Which is more important for Bbn: Dex or Con?

[Darklone]

I've never bought the "best defense is a good offense" argument, particularly at low levels.

You can only make this argument if a barbarian is "poof" face-2-face with the bad guys and raging and putting the smack down immediately.

But this rarely happens. What about the round or two of ranged combat before melee is engaged? What about the round of barbarian charging (which end with a killed grunt) then 3-4 other grunt surround the barbarian and start hitting? A half-orc does not even have cleave, and is busy getting pounded on with it's wretched AC.
...
Last) Cleric. Has anyone ever seen a cleric actually die?

You're right that barbarians tend to die fast. But that's true even for the few barbarians who played 2nd rank fighters with shield and battleaxe as soon as they started to rage.

Clerics died often if I believe other posters here on the board...

How a barbarian can survive his low AC? Well, our halforc usually hid behind the dwarven fighter till he saw some foes he could take down quickly

 

[Shard O'Glase]

Not necessarily true if you are in the front rank all of the time.

being in the front ranks only means something in the games where the DM decides to throw softballs to the mages. Its just way to easy to circle around and face the foes you want to face. Heck I think you pointed this out in the fighter skill point thread, who really dies all the time at low levels, its the wizard hands down all the time.

Sure the barbarian does die now and then but its about as likely as the fighter dieing, so yes it can happen but its not nearly as common as the other classes. So classes like the fighter and barbarian are the classes you can more easily gamble on survival at low levels so look to the long term in character design.

 

[Shard O'Glase]

I've never bought the "best defense is a good offense" argument, particularly at low levels.

In my experience, death likelihood for classes is:

1) Monk
2) Barbarian
3) Rogue...


Last) Cleric. Has anyone ever seen a cleric actually die?

If wizard isn't number one on your list then I'd say your list is really off IME.

Cleric sure most unlikely to die, but I put fighter and barbarian at the same level in the 2nd most unliekly to die. Now sure a defense oriented fighter survives longer than a offense oriented barbarian. But a barbarian can use a shield, can wear medium armor(likely all the low level fighter can afford) and has more HP. I've seen just as many 2 hander fighters as I have barbarian, and I've seen more barbarians switch styles than fighters. Fighters with specializaiton and hopes how long feat chains seem more speicalized so if he starts 2 hander he'll likely keep going 2 hander. The barbarian though seems to switch to what he needs as he needs it(like a shield) since his feat selection is usually more general.

Also best defense good offense argument pans out just as often as not, especially at high levels where AC becomes less important becuas epeople hit you all the time. The quicker you kill the less the swing the less they swing the less you get hit. IOW the highest AC boost you can have is by having your foes dead before they get another chance to swing at you.

 

[Nail]

Speaking of AC for a Bbn: Can't the big lug hide behind a tower shield as he charges, drop it as a free action, and swing away at the enemy he's closed with?

 

[Limper]

Con 100%.


At higher levels you always get hit what keeps you going is the HPs.

 

[Epametheus]

Dex helps a little at the low levels, and it's pretty useful to all classes. But no amount of dex is going to save you if the DM gets a few lucky rolls. HP is more likely to; that 1 extra point amounts to 1 more round before you hit -10, if worse comes to worse.

 

[Al]

Conspicuous targetting, as I see it, also says if the Barbarian is wading through my goons, I need to do something about him before he reaches me. So I can be "forced" to target the Barbarian. Obviously a Will-save spell would be my first choice, but I will hit him with whatever I've got to save my hide.

IME most Fort saves are actually poison or some effect of Undead, e.g. ghoul paralysis. You are targetted as a direct consequence of being in melee. These are not the most dangerous effects, but you will often get hit by them many times in the same encounter. YMMV.

The problem with the notion of being 'forced' to target the barbarian is that this assumes he is the biggest threat in the opposing party. He is not. At high levels, the enemy barbarian is one of the *least* biggest threats. Any primary caster is a bigger threat- Finger of Death beats bashing skulls. Rogues are almost certainly going to be a bigger threat, unless you are immune to sneak attacks. Even fighters are going to be comparable threats, with GWF and GWS at least compensating for Rage. Thus, you are going to target your spells on these other enemies first; if you are going for the barbarian, you use Will saves- you may not have many prepared, but only a fool does not take a balance in his save-targetting spells, especially with the Spell Focus nerfs.

Fort saves deriving from poison or undead are an issue, but one has to bear in mind that in order to be subjected to such a problem, you must be hit in the first place! Particularly with regard to undead, the to-hit bonuses are often pretty feeble, so it is much more effective boosting AC than boosting a Fort save.

 

[KarinsDad]

Dex helps a little at the low levels, and it's pretty useful to all classes. But no amount of dex is going to save you if the DM gets a few lucky rolls. HP is more likely to; that 1 extra point amounts to 1 more round before you hit -10, if worse comes to worse.

Philosophizing about lucky rolls works for both damage rolls as well as to hit rolls.

"An extra hit point at first level is not going to save you if the DM gets a few lucky rolls."

But, a Barbarian with AC 16 at first level against +3 to hit opponents will on average get hit 40% of the time. A Barbarian with AC 17 at first level against +3 to hit opponents will on average get hit 35% of the time. That means that the Barbarian who boosted his Con instead of his Dex will take 14% more damage (40 / 35) and in those cases where one hit point matters, 14% of the Barbarian's total hit points is greater than 1 hit point (it's typically about 2 hit points).

You cannot look at lucky rolls, you have to look at averages.

 

[Epametheus]

Philosophizing about lucky rolls works for both damage rolls as well as to hit rolls.

"An extra hit point at first level is not going to save you if the DM gets a few lucky rolls."

But, a Barbarian with AC 16 at first level against +3 to hit opponents will on average get hit 40% of the time. A Barbarian with AC 17 at first level against +3 to hit opponents will on average get hit 35% of the time. That means that the Barbarian who boosted his Con instead of his Dex will take 14% more damage (40 / 35) and in those cases where one hit point matters, 14% of the Barbarian's total hit points is greater than 1 hit point (it's typically about 2 hit points).

You cannot look at lucky rolls, you have to look at averages.

I've never been in a campaign where luck -- good or bad -- could be casually dismissed like that. I'm sure you've had sessions where all of your monster can't seem to roll below a 15 and at least one of the PCs nevers seems to roll above 5. Part of the nature of randomness is that it can land in the high range repeatedly. My experience with 1st level characters is that they don't survive due to superior number crunching; they survive through dumb luck, DM fudging, and through the assistance of the party's cleric.

A Barbarian fighting multiple opponents at once will not escape damage. If he's dueling an orc that can potentially drop him in 1 hit, then the AC will matter more because he has to avoid getting hit at all costs. If he's fighting say, two goblins, then the odds of escaping damage are much less in his favor, and he could well get reamed if it goes badly. I'm not expecting that 1 extra HP to keep him going in the fight (though if a generic orc with a great-ax hit him for max damage while he was raging, it actually would); I'm expecting it to buy him another round to bleed quietly while the party can finish off whatever took him down and attend to him. If he dies anyways, then such is the lot of 1st level characters.

 

[two]

If wizard isn't number one on your list then I'd say your list is really off IME.

Cleric sure most unlikely to die, but I put fighter and barbarian at the same level in the 2nd most unliekly to die. Now sure a defense oriented fighter survives longer than a offense oriented barbarian. But a barbarian can use a shield, can wear medium armor(likely all the low level fighter can afford) and has more HP. I've seen just as many 2 hander fighters as I have barbarian, and I've seen more barbarians switch styles than fighters. Fighters with specializaiton and hopes how long feat chains seem more speicalized so if he starts 2 hander he'll likely keep going 2 hander. The barbarian though seems to switch to what he needs as he needs it(like a shield) since his feat selection is usually more general.

Also best defense good offense argument pans out just as often as not, especially at high levels where AC becomes less important becuas epeople hit you all the time. The quicker you kill the less the swing the less they swing the less you get hit. IOW the highest AC boost you can have is by having your foes dead before they get another chance to swing at you.

Good point!!

-- I play with the most cowardly wizards you have ever seen... in a normal campaign, wizards/monks will die fastest, you are right.

The best defense/good offense argument might pan out at high levels (doing 100 points per round on average vs. a Balor is, well, very nice), however the barbarian under discussion is a Barb1. I don't think it's the way to go at low levels.

There is also the "damage overkill" issue; 2 handed raging barbarian1 with str=22 only gets 1 attack per round (without cleave). Yippie, you hit the goblin for 17 points of damage; that's 10 more than you needed to kill it. Meaning, you don't need to do HUGE amounts of damage a low levels. You just need to survive. That's why I think a str=13 or str=14 barbarian is just fine (str=17/18 when raging). Damage output is completely excellent for 1st-3rd levels, either with 1 or 2 handed weapons. More is often, well, just more (overkill, as it were).

Really, I can't begin to tell you how many times a barbarian hits something and the DM says "just stop counting it's way dead."

Oh, if you could only "excess" damage done to an enemy for the next blow!