Enhancement feedback project, volume 2: Barbarian

[HatsuharuZ]

My objective here is to give, without questioning anyone's competence or sanity, feedback on enhancements. I'm going to start with artificer, then work my way through the classes in alphabetical order. I'm not going to list all of the enhancements, just the ones that are either very interesting or very much in need of a change, then make a few comments. If anyone feels that they disagree, or have alternate suggestions, please feel free to post them. That's what the forums are for, after all. All comments and opinions made by the OP are talking from the standpoint of a single-classed character.

Note: If you see [enh. a]------->[enh. b] anywhere, that signifies an enhancement line, and that any comments made after that are talking about the entire line. [enh. a] is a prerequisite for [enh. b].

Note 2: I'm not going to list the descriptions of the enhancements, just the names, where they are found, and my comments concerning them. Again, not all enhancement will be listed, just the ones that deserve attention, one way or another.


General Comments:

Barbarians. They get AC penalties and can't cast spells or use most items when raging, but in return they get greatly increased strength and constitution. An ideal frontline melee class. Theoretically, anyways. While they have a lot of interesting offensive and debuffing options, their damage mitigation options are a bit lacking. Also, this class is going to be chugging potions ALOT, since they can't use wands or scrolls when raging, yet there are no enhancements that make their potions more efficient, despite almost every other class having an enhancement that increases the effectiveness of wands and scrolls.

Frenzied Berserker

Comments: To gain access to every ability in this tree, the player needs to take Two-Handed Fighting, Improved Two-Handed Fighting, Power Attack, Slicing Blow, Combat Expertise and Improved Trip. That's 7 feat slots.

[Core Abilities]

1) Frenzy ----> Death Frenzy

Comments: Note that, while these two enhancements cause the user to damage himself when attacking, he is doing at least three times as much damage to the enemy than he is to himself. Bane damage, at that. Unlike "Storm's Eye".

2) Storm's Eye

Comments: This is the FB capstone. Sadly, it's not worth taking at all.Not only does it damage the user, it debuffs AC and to-hit rolls. The cost is ultimately greater than the benefit. This should be replaced by an ability that *lowers* HP costs from barbarian abilities, gives the user healing amplification, or heals the user over time.

[Tier 1]

1) Cracking Attack ----> Body Blow ----> Crazy Strike

Comments: Taking full ranks in C.A. and B.B. turns this ability into a less effective, but higher DC version of Improved Sunder. Crazy Strike, like Storm's Eye debuffs the user more than it buffs him. Also, I don't think PRR penalties are a good idea for barbarians. A barbarian is going to get hit, and anything that reduces his ability to reduce incoming damage is a bad idea.

2) Die Harder

Comments: This could save the user's life. Good idea.

3) Athletics

Comments: I especially like the tier 3 ability.

[Tier 2]

1) Angry Arms ----> Mad Munitions

Comments: It's hard to find abilities that increase glancing blow damage. Nice.

2) Blood Tribute

Comments: Interesting. Also probably necessary for anyone crazy enough to use Storm's Eye.

[Tier 3]

1) Supreme Cleave ----> Blood Trail

Comments: S.C. is a very popular ability. I don't understand why Blood Trail is capped at 10 temporary hit points, though. They only last up to 6 seconds, and how often does one get surrounded by 10 enemies?

[Tier 4]

1) Wade In

Comments: Eh, I suppose this is useful, up to a point. Considering that barbarians tend to have very high strength and full BAB, do they even *need* the extra to-hit?

2) Exhausting Blow

Comments: Not a bad debuffing ability.

[Tier 5]

1) Focused Wrath

Comments: Crit multiplier! Yum~

2) Lash Out

Comments: I like the ability, although I don't understand why it requires Slicing Blow. Slicing Blow isn't very useful when the barbarian already has a much better enhancement in the Ravager Tree; "Cruel Cut".

3) Tantrum

Comments: This is very powerful, certainly, but I don't think I want to use up two feat slots for it when one of those feat slots is Combat Expertise, which dispels rage effects.


Occult Slayer

Comments: I like this tree, since it gives the user lots of defensive bonuses, which barbarins really need. However, the "Weapon Bond" mechanic can put the user in a difficult position if they run content with lots of enemies that have DR, or have very little gear to choose from.

[Core Abilities]

1) Weapon Bond

Comments: This is okay. Still, it's one of the many to-hit bonuses in the game, and not really that useful. Very cheap cost, though.

2) Elemental Defense

Comments: Seeing as it can only occur once every 12 seconds, is it necessary to have the "25% chance"?

3) Blank Thoughts

Comments: I like it~

4) Force Ward

Comments: Only a 5% chance to ignore force damage? And only force damage? Kind of meager for a high level core ability.

5) Mind Over Magic

Comments: Very nice, but it's missing something... like a saves bonus, or an improvement to Force Ward or Elemental Defense.

[Tier 1]

1) Ear Smash ----> Knockout

Comments: Good anti-caster abilities.

[Tier 2]

1) Anti-Magic Boost

Comments: This is a lot less effective than a Saves Boost.

2) Lessons of Travel ----> Kinetic Bond

Comments: Why does kinetic bond have LoT as a prerequisite? Otherwise I have no complaints about these.

[Tier 3]

1) Arcane Encumbrance

Comments: Too bad it doesn't work more often, or have a component that does.

[Tier 4]

1) Viscous Strike

Comments: I haven't tried this one. Does it work on bosses?

[Tier 5]

1) Vampiric Bond

Comments: I read the name and thought "like a vampirism weapon?", but was disappointed when I read that it was only temporary HP. Oh well.

2) Metalline Bond

Comments: Yet another enhancement with a misleading name. The problem with this enhancement is that if you need it, you might not have it, and if you don't have it, then it's hard to get it since the Weapon Bond charges up only when the user *damages* an enemy. Sometimes you don't damage an enemy if they have DR, due to a low damage roll. This one needs to be changed a bit.

3) Toughness

Comments: This is a first-tier enhancement in at least 3 other trees that I can think of.


Ravager

Comments: This tree was an attempt, I think, at a debuffing and crowd-control barbarian. Some it is useful, but the fixed DCs of some of the abilities pretty much killed the idea. It's not unusable, though.

[Core Abilities]

1) Furious Rage

Comments: "Fury" is a competence bonus. The "Deadly" and "Accuracy" items that show up in randomly-generated loot are both competence bonuses. "Fury" stacks up to 10 times. "Deadly" and "Accuracy" both appear as a +10 bonus. "Fury" lasts six seconds. "Deadly" and "Accuracy" are permanent. Which one of these are actually going to be used? Not to mention "Fury" only happens when you miss, which is increasingly unlikely as one gets better gear and buffs.

2) Pain Touch

Comments: This is untyped damaged. For some reason, it can only happen once per second, which prevents it from happening on doublestrikes. Very strange, especially when druids, rangers and rogues get similar enhancements which do not have the same restriction.

3) Demoralizing Success

Comments: I like the idea, but I don't like the fixed DC.

4) Visage of Terror

Comments: An instakill? Great. It uses up a use of Rage? Alright, that's fair. However, the capstone doesn't have an interesting passive ability that would make me want to take two more barbarian levels. The strongest capstones are, generally, the ones that have a passive ability.

[Tier 1]

1) Ritual Scarring

Comments: Interesting. However, 3 PRR really isn't much...

2) Hate ----> Mutilate

Comments: The best part about this ability is the charisma damage. Evil damage is not going to affect most enemies, who are mostly evil, and extra threat is not very useful for a barbarian, which is a class that has intimidate as a class skill.

3) Do You Like Pain? ----> I Like Pain ----> I Hit Back! ----> Bully

Comments: No-save debuffs are always welcome. As is temporary HP. However, "I Hit Back!" is chaotic damage, and there are more than a few chaotic enemies in this game. It might be best if it were changed to force damage. "Bully", however, shouldn't have all of these prerequisites. After all, it's a fifth-tier ability, and I don't think any of the other enhancements that do the exact same thing in other classes have so many prereqs.

[Tier 2]

1) Fear Me! ----> Aura of Fear

Comments: This would be useful if the DC scaled at all, or was somehow linked to the user's intimidate skill. The Aura of Fear seems worthwhile, though.

2) Cruel Cut ----> Festering Wound ----> Dismember

Comments: Cruel Cut by itself is very good to have. Not sure about Festering Wound, but I can think of a few self-healing mobs it would be good against. Dismember though, is way too random. It would be perfect if the chance of chaotic damage was removed, though.

[Tier 3]

1) Slaughter ----> Laughter

Comments: If it worked, Slaughter would be useful, especially with Adrenaline. Laughter however is only as useful as Fury.

[Tier 4]

No comments

[Tier 5]

No comments

[lyrecono]

hi,

good initiative! barbs need some love,
An enhancement line that gives healing amp using potions and ignoress the negative effects of silver flame potions would help a bit

as for your take on feats:

Frenzied Berserker

Comments: To gain access to every ability in this tree, the player needs to take Two-Handed Fighting, Improved Two-Handed Fighting, Power Attack, Slicing Blow, Combat Expertise and Improved Trip. That's 7 feat slots.

what barbarian would pass up cleave and greatcleave? not only gives it acces to the epic crit feat, wich they need a lot but lay waste needs cleave to work (not that every FB uses that destiny, it is usefull to say the least)

[HatsuharuZ]

hi,

good initiative! barbs need some love,
An enhancement line that gives healing amp using potions and ignoress the negative effects of silver flame potions would help a bit

as for your take on feats:

Frenzied Berserker

Comments: To gain access to every ability in this tree, the player needs to take Two-Handed Fighting, Improved Two-Handed Fighting, Power Attack, Slicing Blow, Combat Expertise and Improved Trip. That's 7 feat slots.

what barbarian would pass up cleave and greatcleave? not only gives it acces to the epic crit feat, wich they need a lot but lay waste needs cleave to work (not that every FB uses that destiny, it is usefull to say the least)

I just don't like feat prerequisites, period. I do like to put in the Overwhelming Critical line whenever possible, though.

Thank you for posting, by the way. It's nice to know someone took the time to read this

[lyrecono]

in all honesty, there is no reason to go barb 20 anyway, the current capstone is utterly terrible, getting 2 levels of fighter might at least allow you to get the cleave line.
2 rogue adds evasion, skill points and umd. you could be the scroll healer for the real EE Stormreaver tank.
Too bad that death frenzy requires lv 18 barb, going rogue 6/8 would really help to create a evasion barb, a angry stick wielding build perhaps?
half orc q-staf rog/barb, power attack, cleaves, trip, sneak attack, attack speed, decent ref save&evasion, ok hp,
it could be made to work, at least for a heroic tr life.

Getting of course here....

nice initiative, i hope someday a dev will read it.....

[Vargouille]

Thanks for the continued feedback.

[CaptainSpacePony]

I have to admit, I have had no interest in playing a barbarian since the enhancement pass. 3 lvls is a very nice DPS splash, but other than that no thanks.

As the OP seems to indicate, many of the enhancements have contraindicated prereqs or small payoffs with big costs associated. While risk/reward tension can breed interest and excitement (vicious for example) the barb trees are overloaded with these contrasts and overall just don't have big enough upsides to make me even want to give it a dedicated effort.

[Qhualor]

Storms Eye I don't feel is worth taking either. AC isn't what it used to be and players shouldn't have trouble hitting mobs, especially barbs. 100 hp to use is too high and on top of that, you are continuously taking damage that will also stack with Frenzy and Death Frenzy. basically you are killing yourself for such a very poor return. in EEs you would last a whole 5 seconds after using it and with every other damaging enhancement you have going at the same time.

the thing I don't like about Crazy Strike is that you lose so much PRR. barbs are already getting penalized for AC, which is not a big deal the way AC is now, but also one of the few easy ways to boost a barbs much needed defense? barbs are going to take a lot of damage regardless with their brutal nature, but in DDO they need that PRR. everything else about the line is good. increasing the (W) damage is perfect for a barb. reducing the Fortitude saves on mobs I look at it as helping your party memebers reduce mob saves to hit them with what they got for spells or whatever. debuffing mobs is a good thing, except again, lowering AC on mobs is not a big deal.

Die Harder just makes you have a chance to get back on your feet in time to die. I can see it rarely having its benefits, but in upper levels you don't become unconscious hardly ever. you either die or survive. much rather spend my points somewhere else that is more useful.

the only thing good about Athletics is the tier 3 movement speed. its a waste of points just to get to that tier. Balance, Jump and Swim are all strength skills and a barb is already going to have a high strength anyways, or at least they should unless you are a dwarf barb focused on Throw Your Weight Around. but even then they should have a high strength anyways. by the time I hit 20 my barbs already have a high balance and jump. I always invest in them each level up but since 30 is the cap, not much sense in putting more than 20 in. swim has no real use in DDO. only a few quests I know of that make it at best useful.

Blood Tribute is useful, but its temporary hp. barbs need temporary hp like they need 2 left hands.

Blood Trail. see above

Wade In is meh. barbs don't need to worry about a bonus to attack.

Lash Out is nice, but yes, I would rather have Cruel Cut.

would love to have Tantrum, but I wont use 2 feats for a tier 5 enhancement. cost is too high.

I don't know much about OS because I haven't tried leveling through one, but I will say unless you actually invest in Weapon Bond, its pretty useless for barbs who focus on FB or Ravager. the stacks are easy to build and you would never use them all before the end of the quest. only reason why a barb has to take Weapon Bond is for Extend Rage and Earsmash. most times I forget to even use Weapon Bond because I already have a bout a dozen other boosts and whatnot im hitting.

agree on Furious Rage but also will add it deadly doesn't stack with ship buff unless the combat log is lying to me.

Demoralizing Success actually procs a lot in epics. its a nice debuff.

wont use Visage of Terror. my rages are needed and wont take a chance at a save just to lose a rage. cost is too high and other classes have instakills with no penalty.

Ritual Scarring...haggle... lol Ill trade haggle for 10x more PRR.

Hate and Mutilate is actually quite good for a barb. if you play a barb you will have agro no problem as long as you are focused with a lot of offensive abilities. intimidate and threat are 2 different things. intimidate you are trying to get the attention of mobs and threat you will get the attention of mobs if it is higher than the other party members.

Do You Like Pain? again AC lol, but 150 temporary hp is useful and also gone almost immediately. I like the idea of force damage better than chaotic damage, but im taking Bully because most of the line is pretty good and with only 2 tier 5 enhancements, im taking both anyways.

Fear Me actually procs pretty good in epics, not great but it works. think the DC does need to be boosted.

Festering Wound is good, but mobs losing heal amp? how many actually try to heal up or have casters in their group healing them? this does need to be changed. Dismember is random and I don't like random affects. I like to know what kind of damage im dealing, but at least all of the random damages are good and not like random elements damage.

not a fan of Laughter. I don't use it and wouldn't mind seeing it replaced with something better.

[lyrecono]

nice initiative, i hope someday a dev will read it.....

Thanks for the continued feedback.

WOW!

Scroll down to avoid wall of text

welll, since one is reading it...
in PnP we recomended the barb for new players getting into the game, not to much tactics, just rage and smash,
wel, it's easier then a wizard or rogue for the first time around.
The barb needs a lot of work to be made workeble in epics,
Defence, in the form of dodge/prr and inate dr needs to be a lot better for it to be usefull in epics.
But! thats not the biggest problem the barbarian class faces, it's his damage output;
An example: in heroics a well build and well equiped barbarian can destroy an enemy faster then it can estroy him, thats the trade of, low defence vs high dps output.
In epic elites the mob's hp is so high that a barbarian can't take m down before getting to much damage himself.
The trade of is gone.
Now a fighter/paladin/monk combo (eg, the cetus build) has far higher saves/far better dodge/prr and pretty high dps. It gains a big crit mod too.

I'm not gone cry about it, atleast there is a change to play allong with friends whille melee-ing, even if it is a hybrid (melee/ranged) build.

The barb could use more passive dps (instead of more clickies) and a far better capstone.
I would like frenzy to be a on/off clicky (like the epic past live double strike) and impr frenzy a passive boost to the first one. make it scale with level (even epic level)to compensate for their low dps at higher levels.
The capstone dissapears when below 50%, with their playstyle and low defences thats about 10 seconds into the quest, esp if it costs 100 hp to activate.
Tantrum looks realy nice on paper but requires 2 feats and int 13 early enough to take it, not realy a smart idea for barbs, they lack feats and stat points for it.
Abilities that trigger on Supreme Cleave also trigger on Tantrum. (Blood Trail, Wade In, Lash Out, Sundering Spin)
Blood Trail is to low for epics to be usefull,
Wade In, no barb should have trouble hitting with all the str bonus,
Lash Out, too weak and requires another feat not commenly chosen.
Sundering Spin, cleave is required, but again, thight on feats, and no barb should need a bonus to hit.

Tantrum would be nice if all the effects would have gone of on all the cleave attacks, incl lay waste&momentum swing.
Lifting the feat presiquites would realy help barbs out
Another point is the saves. as a front line melee the hp pool is no longer suficient to take the ref save spell hits in EE's, nor can they pump up their ref saves enough without loosing too much of what should have been their defining characteristic: the high dps


In short:
It needs more dps, more passive core abileties instead of clickies, more survilal options and less feat prereq's

Now that we have a dev reading it, i hope he/she takes the advice seiously

[Scraap]

Thinking aloud here, but: If they altered rage the rage mechanic it's self to self-stack, toned down the time an individual one is up, and they regened like wings or smites (perhaps as a capstone, perhaps as an innate ability to the class), I wonder if that wouldn't help some of the core issues a bit, or at least open up some interesting tech they could tack new or revised enhancements onto, in addition to making it a more situationally-derived choice of when to pump up.

[lyrecono]

you mean a frenzied berserker making rage stronger in a pasive manner?
that sounds good,
on the other hand, the regen thing is a bad idea, we usualy build barbs to be in permanent rage (to compensate for being as sturdy as wet paper.making it the same mechanic as smithes or wings would by no means enough to perma rage through quests.
The barb already has a mechanic for short term dps on a timer, it's called cleave, great cleave, supreme cleave, tantrum and in the case of LD-->laywaste&momentum swing.

For a barbarian it's not a choice when to rage, at a certain point he should be perma raged just to survive

[barecm]

Barbs need help. I am struggling with trying to find a build I can do just to get the barb life out of the way let alone play the class longer than just to TR.

[Qhualor]

Thinking aloud here, but: If they altered rage the rage mechanic it's self to self-stack, toned down the time an individual one is up, and they regened like wings or smites (perhaps as a capstone, perhaps as an innate ability to the class), I wonder if that wouldn't help some of the core issues a bit, or at least open up some interesting tech they could tack new or revised enhancements onto, in addition to making it a more situationally-derived choice of when to pump up.

I could go with regenerating rages. A barb without rage loses a lot of DPS. Paladins can regenerate LOHs in EDs so maybe should be put in FOTW instead.

[Khurse]

There should be a level 18 or 20 ability that lets Barbs use SLA's and spells/scrolls while raged.
I completely understand the reason that Barbs originally weren't given this, but with the power levels now in the game I don't see this as being even a little unbalanced.

I think this in addition to some mitigation buffs, as well as some minor increased DPS.
The fact that Fury doesn't stack with one of the most common loot gen prefix/suffix items in the game is one of the things that really suggest different design teams really don't talk to each other.

[Seikojin]

I think all three trees are seriously lacking. I like some of the concepts, however like everyone else has mentioned, they all are weighted down by costs that are too extreme solo class or multi.

When I look at the three trees, I see a path not really explored: TWF. Occult slayer and ravager does not have anything against twf, however it should have something to benefit it for those barbs who want to twf.

I think all core abilities should be rage based. Since barbs are about raging.

Frenzied berserker should have massive prr and dr boosts while raging. They should have diminishing costs for hp hitting abilities (like vicious), doublestrike boosts, PA boosts, crit multiplier boosts, glancing blow boosts and effects (like glancing blow stuns). Split that tree into singe target attacking, and one for multi target attacking. Capstone should be +1[w]/stack instead of flat damage.

Occult slayer: I like most of the weapon bond idea, I do think it needs tweaking. And I think you should get bond while raging (buildup). Also I think it should favor TWF barbs with some passives and boosts for twf. Perhaps a multi cleave proc ability, or a cleave reset ability. Capstone should be improved to offer elemental absorption, immunities to crowd control (activate), and the SR boosting.

Ravager: Overall, some decent abilities, but not enough to warrant going for the tree fully. This could use more abilities, perhaps some click abilities, like extra cleaves or attacks that stun or debuff. The capstone should be an aoe attempt since everything will save eventually, and the dc isn't soo hard that it will be bad foe ee and nameds obviously won't suffer from it.. Like a barb wail of the banshee. Have it debuff nameds and bosses.

[Qhualor]

There should be a level 18 or 20 ability that lets Barbs use SLA's and spells/scrolls while raged.
I completely understand the reason that Barbs originally weren't given this, but with the power levels now in the game I don't see this as being even a little unbalanced.

I think this in addition to some mitigation buffs, as well as some minor increased DPS.
The fact that Fury doesn't stack with one of the most common loot gen prefix/suffix items in the game is one of the things that really suggest different design teams really don't talk to each other.

No. This would only promote more unbalance. Barbs need enhancements that can boost healing from pots, better defense in dodge and prr and better potions than SF and CSW. I would love to see an enhancement or in FOTW where barbs can life steal enemies to gain back HP.

[Khurse]

How would this promote unbalance? Giving a Barb (with at least 18 barb levels,or heck even 20) the same ability to self heal as a Centered ESOS wielding Earth Stance Monk/Fighter isn't going to have a bunch of players switch over to the barbs. The Monk/Kensai split is still better.
Heck (arguably) the two best melee "splashes" right now are Monk and Paladin, neither of which is available for the barb (obviously)
Giving barbarians the ability to fire off a heal scroll or reconstruct in return for investing 18-20 levels into the Barbarian class is in no way unbalancing to the current endgame build melee toons.

[SisAmethyst]

How would this promote unbalance? Giving a Barb (with at least 18 barb levels,or heck even 20) the same ability to self heal as a Centered ESOS wielding Earth Stance Monk/Fighter isn't going to have a bunch of players switch over to the barbs. The Monk/Kensai split is still better.
Heck (arguably) the two best melee "splashes" right now are Monk and Paladin, neither of which is available for the barb (obviously)
Giving barbarians the ability to fire off a heal scroll or reconstruct in return for investing 18-20 levels into the Barbarian class is in no way unbalancing to the current endgame build melee toons.

Only because monk splash are in general already unbalanced, doesn't mean we have to bork the others too. In your example the monk splash is the issue, not the barb. So I agree with others that the goal should be to keep it barb centric by providing regenerating rages, prr and dr boosts while raging or better absorption, immunities in case of Occult slayer line.

[Qhualor]

How would this promote unbalance? Giving a Barb (with at least 18 barb levels,or heck even 20) the same ability to self heal as a Centered ESOS wielding Earth Stance Monk/Fighter isn't going to have a bunch of players switch over to the barbs. The Monk/Kensai split is still better.
Heck (arguably) the two best melee "splashes" right now are Monk and Paladin, neither of which is available for the barb (obviously)
Giving barbarians the ability to fire off a heal scroll or reconstruct in return for investing 18-20 levels into the Barbarian class is in no way unbalancing to the current endgame build melee toons.

First of all it goes totally against PnP barbs. I know DDO is not PnP but it is used as a guide at least.

Secondly, a barb dealing the kind of damage he does plus able to use scrolls would be too OP. They would be practically unstoppable and only not using good tactics would they be at just as much risk of dying as a divine or self healing caster.

Thirdly, the other builds are too OP with 0 loss for 100% advantage in DPS and self sufficiency. With the way trees, EDs and character customization flexibility is set up in the game now, they have too much power for no real sacrifice.

And lastly, I would consider the class broken. The balance needs to stay in check not make it worse. I think my suggestions are right in line keeping the balance and making them more survivable in epics.

[aristarchus1000]

The class could use an update.

That said, I really want to discourage the devs from trying to balance the class based on EE content. The reality is that most people don't play EE, and the few that do are willing to play tweaked builds because that is what they enjoy. Barbarians don't compete with paladin/monk/fighter super-optimized multiclass builds in 20+ EE but that has as much to do with a content problem over a build problem.

In my opinion, Barbarians should be easy to play (in a group with some support). Not too many clickies, just go out and hit things. It allows the beginner to pay attention to his/her surrounds and learn the game from a strong foundation. Ideally it will fill a role well if it is strong through the early heroic content and viable until 20 and a good contributer (perhaps not top) in 20+ content for EN and EH.

[Seikojin]

The class could use an update.

That said, I really want to discourage the devs from trying to balance the class based on EE content. The reality is that most people don't play EE, and the few that do are willing to play tweaked builds because that is what they enjoy. Barbarians don't compete with paladin/monk/fighter super-optimized multiclass builds in 20+ EE but that has as much to do with a content problem over a build problem.

In my opinion, Barbarians should be easy to play (in a group with some support). Not too many clickies, just go out and hit things. It allows the beginner to pay attention to his/her surrounds and learn the game from a strong foundation. Ideally it will fill a role well if it is strong through the early heroic content and viable until 20 and a good contributer (perhaps not top) in 20+ content for EN and EH.

I think Barbs should be a monster on the field, but have very little utility outside of dps. I do agree that they need some pot healing amp capabilities, and what I mentioned above. But I don't think the tooling on them should be EE focused either. Difficulty in quests are typically approached from group play.