Barbarian on plate, is it worth?

[avin]

A player of my campaign will change his cleric for a barbarian.

Thing is, he is is obsessed by Plate. With his cleric he spend feats until having plate and with his barbarian he wants to keep the plan.

Being a DM I haven't spent too much time building characters but even so I imagine it's a full waste of feats. Not to mention that Barbarian in plate is a heresy

Any of you guys playing a barbarian could tell me if is this worth? Could you describe it in therms of "you are buying X points of AC and losing Y damage" or something like that?

 

[Danceofmasks]

Barbarian in plate isn't optimum, but it's not bad.
Having looked through through the barbarian's powers, it's not critical to have much con or cha ... so I've been looking at investing in AC instead.

I wasn't thinking of doing it with feats, though .. but Str/Dex half-orc barbarian looks like a very scary build.

Just my opinion, but a plate barbarian isn't a bad build.

Heck, right now I'm trying to build a druid in plate & heavy shield.

 

[Mengu]

It's 3 feats (4 if you want specialization), and you qualify for it very easily if you are a Con based barbarian. You are not exactly improving on your role in the party, but if you're human and have the extra feats for it, I think it's a decent approach, if you spread out the feat acquisition a bit. You could start with chain and a superior weapon, that's helping your defense and your role. Then at second level grab scale. 4th level maybe a barbarian feat or a racial feat, or weapon focus. 6th level you could upgrade to plate. Not a bad plan.

If he's obsessed with plate I guess he could be wearing it at level 2 as a human barbarian, but I'm not too fond of builds that ignore their role with feats.

For high AC, the Half-orc can almost compete with plate. You can fairly reasonably start with 16 Dex, which puts you at the same level as scale, and you also end up with considerably higher reflex defense. The advantage of the plate build over this, is that you can focus more on Constitution, and dump dexterity.

 

[DracoSuave]

Barbarians are a mobile damage factory. They charge at someone, beat the hell out of them, charge again, and continue charging and beating until enemies are dead.

Plate reduces their ability to charge and beat, while giving them few properties that can actually help them move into positions.

They're better off in either hide or scale.

 

[Danceofmasks]

Well, starting with 16 dex and pumping it eventually out ACs plate.
Remember the barbarian's agility scales by tier ... so they're even-ish in paragon, and dex eventually gets ahead in epic.

But ... that's assuming you pump dex always ... see, barbarian is one of those classes that actually benefits from splitting their stat bumps .. alternating str/dex and str/con for instance.
Every point of AC + Ref helps, sure .. but so does every point of secondary stat .. IMO AC + Ref > any benefit from a secondary, but all benefits are sufficiently yummy.

Actually, I like the thaneborn bonuses (from cha) a lot more than the rageblood (from con) ... so for a plate barbarian, i'd probably go cha. The ridiculous boosts to hitroll alone more than makes up for any lack of defense ... and particularly if teamed up with a hitroll boosting leader, can more than make up for a relative lack of offensive feats. Especially those dragonborn ... they like having a couple extra points of con (ok, who doesn't, but them more so) ... so plate could very well be optimum.

Those rageblood ... a few extra points of damage on encounter powers and possibly a few more temp hp? Likely not worth the feat investment ... 'cos feats can = moar killing power instead.
Especially if improved rageblood vigor is taken, it's effectively 6 temp hp vs 8 temp hp per kill.

The cost of investing 3 more feats ('cos everyone takes spec, right?) in AC translates into 5 AC over hide in heroic normally, but factor in agility and a modest dex, and it may not look worth the cost.
MW plate adds (approximately) +3 per tier, whilst agility + MW hide adds +2.5 per tier ... since you get +1 dex at L11 and L21.
For a barbarian that puts half their stat bumps in str/dex and str/con, the bottom line is still just 2 or 3 AC behind plate.

Actual examples of my str/dex rageblood builds:
Half-orc .. Str 20 Dex 15 Con 13 ... AC 16, for maximum hitroll .. lv 18 stat bump goes in str/con
Golaith .. Str 18 Dex 16 Con 15 ... AC 17, more balanced .. str/dex all the way

I like *cough* hitting
1) Weapon Expertise (Axe or Heavy Blade)
2) Improved Rageblood Vigor
4) Weapon Proficiency (Fullblade); Retrain Weapon Expertise if necessary
6) Weapon Focus (Heavy Blade) or Goliath Greatweapon Prowess
8) Deadly Rage
10) Powerful Charge
And ... I'm having trouble finding room for racial feats!
The way I see it, having expertise and improved vigor early will be equivalent (depending on party and tactics) for raw survivability to armor feats ... plus, killing stuff faster = fewer attacks coming your way.

Here, I'm having trouble justifying a str/con build ... 'cos unlike thaneborn, the bonuses off con just aren't worthwhile.
Just a comparison of high end AC (ignoring common bonuses):
+14 (plate)
+5 (Hide), +3 (Agility), +6 (22 dex for the half-orc. 24 for goliath)
What's more, barbarians do so much damage per hit anyhow, I'd choose +1 hitroll (fullblade) over +1.5 damroll per [W] (executioner axe). Assuming of course you want the appropriate weapon mastery feat.

 

[Victim]

I think that heavy armor could easily be worth it.

+6 Godplate = +20 AC
+6 Hide = +11 AC

Add in the barbarian's +3 AC/Ref from Barbarian Agility, and the Barbarian needs 22 Dex to even out versus plate. 22 Dex isn't exactly easy to get, especially for Thaneborns who would otherwise need Con AND Dex besides their primary and secondary stats.

Of course, Plate is 3 feats... I'm not really convinced it's worth the cost over just staying with Scale.

BTW Dance, Goliath Greatweapon doesn't add to the damage of a Fullblade. It's only military and simple two handed weapons.

 

[Keenath]

It's not awful, but it's not particularly smart either. Wearing heavy armor means giving up your +1/2/3 Agility bonus for a +1/2/3 Masterwork bonus. (Masterwork heavy armor gives you a bigger bonus than masterwork light, as it takes into account that you aren't applying ability advancement bonuses.)

Barbarian Agility is supposed to make up for the fact that you have no good reason to bump your Dex or Int and don't start with heavy armor (and a lot of people object on flavor grounds to wrapping a barbarian in metal). Its bonuses are exactly the same progression as if you were upgrading your dexterity at every opportunity, only you get them at the tiers rather than a bit later, to make the math easier to follow.

I mean, really. A barbarian with even a modest 12 in dexterity and hide armor is starting out at AC 15 (+1 dex, +3 armor, +1 agility). The Rogue who pumped an 18 in dex is only at AC 16. (Both of those can go up by one if you play a dex-bonus race, obviously, but it stays at a one point margin.)

If you swap out hide for chainmail, you've got... AC 16. Congrats. And each feat beyond that is worth another +1 AC. It's not an awful choice, I suppose, but adding boosts to AC never really seemed that valuable to me. Especially in a striker who can get temporary HP so easily.

He'd be better off taking Improved Rageblood Vigor or Rising Fury (or both, yummy! When you drop a guy, you get tons of temporary HP, a damage bonus, AND a free charge attack that includes said bonus!)

 

[Keenath]

I think that heavy armor could easily be worth it.

+6 Godplate = +20 AC
+6 Hide = +11 AC

Add in the barbarian's +3 AC/Ref from Barbarian Agility, and the Barbarian needs 22 Dex to even out versus plate. 22 Dex isn't exactly easy to get, especially for Thaneborns who would otherwise need Con AND Dex besides their primary and secondary stats.

Of course, Plate is 3 feats... I'm not really convinced it's worth the cost over just staying with Scale.

Don't compare plate to hide, compare hide to chainmail. Once you're in the heavy armors, each step up is just a feat for +1 AC, no matter what level you're at.

+6 Spiritmail is AC +18; +6 Elderhide totals +11. With a modest +2 dex bonus (started out at +1, and got two automatic upgrades at 11 and 21) and his Agility, that adds up to AC +16.

A feat for +2 AC isn't awful (it starts out at +1 in Heroic and increases to +2 in Paragon), but the speed hit is going to be something a barbarian really notices. And if you start with 14 dex (not hard), you're only lagging by 1 point behind wearing speed-sapping metal.


Armor just isn't worth your feats. Take Armor Specialization if you really want to boost your AC; then you'll actually be reducing your check penalties as well. Take Defensive Mobility (since you know you'll be charging a lot, probably past other enemies). But you're a striker! Boost your damage output, not your defenses. You can deal disgusting amounts of damage, and that's what you should be focusing on!

If you're a striker who's trying to get Defender-class AC... You're doing it wrong.

 

[Regicide]

Being a DM I haven't spent too much time building characters but even so I imagine it's a full waste of feats. Not to mention that Barbarian in plate is a heresy

There are much better ways to spend those feats, particularly for barbarians.

a) At-will that generates temp HPs, so avoiding being hit isn't worth tons of feats.
b) At-will that gives you a movement, so lowering movement is a big drawback.
c) Class feature adds defense without heavy armour so again, not worth the feats.

 

[Roger]

Plate might be worth it; I'm not so sure proficiency is, though.

-2 to attack rolls and Reflex isn't a good thing, but is it worth 3 or 4 feats to avoid? Maybe not.


Cheers,
Roger