Rate my barb please!!

[phalaris]

Hi guys,
This is my first post on these forums. It's hard to find a D2 forum that ins't abandoned these days. But I stumbled upon this one and was shocked to see so many threads made within the last couple of days! :)
I am hoping this is a thriving oasis of information among a desert of outdated message boards whose members have moved on to WoW.. :)

.

Anyway, this is my latest character and I hope you can give me some feedback on it:

Name: SS-Phalaris
Level: 83 (build complete at lvl 90)

Skills: (assumed for level 90)
10 Sword Mastery
20 Concentrate
20 Iron Skin
20 Shout
20 BO
1 Bash, Stun, Leap, LA, Berserk, WW
1 Howl, Battle Command
1 Inc Stamina, Inc Speed, Natural Res

Stats: (WITH gear)
Str: 233 (130 base)
Dex: 177 (less than 100 base)
Vit: 304
Ene: about 40 (10 base ofc)

Equipment: (from top to bottom)

Um'ed Arreat 195/6
Metalgrid 418/33/334
eBotD CB 366/13 (I was really disappointed with the bad roll..)
Um'ed Stormshield 148
Ondal's Wisdom +4 (for BO and XP)
Guardian Angel 1411 w/ 12res jewel
Ravenfrost 222/18
Carrion 7
Dracul 9/11
String of Ears 8/14
Gores

12/11 Torch
Some psn charms..

Some final stats:
90% all res in hell
49% damage reduction
39% LL
over 30k defence
7k one-handed damage
13k AR
about 3k+ life

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He recently slayed the ubers almost single-handedly (needing a bit of help with Meph). But he is bitterly disappointing in PvP, not to mention being so damn slow at killing monsters.. I guess he was always going to be a slow killer, but I expected him to rule in PvP. When I look at the stats I really don't see what I'm doing wrong. :(
I play Europe SCL and am pretty sure that the people I have duelled are not wearing uber gear.
Any suggestions, as well as an overall rating are welcome. :)
If you can think of any equipment that strikes you as an obvious substitute for what I am using, then I would love to hear it!

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Thanks, and.. nice to meet you all :)

[Halciet]

Okay:

Axes > Swords; BotD Berserker Axe is superior to the CB. Similarly, since you are on ladder, Grief is better than BotD for PvP.

Other gear: Carrion is ok, but nothing spectacular. Metalgrid should be replaced with highlord's wrath for the increased deadly strike; that will greatly speed up your monster killing. Ondal's would be better replaced with stormshield (since you're swords), or Beast if you ever rebuild for axes and want to dual wield for BvC or PvM. Guardian Angel can be replaced with Fortitude or Engima. Charms should be damage/ar/life smalls, if you can get your hands on them! Also, if you're going to be going up against other melee classes, you'll want the angelic amulet and two of the rings to swap out for that. The massive AR helps get a hit off against high-defense opponents.

Skills: Your mastery should be maxed; ironskin should come last. Likewise, since you went with concentrate, there's no need for the point of whirlwind. Good work with the rest of the placement though.

Stats: You have far too much strength; you should try and keep it between base and the mid-80s or so, instead relying on gear to equip heavier items and pumping everything you can into vitality.

Why you're losing in PvP: You're using concentrate. That's why. Unfortunately, whirlwind is the only skill we have that really competes in PvP :/ Also, you have to decide whether you want to be a melee barb, or fight casters, as the weapons/stat placements vary between those two. BvC uses dual axes, just enough str/vit to wear gear, and rest in vit. BvB uses Axe/Shield, enough str to wear gear, enough dexterity for max block, rest in vitality.

Nice first attempt, just needs some alteration to be competitive in PvP.

Welcome to the boards,

-Hal

[NewForumBloke]

Well, ok. I think im going to address more so on ur pvp issues rather than pvm issues since i myself am not that well versed on pvm conc babas, so here it goes.

First, as Hal said your really going to want to switch over to a BoTD zerker. Its going to give you more speed as well as a larger max dmg. Since your conc your probably going to mainly want to do straight melee duels and almost nothing else, though you wont do too bad in pub pvp.

Second, your going to want to make a few other gear selections, mainly armor and rings are my biggest concern for you. Armor, look for fort an enigma as hal said, these are going to help you out a lot. Other items to look for are cube bugged Stone/Prudence armors, though ive seen some using cube bugged Forts as well. Another armor is a Duress which gives some mean pvp mods on it. Jewelry is also another issue, highlord/raven/raven, gelic combo, ive heard Metal/raven/raven does decent as well. Also i kinda feel your wep mastery is a bit low, but thats my own preference (i max iron skin last).

Stats look ok, maybe consider getting a couple ias/ed jewels for the arreants and the ss for more speed if it means you'll hit the next bp. Otherwise, all you really need to work on is gear and he should do decent in pvp. Good luck man!

-BLoke :smug:

[Omikron8]

remake

all barbs need a max mastery

except singers

20 iron skin is a waste on any build except wolfbarb

[Terenas]

remake
all barbs need a max mastery
I remember that when 1.10 came out, there were folks telling you that Mastery was a waste. I made two barbs, identical for all except Mastery, and guess what...*reads Omikron8's quote*
Not a constructive post, just for the records...

[CupOfTea]

One word - remake

[Terenas]

I find it a good standard procedure to check the boards before making new chars. You can always customize your build around a bit, but odds are you are not going to improve much (especially pvp-wise). I built my frenzy barb after a thread here, I may not be as effective as the original author's barb, but the char works nicely.
On top of that it is possible to get some really great insight :thumbsup:, or at least this is what happened to me.
Bye.