4th & Dragon : Dungeons and Dragons...and stuff

It look quite nice, cant wait to see the other builds. The class seem to be filling its role well.

I have a feeling my opinions are not going to be very popular, but here goes nothing.

Likes:
- Rages as daily powers similar to stances seems fun.

Dislikes:
- Without a bonus to damage like the other strikers Barbarians seem likely to fall short on damage output. (I don’t have the PHB with me so I can’t do a comparison yet, so this is just a feeling).
- Rampage is just lame - a 5% for an extra basic melee attack.
- I really don’t like Rage Strike, it promotes the use of multiple dailies in a single encounter which moves away from two key factors that I like about 4e; (1) diversity, if you use Rage Strike you essentially have fewer daily options available to you, and (2) it can shorten your adventure day as you burn more of your dailies in fewer encounter. Now a class I would have expected to last longer then the others is having to take extended rests more often.  You can’t use it until 5th level anyway.

Overall, I think the class needs some retooling.  Each rage (daily) provides some bonus which seems (again I don’t have the PHB on me) greater then most other striker dailies but costs something additional to balance it (like the target getting a free melee basic attack against you).  Now this is fine and seems well balanced but Barbarians don’t get bonus damage without having to sacrifice other dailies and they get a small 1[w] increase to the typical damage for a striker daily with it anyways.

I know a lot of people are going to come at me with the added damage being option and that you can keep the diversity and not do the extra damage and normally I would agree with that but the extra damage is something the barbarian should get for free, or at least require some status effect like the rogue.

Burning powers is too complicated a device to have it be a cornerstone class feature.  I give this class a 2/5 and only because the art was bad (Gibbering Mouther Ate Your Word!).

Sorry for the double post, I need to clarify and I have no ability to edit here.

When I am talking about the lake of bonus damage I am talking about encounter and daily powers, the at-wills seem to have it built in.

It definitely looks promising.  I especially like how the rage mechanic was handled.  Now one has the option of raging several times during the course of a day or going all out in a single combat.  It fits far better with the mechanics that other classes operate under than 3.x rage ever did.  My one objection is that it encourages the expenditure of daily powers quickly.  Barbarians go from being a phenom in combat to wanting to rest early fairly easily.  I highly suspect that Paragon Paths, Epic Destinies, and other abilities that allow for the regaining of daily powers will be very popular with barbarian players.

I also think that the build presented here clearly captures the never-ending power of rage.  I look forward to seeing the other build successfully capture the fear that a raging barbarian can inspire.

I’m also curious as to how the multiclass barbarian will work.

- I really don’t like Rage Strike, it promotes the use of multiple dailies in a single encounter which moves away from two key factors that I like about 4e; (1) diversity, if you use Rage Strike you essentially have fewer daily options available to you, and (2) it can shorten your adventure day as you burn more of your dailies in fewer encounter. Now a class I would have expected to last longer then the others is having to take extended rests more often.  You can’t use it until 5th level anyway.

This. Although, I suppose you can just ignore it if you don’t want to spend daily powers.

For the damage boost, barbarians seem to have scaling at-wills so they get extra d6’s for damage, but the encounter powers I suppose will just have to have more [W]’s in them to compensate - this can cause a problem with multiclassing, fighters will definitely like to get some barbarian powers…

If you ignore it you don’t get bonus damage and you make a pretty crappy striker.

Good point about MC into barbarian encounter powers, I will include that in my response to WotC.

The lack of Chaotic Neutral will be interesting for Barbarians. I guess Unaligned will work, but it just doesn’t feel the same.

Lakoda Rage strike IMO was just put in to allow you to use a daily without overwriting your current rage benefit.

Striker extra damage for a barbarian appears to come from Reducing an Enemy down to zero and allowing you to do a charge to another enemy. So movement and a basic attack.

Also a barbarian will get to make a free basic attack after scoring a critical on the target.

Those are the two extra damage abilities that the rageblood barbarian gets.

Rage strike is not what they used for extra damage.

So movement and a basic attack.

Actually, the Barb has an at-will (Howling Strike) and some encounter powers (Shoulder Slam & Crater Fall) that can be used as part of a charge so it’s generally even better than that.

The Howling strike is extra nice if you are raging since you ignore OA during the charge and the power itself provides an extra 1d6.

I think I’d rather it burned Surges than Dailies, but it’s an interesting start.

As written it’s too powerful to burn surges, and really it shouldn’t.  Rage strike is simply a way for a Barb to use two or more dailies in the same encounter, just like everyone else can, without having to worry about changing their rage benefits if they don’t want to.

My girlfriend like running little mini-adventures for me with solo characters, and I found the damage output of a level 6 barbarian to be easily on par with a level 6 TWF dwarven ranger with Dwarven Weapon Training against similar levels of opponents.

Howling Strike was definitely my favorite at-will power (I almost never needed the temp HP from Recuperating Strike). An extra 1d6 damage and the ability to use it on a charge were fantastic, and I believe it would be even more useful in a party with bigger encounters and more targets to charge at.

This barbarian build allows you to really optimize for Str/Con. A little bit of Dex for AC is good, and Charisma may be help for some powers, but you can go light on it. No need to spread points too liberally across attributes, so you can make a very strong, durable melee beater.

Consider picking up the Powerful Charge, Power Attack, and Weapon Proficiency (Executioner’s Axe) feats, then rustle up a Horned Helmet if you can, and you’ll really be in business.

I never did use the power to trade in a daily for damage, but I can see it being useful against the big bad guy in an adventure. Pick the most useful rage (the one that lets you knock someone prone at the start of your turn is awesome!), then use whatever else you have left to unload on him.

Why use rage strike at all when you could enter a new rage?

Because you may like the benefit of your current rage better than the benefit of your unused rage.  The barbarian only ever gets one rage benefit and entering a new rage ends the benefit of the old.

Wouldn’t it be easy to take PCGEN, being open source, and work with that code?  Rather than re-inventing the wheel?
Maybe I’m talking out of my butt…

I meant to post that last comment on the Character Builder post… sorry!!