Q-staff barbarian

[Sunnie]

Doable or not? It's either that or a 6/6/8 split with rogue and artificer using repeaters for the past life, but I would like to play a "proper" THFing barbarian once. I just can't stand how two-handed fighting looks in general, it's like staggering around drunkenly. Only the q-staff looks good.


My tentative plan for a q-staff user is 15 barb/3 rogue/2 fighter OR 15 barb/4 rogue/1 fighter. Ravager's Blood Strength will probably be more useful than Staff Specialization from the TA tree, though the increased crit multiplier and threat range would be nice to have. The question is how deep I need to go into the TA tree.
Tier 4 gives access to No Mercy, 30% extra damage to helpless opponents, but loses me a feat from fighter level 2. If No Mercy stacks with Bully from Ravager and Sense Weakness from FotW it would probably be worth it, if they don't stack I believe the extra feat will be better, has someone tested if they stack or not?

Furthermore, with the high attack speed of q-staves and the doublestrike bonus from Quick Strike, how useful are the cleaving feats? I must admit I haven't really followed the development on that front, I recall that cleave and great cleave used to not cause extra attacks from doublestrike, is that still the case?
Does doublestrike cause extra glancing blows on normal attacks? It probably should, but in this game it's sometimes hard to tell.

[LordTigerDawn]

I am playing one right now.

Twelve barb, five rogue, three druid...

Rogue for the staff spec, druid for fatal harrier, rest in barb... Highest eps toon I have played in a long time. I would recommend if going epic lvls, if not your idea would be fun. Staff spec is better if you have sticks with a bigger threat range, they only really show up in epic levels.

Otherwise you only need two rogue lvls... And will regret not just using axes the whole time.

[elcagador]

Rogue splash for traps is always a good option, also can use know the angles for some int to dmg (although very tight on action points, between ravager, frenzied, acrobat, occult and harper). I probably would go with18 barbarian for death frenzy, also blood strength is supposed to work with Barbarian levels so the more Barb levels, the more self heal from that enhancement. Also 2 rogue give you the basic for staff dmg with thieft acrobatics, quick strike and possibly haste boost. Cleaves are always useful for cleaving waves of enemies, also for reset of momentum swing and lay waste on epics. Using heavy armor for prr/mrr would probably be better than using light armor with evasion, but having both options is also good.

If not going with 18 barbarian lvls, then 3 Druid levels for fatal harrier would be another decent option.

[Eth]

I tried a 2 rogue splash with q-staffs on lammania, but wasn't really impressed with it compared to a pure barbarian.
Not saying it's bad, but really not better.

[Blackheartox]

Opener, at least imo, you can hardly call something without cap stone a proper 2 handed barb

[Sunnie]

Opener, at least imo, you can hardly call something without cap stone a proper 2 handed barb

Point taken, but with the [W] and crit profile of q-staves, some rogue or monk levels are needed to boost dps. And hey 75% class levels is better than two out of three, which we all know ain't bad.

Does anyone know if No Mercy, Bully, and Sense Weakness stack? If they do I'm definitely feats towards Stunning Blow.

[painkiller3]

I tried a 2 rogue splash with q-staffs on lammania, but wasn't really impressed with it compared to a pure barbarian.
Not saying it's bad, but really not better.

did the capstone make the difference? or something else? just curious, as I think that since they weakened storm's eye, the traps and attack speed from 2 rogue would be pretty good

[Sunnie]

Good news, everyone!

Sense Weakness stacks with TA's No Mercy.

[Toro12]

I am playing one right now.

Twelve barb, five rogue, three druid...

Rogue for the staff spec, druid for fatal harrier, rest in barb... Highest eps toon I have played in a long time. I would recommend if going epic lvls, if not your idea would be fun. Staff spec is better if you have sticks with a bigger threat range, they only really show up in epic levels.

Otherwise you only need two rogue lvls... And will regret not just using axes the whole time.

'Staves don't have expanded crits till epic'
Very false info

Cheiftans spear , level 4, 19-20
Arylns staff , level 6 , 20x3
Theurgic staff and staff of the seer , level8 , 19-20

So there are plenty of non standard crit sticks for lower levels.