I did my best with your wall of text, but while the math is nice, the formatting needs serious work.
So, here's my rebuttal as to why a Barbarian two-weapon fighting build is inferior to a two-handed fighting build.
1st: Feat Tax
At a bare minimum, you need to take Two-Weapon Fighting as a feat. This puts you 1 feat behind other builds, which can wield a two-handed weapon without penalty.
2nd: Attack Bonus
You will have at best a -2 penalty to your attack rolls compared to a two-handed weapon fighter. This means an additional 10% of your attack rolls will miss the enemy's AC compared to if you were wielding a two-handed weapon.
3rd: Multiple Attribute Dependency
Whilst you shouldn't be dumping dexterity on a martial character, the dexterity feat prerequisites for Two-Weapon Fighting only get steeper the deeper you go into the chain. This costs you in other areas of your build, whether it be lower mental or physical attributes.
4th: Cost of Equipment
A two-weapon fighter needs two weapons. A two-handed fighter needs one weapon. A two-weapon barbarian using two +1 furious weapons spent over 16,000 gp on their weapons. A two-handed barbarian spent only 8,000 gp on their weapon. The two-handed barbarian will have better gear than the two-weapon barbarian.
5th: Damage Reduction
Any creature with DR will mean you deal less damage with many small hits compared to more damage with one big hit. Many creatures have DR.
The biggest problem you have with TWF is that in general it's going to be worse unless you:
1) Have pounce, which barbarians can get but not until level 10. This locks you into Beast Totem
2) TWF doesn't benefit as much from a high strength score, and takes a lot of feats/abilities to get the same total bonus in terms of damage as two handing with power attack does.
There are ways to build TWF that work well, but Barbarian just isn't the chassis for it, IMO.
I'd like to challenge your claim that the attack penalty is worth the trade because you hit more often due to having more attacks.
In terms of combat potential, let's look at DPR, or Damage Per Round.
Let's take a pair of 6th level barbarians and see how much they can put out against an AC 19 enemy, both wielding masterwork weapons.
Our two-handed barbarian has taken Power Attack, Furious Focus and Weapon Focus (Greatsword). He has 22 Strength when raging.
Our two-weapon barbarian has taken Two-Weapon Fighting, Double Slice and Improved Two-Weapon Fighting. He has 18 Dexterity and 18 Strength when raging.
Here's the attack sequences:
Greatsword: +14/+7 (2d6+24)
Shortsword: +9/+4/+4/-1 (1d6+4)
Our greatsword will hit AC 19 80% of the time on the first attack, and 45% of the time on the second attack. It deals an average of 31 damage per hit. So per round, we'd have 125% chance of dealing 31 damage, for an average of 38 DPR.
Our shortsword will hit AC 19 55% of the time on the first attack, 30% of the time on the second and third attack, and 5% of the time on the fourth attack. It deals an average of 7.5 damage per hit. So per round, we'd have 120% chance of dealing 7.5 damage, for an average of 9 DPR.
This isn't counting criticals, but these overwhelmingly favor the greatsword build as well.
I know it's a bit off the barbarian theme but a ranger in mithril full plate with a 1 level dip in warrior(around whenever you can afford the armour for free h.armor prof and other goodies)and maybe some ranger archetypes is my preference for strength twf.
Preferred Dwarf for armored rules, dwarvern waraxes(and lace on offhand one)and good stat mix. Or maybe half orc as you can get boon companion as well as beast rider(extra choices too) to offset animal companion levels being behind entirely(due to warrior dip) and otherwise a good flexible race.
But yeah barbarians are mechanically simple beasts, a single big two hander is a easier build. But chase your dreams it's not all about the numbers.
P.s forgot to mention dorn dugar(was concidering for an entirely different character), can be duel wielded if you want reach but that does cost extra feats heck dwarf barbarian with two of these could be fun too but again feat heavy!
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I would have agreed that two weapon fighting is bad for barbarian before unchained was released. As long as you are using unchained barbarian you're good to go. Unchained rage is a flat bonus, it adds equally to both weapons and is not multiplied by 1.5 for a two hander, nor reduced to .5 for an off hand.
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1)The problem with pounce, and correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe you can only use it when you charge, which you only really do once when you fight a creature. So I can't really factor into the average damage because it's not something that is constant on every single hit, which over many many full-round actions. makes it negligible. A similar reason to why I can't factor in rage powers that can only be used once per rage.
2)Yes, that is another problem with two-weapon fighting is that is can't keep up with the 1.5x bonus that two-handed weapons have.
Also, that last number for the short swords was off by 1.525 for some reason I think. I'm pretty sure it should have been 71.61 instead.
Honestly, I had a fun time calculating the statistics, but I think the reality is that the butchering axe, and maybe even greatsword, although I still have my doubts about that one, will just be better. And I'll be ok with a two-handed weapon, just kinda wanted to see if there was really that much of a benefit.
Yes, the statistic don't show how important Pounce is because when you calculate theoretical DPR you're not including that every time you move you get only 1 attack without it. There's no "easy" way to account for it. As for "once per rage" abilities, finding ways to rage cycle is a classic move, so that those abilities become once per round.
Gnoams is right, Play an unchained barbarian, they're better at two weapon fighting than the core barbarian, use high crit weapons like kukri and go down the accurate stance tree and beast totem tree.
The biggest problem you have with TWF is that in general it's going to be worse unless you:
1) Have pounce, which barbarians can get but not until level 10. This locks you into Beast Totem
2) TWF doesn't benefit as much from a high strength score, and takes a lot of feats/abilities to get the same total bonus in terms of damage as two handing with power attack does.There are ways to build TWF that work well, but Barbarian just isn't the chassis for it, IMO.
Double Slice puts a TWF character into a position to get full STR on both weapons. TWF also gets more benefit from the unchained barbarian's rage power as the static moral bonus to damage is applied equally to all attacks.
Power attack breaks even. Between main hand and off-hand you get the same total damage damage.
Barbarian might not be the most common choice for TWF, but it can work.
I'd like to challenge your claim that the attack penalty is worth the trade because you hit more often due to having more attacks.
Our two-handed barbarian has taken Power Attack, Furious Focus and Weapon Focus (Greatsword). He has 22 Strength when raging.
Our two-weapon barbarian has taken Two-Weapon Fighting, Double Slice and Improved Two-Weapon Fighting. He has 18 Dexterity and 18 Strength when raging.
Here's the attack sequences:
Greatsword: +14/+7 (2d6+24)
Shortsword: +9/+4/+4/-1 (1d6+4)
You seem to have applied an additional -5 penalty to all off-hand attacks, and what's up with the +24 dmg modifier on the Greatsword? Power Attack (+6) and Strength (+9) would only result in a +15.
The biggest problem you have with TWF is that in general it's going to be worse unless you:
1) Have pounce, which barbarians can get but not until level 10. This locks you into Beast Totem
2) TWF doesn't benefit as much from a high strength score, and takes a lot of feats/abilities to get the same total bonus in terms of damage as two handing with power attack does.There are ways to build TWF that work well, but Barbarian just isn't the chassis for it, IMO.
Double Slice puts a TWF character into a position to get full STR on both weapons. TWF also gets more benefit from the unchained barbarian's rage power as the static moral bonus to damage is applied equally to all attacks.
Power attack breaks even. Between main hand and off-hand you get the same total damage damage.
Barbarian might not be the most common choice for TWF, but it can work.
Unchained Barbarian is very different proposition because of the morale bonus to attack and damage. And while Double Slice does put you into a position to get full strength bonus on both weapons, you also have a greater chance to miss the attack (getting 0 damage) and requires many more feats work and requires you to sacrifice some Strength for Dex as well.
This isn't to say that you can't make a TWF Barbarian, just that it's more effective to make a THW Barbarian in my experience.
From my perspective, the TWF version needs to exceed the THW build because otherwise you're spending more feats and gold on the build to achieve the same result. So unless it can significantly output more damage, it's not a "better" build because it requires more resources to reach the same goal.
Now for comparison, a Ranger which uses Instant Enemy and TWF to get his full Favored Enemy bonus to attack and damage is a terrifying TWF combatant because the attack and damage bonuses make up for sacrificing strength.
Fighter can also do well with Advanced Weapon training options allowing you double your weapon training damage with Trained Grace and can grab effortless dual wield to treat one-hand weapons as light (though kukris work just fine, weapon damage dice don't mean much in Pathfinder).
Here's the attack sequences:Greatsword: +14/+7 (2d6+24)
Shortsword: +9/+4/+4/-1 (1d6+4)
Your math is a little messed up, even assuming you used Barbarian for both instead of unchained barbarian (Which is better for THF worse for TWF). (I'm going to assume human)
Greatsword: +6 BAB +6(+9) STR Bonus -2/+6 from PA, +1 WF, +1 MW
+14/+7 (2d6+15)
.8(22.5) + .8(.1)(22.5) = 19.8
.35(22.5) + .35(.1)(22.5) = 8.6625
DPR = 28.4625
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Shortsword: (18 STR, 17 DEX) +6 BAB +4 STR, -2/+4/+2 PA, +1 MW, +2 moral, -2 TWF
+9/+9/+4/+4 (1d6+10)/(1d6+8)
.55(13.5) + .55(.1)(13.5) = 8.1675
.3(11.5) + .55(.1)(11.5) = 3.8
DPR = 23.935
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At 6th level, the THF does deal ~19% higher DPR.
The equations change as level increases. There are more feats and properties available to the TWF to increase DPR, or that grant static bonuses the TWF can apply more often. Weapon focus, for example, is obviously an option at 7th level. But there are plenty of other options:
- Two-Weapon Rend (1d10 + x1.5 str + other modifiers)
- Possessed Hand / Hand's Autonomy (+1 to-hit & damage / reduce TWF penalty
- Martial Focus (+1 Damage)
- Dual Balanced Weapons (-1 TWF penalty)
- Thunder & Fang (TWF with an Earthbreaker + Klar)
- Two-Weapon Grace - Slashing Grace with two weapons (DEX to damage)
Several things come to mind here.
- Thunder & Fang is barbarian themed.
- Dual Balanced Weapons + Haunted Hand = -1 TWF penalty while using a 1-handed weapon in your off hand. You can use much better weapons than short swords
- Two Weapon Grace = no more splitting stats. Go pure DEX build
You don't build a TWF barbarian the same way you build a THF barbarian, and it takes more feats to get going full steam than a THF character (which are always the strongest builds at low level). Once the TWF character gets going, however, it has a lot more room for growth and eventually overtakes the THF in both damage and defense.
Fighter can also do well with Advanced Weapon training options allowing you double your weapon training damage with Trained Grace and can grab effortless dual wield to treat one-hand weapons as light (though kukris work just fine, weapon damage dice don't mean much in Pathfinder)
At higher level the fighter takes Focused Weapon and his kukri start dealing much higher base damage.
I didn't even try to follow the math, because it doesn't matter much. I like the idea of a TWF Barbarian. I have an NPC in my campaign that does just that. He actually has some Rogue levels, getting some extra d6's in there with flanking attacks.
Is he optimized? No. Don't care. But I would happily play him as a PC. Because I think that people should just go ahead and play what they like. Make it work well enough to be an asset to the party and get in there!
My only advice is this: get yourself some flanking help. If nothing else, it compensates for the TWF penalties. Oh yeah, it is a party-oriented game. Maybe someone [i]wants[i] to help you....
I didn't see any mention of it but I think a half orc with an orc double axe is worth a mention. He loses the bonus feat humans get but trades that in for other orc goodies and that orc familiarity. I didn't crunch any numbers but a double weapon should as effective as two light weapons for slightly better damage as well as other bonuses inherent with double weapons namely being able to add str +1/2 when you move and attack and freeing up a hand for potions or what not.
Now the real question, can we make a half-orc Titan Mauler Barbarian wielding a butchering axe in each hand work XD.
(That's a -7 to hit at 3rd level and -6 at 6th level)
Probably not but I may still crunch some numbers just to see because my curiosity tends to get ahold of me. I'll let y'all know how it compares if/when I finish, and I won't go into the math do keep it short.
I have a number of these. Now, generally I'm assuming human or half-elf but it's just so I can grab exotic weapon prof. butchering axe. So, you can do it with half-orc but the feats will be skewed. Otherwise, take your pick
Mobile Titan Mauler (Barbarian/Fighter)
Key concepts: A warrior who uses 2 butchering axes and can move and attack
Race: Human or Half-elf
Racial Traits: Heart of the Fey and Focused Study or Military Tradition(Human), Ancestral Arms or adaptability (Half-elf)
Class: Barbarian(2) / Fighter(x)
Archetypes: Titan Mauler – Barbarian / Fighter – Mobile Fighter
Eldritch Heritage Bloodline: Abyssal
Feats: Skill Focus (1st), Exotic Weapon Proficiency [Butchering Axe](1st), Eldritch Heritage(3rd),Two-Weapon Fighting(3rd), Power Attack(4th), Furious Focus(5th), Improved Two-Weapon Fighting(6th), Weapon Focus(7th), Retrained Feat(10th), Greater Two-Weapon Fighting(11th), Improved Eldritch Heritage (11th)
Suggested Gear: Glove of Storing, Shrinking Growing Butchering Axe of Impact, Cracked Opalescent White Pyramid (Butchering Axe), Pauldrons of the Juggernaut, Amulet of the Blooded, Dual-Balanced (weapon mod)
Key Features: Base Damage for the Butchering Axe is 3d6
At 13th level you can move and make a full attack, losing your first primary attack
Titan Mauler Infiltrator (Barbarian/Ranger)
Key concepts: A warrior who uses 2 butchering axes and can move and attack
Race: Human or Half-elf
Racial Traits: Heart of the Fey and Focused Study or Military Tradition(Human), Ancestral Arms or adaptability (Half-elf)
Class: Barbarian(2) / Ranger(x)
Archetypes: Titan Mauler (Barbarian) / Infiltrator (Ranger)
Eldritch Heritage Bloodline: Abyssal
Combat Style: Two-Weapon Combat
Spells: Lead Blades
Feats: Skill Focus (1st), Exotic Weapon Proficiency [Butchering Axe](1st), Two-Weapon Fighting(3rd), Eldritch Heritage(5th), Power Attack (7th),Weapon Focus(9th), Improved Eldritch Heritage (11th)
Bonus Feats: Double Slice(4th), Improved Two-Weapon Fighting(8th), Greater Two-Weapon Fighting (12th), Two-Weapon Rend(16th), Two-Weapon Defense(20th)
Suggested Gear: Glove of Storing, Shrinking Growing Butchering Axe of Impact, Cracked Opalescent White Pyramid (Butchering Axe), Pauldrons of the Juggernaut, Amulet of the Blooded, Dual-Balanced (weapon mod)
Titan Mauler Goliath (Fighter/Druid)
Key concepts: A druid that can shape change into a troll in order to wade into combat
Race: Human or Half-elf or Tiefling or Half-Orc
Racial Trait: Heart of the Fey and Focused Study or Military Tradition(Human), Ancestral Arms or adaptability (Half-elf)
Class: Barbarian (2), Druid(X)
Archetypes: Titan Mauler (Barbarian) / Goliath Druid (Druid)
Eldritch Heritage Bloodline: Abyssal
[b]Domain: Rage
Rage Power: Beast Totem Lesser(2nd), Beast Totem(13th) & Beast Totem Greater(14th)
Feat Tree Pounce: Possessed Hand(1st), Hand’s Autonomy(1st), Two-Weapon Fighting(3rd), Double Slice(5th), Racial Heritage[Ogre](7th), Improved Two-Weapon Fighting(9th), Raging Brute(11th), Extra Rage Power(13th), Greater Two-Weapon Fighting (17th)
Feat Tree +6 CON: Skill Focus(1st), Exotic Weapon Proficiency [Butchering Axe](1st), Two-Weapon Fighting(3rd), Double Slice(5th), Eldritch Heritage(7th), Improved Two-Weapon Fighting(9th), Improved Eldritch Heritage(11th), Greater Two-Weapon Fighting (17th)
Suggested Feats: Die Hard, Deathless Initiate, Cleave,
Suggested Gear: 2x Shrinking Butchering Axes (Growing, Furious, Impact, Vicious or Furyborn), Cracked Opalescent White Pyramid (Butchering Axe), Irongrip Gauntlets, Cord of Stubborn Resolve, Pauldrons of the Juggernaut, Amulet of the Blooded, Dual-Balanced (weapon mod)
Key Features: • Base Damage for the enlarged Butchering Axe is 4d6
• With Enlarge person damage then becomes 4d6
• With Impact damage becomes 6d6
• At 3rd Level (assuming nat 20 str & E person) Dmg = 4d6+12 (24 avg dmg)
• At 13th Level you can assume the form of a troll gaining regeneration & rend
• At 15th level you can assume the form of a huge giant (24d6 butchering axe)
• At 19th level( (assuming nat 30 str & wildshape & rage) Base Dmg = 24d6+40 (Avg 124/184 max)
• Growing can increase the size again, but only if the weapon is already huge and only for 10 min. per day
Raging Titan Mauler (Barbarian/Bloodrager)
Key concepts: A warrior who uses 2 butchering axes and can move and attack
Race: Human or Half-elf
Racial Traits: Heart of the Fey and Focused Study or Military Tradition(Human), Ancestral Arms or adaptability (Half-elf)
Class: Barbarian(2) / Bloodrager(x)
Archetypes: Primalist (Bloodrager) / Titan Mauler (Barbarian)
Bloodline: Shapechanger
Eldritch Heritage Bloodline: Orc
Rage Powers: Lesser Beast Totem(2nd), Beast Totem(10th), Beast Totem, Greater(10th), lose evolving aspect(10th)
Feats: Skill Focus (1st), Exotic Weapon Proficiency [Butchering Axe](1st), Eldritch Heritage(3rd),Two-Weapon Fighting(3rd), Power Attack(4th), Furious Focus(5th), Improved Two-Weapon Fighting(6th), Weapon Focus(7th), Retrained Feat(10th), Greater Two-Weapon Fighting(11th), Improved Eldritch Heritage (13th)
Suggested Gear: Glove of Storing, Shrinking Growing Butchering Axe of Impact, Cracked Opalescent White Pyramid (Butchering Axe), Pauldrons of the Juggernaut, Dual-Balanced (weapon mod)
Key Features: Base Damage for the Butchering Axe is 3d6
At 10th level you gain pounce
Gnoams is right, Play an unchained barbarian, they're better at two weapon fighting than the core barbarian, use high crit weapons like kukri and go down the accurate stance tree and beast totem tree.
Here's a few more options:
1) Standard two-handed Power Attacking core/archetype barbarian who uses a polearm rather than a greatsword, and is built to achieve a lot of AoOs. You'll want either the Drunken Brute archetype or the Accelerated Drinker trait in order to slam portions of Enlarge Person as a move-action. The nice thing about AoOs is that they're at your full attack-bonus. Opinions varied, but I just love this build to death (see the follow-up post down-page for more detail in how its gears worked).
2) Halfling or goblin dex-rager (urban or savage-technologist barbarian or bloodrager). These guys (especially the goblin) are the TWF crit-fish champs. You'll finagle wakizashi or waveblade proficiency one way or another, and will have three or four levels of unchained rogue in the multiclass stack.
3) "Monkbarian": uses flurry instead of TWF so he can use a single weapon (typically a temple sword or sansetsukon with the Furious enchancement) in two hands (keeping Power Attack bonus up and costs down). Build uses the Martial Artist chained archetype, and is more monk than barbarian. At monk5th, you're immune to fatigue and can then effortlessly rage-cycle so you don't have to worry about your AC off-turn. Build path is normally something like 1.Barb1 w/Extra Rage, 2-X Monk(nth), and at least one more barbarian level at any point for rage powers (with Reckless Abandon being a total gimme in a rage-cycler). Given the awesomeness of the Martial Artist's "exploit weakness" ability (which basically eliminates the -2 flurry penalty as well as letting you crack DR or give you more AC when you need it), you'll be only two levels of barbarian, and all other levels will be monk, or other classes that count as monk (this, unfortunately, does not include Brawler). You'll have a move of 50 at 4th as a B1/M3 multiclass, and enjoy quite decent AC compared to the average barbarian despite not wearing armor. Works well in point-buy with a 15,15,14,14,10,7 20pt array with one of the 15s in wisdom (it will be advanced at 8th).
LordKailas,
Wow, that's pretty awesome, I said half-orc because for some reason I thought you had to be a half-orc to wield it, which in retrospect doesn't really make sense anyway, not sure why I thought that. Those look pretty cool though, do you find that it is more effective for these characters to multiclass?
Thanks! :)
For these kinds of builds I multi-class when it makes sense to do so. Barbarian doesn't get anything that makes it easy for them to dual wield. There are some things to keep in mind with dual wielding.
1. It's very feat intensive, anything you can do that helps with this is good.
2. As a dual wielder, the biggest problem you have is having to move before attacking. This means instead of getting 8 attacks you get 1. Anything you can do to get free movement or all of your attacks with movement helps.
3. DR can majorly dampen the damage output of any character that relies on multiple attacks instead of 1 big one. So, anything that can increase the damage per hit helps.
4. Accuracy can be an issue if you don't minimize your penalties in some way.
To this end. I looked at whatever helps deal with these four issues in the most efficient manner possible. In general IMO you should avoid multi-classing as much as possible. The reason I've done so in these cases is because titan mauler lets you dual wield butcher axes. Using magic items alone you can get 1 virtual size increase and 1 actual size increase making each weapon deal 6d6 damage. This helps address issue #3.
I've then mixed this with other classes that are either good at dual wielding or are able to push the butcher axes beyond just 6d6 on a regular basis. A straight barbarian can work with a build like this but as others have stated you're going to spend all of your feats on it and you might have accuracy issues.
One big advantage the THF has is that his one attack does a lot more damage than one attack with a one handed weapon. that's why pounce is so valuable - every time you have to move to engage (which can be multiple times in a combat) it really matters.
DR also changes the equation - often by quite a lot.
All that said, play what you want. One of the builds I really like is a dwarf Bbn. with twin waraxes...though I saw a PC try it at first level, and rarely hit anything...died at fourth.
Look into dual balanced weapons + Hand's Autonomy.
Hand's Autonomy is -2 to TWF penalties, to a minimum of -1.
Dual Balanced Weapons is a non-magical weapon property that costs 2,000 per weapon, but reduces the TWF penalty by -1
The prereq for Hand's Autonomy is Possessed Hand, which give +1 attk and dmg to one weapon.
You are effectively -0 to-hit/+1 dmg on one weapon and -1 to-hit on the second weapon.
Hand's Autonomy also has a bunch of situational abilities, like the ability to act while the character is unconscious or helpless. E.g. attack, feed you healing potions, wake you up etc.
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*snip
Since Double weapons are still two-handed weapons (not light weapons) being wielded with two hands, even if they grant additional attacks, I believe they still fall into this category of applying 1.5 strength mod.
*snip
I have never even considered this to be a possible ruling. Reading the light weapon penalties as only applying to attack (so not actually a penalty considering) would make this viable and rewarding to those who want to mix up the whole "humans are best at everything"
Another thing you can do is use the orc double axe and two weapon fight with that. You have to be an orc (or use traits or an ioun stone for prof) but you are a barbarian so orc is great anyways. It solves the cost problem since you only need to enhance one weapon, and it gives you better damage than most of the other weapons at 1d8/1d8. I’ve had a lot of fun with that build before.
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double weapons have to have each side enchanted seperately