Rage and combat expertise

[JIŘÍ]

Barbarians got overtuned whenever it got its buff. Vanilla rage is super strong with all benefits and no AC loss, barbarians get evasion, bonus feats, only need 21str/con so you can get epic rage and epic dr without any issue, +2AC.

Though at this point its hard to take away what has been given.

theminor nerfs of kind like disabling CE in a rage would make their players to think what they will use at the moment, more Ac or more striking power.

[Zkenic]

Here is my sample barbarian build. It has everything. It has high AB, high damage, high AC, high saves, huge HP, high DR, regen, expose weakness.

http://nwn2db.com/build/?327026

I was bored and made a second one focused solely on high strength and AB. Note IKD +20, super high AB, high damage, high AC, high saves, still has huge HP, moderate DR (5 instead of 15), high saves, dr, expose weakness.

http://nwn2db.com/build/?327063

[c2k]

A lot of Barbarian buffs were given because the gear they would use to get close to the viability of a fighter is not allowed on this server.

The power creep from gear in general though is making it seem like these buffs were unwarranted.

You were always able to CE while raging, its part of the generic code, and frankly, while its perhaps not up to PnP standards, its not great when you could be using better modes.

Nerfing the CE/rage thing won't impact barbarian one bit, because all you are doing is removing a counter-intuitive strategy. You are just better off with Power Attack.

[Deragnost]

Barbarians are a lot stronger in PnP, so I'm not sure why we want to nerf them even further here..?

[Steve]

I think it would be awesome that when a Barbarian rages, they become an uncontrollable war machine, and the Player can no longer WASD or click to move the PC until Rage ends. The Barbarian PC just randomly attacks whatever is within some range/perception—or the Player can select a mob to switch focus, but... colleagues beware (!) because even getting to close could get you whacked a bit as well! lol. Kinda like what happens with a Confusion spell but without the aimlessly walking or standing still part.

Now this would make sense! Because if one is arguing that a Barbarian cannot concentrate to have CE, then how about how one can set off Rage, but then just stand there and emote/converse about the color of the sky (essentially a rage-non-rage moment).

I'll let myself out....

[Bobthehero]

That's frenzy, really, if only it was worth it X.X

[mrm3ntalist]

Here is my sample barbarian build. It has everything. It has high AB, high damage, high AC, high saves, huge HP, high DR, regen, expose weakness.

http://nwn2db.com/build/?327026

I was bored and made a second one focused solely on high strength and AB. Note IKD +20, super high AB, high damage, high AC, high saves, still has huge HP, moderate DR (5 instead of 15), high saves, dr, expose weakness.

http://nwn2db.com/build/?327063

Typical number crunching. The reality is much different though.

- Evasion does not work with medium/heavy armors and evasion is far more important than EW since it is the difference between soloing bosses and epic areas. A player with some experience with Barbarians would not equip such armors, instead would settle with light armors even if that means losing some AC - at least 2.

- Your STR build does not take into account the ability caps. The ability cap is what limits the bonus of rage AND maxing single stats and allows barbs to spread ability points between different categories.

- It would be indicative of the power of the barbarian class if you posted the stats with and without rage. Because rage has limited uses and without rage a barbarian is weaker than a plain fighter.

MaA26/X4, Dwarven Defenders, High CON defensive WMs, even STR rangers and WIS monks, all outperform barbarians regarding PvE content mostly because they can sustain high stats longer ( or repeatedly in the case of MaA). Most of those builds would also mop the floor in tournaments like the one that triggered this thread/players. Of course a raging barbarian should be stronger when raging while being average when not.

[Zkenic]

Here is my sample barbarian build. It has everything. It has high AB, high damage, high AC, high saves, huge HP, high DR, regen, expose weakness.

http://nwn2db.com/build/?327026

I was bored and made a second one focused solely on high strength and AB. Note IKD +20, super high AB, high damage, high AC, high saves, still has huge HP, moderate DR (5 instead of 15), high saves, dr, expose weakness.

http://nwn2db.com/build/?327063

Typical number crunching. The reality is much different though.

- Evasion does not work with medium/heavy armors and evasion is far more important than EW since it is the difference between soloing bosses and epic areas. A player with some experience with Barbarians would not equip such armors, instead would settle with light armors even if that means losing some AC - at least 2.

- Your STR build does not take into account the ability caps. The ability cap is what limits the bonus of rage AND maxing single stats and allows barbs to spread ability points between different categories.

- It would be indicative of the power of the barbarian class if you posted the stats with and without rage. Because rage has limited uses and without rage a barbarian is weaker than a plain fighter.

MaA26/X4, Dwarven Defenders, High CON defensive WMs, even STR rangers and WIS monks, all outperform barbarians regarding PvE content mostly because they can sustain high stats longer ( or repeatedly in the case of MaA). Most of those builds would also mop the floor in tournaments like the one that triggered this thread/players. Of course a raging barbarian should be stronger when raging while being average when not.

Yes you could swap mithral fullplate for mithral chainmail, it would drop your AC by 2. That is fine. Against melee only bosses swap back to your MFP. It is super easy to swap between them, and your strength is more than high enough to carry both armors around. For example, fire giant boss, yuanti queen, balor (though he does have a wizard add), earth elemental boss all can use the +2AC. For the draco-lich, green dragon, white dragon, black dragon swap to the mithral chainmail. Anytime you smash a chest, put on the chainmail. etc

Strength does put in the cap. The +12 cap is for temporary bonuses, which epic feats and stat bumps from leveling do not count towards. You get 30 base strength that way, 10 from rage, +2 from an item, so 42 str which is +16. I did the caps proper on both builds, assuming a ring of might +2str/con and +10 from rage.

Yes barbarians are weaker while not raging. That being said, duration and number of rages is easily maintainable 100% of the time while fighting. There are two different items that give extended and extra rage. One is a neck slot, which is free because of ice troll beserker feat for example. Pick one of them. Build one duration with one of those items is 8(base)+12(con)+5(extended rage) = 25 rounds. 8 times a day, so 200 rounds, ie 20 minutes. Duration for strength build 8(base)+9(con)+5(extended rage) = 22 rounds. 8 times a day, 176 rounds, ie 17.5 minutes. Both of those are above the length between resting, and of course you arent in combat 100% of the time, so with the downtime of running around and looting chests or the like you should always have rage ready for PvP or PvE big boy bosses. The managing of rages and timing can be annoying, but that annoyance exists with every build that requires resource management. We do not claim wizard builds are shit because they can run out of spells. I should mention again, like I did in my first post, that I actually do not like managing resources on melee builds, which is why I only ever played one high level barbarian and now mostly stick to fighters.

MaA26/X4, Dwarven Defenders, High CON defensive WMs, even STR rangers and WIS monks, all outperform barbarians regarding PvE content mostly because they can sustain high stats longer ( or repeatedly in the case of MaA). Most of those builds would also mop the floor in tournaments like the one that triggered this thread/players. Of course a raging barbarian should be stronger when raging while being average when not.

This is all debatable speculation. A 60AC uncanny dodge barbarian would have done very well against the winner of the recent tournament (with the ninja burst attacks being the main winner). MaA26/X4 is a slower and steadier build in PvE compared to the offense and defense combo of the barbarian. Dwarven Defenders are good yeah, do not see how that has anything to do with the overtuning of barbarians. Strength rangers have their own issues (hips only some places, having to buff to be useful, only good against favored enemies etc), wisdom monks also have some of their own issues and usually do better PvE against weaker mobs that they can cruise through. If you want you can make a build and we can compare it to my barbarian builds, but until then this is all just naval gazing.

[mrm3ntalist]

Its not theory-crafting for me. I actually play these builds - have been for many years. Put on CE/ICE on a STR/CON barbarian and see how "maintainable" the rage uses are against epic content - especially bosses. If you account for a tower shield - which you included in your calcs - not only lowers AB but you dont get the extra damage when 2 handed, then you see how fast the rages go by. There is only one build in which CE/ICE would make sense while raging and I think somebody mentioned something about it before. A barbarian ( whirlwind rage)20/Dervish 10. That build eats bosses with its burst damage when Rage/Dervishdance+1000cuts/ICE are combined. Only then a barbarian with ICE can actually hit consistently and "maintain" rage. Otherwise you would wish for a rest midway. I play both barbarian builds (barbarian25/Battlerager5 no CE/ICE, Barbarian20/Dervish10 with CE/ICE) and the latter is ugly like i mentioned before. It eats up the balor like its nothing with no umd or healing. But it is not the Barbarian class or ICE but the combination of it with the Dervish prc which more than negates the penalties from ICE and also gives the barbarian what it lacks most- Burst damage. Thats the only change I would make. MAke barbarians disqualified from picking the Dervish PRC, or have rage not work with the dervish dance - which in my eyes it shouldnt based on the description.

I dont know if i have to say anything here about dwarven defenders. I can remind those that were around for the Triel tournament, when my dwarven defender Didri literally mopped the floor with every contender. Only an FS who had to go away, buff and come back to fight managed to beat this character and again it came down to the last blow. Regarding the PvE content dwarven defenders really are invisible against anything on this server, anything a dm throws against it and is the only melee character that i have seen legitimately go toe-to-toe with the white dragon. KArond's Dwarven defender could not beat the white dragon only due to the low damage.

Now if you have issues with rage tell me how you explain MaA's Challenge (+5Ab, +5Damage, +5Will at level 25) which can literally be "maintained" (sic) for ever. In combination with Demoralize opponent and shield slam, CHA synergy for EDM and saves it will eat through all content. Especially if the four levels are of Blackguard (Aura of despair). Players are so much sleeping on the potential of MaA that when they see someone play it always ask for the build.

tl;dr CE/ICE is not an issue here. Only one build combo can actually benefit from it and i can see something being done for the rage/dervish dance combo. For everyone else, CE/ICE does more harm than good. The Barbarian/Fighter build you mentioned would be problematic if you could squeeze in all 12 fighter levels and get epic rage - which you cant. The issue here are players' egos since they feel its not ok when their characters gets beaten by a raging barbarian... Seeing how the trend on BG currently works, after the next tournament we can have Dwarven defenders and MaA nerfed because they will beat into submission the characters of the players asking for nerfs. Then do the same for defensive focused WMs and maybe monks who i dont play a lot but i seen both a Wisdom and dex monk do some -really- nasty things to characters that took part in a Roaring Shore tournament.

Finally, i left last the comment you made about rangers. I dont think anyone played rangers more than I have and Hips have nothing to do with rangers. They are High BAB fighters and they dont need it to be a perfectly balanced class without it. HIPS is what makes a ranger lethal when outdoors. Nothing can beat a ranger outdoors because it can control every aspect of the environment - enemy position through track, initiative since he can choose when to attack from hips, shitload of damage from range and finally high movement - increased speed when outdoors and full speed hips. Again, there is nothing that can kill a ranger other than bad luck or lack of skill. When indoors, it is still a 52+AC fighter with 12 attacks and a lot of damage against FEs ( which can cover all pve content or focus more for pvp or balance between the 2 which i prefer ). Then it is a matter or rolls and wherever a 330hp ranger with 12 attacks and high damage can beat a char with double the hp, 6 attacks and moderate damage.

Finally - for real this time - there is no point in theory crafting more on this by sending builds back and forth. You can always go "but i can get 2 ac from here and +2 damage from there and it this and if that". We can go and practice how insignificant ICE is for barbarians, in game right now. But i assume that you dont have characters with such builds otherwise we wouldnt be having this conversation. More importantly, if players cant stand losing a meaningless tournament by builds that are by design more suited for pvp, maybe they should refrain for taking part in such. Else i can see the nerf train going for ever because there will always be one build that beats someone else's character. Both cant "win", but egos aside they both can have fun.

[c2k]

As long as QC doesn't recommend a buff to Extend Rage and Extra Rage to work with Dervish Dance ability, I don't see the Rage/Dervish Dance combo completely out of control. Perhaps that is a resolution that can be determined by this thread.

Oh, and those Roaringshores tournaments were great. I had a lot of fun being apart of them.

[mrm3ntalist]

Oh, and those Roaringshores tournaments were great. I had a lot of fun being apart of them.

[Max Hatchet]

I RP rage something like some suggestions here

I have a new one I made this week

When she goes into rages she doesnt stop attacking till the rage ends or nearly ends. She generally keeps running on until she finds an opponent. I dont have her go completely crazy - she maintains some sense and awareness and would'nt do suicidal stuff tho. She goes GAAAHHHH! - which lets other players know she is raging or I do other emotes

RP conquers all