I have a wonderful build for this - a DR heavy Invulnerable Rager that has been used with great success in the past. He takes a 1 level dip in Unbreakable Fighter. I'll post it for you when I get back from lunch.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
i made a guy very similar to this. i used a level dip into unbreakable fighter, and took tenacious survivor my gm had a pain in the ass time killing him, then my cleric just channeled positive and quicken cast a healing spell and i was back in the fight. with the massive bonuses you gain from superstitious he saved on just about every save or die spell leaving the only effective way to kill him HP damage. and we all know how IR's handle HP damage mitigation.
Optimistic Gambler is a campaign trait specific to PC's in one particular campaign path (2nd Darkness in this case), not one you can just take whenever you want.
Unless of course the GM allows for it. I wouldn't, but it's not my game.
You're talking about the ultimate tank barbarian?
I've seen those, not bad, and good as soaking up damage.
Any good variation on it that can help with this build?
.
LOL - not bad? Its one of the best builds I've ever made or seen. Thanks.:-P
And yes, I'm putting together a version for you - I assume you're married to Half-Orc as part of the core concept? Humans are a better option in my opinion, but I'm willing to customize the build if that's what you'd like.
Are you worried about being effective at range at all? Out of combat ability?
Honestly, looking at your build selections it seems like you're falling into a very common trap by 'doubling down' on abilities that have similr effects in an effort to make them really good. You get a lot of diminishing returns that way and there are other options available that you might not have considered (like Raging Brutality and Guarded Life/Greater Guarded Life). You also seem to be building for some very long battles and its ben my experience that battles involving Barbarians tend to be very short.
I will often build my Barbarians as both Invulnerable Ragers AND Urban Barbarians (the archetypes stack) for the increased versatility. In truth, I prefer to avoid those false 'bonus hit points' that you lose as soon as you stop ragaing anyway... they're fool's gold and a trap. Better to simply not take the damage, and the Urban/Invulnerable mix is the best option in the class to do that.
Hm. If you just got dropped into negative, and you have to use your action to drink a potion, you're probably about to right back into negative. If not deeper.
It sounds like you'd be better off with a CAGM/debuffer barb if you want defense to be secondary. In this case, your offense helps to buff your defense a little.
You're talking about the ultimate tank barbarian?
I've seen those, not bad, and good as soaking up damage.
Any good variation on it that can help with this build?.
LOL - not bad? Its one of the best builds I've ever made or seen. Thanks.
Yeah, Wiggz build is boss. Wiggz have you considered using dragon totem in your build for even MORE dr? ;P
|
|
my debuffer barbarian was dipped into magus for frost bite + rhyme spell + Cornugon Smash + cruel weapon enchant = massive penalties that lower your saves by quite a bit. your target gained the shaken, sickened, entangled, fatugued, and something else
but if you were going to do that you should just go solid magus and be even better at it.
What's an example of a debuffer barb then?
Here you go: Debuffer Barb
|
Can I ask if we can use a half-orc as the base instead, as honestly I think they're a lot better suited for this, and have much better alternative racial abilities. Also how many other people in your party are able to rage? I ask because of Amplified Rage.
Also thanks for this thread, it's brought a few feats and such to my attention that I hadn't noticed for my Barbarian guide.
|
|
Inquisitor, Viking Fighter, Savage Skald, Myself, Ragechemist
And we're all Orcs/Half-Orcs.
The Ragechemist was contemplating doing a Blood God Disciple, but decided to go Orc Ragechemist instead. She's never done a summoner before. We do these types of theme parties on occasion.May I ask why half-orc versus full orc? The orc is the only one that can get reverse feint, that's why I chose the Orc.
That and the +4 to Strength. And everybody loves that.
I just don't see a great value in Reverse Feign, as well as the Toughness prereq. I had issues with other things before looking them over (Didn't know Grudge Fighter was a Morale bonus for one), and you're getting +4 Str for -2 all mental, which is pretty harsh. I'd rather go half-orc and not lose as much, as well as having access to the wonderful Human favored class bonus to make your saves go nova. Also the Mystic half-orc gives away Intimidation for Endurance and Ferocity (a rather lackluster ability) for a +1 luck bonus to all saves. Taking a Drawback could get you Fate's Favored, pumping all your saves by 2 in total in addition to the boosted Supernatural saves from Human Favored bonus class.
Knocking away Toughness/Reverse Feign opens up Diehard and another feat of your choice. With Diehard, you're really using your Tenacious Action even better, as you won't even miss your traded away Ferocity. I could also see swapping out Merciless Cruelty (great, I'll admit) for Touched by Divinity (or Wendifa Apprentice if you're not allowed) for a scaling SLA, which will give you a use for your Swift Action to power it, and add by this point 3 points of untyped damage to each of your swings. Without going Stalwart, taking more hits than you has to seems inadvisable, even with IR DR absorbing punishment and no guarded life.
Also I'm not huge on Amplified Rage. It's nice in theory, but I don't see it being pulled off too much without a more rage-centric party. I wonder if regular half-orcs could get Reverse Feign anyways, due to how halfbreeds have been rules (such as the human favored class ruling) What you can trade away as a half-orc makes them pretty sick sexy brutal as Barbarians, and is easily worth the 2 less strength.
Name him Foamy.
I am personally very surprised you are playing an orc with sunder powers and not getting Destroyer's Blessing. Become a perpetual hate machine. Using this and a high enough sunder check you can run anywhere in straight line destroying all that crosses your path or gets to close.
|
|
My party uses a Savage Skald, Viking, Anger Inquisitor, and a Ragechemyst and it's not rage centric enough?
It's just not my thing, really. Also I don't think the Rage Chemist actually is raging unless they use the Rage extract, and that's a really subpar buff for what they could be doing at that level. I guess it just depends on what you consider Rage, which while reading all this does make me think that the term has been used freely enough that any of these would fit the description.
But I don't care for teamwork feats, so that's just me. What about everything else?
I would never bother with sunder as feats, busting up the treasure is just bad lol. just keep Eldritch heritage in the back of your head. It something I would take at the later levels. +9 because that when it became effect also retraining to it would not be bad either. it gives time to see if gm goes mythic and if he does it will only cost you two feats for all the powers and only cha of 13 which you could buy a tome to increase you cha if you don't tank it completely. You can get retrain sunder and toughness. ...
3 total feats right? Skill Focus, Eldritch, and Mythic Eldritch.?
|
|
Kain, I don't think you're getting some parts of his build.
The Courageous weapon is boosting the morale bonus of both their rage and the Grudge Fighter Feat. Assuming they're not raging, the +4 base on the weapon turns that from a +1 bonus to a +3 (for half the weapon's ench vale), and while raging it turns it from a +1 to a +4 to both attack and damage. At this point they're using Opportunistic Gambler to keep those bonuses for 1 to four rounds longer. I personally think the trait isn't needed, as your Barb is going to get tagged every round since Barbs tend to have poor AC, and should go towards Touched by Divinity.
Courageous is actually also boosting his rage bonuses by +3 to Strength and Con, which as stated, is pretty sick nasty sexy.
Dot
|
|
I still question Reverse Feign, as it is making you sponge more damage, and it conflicts with your Strength Surge and No Escape, both of which are immediate actions. I don't think you'll have the Immediate Actions needed to take full advantage of Reverse Feign, which adding with how little Toughness really adds to your build, makes it a poor build choice. Unless you're facing combat that often goes 4+ rounds, I doubt you'll see a great use since
1st round Spell Sundering their best buff.
2nd round Chasing someone who's running
3rd round Maybe getting the chance to use Reverse Feign.
I'll admit it makes my Arcane Strike suggestion not work either, so instead I'd suggest just embracing it and taking Extra Rage Power for the Beast Totem. Toughness, Reverse Feign, and Ferocious Tenacity are all solid swaps to end up picking up +6 Natural Armor and Pounce, both of which will really enhance this build.
Or of course there's always the standard half-orc (for free endurance or Boar's Resilience Trait to ignore prereq) to pick up Diehard/Stalwart/Improved.
If you're really set on taking a hit, why not drop Improved Sunder, let them take the AOO against you, and let that trigger Grudge Warrior (if you're going low AC for this) which would give you another feat to play with.
|
|
Reverse Feint is a cost of a move action, not an immediate action.
What I was referring to was:
Whether or not the opponent successfully hits, you may attack it as an immediate action with a single melee attack, gaining a +2 bonus on your attack roll.
The move action is just even worse, as you're not getting a full attack routine on whatever you're up in melee against. You're paying a move and immediate action a round when you could just full attack, five foot step out of their range, and then Unexpected Strike them for only the cost of an AOO.
Reverse Feign is kind of awful once you have more than one attack you can make a round.
Touch rage is good when you have absolute nothing you can do, but you can't use it on your self so that why I say it is semi useless.
Why can't you use on self?
|
|
I missed the part about raising his str and con but raising it by 3 is nothing compare to raising it by 12 str and 4 and gain 6 natural armor reach and increased weapon damage and out right immunity to fear. Also again moral bonus is the 2nd most common bonus so they don't stack, if there is a bard or cleric in the party odds are you are wasting that feat. your better off using the money for vicious gain 2d6 damage. or save the money all together and put it toward something else.
I don't get the Bard issue here, as they give a competence bonus with their song. Most good Cleric buffs seem like they're luck anyways, which is another point towards Fate's Favored.
I could see the issue with Touch of Rage only being a turn, since it's a poor use of a standard action though.
Courageous is like the second best thing a Barbarian can get on a weapon, and it's only a +1, so there's really no reason why not to pick it up though.
Touch of rage with mythic. Amazing initiative gives you an extra standard action.