they're amazing. They stack additively with themselves and multiplicatively with damage reduction
so 1 - (1-armor_reduction)*(1-resistance_reduction)*(1-range_attack_reduction) = total range attack damage reduction
thus, it is very powerful
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- JCLe
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Member for 11 years and 11 months
Last active Tue, Sep, 11 2012 18:29:04
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This guide is meant to introduce the theory behind a build that could suit real Vikings that are tired of the same revenge-based build where stacking vitality and res all is the only viable option for later acts in inferno difficulty. You have two choices to slay: spam revenge or throw axes, easy one.
To smoothen the read, the following abbreviations will be used:
Skills
AS : Ancient Spear
BR : Battle Rage
GS : Ground Stomp
WC : War Cry
WOTB : Wrath of the Berserker
WT : Weapon Throw
General terms
AOE : Area of Effect
CC : Crowd Control
CHC : Critical Hit Chance
DH : Demon Hunter
DPS : Damage per Second
DEX : Dexterity
IAS : Increased Attack Speed
IFG : Initial Fury Generator
INT : Intelligence
RRCWT : Reduces resource cost of Weapon Throw by X fury.
STR : Strength
VIT : Vitality
Sections
1. How does it work?
- 1 Skill synergy
2. Skill Build and possibilities- 2.1 Group Build
- 2.2 Other viable skills
- 2.3 Passive Skills
3. Playstyle4. Mathematics
5. Item choice
6. Pros and Cons
7. Additional Information, Balance edits (skill tests, BiS gear, etc.)
8. Links
- 8.2 Item related links
9. Summary1. How does it work?
The main idea behind this build is to stay out of melee range and still being able to cast spells. Since the Barbarian requires being in melee range to generate fury, it might seem farfetched to you earthlings. We will see that a traditional fury generator (bash, cleave, frenzy) will not be used for this build, thus giving us Barbarians the privilege to kite and attack at the same time. #swag
It is important to know what you need to become a true slayer, as a combination of various items and skills make this build possible, and the correct balance of itemization and skills make you a Lumberjack World Championship winner.
1.1 Skill Synergy
Without further ado, here is the backbone of the build:
+
Weapon Throw
+
Crit Chance
+
Waist cord with high Reduces resource cost of Weapon Throw stat (RRCWT), ideally 5 RRCWT.
A good balance of Critical Hit Chance (CHC) and Initial Fury Generators (IFG)will give us :
- i. Sustainable Fury Generator through No Escape / BR and Weapon Throw
- ii. Carry potential for a 4 player games and a free slot for War Cry for the lowborn with low resists (Impunity is possible with high CHC, although the Charge! rune is necessary with low CHC).
- iii. The chance to use more DPS oriented gear and still survive in inferno act3-4. Also not getting sent to Valhalla by pink horses is fitting for us.
- iv. FUN FUN FUN FUN
2.Skill Build and possibilitiesAll the skills used in this build will be covered and will help giving in depth information on how it works for the slower kind that still don’t understand by now.
2.1 Group Build
The standard build for the average geared folk is:
http://us.battle.net...PQik!YZf!acZZYZ
We will go through each skill and rune to examine various possibilities this build gives you.
i. Weapon Throw
Who would’ve thought? A Fury Dump / DPS skill as well as Sustainable Fury Generator. Two runes can be used and are pretty straightforward; I’m only putting Ricochet as usable to see if your still paying attention, but it’s a no brainer here. Or was this a trap ? As of patch 1.03, Ricochet is needed if your damage isn't through the roof with a good amount of IAS, like 1.8+ (talking 100k+ dps with BR on here).
- Stupefy : This isn't a bad rune if consider you are able to kill bosses and you just want to clear the trash up to the boss. Watching people hit their friends is pretty funny. This is clearly a rune that help under-geared people, because with proper DPS you can use mighty throw to kill whatever you'd kill with this rune. It also serves as a crowd control ability because mobs tank/hit for you. This would be really good if we could use two ranged attacks, but AS isn't reliable enough for consistent DPS on elite packs and bosses.
*A very important thing to note with this rune is that every crit does no longer generate fury as it does with Mighty Throw ; this probably has to do with the wording on your fury generation rune/passive (more on that in the Battle Rage skill section). You then need to use the Into the Fray rune on Battle Rage, which lowers your DPS even more (-15% from Into the Fray, -30% down from no Mighty Throw). This makes it pretty important to wear a Sword/Dagger to make full use of the damage from our Weapon Master passive.ii. Ancient Spear
Your second WT’ish spell, it also act as a great
Initial regenerator- Rage Flip : This is the only viable rune because it’s stupid to be using anything else ; why would you ever want to flip out raging that a mob one shotted you because you pulled him in ? What this does is provide you with a very good CC ability and adding a skill factor to the sissy strategy proposed. It is also very important to note the 28% weapon damage increase, making CHC stacking very proficient. This rune effectively separates mobs from each other (takes it away from its group into yours or just behind you) or pulls back a straggler onto the big pack of mobs (from your group to the enemy group) while doing massive damage.
iii. Wrath of the BerserkerOnly used for the Super Saiyan animation. Careful of the fury cost you don’t want to get to 0 fury without a IFG. This can be a problem for those with low CHC (is why I put Into the Fray in for you folks!)
- Insanity: A very good rune for bursting an Elite inside a pack, or even bosses during specific phases. Arguably the best rune because of the burst it grants: 100% + damage, 10% CHC, 25% IAS? I’m in. In a CHC density build, it would be insane to throw away the other options: this scales too well with the critical hits.
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- Thrive on Chaos: This is mentioned because it’s actually possible to keep it up for quite awhile with a lot of CHC, which equates into high fury generation, nommean. The choice is simple: if you want to kill a manpiece of a boss where you can pretty much stand there and turret shoot, take this. Otherwise, go for Insanity: clearing just 1 mob in an elite pack is better than using this rune and only getting +5 seconds out of it because you need to kite while cleaning your nails and wiping for 30 minutes.
iv. Battle RageAll barb skills are so boring. One thing: use with caution, it costs
ragefury! Sadly every rune in this bar one (Ferocity) are usable so this section will take longer to write (and read, lol@u) than it should.- Into the Fray: Gives you additional Fury Generation. Good with low CHC gear or in synergy with Thrive on Chaos. This is the rune I was using while I was at around 30-35% crit, or with high CHC (50-60%) and Impunity on WC.
*Note the wording on the spell : it says that there is a chance to gain Fury if you crit, which means absolutely nothing if you consider that other skills have the % chance of proccing on crit and No Return and Into the Fray do not. As we talked about in the Ricochet rune section, runes seem to affect the proc rate and not stats.
- Marauder's Rage : The best rune, end of story ; it’s pretty much like Insanity, extra damage scales with the critical damage better than anything else. The price is big though : you need big fury generation.
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- Swords to Ploughshares : Interesting if you team up with a Witch Doctor with Gruesome Feast (http://us.battle.net.../gruesome-feast) or something, just throwing that out there.
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- Bloodshed : Good AOE, eh!
v. Overpower**This was tested by me for the No Return passive (which we have to use). Note that I wrote my results on pink post-it’s for optimal result :
Turns out IAS doesn’t affect the proc rate. It is 100% proc rate from 1.00 attack speed to 2.00, with 45% CHC. Now, if CHC would chance the proc rate at which this procs, it wouldn’t matter much because my playing at the sweet spot rate, 60-65% - explained in math section – I generate more than enough fury with the Impunity rune on War Cry and no Into the Fray on BR (I use the next mentioned rune).
Pretty much only used with the 10% CHC for 6 seconds rune. Use this when it’s up you can even use it for melee attack while kiting (use it and click to move right after for close to no animation with high IAS)
*Do not underestimate the damage you can get from this spell. It’s the only spell you can use without turning around and it costs no fury.
- Killing Spree : Pretty much only used with Overpower on your skill build.
vi. War CryGood team buff + IFG, woot! Another very complicated skill.
- Impunity : +50% to all resistances, need I say more?
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- Charge! : For those with fury generation problems. You really need this until you get around 60%+ CHC because you will just keep running low and won’t be able to use WoTB and BR, which lowers your incredibly potent DPS by a good margin.
2.2 Other viable skillsFor solo play, a few skills can be replaced to ameliorate your slayer’ing.
Ancient Spear–> Sprint
This is pretty simple : without a pet in front of you to tank (monk), you need to kite more. This skill gives you the ability to kite and do damage at the same time through the Run like the Wind rune.
- Run like the Wind : This will be used in conjunction with Into the Fray on BR so that you can keep using sprint if needed. Used for dire situations where you can’t turn around or just for ez-mode clear on some encounters if you don’t really like this build and you’d rather be playing a Demon Hunter but you want Diablo inferno achievement now.
Ancient Spear -> Ground StompThis is mainly for group play, if your ranged DPS bros have good AoE and you all get one shotted cause you have bad gear. I still use it with good gear cause I team up with a DH from time to time.
- Wrenching Smash : More range, acts as a IFG, gives your Demon Hunter’s skills more targets, etc. This is a good panic button life saver for any teleporting or fast mobs (including the white ones who charge or whatever), but requires some kind of coordination, which I’m sure all you barbarians have, no doubt,
As of 1.03, you generally want to drop Overpower for your defensive skill slot, and use Ancient Spear as a second attack (single target) to complement the use of Ricochet. The DPS in your character sheet will drop but you will generally clear packs faster than with Mighty Throw and low IAS. At the least, this allows you to kite without to much IAS.Other build options will be covered in 2.3 with passives, and 7.1, 7.2 and 7.3. See you there love xoxoxo
2.3 Passive skills
No Escape : This is the only reason why I thought of this build. Makes AS really strong against bosses and gives you +10% damage because it acts like Into the Fray for BR, so you can use Marauder’s Rage.
Ruthless : Really good passive, gives you free CHC and more Critical Hit Damage. A no brainer for this build but can be swapped out if needed, although I wouldn’t advise it : it’s good for DPS and Fury Generation, what else do you want ?
Weapon Master : Very versatile passive, if you need more cheap CHC use an Axe, if you can afford good IAS / CHC amulets and rings then you can actually reach 60% CHC without the 10% this gives. If so, you can use another weapon type.* Keep in mind that this is if you want to use Battle Rage with Maurauder's Rage. If you use Into the Fray, the minimum CHC drops to about 40-45%, but you give yourself less options (could need Charge! on War Cry to start with WC and BR on, stuff like that)
*You would think a viable option would be a mighty weapon for fury generation. WELL YOU ARE RIGHT HOLY SHIT HOW SMART ARE YOU??? This is in fact pretty damn good. With a Mighty weapon, it’s really easy to use Impunity on War Cry, Marauder’s Rage on BR, and still have ridiculous fury generation (as much as you’d have with Into the Fray) This makes Mighty weapons arguably the best choice without BiS in every slot, and even then you can argue that Mighty weapons are better because of less randomization. Mighty weapons give you the 15% that swords would give you from BR, and swords are the best choice ultimately for DPS, as well as the +3 fury per hit.
* It is not out of the question to use a sword. If you feel you can rune Impunity on War Cry and Marauder’s Rage on BR with a sword, go nuts. This requires high end gear, and makes the build more random. With Charge! on War Cry, it is definitely viable. My monk tank likes the 50% all res.
**Swords and Daggers became much better as of 1.03 because of the low IAS stats on everything. Having a fast based weapon is very good for kiting.
No other passives are really good for the build, you could suggest Animosity, but meh. I could see Inspiring Presence fitting, but I wouldn’t want to drop any of my other passives because of the great DPS they give.
3. Playstyle
The general playstyle is pretty simple. Bossfight videos will be posted in the 7.3 section.
In groups, you try to stay off-screen if you get one-shotted. You basically fish and aim on your tank. If you see your fury going up, you are doing it right. Try not to forget to refresh overpower. Battle Rage is used after you have a comfortable amount of fury or right away if you have Charge! on WC. If you run Ancient Spear, try to position yourself in between the tank and the ranged (this requires better gear/paying more attention to not die) so you can hook stragglers from the DPS’ers to your tank. This way, you can save your friends and make it easier for the tank. This is very useful for Belial phase 1 and 2. If you run Ground Stomp, just be ready to use it at all times to save your buddy buds bud buds (you can use it for yourself but you don’t die, you are a godlike machine of war.)
While solo’ing, you need to be careful : You don’t want to run recklessly while exploring and get jumped. Don’t forget that you need an IFG up to start fighting, so chain dying doesn’t work for champion packs. You can die once 30 seconds after using WC, and then you need to survive at least 30 seconds again if you really think you will die again. Again, if you run Charge! (you probably should), you apply it, then use BR, then use Sprint if needed. You need BR on if you want to start chain-sprinting. With 20%ish movespeed from items you can generally kite well without Sprint.
4. Mathematics
*Keep in mind that these calculations are for optimizing the build at high levels of gear. If you use Charge! rune on War Cry and Into the Fray on BR, you need around 30%-40% CHC. Charge! only is roughly 50%.
**These tests are meant for builds without a Mighty Weapon. They will prove it is possible to play this with low-end gear and a random weapon.
The mechanics of the build are pretty simple: lower the cost of weapon throw to 5 and then try to sustain enough fury to keep throwing. You have a 30 second cooldown IFG that generates either 30 fury or 60, and another one that generates 15 fury every 10 seconds and is reset by a crit.
Doing simple math, the fury return you get from No Escape is 14 and your weapon throw costs 5 fury. Since you need to be furious to go into a Battle Rage we’ll just make sure we can sustain a bit of fury with the initial 30 fury War Cry and WT.
Since there is a lot of variables possible (IAS / Kiting, etc.) we will keep this as simple as possible to get a benchmark on how much CHC you need.
Let’s say you can throw approximately 6 times every fight start (not counting the fury generated by ancient spear because it’s random and situational sometimes). What I mean by that is that you can’t cast it if your back is on a wall ; let me remind you that you don’t like it from the back.
Taking into account that you can use WT 6 times at least, we need to examine the generator spell : No Escape. If it procs twice, it gives you 28 fury, enough for 5 uses of WT.
That means you need to score a critical hit at least twice per 5 throws. You need the following formula to calculate it:
(100^5 - (100-x)^5 -5*x*(100-x)^4)/100^5.
A graph is definitely easier to interpret for those who lack the knowledge in probability calculations. X (horizontal axis) is your CHC. The Y (vertical axis) axis shows how likely is to happen.
Two interesting things are to get from this graph:
i. The curve is very linear in the middle. We like straight lines, they’re easy to understand. This means that CHC scales directly with the chance to generate fury: that was quite obvious from the beginning, but at least this means that there are almost no diminishing returns.
ii. It seems that the ideal value starts at around 60% CHC. However, we need to keep in mind that this is to remove any chance of downtime: a 40% CHC wouldn’t be unplayable, it could involve more kiting.
5. Item choice
*Every specific piece listed here is linked in the link section.
**Please keep in mind that I only make the ASI – IAS distinction on items where it matters, only a few of them are bugged. Make sure you always get ASI on armor if you are reading this in 1.02. IAS is bugged and doesn’t apply.
The most important part is the waist holder (you wouldn’t want to show your manhood to the enemies, that would be as cheap of a strategy as abusing force armor at d3 launch):
Lamentation is a great legendary belt with CHC and possible RRCWT. You are looking for the 5 RRCWT on this beast. You can also get that mod on rares, which can be better than legendaries sometimes.
Then, you need CHC, and where that is not available you get IAS, Increased Critical Hit Damage and Strength. As of 1.02, you can get :
*CHC Values
- 6% Helm (I use Andariel’s Visage it has IAS and 3% CHC)
- 8.5% Amulet (Get IAS and CHC and you are golden)
- 0% Shoulders (no IAS possible either, get some STR here, and VIT / all res if possible)
- 0% Chestpiece (Tal Rasha’s Guardianship has IAS)
- 6% Bracers (Lacuni Prowlers can get around 2% CHC with IAS and movespeed, which is really strong for kiting ; probably best choice for now)
- 10% Gloves (IAS + CHC is possible)
- 4.5% Rings (IAS + CHC is possible)
- 1% Belt (Lamentation)
- 1% Pants (Inna’s Glory, IAS as well as movespeed bonus, though it is bugged for now (IAS doesn’t work on-non weapon items at the moment, ASI – attack speed increased - does)
- 0% Boots (Boj Anglers are good: there’s IAS and movespeed on them, make sure to get the ASI kind since they can spawn both ways). *** A way to get some kind of crit % from this is to get Natalya's Soul boots, and another piece to get 7% CHC from the two pieces. The ring is very expensive but definitely better than the helm here. If you can get a helm with crit and str roll though it's all good.
- 0% Weapons (Get Critical Hit Damage Increased, IAS and sockets if possible to get more Critical Hit Damage Increased through that green girl stone)
- 10% Shields (Yep, this is a good option if you don’t like dual-wielding)
This is pretty straightforward : since IAS generally beats every other DPS stats you can*, most of the time, find legendaries with said stat on it even if it couldn’t spawn there otherwise, like Boj Anglers.The problem with a mass IAS build is that you are squishy. If you don’t like that, you need a fast weapon from the get-go.*As of 1.03, IAS takes the backseat to CHC and Critical Hit Damage Increased. It's needed to have some IAS but it's more important to get the other stats. You can go without too much IAS as long as you have a fast weapon. Get a few pieces of IAS then look for the two other stats.
6. Pros and Cons
Pros :
- Fury generator and DPS skill is the same
- Ranged = no need for tank spells = room for Battle Rage and more.
- Fun experience
- Boost you tank’s stats and help him with massive single target DPS
- Revenge-less build.
Cons :- Revenge-less build.
7. Additional Information, Balance edits (skill tests, BiS gear, etc.)Will not update the BiS gear section until the legendary buff patch, where many items may get replaced for others. The gear section has ideal items for patch 1.02.
- 7.1 Current Solo build
http://us.battle.net...PiUk!fZY!ZbZYZZ7.2 Current Group build
http://us.battle.net...PiQk!ZYf!ZcZaZc
*I still use Mighty Throw with a tank in front of me
- 7.3 Inferno Boss specific builds
Butcher, Belial, Siegebreaker : http://us.battle.net...PikQ!ZYf!acZacZIzkatu : http://us.battle.net...PikT!ZYf!aZZacb
Rakanoth : http://us.battle.net...PikQ!ZYf!aZZacZ
Izual : http://us.battle.net...PikQ!ZYf!acZacZ
Diablo : http://us.battle.net...RikQ!ZYf!aaYacZ (this is for peeps who feel undergeared for this, Run like the Wind is viable for solo kills)
Azmodan : http://us.battle.net...PikQ!ZYf!aZZYcZ (sorry didn't realize I didn't post this)
Videos will be posted shortly.
8. Links
8.1 Class related links
Barbarian overview : http://us.battle.net...lass/barbarian/
Barbarian active skills : http://us.battle.net...rbarian/active/
Barbarian passive skills : http://us.battle.net...barian/passive/
Low gear build : http://us.battle.net...PQik!YZf!acZZYZ
High end CHC build : http://us.battle.net...PQik!YZf!acZZac
8.2 Item related links
Andariel’s Visage: http://us.battle.net...ndariels-visage
Boj Anglers boots : http://us.battle.net...tem/boj-anglers
Lacuni Prowlers: http://us.battle.net...lacuni-prowlers
Lamentation: http://us.battle.net...tem/lamentation
Inna’s Glory: http://us.battle.net...tem/innas-glory
Tal Rasha’s Guardianship http://us.battle.net...as-guardianship
9. Summary
Get 60%ish Crit, get a good amount of DPS with Battle Rage on (45-50k with Ricochet does the job.. I tested it. I'm at 80k+ atm and it works wonders), then get survivability, etc. If you still want to use Mighty Throw, as I said, you need a lot of DPS but also good IAS. With the 95k DPS I can get and 1.8 IAS, it's fine, but I prefer Ricochet now, just because you can't kite as effectively as before with low IAS. If you want to talk to me ingame just pm me on whatever forum you see this. For those who suggest things, contribute to the guide (even pointing out typos help!), donate, whatever, you will be posted below in the Hall of Fame and will receive my eternal praise. Thanks for reading.
Please donate if you feel like it, it is much appreciated and will motivate me to put in more work into this!
Hall of fame (contributors) :
xXxSebixXx@d2jsp for extra explanations
MeraxesIF@diablofans for Stupefy rune reminder
Ahmy17@diablofans for No Escape correction