In the time since that post I tried to play with a lot of builds and also watched gameplay videos and several things appear to be ironclad now. The most important are:
1) "Fun" abilities are for softcore. Death is a serious business and avoiding it is meant for serious people. Your build whatever it is should be aimed for killing things and not letting them kill you, not for numbers or fun factor, unless you want to start over sooner than later.
2) Threatening Shout is a MUST in HC. Yes it has been nerfed. And yes it drains rage. It still is a must, unless you plan to make some kind of a hit-and-run Barb, which does not really get hit and runs rings around enemies (seems it might work just fine, just will not be high on damage)
3) You cannot keep up Threatening Shout, WotB AND spin WW at the same time, unless you rune WW with Gold, making it a free spell, which seems good, until you realise that Cleave beats non-Crimson WW in every aspect.)
1) Whirlwind (Crimson)- primary aoe attack, 430% weapon damage per second, for clearing out mobs. Other runes are nowhere near this god-like ability
2) Ground Stomp (Crimson)- aoe stun, runed for more damage. Golden seems nice, but this build has 4 rage generators already, I swim in rage.
3) War Cry (Alabaster)- gives HP, Rage, armor and a whopping 890 hp per second. HP is best of all the choices as being fat lets you take all kinds of hits, spell and physical, though dodge would work out fine too, considering how you can dodge spells.
4) Frenzy (Crimson)-primary single-target attack. Runed for damage. Seems to beat Bash for pure dps.
5) Threatening Shout (Gold)- for staying alive.
6) Biggest change from my pervious build. Furious Charge (Indigo) replacing Revenge. While Revenge will hit more mobs and do more damage and healing, it is based on suffering hits, with 27% chance of activation. Say you will suffer an unlucky hit and be left with 50% damage and Revenge will not be triggered, meaning you either have to run (if you can) or stay and hope it will trigger before you die. With FC you can basically heal yourself every 10 seconds and if gameplay videos are typical, you can easily gain 20-30% of your total hp.
Passives
1) Superstition. I expect to play HC, mostly solo, therefore I need protective abilities, and this one helps me with caster attacks. I also expect that majority of boss attacks will be magical in nature (except Butcher) which should help too. The fury bonus is the icing on the cake.
2) Ruthless. Simply a must for any barb. Extra crit and damage on crit benefit every play style. I think this ability is too good to swap for a more protective one, but if Inferno proves to be just evil, I will pick Inspiring Presence.
3) Inspiring Presence. Whoa. Gaining 20% life in 10 seconds by doing NOTHING is cool. Remember running away from Diablo, Duriel and most other bosses? Well with this running around in circles actually heals you.
The other passives to take, in my opinion: Weapons Master, Animosity, Nerves of Steel, Relentless,Tough as Nails.
Tough as Nails. Might seem as first choice but the wording on armor shows that the 100% armor boost will be something like 600% armor over 500% armor without. Not such a big bonus really and the thorns are a strange skill, useless if you take low damage, dangerous if you take high damage. Still could be viable.
Nerves of Steel. Used to be a must passive, but now will hardly compete with TaN. Becoming fat makes you tougher and I expect to stack Vitality at maximum level, but i just dont thing I will gain that much armor.
Weapons Master. Good damage or rage gain.
Animosity. Faster rage gain is good, not terrible, but not a waste either.
Relentless. Is good but what is the chance you will survivie when taken down to 20% anyway? If I get left with a tiny bit of HP, I will stun and run or Furious Charge, stun and run.
1) Frenzy. As above.
2) War Cry. As above.
3) Ground Stomp, As above.
4) Threteaning Shout. As above
5) WotB. Runed Obsidian. 25% dodge is mad and beats 26% damage increase. Since WotB has no cooldown anymore runing it Golden is a waste, keeping it up for extra 4-5 seconds will translate to not spending extra 12-15 rage.
6) Cleave. Runed Crimson for more damage. Game play with this build essentially consists of butchering mobs with Cleave while keeping WotB and Threatening Shout up and helping self with stun and Furious Charge.
Passives. Exactly as above. Boon of Bul-Kathos does nothing for WotB now, so it is not even considered. If WotB goes on cooldown in the release, the Boon will be probably very handy and WotB will have to be runed Gold.
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In the time since that post I tried to play with a lot of builds and also watched gameplay videos and several things appear to be ironclad now. The most important are:
1) "Fun" abilities are for softcore. Death is a serious business and avoiding it is meant for serious people. Your build whatever it is should be aimed for killing things and not letting them kill you, not for numbers or fun factor, unless you want to start over sooner than later.
2) Threatening Shout is a MUST in HC. Yes it has been nerfed. And yes it drains rage. It still is a must, unless you plan to make some kind of a hit-and-run Barb, which does not really get hit and runs rings around enemies (seems it might work just fine, just will not be high on damage)
3) You cannot keep up Threatening Shout, WotB AND spin WW at the same time, unless you rune WW with Gold, making it a free spell, which seems good, until you realise that Cleave beats non-Crimson WW in every aspect.)
Build 1: WW, no WotB
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/barbarian#kegfbT!Zec!ZZaZbY
1) Whirlwind (Crimson)- primary aoe attack, 430% weapon damage per second, for clearing out mobs. Other runes are nowhere near this god-like ability
2) Ground Stomp (Crimson)- aoe stun, runed for more damage. Golden seems nice, but this build has 4 rage generators already, I swim in rage.
3) War Cry (Alabaster)- gives HP, Rage, armor and a whopping 890 hp per second. HP is best of all the choices as being fat lets you take all kinds of hits, spell and physical, though dodge would work out fine too, considering how you can dodge spells.
4) Frenzy (Crimson)-primary single-target attack. Runed for damage. Seems to beat Bash for pure dps.
5) Threatening Shout (Gold)- for staying alive.
6) Biggest change from my pervious build. Furious Charge (Indigo) replacing Revenge. While Revenge will hit more mobs and do more damage and healing, it is based on suffering hits, with 27% chance of activation. Say you will suffer an unlucky hit and be left with 50% damage and Revenge will not be triggered, meaning you either have to run (if you can) or stay and hope it will trigger before you die. With FC you can basically heal yourself every 10 seconds and if gameplay videos are typical, you can easily gain 20-30% of your total hp.
Passives
1) Superstition. I expect to play HC, mostly solo, therefore I need protective abilities, and this one helps me with caster attacks. I also expect that majority of boss attacks will be magical in nature (except Butcher) which should help too. The fury bonus is the icing on the cake.
2) Ruthless. Simply a must for any barb. Extra crit and damage on crit benefit every play style. I think this ability is too good to swap for a more protective one, but if Inferno proves to be just evil, I will pick Inspiring Presence.
3) Inspiring Presence. Whoa. Gaining 20% life in 10 seconds by doing NOTHING is cool. Remember running away from Diablo, Duriel and most other bosses? Well with this running around in circles actually heals you.
The other passives to take, in my opinion: Weapons Master, Animosity, Nerves of Steel, Relentless,Tough as Nails.
Tough as Nails. Might seem as first choice but the wording on armor shows that the 100% armor boost will be something like 600% armor over 500% armor without. Not such a big bonus really and the thorns are a strange skill, useless if you take low damage, dangerous if you take high damage. Still could be viable.
Nerves of Steel. Used to be a must passive, but now will hardly compete with TaN. Becoming fat makes you tougher and I expect to stack Vitality at maximum level, but i just dont thing I will gain that much armor.
Weapons Master. Good damage or rage gain.
Animosity. Faster rage gain is good, not terrible, but not a waste either.
Relentless. Is good but what is the chance you will survivie when taken down to 20% anyway? If I get left with a tiny bit of HP, I will stun and run or Furious Charge, stun and run.
Build 2: WotB, no WW.
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/barbarian#fgebPc!Zce!ZabbcZ
1) Frenzy. As above.
2) War Cry. As above.
3) Ground Stomp, As above.
4) Threteaning Shout. As above
5) WotB. Runed Obsidian. 25% dodge is mad and beats 26% damage increase. Since WotB has no cooldown anymore runing it Golden is a waste, keeping it up for extra 4-5 seconds will translate to not spending extra 12-15 rage.
6) Cleave. Runed Crimson for more damage. Game play with this build essentially consists of butchering mobs with Cleave while keeping WotB and Threatening Shout up and helping self with stun and Furious Charge.
Passives. Exactly as above. Boon of Bul-Kathos does nothing for WotB now, so it is not even considered. If WotB goes on cooldown in the release, the Boon will be probably very handy and WotB will have to be runed Gold.