Barbarian is up!!!

[Goumindong]

Class Features:
All Barbarians know Rage Strike, usable only during a rage.

Your Rageblood Vigor class feature grants you the use of the swift charge power.

Its the same conundrum with Warlocks. But I am guessing that they intended it to go the opposite way that it goes with warlocks.

I'm a bit concerned that the barbarian doesn't seem to do very much damage for a striker. The extra damage on the at-wills is no more than from Hunter's Quarry, and a barbarian who's not raging only gets it if he uses Howling Strike, which is just a basic attack with the extra damage.

Barbarians are all about burst damage.

Hunters quarry does about +3d6/4rounds at the first level[75% hit rate].

But barbarians as we see here, get a free charge 1/encounter. Their charge likely does 3d6+strength[Maul+1d6].[+1d6/2 round average for a 4 round combat, rounding the strength to 3.5 avg for the sake of ease]

Now, assume that the ranger is twin striking with 1d12 weapons. In which case, a 18 strength barbarian has an average damage of 7.25[14 avg/hit, 1/2 average hit/round] while the twin striking ranger has an average damage of 6.5/round[6.5 average a hit, 1 average hit/round].

So in a 4 round combat, the barbarian is at +.625 /round and the Ranger is at +1d6/4 rounds[+.875/round] for every round before round 4 and +3d6/4 rounds[2.625/round] for every round above round 4.

Crits are ignored[which would slightly favor the ranger], but the barbarian is going to be running another 5.5 average damage on a crit due to his extra crit damage. Which will trigger once every 5 rounds or so for 1.125 average damage every 5 rounds.

So, in a 5 round combat you expect the barb to have +4.25 damage advantage and the ranger to be up 6.125 damage. Before round 5, the barbarian is winning and the barbarian is prone to damage spikes, which can be very beneficial in reducing incoming damage.

Not to mention the barbarians really strong dailies.

It's not broken because for the barb to do 6W+6, he's got to hit with all 6.

So I don't really see what makes six attacks at 1W so broken.

Because damage against a single target >> damage against multiple targets. You need to do roughly three times the aggregate damage in order to make up the advantage that single target damage confers in terms of incoming damage reduction.

So a 2[W] +str power that hits everyone has to hit, at the very least, 6 enemies before it makes up against the 6[W] power. And this power is actually 6[W]+6x static bonuses +6x chance of a critical[with the chance of multiple crits, with all the extra damage that implies AND an extra attack if you're a barbarian].

Edit:

E.G. lets do an examination of Hellfire curse vs Hurricane of Blades. Assume +20 damage/hit[which is unfair to the barb since he is weapon and melee which have more advantages], and assume a 1d6 critical die[also unfair to the barbarian]. With the barbarian using an executioner axe and each has a 50% hit rate.

The hellfire curse does 5d10+25. The Hurricane of Blades does 1d12+20 six times and criticals on a 19 or 20.

Avg Damage Hellfire curse

.45 x 5d10+25+3d6 + .5 x 93+5d6 = 28.4 + 5.7= 34.1 average damage

Avg Damage Hurricane of Blades

(.40 x 1d10+22 + .1 x 32+5d6 )x6 + .4685(.4 x 2d10+24 + .1 x 44+5d6) = 97.8 +9.6 = 107.4 average damage.

Want to see what it looks like against that 1[W]AoE if the AoE hits 4 enemies?

 

[mhacdebhandia]

It is technically well-done but the proportions of the lead barbarian are all over the place, specially the ginormous head.

The "dwarf vs. orcs" picture is alright, specially the dwarf, but the orcs are very stiff, with distorted faces and undetailed arms.

The leaping woman in page 6 is almost perfect, but her stomach has too deep lumps, and her legs (specially the right one) are weirdly posed.

The picture on page 7 is the best of the bunch, but the armor should cover the same side of the body as the armor sleeve.

The picture on page 11 has really weird foreshortening, with the tiefling's arms being of unequal length and the dragon leg being almost elephantine.

Glass houses, Claudio. Glass houses.

 

[WhatGravitas]

Optimised Barbarian:
Str (26) +8
Magic Weapon +5
Weapon Focus +3
Power Attack +9 (admittedly, this would reduce the chances of hitting with 6 attacks considerably)
That's +25 damage, without too much effort. When you factor in power, rage and other bonuses I'm sure you could easily top +30 to damage. When you multiply this by 6, that's 180 points without factoring in dice damage or criticals. And I'm not even much of an optimiser...

Let's redo that, this time without the power attack, but with items from the AV:
Str 28: +9
Weapon Focus: +3 feat bonus
Bloodsoaked Bracers: +10 power bonus (while bloodied)
Battlecrazed Weapon +5: +5 enhancement bonus, +3d6 untyped (while bloodied)

Total: +27+3d6 (while bloodied), which gives us an average of: 37.5 damage per hit.

Ouch.

Cheers, LT.

 

[AllisterH]

Let's redo that, this time without the power attack, but with items from the AV:
Str 28: +9
Weapon Focus: +3 feat bonus
Bloodsoaked Bracers: +10 power bonus (while bloodied)
Battlecrazed Weapon +5: +5 enhancement bonus, +3d6 untyped (while bloodied)

Total: +27+3d6 (while bloodied), which gives us an average of: 37.5 damage per hit.

Ouch.

Cheers, LT.

Again...if we're doing a comparison, can we at least see the optimized comparison we're measuring against?

For example, Guoimodong contrasted this power of the barbarian with a Warlock, how does this compare with the OTHER ranger or Rogue powers?

 

[SeRiAlExPeRiMeNtS]

I freely admitted that. All I was illustrating in this case is that it is certainly possible to achieve some very high numbers under ideal circumstances. I think under normal circumstances, around 100-150 points is more like what you'll get if all attacks hit (and given that only 3-4 attacks are likely to hit, most probably around 50-100 points on an average use of the power).

My point stll stands - this is more than the expected damage output than a 5[W] + Str power against a solo.

With a decent leader, like a warlord using lead the attack (a very broken power) or a cleric with good omens the chance to hit goes from 50% to 75-80% and the mean damage increases a LOT.

 

[gribble]

Again...if we're doing a comparison, can we at least see the optimized comparison we're measuring against?

Any other power which can (potentially) multiply that base damage by 6 against a single target.

Wait a minute! There aren't any (except for the pre-errata Blade Cascade)!
I wonder why...

 

[Turtlejay]

tl:dr

It is a class in beta, it has problems, any issues while playtesting should be sent to dndinsider@wizards.com with Barbarian Playtest Feedback in the subject.

I'd say try it out first, if you still don't like it, email them. Remember, we saw A LOT of this kind of nitpicking when 4e first came out (and still see it) over things that are perfectly reasonable.

Jay

 

[JesterOC]

Rage strike is a very good power that is not presented well. I am really curious how Avalanche Strike is going to work out. It looks like a great "finisher". Recovering Strike looks like it converts minions into health kits, but we shall see. I can imagine the barbarian getting in arguments with wizards over minions. It could be frustrating to see the wizard kill off all of the barbarians health bait.

JesterOC

 

[Stogoe]

Trading a level 1 rage power for Raging Strike is doubly frustrating, since you get more out of your level 1 rage power than from Raging Strike, except if you want to keep you first rage power benefits going.

This is really a bad mechanic overall IMO, and this is the first class in any D&D edition that i read and say to myself: i would never pick this class for my PC.

As dozens of others have said, and as you have studiously ignored, sometimes you want to keep your current rage but need the big guns. Rage Strike enables that. That's all Rage Strike does.

 

[Iron Dog]

I kinda like the barb (this build anyway) "as is". It fits the idea of a barbarian to me. It's pure smack down and not much good for anything else.

The role-playing barbarian:

DM: "You walk into a Tavern, what do you do?"
Barb: (In the best Arnie voice) "I 'it it wit mi arx"
DM: "hmm ok.. The villages want you to save them..."
Barb: "I 'it it wit mi arx"
DM: oh, um, they show you a map to the treasure, what.... no.. let me guess..
Barb: "I 'it it wit mi arx"

Plus I like the idea that a Barb can go "nova" by going off half cocked, spending his lot early and being stuffed for the rest of the day. (Anyone seen Eric the Viking)

As for the daily power swap out. I wouldn't be surprised that there will be new swap out powers for the other martial classes come the Martial Powers book.