP) +1%/+2%/+3% chance of triggering weapon effects on glancing blows and +3%/+4%/+5% glancing blow damage.
No change was needed

Body Blow: (1/1/1 AP) Damaging enemies with Cracking Attack reduces their Fortitude saving throws by 1/2/3 for 20 seconds.
A key part of the Crack tree, but still could care less as the ability has the 30s cooldown. Still want to see a shorter cooldown.

Blood Tribute: (1/1/1 AP) Gain +50/+100/+150 Temporary Health for one minute. This scales with 400% Melee Power. You have a stacking -1 penalty to constitution until you rest or die. (Cooldown: 3 seconds)
Curious as to how these numbers play with the melee power... though do find a semi-permanent CON penalty too heavy for any amount of temp HP. Maybe a 2 CON penalty that lasts 1 min and stacks (where it takes off 1 stack when the timer run out)? A temporary sacrifice for temporary HP...

Extra Action Boost: (1/1/1 AP) +1/+2/+3 additional Action Boost use per rest.
I really do think the Fighter one should only cost 1 AP as well, but a great ability for any that use boosts.

Sprint Boost: (1/1/1 AP) +35%/40%/50% Action Boost bonus to movement speed for 20 seconds. Cooldown: 30 seconds.
How else can a Barbarian run ahead to try and get the kill so he can be resurrected when the party catches up?


Tier Three (Requires Barbarian Level 3, 10 APs spent in tree)

Mad Munitions: (1/1/1 AP, Requires: Greater Two Handed Fighting, Angry Arms) +1%/+2%/+3% chance of triggering weapon effects on glancing blows and +3%/+4%/+5% glancing blow damage
No change needed


Blood Trail: (2 AP, Requires: Blood Tribute, Supreme Cleave) Supreme Cleave no longer has a hit point cost. You gain 2 Melee Power.
Nice change

Supreme Cleave: (1/1/1 AP) Tactical Melee Cleave: Expend 10 hit points to activate this ability to attack enemies around you. This attack deals +1/+2/+3[W] damage. (Activation Cost: 10 Hit Points, affected by Dungeon Scaling. Cooldown: 9/6/3 seconds)
Nice to see this minor boost to the cleave damage

Strength/Constitution: (2 AP) +1 Strength or Constitution



Tier Four (Requires Barbarian Level 4, 20 APs spent in tree)

Crazy Strike: (1/1/1 AP, Requires: Body Blow) When you score a --- hit with Cracking Attack, for 12 seconds you gain +0.3/+0,6/+1[W] damage and 1/2/3 Melee Power.
For less than 50% uptime, I still find this to be a hard 9AP buy in... though at least you took off the crippling penalty. Personally I'd like to see the uptime brought up, or the bonus(es) made stronger

Exhausting Blow: (1/1/1 AP) Melee Attack: Deals +2/+3/+4[W], 1d6/2d6/3d6 Strength, and 1d6/2d6/3d6 Dexterity damage. (Cooldown: 20 seconds)
Nice in heroics, meh in Epics as the target will just get that back. Maybe an Intim based DC Exhuastion that lasts 20s?

Wade In: (1/1/1 AP, Requires: Supreme Cleave) When you Supreme Cleave, you gain +1 Primal bonus to Attack --- per enemy damaged, up to 3/6/10 maximum. Lasts for 4 seconds.
Once again, thanks for taking off the AC penalty that made a weak ability useless. But, really, on a fully raging barbarian, they're not struggling for Attack. This would be much more useful if it was a primal bonus to damage.

Strength/Constitution: (2 AP) +1 Strength or Constitution


Tier Five (Requires Barbarian Level 5, Character Level 12, 30 APs spent in tree)

Focus Wide: (2 AP, Requires: Mad Munitions) When you score a vorpal hit, you increase your chance of triggering weapon effects with glancing blows by +10% and gain +10% glancing blow damage for 12 seconds.
I'm not sure this is strong enough to qualify the 2AP cost... maybe add melee power to the Vorpal trigger?

Focused Wrath: (2/2 AP) While raging, increases the critical multiplier of all weapons you use by 1/2 when you roll a natural 19 or 20 that is a confirmed crit hit.
No change needed

Lash Out: (1/1/1 AP) Supreme Cleave has a 50%/75%/82% chance to cause bleeding to damaged enemies, inflicting up to 1/2/3 stacks. This can stack up to 5 times. Your Supreme Cleave also reduces the AC of enemies by 1/2/3 for six seconds. This stacks up to five times.
Bleed damage is rather weak - would be nice to see this scale. My bigger question is - does this still have the stupid feat qualifiers, or will those be taken off?

Accelerated Metabolism: (2 AP) While raging you heal 2d6 hit points every 4 seconds. This healing scales with 100% Melee Power.
While every little bit helps, still a small pittance that would instantly vanish if the player were to Frenzy. Would it be possible to do an ability called "Heartless" where you no longer take Vicious damage?

Tantrum: (2 AP) Tactical Melee Cleave: Expend 25 hit points to activate this ability and attack enemies around you. This deals +5[W] damage and has a 50% to knock down each damage enemy briefly on a failed Fortitude save vs. 10 + Strength modifier + Barbarian Level. Abilities that trigger on Supreme Cleave also trigger on Tantrum. (Blood Trail, Wade In, Lash Out, Sundering Spin, Storm's Eye)
Several questions:
1) Does this still have an expensive feat qualifier that brings this out of range of most pure Barbarians?
2) How will Blood Trail play into this ability? No HP cost, or -10 to the HP cost?
3) The DC is a tough cookie for epic content. Adding Trip modifiers would fix that.

when you were talking about the damage they take. Did you ever consider heal amp? do you understand how it really works? if you have enough amp that small stack with hit you a lot more then a few points. why do you think people liked vampirism or light monks. with amp those 2 abilities turn into great healing for a person. my main with amp and scroll/wand mastery can use a scroll of heal and hit myself for 600+. they normally hit people for like a 100. so now think how amp would apply to these abilities.

[Wulverine]

do we now see the contradiction? I cant edit your posts more or I would delete the contradiction.

it is an option, but its viability in EE mainly is the issue. their defense and self healing is incredibly lagging behind. I don't understand all this about solo/zerg. im more concerned about them being able to survive a fight without being a burden to the group or running around in circles trying to stay alive while the rest of the group picks off the mobs.

Still not seeing the contradiction

The first quote is me saying there's not really an issue if 1 character class is less viable/fun/popular whatever in a byoh game setting. (as opposed to a group setting with other people helping you with occasional heals, or in a static group)

The second quote is me responding to your "why do you want them to be played very little?" question. I'm saying that i never said that, and that that's not something I want. It would just be a side effect of 1 playstyle (zerg/byoh) being more popular in the game, (which the barbarian is less suited for)

[Qhualor]

Still not seeing the contradiction

The first quote is me saying there's not really an issue if 1 character class is less viable/fun/popular whatever in a byoh game setting. (as opposed to a group setting with other people helping you with occasional heals, or in a static group)

The second quote is me responding to your "why do you want them to be played very little?" question. I'm saying that i never said that, and that that's not something I want. It would just be a side effect of 1 playstyle (zerg/byoh) being more popular in the game, (which the barbarian is less suited for)

BYOH extends to groups too. sometimes you have players in groups throwing you a heal, but it is expected to be self sufficient. it may not say it in the lfm anymore, but DDO is a BYOH game now. because its BYOH, barbarian needs a boost to self sufficiency, which is one of the biggest reasons why people stopped playing them. you can get just as good dps and much higher healing from most other classes and are less restrictive or penalizing to self healing. why play a build that may or may not get some heals from others when its easier to roll up almost any build that is easier to keep alive?

I really don't care about zerg. improving the class shouldn't be based on whether or not it is capable of being able to zerg a quest or not. as far as soloing, it takes a different approach and use of tactics in tough content. I was soloing old epics on my barb pre-MOTU. just as long as the heal amp changes give barbs a decent boost in healing self sufficiency than that's all I care about on that subject.

[Scrabbler]

it may not say it in the lfm anymore, but DDO is a BYOH game now. because its BYOH, barbarian needs a boost to self sufficiency

I'd like to see the universal BYOH reversed, but I know it's too late now. (And maybe I helped start it many years ago, as one of the earliest melee Clerics who did more DPS than most Fighters and Barbs).

However, given that BYOH is required for all classes, it'd be better if instead of trying to shoehorn self-healing into every single enhancement tree, they start by putting it in the vendor: create affordable items self-healing items sold for plat, somewhat similar to potions (but are not exactly potions). In many games, they're called "Bandages".

Once they've got that baseline level of self-healing available to every single character build, then the designers can consider if some trees here and there should have additional healing features.

[Wulverine]

BYOH extends to groups too. sometimes you have players in groups throwing you a heal, but it is expected to be self sufficient. it may not say it in the lfm anymore, but DDO is a BYOH game now. because its BYOH, barbarian needs a boost to self sufficiency, which is one of the biggest reasons why people stopped playing them. you can get just as good dps and much higher healing from most other classes and are less restrictive or penalizing to self healing. why play a build that may or may not get some heals from others when its easier to roll up almost any build that is easier to keep alive?

Ahh. Well I disagree that the game is 100% byoh for everyone now. It might be for you and me and in pugs. But there's still people who roleplay, people who play in static groups with actual healers. You might not see them in pug groups but they're still there.
Hell, I run EE Mark of Death daily now. There's a dedicated healer in each run we do even though pretty much everyone is selfhealing. And he's definitely being put to good use
A barbarian with very high dps, higher than selfhealing dps classes, but less efficient selfhealing, would not be out of place in there.

I really don't care about zerg. improving the class shouldn't be based on whether or not it is capable of being able to zerg a quest or not. as far as soloing, it takes a different approach and use of tactics in tough content. I was soloing old epics on my barb pre-MOTU. just as long as the heal amp changes give barbs a decent boost in healing self sufficiency than that's all I care about on that subject.

Alrighty then.
Like I said, I'm fine with giving the barbarian a little bit more self sufficiency, but it's not, not should it be, a core feature of the class. That is still DPS.

[Stoner81]

We will look into the self damage that Vicious causes. To be honest we were on the fence about it, but didn't want to remove too much flavor from the tree.

Sev~

An idea I had for boosting the cap stone...

Pain Is Your Friend - Through constant pain and suffering you now welcome the pain and embrace it! You use the pain to focus yourself and you receive +2 Rages, +2 STR & CON and no longer suffer the ill effects from Viscious. Entering Rage no longer prevents you from doing many things.

This is obviously off the cuff so to speak but you get the idea (yes it is probably over powered but cap stones need to be strong to be worth taking in the first place).

Stoner81.

[Cetus]

I'd say drop these forced self-healing enhancements, increase the barbs damage output by like 25-35%. As it is right now, paladins are way better to play than these enhancements.

With these changes, the barb is scrambling to even compete with pally DPS right now, and we didn't even talk about the defensive differences - where the pally soars ahead.

Make the barb do substantial amounts of damage to compensate for its lack of defenses, instead of throwing all these hitpoints at them.

[Qhualor]

I'd say drop these forced self-healing enhancements, increase the barbs damage output by like 25-35%. As it is right now, paladins are way better to play than these enhancements.

With these changes, the barb is scrambling to even compete with pally DPS right now, and we didn't even talk about the defensive differences - where the pally soars ahead.

Make the barb do substantial amounts of damage to compensate for its lack of defenses, instead of throwing all these hitpoints at them.

because you still need a reliable source of healing. being able to do 25% more damage doesn't matter if your options are CSW pots and SF penalty pots.

[Qhualor]

Ahh. Well I disagree that the game is 100% byoh for everyone now. It might be for you and me and in pugs. But there's still people who roleplay, people who play in static groups with actual healers. You might not see them in pug groups but they're still there.
Hell, I run EE Mark of Death daily now. There's a dedicated healer in each run we do even though pretty much everyone is selfhealing. And he's definitely being put to good use
A barbarian with very high dps, higher than selfhealing dps classes, but less efficient selfhealing, would not be out of place in there.



Alrighty then.
Like I said, I'm fine with giving the barbarian a little bit more self sufficiency, but it's not, not should it be, a core feature of the class. That is still DPS.

the game as a whole is BYOH, not 100%. I know there are roleplayers and you do see actual healers in pugs from time to time, but lets talk about the class and self sufficiency in general. you still need to be able to have something reliable to heal yourself if the healer goes down or you don't want to mess around with broken hires. if this were PnP than roleplaying would hold more water in this discussion but this an MMO. like I said earlier too, you see more healers in raids than you do quests but I have seen and been in plenty of raids where it was take first 11 regardless and go.

yes, dps for FB is the core feature. OS on the other hand is not dps focused. that's a whole different kind of barbarian. I would not be against OS tree having better heal amp and FB having the dps as the core feature. boost FB in dps, OS gets a boost in heal amp and Ravager could be in the middle. seems fair to me, but if we start talking defense that barbs also really need to help mitigate damage than FB should get a much needed boost, OS would have good magical/elements defense and Ravager would be a tier down from FB. what I want to know is why barb DR not getting any attention? that's where it needs to start as barbarians are known to shrug off damage and their DR doesn't translate over to DDO well at all.

[Qhualor]

I'd like to see the universal BYOH reversed, but I know it's too late now. (And maybe I helped start it many years ago, as one of the earliest melee Clerics who did more DPS than most Fighters and Barbs).

However, given that BYOH is required for all classes, it'd be better if instead of trying to shoehorn self-healing into every single enhancement tree, they start by putting it in the vendor: create affordable items self-healing items sold for plat, somewhat similar to potions (but are not exactly potions). In many games, they're called "Bandages".

Once they've got that baseline level of self-healing available to every single character build, then the designers can consider if some trees here and there should have additional healing features.

have to be careful with items that also benefit any other class. if its too good than you might see Rangers or Paladins not need to cast cure spells or bother investing in boosting it if they can get just as good or better items at the vendor. SF pots is exactly the kind of reliable healing barbs need in epics, but its too much of a turn off with the movement speed penalty and the constant -10 to stats and minus to saves. I would rather they put heal amp into the trees so that a CSW pot can heal reliably for minimum 500 hp in epics. anything less isn't enough unless the defense is boosted better to be able to shrug off pain and be able to stay in a fight rather than tuck tail and run or die.

[Grailhawk]

As a reminder, Death Frenzy gives you +1 crit mult on 19-20 rolls, not every crit. This is intentional, and the description should be fixed.

I disagree this needs to be fixed to match the description, or holy sword needs to be nerfed.