Barbarian - Ravager Changes

[Hilltrot]

reading some of these posts make me think either people have never played a barbarian or forgotten what its like to play one.

There were people who played barbarians? When was that? Seriously, are you sure there were people who played barbarians?

Personally, I'd like to see 10 PRR and 10 MRR added at every level they gain DR.

In addition, at every level they gain an additional rage they also gain an additional +2 STR and CON while raging.

Add an epic feat - Perfect Rage - Prerequisite - Might Rage - Barbarian is immune to energy drain, death effects, and anything which allows a fortitude or will save while raging.

I honestly don't think something like this would overpower the barbarian.

[Hilltrot]

This.

PTWF gives 5% doublestrike to your mainhand, which does not differentiate between the different fighting styles, it just gives whatever weapon is in your main hand 5% doublestrike.

You are the first person to accuse him of having an agenda. It is not hard to see that Paladin has the highest DPS. It isn't just about the DPS or saves either. The self healing, and mass amounts of PRR/MRR they can achieve, while still having the highest DPS

My mistake on the first part. PTWF is kinda silly then. I apologize. Not that anyone has ever accepted an apology on this forum.

On the second part, yes, there is an agenda. He didn't post to the forum to propose ways to boost Barbarian damage and the poster I was responding to didn't propose boosting Barbarian damage either. They both wanted Paladins nerfed no matter what as if melee was getting too powerful.

Casters still zerg the entire dungeon and then cast blade barrier or something similar then sit back and mb.

I think holy sword set a new standard for melee damage. I don't believe it is one that should be nerfed. I think it should be matched.

Melee damage has been so ?&%$%# that there have been threads where rangers recommended spike growth as the best DPS a ranger can do.

[MangLord]

Now please make a sorcerer to get heal for 1% of his elemental damage he makes to his opponents

Because it's too difficult to cast a heavy damage AOE, then kite enemies through while you're displaced and hasted, or lock them onto the AOE with a heightened Web or Dancing Ball while using an occasional reconstruct to heal yourself back up to full health? Fleshie sorcerers can't self heal nearly as well, but you can still use scrolls while a barbarian can't.

[MangLord]

theres one thing i want to make clear to people who are doing comparative healing numbers with the proposed heal amp for barbarians. barbarian defense and damage mitigation will be the same after the update as it is now. barbarians are not getting any defense upgrades other than more hp and scaling temporary hp. they are not getting higher will saves. they are not get an improvement to barbarian DR. they are not getting higher AC. they are not getting evasion. one tree is getting a little boost to MRR. barbarians will be still be a wet paper bag, but with more hp.

people really need to understand that just because barbarians are now getting a way to self heal and have all this uber heal amp, doesn't mean they will be more survivable than a paladin or bard or monk or cleric or ranger or any other class that already has high defense, damage mitigation and easy and non restricting self healing. even if the numbers are correct and they are able to heal for more per second, they are still going to be taking a lot of damage. they are front line melees that deal more damage with a group of mobs. they will still be taking physical damage, caster damage and elements damage. their best defense will be taking down mobs as quickly as possible and absorbing all that damage with their hp bloat while button mashing Blood Tribute. they still will only have CSW and penalty SF pots to heal with and the no brainer Blood Strength, Accelerated Metabolism or Ancestral Bond that they either need to be hitting mobs or expending bonds to get the benefit.

reading some of these posts make me think either people have never played a barbarian or forgotten what its like to play one.

I agree completely. Barbarians have pretty wretched will saves, so the proposed healing effects will allow them to retain a decent enough HP pool for those inevitable times that they get caught with a CC spell and can't do anything but eat damage. That was usually when my barbarian died. A high HP pool with some level of self replenishment can only help, and i still see the healer devoting quite a lot of attention to a barbarian in a high level EH quest. Unless you only run EN, there is no way that this is overpowered. I still think it's underpowered for EE, and a barbarian will take far too much damage to be viable even with the best of the proposed changes. Barbs lack some fundamental aspects of EE builds, mainly the self healing, so if we want to see people play barbarians past 20, they really need to be able to vampire off trash.

I think barbarian self healing is perfectly acceptable in terms of flavor. If I could offer an adjustment, I'd like to see a "bloodlust" healing effect that heals the barbarian for more and more per hit the longer they remain in battle. Have you never seen a crazed warrior lick the blood off his axe in comics and movies? Morbid yes, but we're talking about a frenzied warrior from the hinterlands who likely would collect enemy scalps as trophies. The effect could operate similarly to Blitz, just as a defensive healing proc. Activating the effect might give the player a 50% chance to heal 1hp per hit, and stack up into more and more effective healing. Perhaps 2 stacks would offer 1hp per hit, scaling up to a d10 at 10 stacks. Unfortunately, that would penalize slower play styles from reaping the lion's share of benefit, but that could be adjusted by a 1min cooldown, so even flowersniffers could build stacks during tough fights and still lighten the load on their healer friend without a ridiculous cooldown for the party to wait on when they shrine and reach the boss fight. There would be no need to reactivate it if you have a fast play style and wouldn't heavily penalize slower/newer players stopping to pick up collectibles and allow friends to disable traps and open doors. I still feel frantic when I have blitz stacks going. In my opinion, barbarians should always be running recklessly towards the next battle.

It's unfortunate that all classes really need to be self sustaining now, but as a player base, we've forced these changes. From launch, Turbine has given us the tools to form great parties, but the community has been responsible for manipulating the game into what it is now, and there is no going back. At this point in the DDO life cycle, I can't see any other option but to afford barbarians some level of self healing, because it's highly unlikely that the community will shift back to party tactics when its so much easier to roll up the uber character of your choice.

[Takllin]

My mistake on the first part. PTWF is kinda silly then. I apologize. Not that anyone has ever accepted an apology on this forum.

On the second part, yes, there is an agenda. He didn't post to the forum to propose ways to boost Barbarian damage and the poster I was responding to didn't propose boosting Barbarian damage either. They both wanted Paladins nerfed no matter what as if melee was getting too powerful.

Casters still zerg the entire dungeon and then cast blade barrier or something similar then sit back and mb.

I think holy sword set a new standard for melee damage. I don't believe it is one that should be nerfed. I think it should be matched.

Melee damage has been so ?&%$%# that there have been threads where rangers recommended spike growth as the best DPS a ranger can do.

People accept apologies, maybe not a lot, but they do. You attacked his numbers, stating he has an agenda. Starting off being hostile isn't exactly the best way to get people to be nice back to you. It is like trying to yell over someone who is having a debate with you, because you do not want to hear their side.

You can assume he had an agenda, but Grailhawk IIRC hasn't called for Paladin nerfs, or Barbarian buffs. I could be wrong, but I don't believe I've seen him post anything to those topics. He just put the numbers into his DPS calculations and posted them for everyone to see.

Melee is getting too powerful, I don't know what your playstyle is, but I currently run a pure Human Paladin, run EEs almost exclusively, and it is boring how easy the game has become with that character. Casters limitation is their spell point pool, which has become trivialized because somewhat trivialized because of some "features" that have been ignored. Casters have always been like that though.

As for Spike Growth giving Rangers the best DPS...that is laughable and I completely disagree with that, if it is even true.

[Hilltrot]

People accept apologies, maybe not a lot, but they do. You attacked his numbers, stating he has an agenda. Starting off being hostile isn't exactly the best way to get people to be nice back to you. It is like trying to yell over someone who is having a debate with you, because you do not want to hear their side.

You can assume he had an agenda, but Grailhawk IIRC hasn't called for Paladin nerfs, or Barbarian buffs. I could be wrong, but I don't believe I've seen him post anything to those topics. He just put the numbers into his DPS calculations and posted them for everyone to see.

Melee is getting too powerful, I don't know what your playstyle is, but I currently run a pure Human Paladin, run EEs almost exclusively, and it is boring how easy the game has become with that character. Casters limitation is their spell point pool, which has become trivialized because somewhat trivialized because of some "features" that have been ignored. Casters have always been like that though.

As for Spike Growth giving Rangers the best DPS...that is laughable and I completely disagree with that, if it is even true.

My apology was for messing up with PTWF, not for saying Grail had an agenda.

Here you call for a nerf.

"Melee is getting too powerful, I don't know what your playstyle is, but I currently run a pure Human Paladin, run EEs almost exclusively, and it is boring how easy the game has become with that character."

Here you say Caster being OP is perfectly fine and the way it should be.

"Casters limitation is their spell point pool, which has become trivialized because somewhat trivialized because of some "features" that have been ignored. Casters have always been like that though."

So what you're saying is that Grail is just your friendly amateur Mathematician, who instead of donating his time to help people with their taxes for free is going to work out problems in DDO for the soul purpose of intellectual advancement?

Seriously!?

And all his surrogates like you just happen to call for a paladin nerf. Actually, not a paladin nerf, a melee nerf. But casters are ok!

As for Spike growth, I couldn't believe it either, but I was the only one to "yell" about how stupid it was.

[GWolfe]

There were people who played barbarians? When was that? Seriously, are you sure there were people who played barbarians?

Personally, I'd like to see 10 PRR and 10 MRR added at every level they gain DR.

In addition, at every level they gain an additional rage they also gain an additional +2 STR and CON while raging.

Add an epic feat - Perfect Rage - Prerequisite - Might Rage - Barbarian is immune to energy drain, death effects, and anything which allows a fortitude or will save while raging.

I honestly don't think something like this would overpower the barbarian.

That would pretty much only serve to turn barbarians into non spell casting paladins.

[Grailhawk]

My apology was for messing up with PTWF, not for saying Grail had an agenda.

Here you call for a nerf.

"Melee is getting too powerful, I don't know what your playstyle is, but I currently run a pure Human Paladin, run EEs almost exclusively, and it is boring how easy the game has become with that character."

Here you say Caster being OP is perfectly fine and the way it should be.

"Casters limitation is their spell point pool, which has become trivialized because somewhat trivialized because of some "features" that have been ignored. Casters have always been like that though."

So what you're saying is that Grail is just your friendly amateur Mathematician, who instead of donating his time to help people with their taxes for free is going to work out problems in DDO for the soul purpose of intellectual advancement?

Seriously!?

And all his surrogates like you just happen to call for a paladin nerf. Actually, not a paladin nerf, a melee nerf. But casters are ok!

As for Spike growth, I couldn't believe it either, but I was the only one to "yell" about how stupid it was.

My only agenda is knowing what is stronger Barbarian or Paladin. I don't care if one gets nerfed or the other gets buffed just wanted to know which does more damage against a Bag of Hp that does not fight back and is immune to instakills and mortal fear type effects.

[Tilomere]

I agree completely. Barbarians have pretty wretched will saves...

And reflex saves against elemental/spell damage. And even fort saves due to lacking divine grace. That's why you multi-class them with druid for fire shield/shield MRR and FoM, or rogue for evasion, cleric for plate + healing, etc. This is one of the main reasons barbarian needs to be multiclass friendly. A pure 20 paladin which has everything is and will remain straight up more powerful against more or less everything in the game than a pure 20 barb.

But that would be fine if barb allowed interesting and powerful multiclass builds across a variety of levels. The game doesn't start at level 20, or 28 with mortal fear weapons. It starts at 1. It is only important to be "good enough" at 20 or 28, not the best. Besides, the best spot is already reserved for Sorc, so these Barb vs. Pali arguments are just nonsense. If all these Pali's truly felt obligated to only play the most powerful class with the most dps, they would all be playing sorcs instead.

[Qhualor]

And reflex saves against elemental/spell damage. And even fort saves due to lacking divine grace. That's why you multi-class them with druid for fire shield/shield MRR and FoM, or rogue for evasion, cleric for plate + healing, etc. This is one of the main reasons barbarian needs to be multiclass friendly. A pure 20 paladin which has everything is and will remain straight up more powerful against more or less everything in the game than a pure 20 barb.

But that would be fine if barb allowed interesting and powerful multiclass builds across a variety of levels. The game doesn't start at level 20, or 28 with mortal fear weapons. It starts at 1. It is only important to be "good enough" at 20 or 28, not the best. Besides, the best spot is already reserved for Sorc, so these Barb vs. Pali arguments are just nonsense. If all these Pali's truly felt obligated to only play the most powerful class with the most dps, they would all be playing sorcs instead.

sorcs are a whole different thing. even I have said that actual casters like sorcs should have higher damage than the best melee build. I have also said that builds with high burst damage should deal more damage than any other class during that 20 seconds. there used to be a trade off several years ago though. for max dps you were squishier than the class that had decent dps but with better saves or self sufficiency. these days, there is no trade off and the ease of multi classing since the enhancement pass and EDs have made it so. there is just a few classes left that cant get the best of both worlds, but that list is growing shorter and shorter every class pass.

[Nandos]

I think it would be really cool if the developer put in another ability early in the tree to spend rage charges on in addition to the level 20 ability Visage of Terror.

This would give multiclassers who may not want to rage at all something to do with their charges.

[poltt48]

Already thinking about a bard/barb build with bards attack speed and lot of barb changes here and other trees they will be a monster on DPS.

[Takllin]

And reflex saves against elemental/spell damage. And even fort saves due to lacking divine grace. That's why you multi-class them with druid for fire shield/shield MRR and FoM, or rogue for evasion, cleric for plate + healing, etc. This is one of the main reasons barbarian needs to be multiclass friendly. A pure 20 paladin which has everything is and will remain straight up more powerful against more or less everything in the game than a pure 20 barb.

But that would be fine if barb allowed interesting and powerful multiclass builds across a variety of levels. The game doesn't start at level 20, or 28 with mortal fear weapons. It starts at 1. It is only important to be "good enough" at 20 or 28, not the best. Besides, the best spot is already reserved for Sorc, so these Barb vs. Pali arguments are just nonsense. If all these Pali's truly felt obligated to only play the most powerful class with the most dps, they would all be playing sorcs instead.

Except people like to play melee and not just specifically casters...so it is not nonsense.

I agree Paladin will remain more powerful until they either bring them back in line by either nerfing them, or buffing everything else. Id prefer the nerf.

[XxJFGxX]

Except people like to play melee and not just specifically casters...so it is not nonsense.

I agree Paladin will remain more powerful until they either bring them back in line by either nerfing them, or buffing everything else. Id prefer the nerf.

/signed

[btolson]

Also, linking healing to MP isn't that great when MP is limited to mid 50s in FOTW. Make it scale with damage per hit, say every 100 instead will give more choice. More choice means more diversity, and that's a good thing.

I've been thinking about this as well, not just in terms of the MP multiplier disparity but also in terms of TWF vs THF disparity. I think tying it to damage inflicted is going to be necessary to avoid invalidating THF, unless the healing procs on 100% of glancing blows.

The trick is making it work reasonably well in both heroics (when you are hitting for maybe an average of 50) and also in epics (when you are hitting for an average of 500+).

I think the solution is make Blood Strength's healing part constant (to be assured of some useful value in heroics) and part % of damage dealt. Something like:

1d4 + 1d[ damage_dealt / 100 ]


This could be additionally modified to include barb levels, to prevent 5-splash multis from becoming too powerful.

1d4 + 1d[ damage_dealt * barb_levels / (total_levels * 100) ]

[Blackheartox]

Trd to pure barb so that i can join this discussion a bit more.
So far i have nothing against current ravager tree, i like that the scalings will be added but thing i dont understand is tier 5 bully, it seems weak to me.
Overall i forsee big numbers with scaling added from melle power, blitzing selfhealing barb.
Should be quite nice.
But back to bully, 15% more helpless damage as tier 5?
No mercy costs double the ap but gives double benefit and it comes in rogue and monk trees.
What i cant understand is why add bully to tier 5 and give it halve the benefit from monk/rogue.
Should be either changed or made same as no mercy, or made to cost more ap but provided a bigger benefit due to being t5.
Maybe 2 ap per rank and 15% helpless per rank?
I mean barbs only have ear smash without mulitclassing and possible balanced with 2 weapon fight.
IF you make it prereq barb 12 levels and add better helpless or melle power passive, it should be better.

[Teh_Bugbear]

Trd to pure barb so that i can join this discussion a bit more.
So far i have nothing against current ravager tree, i like that the scalings will be added but thing i dont understand is tier 5 bully, it seems weak to me.
Overall i forsee big numbers with scaling added from melle power, blitzing selfhealing barb.
Should be quite nice.
But back to bully, 15% more helpless damage as tier 5?
No mercy costs double the ap but gives double benefit and it comes in rogue and monk trees.
What i cant understand is why add bully to tier 5 and give it halve the benefit from monk/rogue.
Should be either changed or made same as no mercy, or made to cost more ap but provided a bigger benefit due to being t5.
Maybe 2 ap per rank and 15% helpless per rank?
I mean barbs only have ear smash without mulitclassing and possible balanced with 2 weapon fight.
IF you make it prereq barb 12 levels and add better helpless or melle power passive, it should be better.

No, 2 AP is too expensive. There is a reason why he got rid of that.

[Blackheartox]

No, 2 AP is too expensive. There is a reason why he got rid of that.

Still tho, it is dependend on line so you cant take t3 anyways til you drop ap in most stuff in the line, and most isnt good, and then you get only 15% helpless.
Dont know, i personally dont think il spend points on it.
IF it added like 10 melle power passive or something, then maybe, and considering for example do you like pain and i hit back seem really weak i dont know what that line is for.
I like pain seems ok due to the hp/scaling per melle power

[XxJFGxX]

Cruel Cut: (1/1/1 AP) Melee Attack: Deals 1d6/2d6/3d6 extra constitution damage as long as you damage your target. (Cooldown: 30 seconds)

Cooldown seems a bit high maybe. Perhaps lower it by half or near half.


Hate: (1/1/1 AP) Melee Attack: Deals +(1/2/3)[W] damage and generate extra threat. (Cooldown: 15 seconds)

Cooldown needs to be slightly lowered.



Critical Fury: (2 AP) While raging, each hit also grants 1 stack of Fury.

Seems like it's missing something. It's going to be easy to gain fury stacks as is so this is hardly an upgrade. Perhaps increasing the amount of stacks when taking this to 15 or so.


Blood Strength: (2 AP) Each time you land a hit you are healed for 1d4 hit points. Each time you kill an opponent you are healed for 1d20 hit points. This healing scales with 100% Melee Power.

Not bad but add where when you kill an opponent you gain a buff that gives you 5% rage bonus to weapon damage or something.


Also Ravager doesn't get anything passive compared to FB and OS. I say give Ravager PRR bonuses.

[Scrabbler]

...
Cooldown seems a bit high maybe. Perhaps lower it by half or near half.
...
Cooldown needs to be slightly lowered.

Active attacks with a short cooldown and no other activation cost are extremely bad.

If you feel like an active attack should be usable more than once every 15 seconds, change it into a passive toggle effect.