View Full Version : Frenzy: Max Damage and Uber Guide 1.11
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Frenzy Frenzy Frenzy Frenzy Frenzy Frenzy Frenzy Frenzy Frenzy
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Max Damage and Uber Guide 1.11
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"...as long as the edge of your blade finds the back of their skull, you'll be unstoppable!"
This guide has been a long time coming.
Ive had numerous forum members pm me on an ideal frenzy set-up for ubers and max damage.
Huge Shoutout to Ash Housewares for his Comprehensive Frenzy Guide (http://forums.diabloii.net/showthread.php?t=182586). Hats off to you for a ridiculously good read.
But anyway, finally, its here.
Done. Sorted. Enjoy.
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Table Of Contents
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The Frenzy Skill and Life Leech
Base Weapon Speed and IAS
Skill Allocation and Synergies
Attribute Allocation
Monster Attributes
Items
Charms
Auras
Curses
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A Special In Depth Section
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Weapons and Curse Casting
Pre-buffing
Max UberTrist Items
The Frenzy Skill and Life Leech
Frenzy deals physical damage, from 2 weapons that swing alternatively, increasing in swing speed after 3-4 sucessful hits.
Damage is transfered to an enemy by way of physical damage being received by them, dealt by you from your 2 equipped weapons.
Monsters aim to stop the above from happening, or at least, minimise the amount from happening.
They include: Chance to block, high defence, high physical resists, stun, freeze, mana burn, auras, cursing.
Frenzy is a high offense skill. Not surprisingly it is also a low defense skill.
What i mean by this is, although he can deal massive damage, it leaves a Frenzier constantly "looking over his shoulder".
By default, its his "proximity" to his enemies that make him vulnerable.
You have no shield, therefor no block, and subsequently lower defence.
Add in lower resists, and no effective "area affect' damage, and we start to look overwhelmed in Hell and beyond.
Your life bulb gets big chunks taken out of it when swarmed by a pack of Mana Burning Physical Immune Death Lords, while Black Souls zap lightning from a distance.
To counter this, a Frenzier hits so hard and fast, that monsters aint around very long to take advantage of these drawbacks.
But how much death can a Frenzier surround himself with, face to face with certain doom, and live?
How deep does this rabbit hole go.....?
The answer is Life Leech!
What is it? Why is it good for a Frenzier? How does it work?
Life Leech steals life from a monster and adds it to your lifebulb while you strike with your weapons.
This is essential for a Frenzier because of all the physical, elemental and magic damage you receive from multiple monsters that mob you.
It is a constant, instant, and important safety device.
Interestingly, a beneficial side affect/paradox presents itself.
Increasing the amount of leech allows a Frenzier to become more aggressive, in that you can ramp up his damage output, by maxing his offensive skill point placement, and neglecting his defensive skill point placement.
In turn, ramping up his damage, gives you more leech, because leech is tied to how much damage your target receives.
They go hand in hand, giving mini lifetap type leech per hit.
It gets to a point that as long as the edge of your blade finds the back of their skull, you'll be unstoppable.
But enemies have two tricks up their sleeve to stop you leeching. These are Physical Damage Reduction % and Drain Effectiveness %.
It varies from monster to monster, increasing their DR%, and lowering their DE%, as we progress to NM and Hell.
Ideally, a Frenzier would like his targets to have 0% DR and 100% Drain Effectiveness.
This way, if you do 5000 damage from your weapon, and you have 10% life leech, you will steel 500 life per hit.
But as soon as your enemy has, say, 50% DR and 20% Drain, you will receive:
5000 x.5 = 2500 x.2 = 500 x.1 = 50 life per hit. Thats a 90% reduction in life steel.
Obviously, maximising your LL% and minimising an enemies physical resist is a GG way to keep your Frenzier alive and kicking.
Unfortuately, no player can change a monsters drain effectiveness.
Base Weapon Speed and IAS
Frenzy checks the base weapon speeds in each hand and averages the difference.
Then it checks for any ias on main weapon and any other ias from other non weapon gear.
It never checks any ias from off hand weapon, so equiping a weapon with 0%ias here will not penalise you.
The idea is to max your weapon swing speed to 5 attacks per second.
Another common term is 5 frame animations per attack, or 5fpa
Skill Allocation and Synergies
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1 in Bash
1 in Double Swing
1 in Double Throw
Max Frenzy
1 in Natural Resist
1 in Iron Skin
1 in Howl
1 in Shout
Max Battle Orders
1 in Battle Command
Max Weapon Mastery
Max Taunt
Max Double Swing last
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Frenzy has 4 Synergies: Taunt | Double Swing | Weapon Mastery | Berserk
Max all except Berserk. Leave it well alone, it doesnt increase your physical damage, just converts a piddly amount to magic damage.
The magical damage when used as a skill, instead of a synergy is also irrevelant.
The other synergies add 8% damage per point, Mastery adds 5% damage and 8% attack rating.
I usually xp leech up to lvl 70 before i spend a single point, then "create" the build there and then.
If you didn't know, maximum skill points anyone can aquire (at lvl 99 with all quests completed), is 111, and this build requires 108, which makes it complete at lvl 96.
After that (if your feeling saucy) spend a point or so on Iron Skin, Shout or Nat Resist.
Skills to not waste points on:
Increased Stamina
Increased Speed
First of all, for general gameplay and baal runs, enigma is REALLY suited to frenzy barbs.
Dont bother blowing 2 points to run faster via this Barb skill, because you gain 45% frw (equal to lvl 25 Increased Speed) plus you get Teleport.
Stun
Concentrate
Berserk
Spending 3 points to get to Berserk was what I USED to do to kill PI's.
Later in this guide, you will see this is just a waste of points that you could add to your Frenzy synergies instead.
Berserk is literally a disruption to the Frenzy Damage | Life Leech machine.
Having zero defence and no leech is the last thing you want to do to your Frenzier, especially on purpose.
Reserve those skills for a different build.
Whirlwind
Leap|Leap Attack
Warcry
Battlecry
Just NO to any of these. They require completely different build/items. Dont waste your precious points on these.
Attribute Allocation
Depends on your weapon choice.
Axes will need virtually no hard points spent in Strength and Dexterity. (Berserker Axes|Ettin Axes)
Swords will need roughly 35 Strength and 15 Dexterity hard points spent. (Colossal Blades|Phase Blades)
Rest in Vitality
Zero in Energy
Monster Attributes
Monsters have 18 attributes: resists, hit points, defence, mellee damage etc.. but Frenziers are only interested in 2.
Monster Physical Resist %, and Drain Effectiveness %. Yep, here they pop up again.
Everything else to be honest, means squat, besides maybe their Chill Effectiveness %, and Hitpoints.
Physical Resist % reduces the damage that they receive. Big time.
Most monsters in Hell have a 30-50% DR, some higher with Stoneskin mod at 80%, some even immune alltogether.
All a Frenzier wants to do is, reduce their DR%, or remove their DR% all together, or even go into -DR%.
If you can do the latter, they will receive more damage than what your Barb is actually producing.
Do this, and your Frenzier is GFG.
Why do nothing, and allow hell monsters to rob what your weapon is capable of?
You spend wealth on your new 415% ebotd , but monsters are denying half your damage from ever touching them.
Thats final damage.
If your LCS says your doing 3000-7500 Frenzy damage per weapon, your target monster is really only receiving 1500-3750.
To actually do 3000-7500 damage to your target, your LCS needs to display 6000-15000.
But how will you do that? Can you go out and get a lvl 60 Concentration Aura for 945% ED?
Is that even enough? Do we need a lvl 50 Fanata Aura aswell?
You cant, basically.
It becomes exponentially impossible to keep ramping up your damage.
Especially when you already have all the GG runewords and ED% aura's maxed out.
Surprisingly, %DR also effects your Crushing Blow 1:1
Crushing blow (when sucessfully "cast") reduces Uniques and Bosses life by 12.5% per attack.
But, as long as they have 50% DR, this comes down to 6.25%.
If your target has 100% DR, they wont receive ANY of this life reduction. Even if you have 100% chance of Crushing Blow.
Deadly Strike is obviously affected as well. Not good.
Drain Effectiveness is the opposite end of the spectrum.
This attribute dictates the amount of life and mana you can leech, regardless of their physical resists.
When a target has 0% drain, you cannot leech, and theres no way to change a targets' drain property.
As long as a target has positive drain, you can leech. The higher the better.
Items
Heres a list of standard, all round general play items to equip your Frenzier, on a day to day basis.
Helm: Arreats Face - Skills Leech Resists Strength Dex AR Hit Recovery Soc 15ias jewel
Armor: Enigma - Skills FRW Strength bonus Life DR%
Belt: Verdungos - DR% HR Vita
Boots: Goreriders - DS CB OW
Gloves: Draculs - Str LL Wounds LifeTap
Amulet: Highlords - Skills Lite Res Deadly Strike 20%ias
Rings: Ravenfrosts - 2x 240+AR | 20 Dex
Weapons: Later in this guide...
A few of those items get changed about when battling Ubers.
Charms
Best possible stats for each charm listed in parentheses.
02x Life/Masteries Gcs (45/1)
26x Fine/Vita Scs (3/20/20)
05x Life/Res Scs (20/5)
01x Annihilus (20/20)
01x Torch. (20/20)
Auras
Might
Fanaticism
Concentration
Sanctuary
Blessed Aim
Holy Freeze
Conviction
All of these Paladin Auras are GG for a Frenzier, and 3 or so can be equipped by a Frenzier via items and Mercs. There is no limit.
Pity Conviction doesnt reduce physical resist like the elementals.
Of all the Auras, only one reduces physical resists. Sanctuary, although its only for undead.
Contrary to popular opinion, the 660% damage to undead seems to work, since one swing cuts them like paper, but I cant hard verify it.
Might, Concentration and Fanaticism all rock, by multipling frenzy damage.
Auras can also stack. In that, you can have lots of different Auras all going at the same time. There is no limit.
What I am unsure of is items that grant the same aura, do they stack?
Does the aura need to be the same lvl, or is it irrevelant? Can I equip 2x lvl 9 auras from 2 items, to get lvl18?
What about a lvl16 and lvl18 of the same aura? Do I get lvl 18 or 34? And what if one comes from a merc, and i have the other?
Frankly, I havn't tested this enough to be conclusive.
Curses
For some players, curses are just glowy things, that dont really do much.
But with some research, specific curses can double or triple a Frenziers damage.
Actually, thats a lie. Curses can manipulate what the enemy receives, via reducing their resistances.
But as far as the enemy is concerned, its the same as doubling or tripling your damage.
You can only have one curse active at any one time.
If there is already a curse above a monsters head, and another curse is cast, the first curse will stop, and the new curse will start.
Herein, you will find pub players dont seem to bother fine tuning their chars to control their curse casting, with multiple players all overwriting each other.
It doesnt matter at all with auras, as they just add to the melting pot of goodies, regardless if you benefit or not.
The amount of times I've watched ppl "loving" their Delirium or Dream casting lame curses like Confuse, others casting weaken, and so on.. arghhh.
Monsters running blind aint my idea of GG.
Wouldnt the Lower Resist curse suit virtually all elemntal damage casters?
I asked a few sorcs what curse they use to max their damage potential, and virtually all went silent...
... :banghead: ...
Eventually one said, "oh you mean conviction? yeah i use that to lower resists"
... :hang: ...
Last time I checked, Conviction was an Aura....not a curse!
Curses arnt really necessary in general pvm play to be honest. Yes, 8 player Baalwalks become a little harder as expected, but its still not essential.
Just equip a couple of GG weapons from the section below, and youll be happy.
But when you decide to try UberTristram, curses become quite important.
For UberTrist, there really is only 3 curses that interest a Frenzier.
I wouldnt be going into 'Trist without knowing which curse applies best to your current stats.
Lifetap (http://www.battle.net/diablo2exp/skills/necromancer-curses.shtml#lifetap), Decrepify (http://www.battle.net/diablo2exp/skills/necromancer-curses.shtml#decrepify), and Amplify Damage (http://www.battle.net/diablo2exp/skills/necromancer-curses.shtml#amplifydamage).
LifeTap is a 100% defensive, 0% offensive curse.
Decrepify is a 50% defensive, 50% offensive curse.
Amp Damage is a 0% defensive, 100% offensive curse.
Depending on your life, phys resists%, ele resists%, and life leech %, these curses will allow you to either:
Save your skin from certain death, or
Bring a balance of safety and increased killing power, or
Show Ubers whos boss.
If your Barb has,
4500+ Life, 10-25% Phys Res, 45%+ Ele Res*, 00-25% LL : use LifeTap.
5500+ Life, 25-35% Phys Res, 60%+ Ele Res*, 25-35% LL : use Decrepify.
6500+ Life, 35-50% Phys Res, 75%+ Ele Res*, 35-50% LL : use Amp Damage.
There's no point using Amp if you're weak as piss, because your just going to get ownd. Badly. :dizzy:
There's no point using Tap if you're buff as an ox, since you'd be limiting your damage potential. :unimpressed:
*Those elemental resists include UberMephisto's lvl 20 Conviction aura.
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In Depth Section
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Weapons and Curse Casting
Etheral Indestructable runeword weapons in elite axes or swords immediately spring to mind.
Weapons with the following bonuses suit a Frenzier:
Etheral Indestructable, Crushing Blow, Deadly Strike, Open Wounds, Static Field, Life Leech, Ignore Target Defence, -% Target Defence, +Attack Rating, Bonus to Attack Rating, +% Damage To Demons, +% Damage To Undead, +Damage, ED% Damage, Increased Attack Speed, Prevent Monster Heal, +Skills, +Strength, and +Dexterity.
Other bonuses like +Magic, Cold, Fire, Lightning, or Poison Damage are minor in the grand scheme of things, as is -% elemental resists.
Bonuses that grant slow or freeze target primarily give a Frenzier enemy Damage Reduction.
Heres a list of the best weapons for a Frenzier in the game in no particular order:
GriefPB or GriefZ
Whoa. Supreme weapon for sheer max physical damage and speed, it adds 180% Demon Damage, the ITD and -25% Target Defence keeps the weapon hitting hard every swing. Works somewhat well with Decrepify.
Needs Crushing Blow, and life leech from other items if using this weapon in Ubertrist.
Zerker breaks and is slower. PB version infinitely superior for Frenzy.
Main hand weapon for general pvm gameplay. Support Ubertrist weapon when using Lifetap.
EBotDZ or EBotDCB
Fundamentally a hard hitting weapon with a more defensive influence, with low requirements via etheral and Hel rune, tons of life and mana leech, and all to stats boost your total life and survivability. If it had Damage to Demons instead of Undead, and Crushing Blow, it would be Godly For Ubers.
This weapon keeps you alive in Ubertrist when casting -% Phys Res curses.
Primary main hand weapon for Ubertrist.
EDeathZ or EDeathCB or EDeathEttin
Has virtually everything an off hand frenzy weapon could possibly want. Etheral Indestruct with hel rune for low req's.
Crushing Blow and Deadly Strike are GG. Needs ITD, -% Target Defence, and Life Leech to be GFG.
Glacial Spike helps freeze, although Ubers have low chill effect, this weapon is neutral when deciding on what curse to cast.
Personally, I'd choose -% Phys Res curses, including Amp Damage.
Primary off hand weapon for Ubertrist. Perfect companion to Ebotd.
BeastZ or BeastEttin
Sporting the Fanaticism Aura, Crushing Blow Open wounds Str bonus and solid IAS, this weapon requires higher strength spendature, with no etheral or hel rune, suits the more defensive curse life tap, since it has no leech or freeze properties.
Pair it with Dracs Gloves for more open wounds, +str, 10% leech and Lifetap.
Breaks alot, pain to keep repairing, lower damage than other weapons above.
Secondary main hand Ubertrist weapon, but still a very powerful weapon. Suits LifeTap based builds.
EOathZ or EOathCB or EOathBalrog or EOathChampion
Etheral Indestuct ramps damage, Demon damage, PMH 50%IAS, this is a solid choice for general pvm runs with -% Phys Res curses.
But once in Tristram, Oath suffers, with no CB, DS and no defensive stats like leech, or freeze, but you could use it for a Lifetap based set-up with other Crushing Blow items.
Alternate main hand weapon for Ubertrist with Lifetap.
EEternityZ or EEternityCB
Etheral Indestruct, 7%LL, Slow target 33%, CBF, Replenish +16, make this a very interesting propostition for Ubers.
Definately the most defensive based superweapon, in this group.
Alternate off hand weapon for Ubers and Amp Damage.
DoomZ
Holy Freeze aura, -20% Req's, freeze target, make this quite a defensive based weapon, but it has no leech or Vita bonuses
Can be used as a main or off hand weapon but no CB or eth indestruct limits damage output.
Main or off hand weapon for Ubers with Decrepify or Amp Damage.
EStormlash
Low physical damage, but good CB, base weapon speed, static, lite damage.
No defensive bonuses. Etheral version the only way to go.
Off hand weapon for Ubers and LifeTap based build.
FortitudeZ
Very defensive weapon. Chilling armor, life bonus, 200% defence, 30% resists.
Allows you to shift other items about when you want to plug holes in your build, but forces you to find Crushing Blow based Items.
Off hand weapon for Ubers and Amp Damage based builds. Needs leech.
ELacerator
A casting weapon for getting openwounds started to stop Ubers superfast regeneration, and cast Amp Damage.
Equip 2 for best results in UberTrist. Winged Axe has no Durability, and benefits from Axe Mastery.
Etheral version for increased damage. Hit Blind Target helps somewhat against uber minions.
Pinnacle Support Ubertrist weapon. GG Amp Damage caster.
LawbringerPB or LawbringerLegend
Lawbringer brings massive killing power to a frenzier via its Sanctuary Aura and its ability to cast the Decrepify curse.
Both these abilitys reduce/remove monsters physical resists/immunes.
Its -50% Target Defence allows quick casting of Decrepify in sticky situations, a little elemental damage, and life leech help somewhat.
Once equipped with a hard hitting main weapon, monsters are toast.
It allows you to chew through virtually anything, this side of Ubertrist.
Solid Weapon combos include: GriefPB, EBotDCB, EOathChampion.
If using solely to cast Decrepify in Ubertrist, equip 2 for best results.
Pinnacle Support Ubertrist weapon. GG Decrepify caster.
LastWishZ or LastWishCB or LastWishPB
Astronomically expensive weapon, LastWish, has got every mod you want when you just cant wait to uber, while still building up your new Frenzier.
Fade, Lifetap, Might Aura, 70% CB, ITD, PMH, all fill gaping holes on mid lvl chars.
Not the highest damaging weapon here, but oodles of safety. 70% CB is very hard to pass up.
Cannot be used when casting -% Phys Res curses. Alternate offhand weapon.
Pinnacle Support Ubertrist weapon. GG LifeTap and Fade caster.
After a study of these weapons, we can place them into the following categories. Brave, Safety, and Casters. (Chance to Cast weapons)
After deciding on what curse your Frenzier is going to use, choose a weapon that will either increase or decrease your safety.
Brave
Grief
Oath
Beast
Death
Stormlash
Safety
Doom
Eternity
Fortitude
Breath of the Dying
Casters
Lastwish
Lacerator
Lawbringer
Pre-Buffing
For general gameplay and 8 player baalwalks etc you dont need to equip GG pre-buff items, like +3 sticks and ammys, if your life is already above 5000.
But once into Ubertrist its a very different story.
Here is a solid list of pre-buff items to use before going through that red portal.
01x +3 Warcries, with +3 Shout, +3 BO, +3 BC Rare barb helm
01x CoH +2 skills.
02x SoJ's or BK's.
01x Spider.
01x +3 Warcries Amulet.
02x +3 Warcries Balanced Knives.
09x +1 Warcries GC's
01x Anni
01x Torch
01x Demonlimb (Enchant)
01x LastWish or Treachery (Fade)
Add in a +2 All Skills shrine :grin: and you get lvl 56 BO.
How much (or little) of these items is up to you.
Obviously more = better, but it takes an eternity to equip them and unequip every 5 mins to rebuff.
If your GG, you can kill all 3 ubers in this time.
Probably worth the hassle if your attempting a -DR% curse for the first time, especially Amp Damage.
Unless you somehow stuff your skill and stat points up, you should easily be over 6000 life now.
Max Ubertrist Items
The following would be the highest damaging Frenzier possible for Ubertrist.
01x P Arreats with 40|15 Jewel
01x P Fortitude 15|15 Superior Archon Plate
01x P P String of Ears Upped
01x P Ravenfrost
01x P Rare 8% LL 20 Str 15 Dex 120 AR 11% All Resist Ring
01x P Laying of Hands
01x P Goreriders
02x P EDeathEttins :shocked:
02x P ELacerators
01x HighLords Wrath
37x 03 20 20 Scs.
01x 20 20 Annihilus
01x 20 20 Torch.
Act 1 Cold Arrow Merc
01x Guillaume's Face 40|15ias
01x P Ebugged Fortitude Archon Plate
01x P Faith 15%ED Sup Crusader Bow
Actually surviving with these items will be difficult even if your (and your merc) pre-buff is completely maxed out. Seriously.
But these items, imo, are as powerful as you can get. The Fanata aura from your merc will give your dual Death's (very slow as ettins) the max 5fpa.
Ettin axes are the highest average damaging 1 hander weapon to make Death in. In this case, it doesnt matter if they are slow attack speed.
This is GG at its best.
Also, dont believe what arreat summit says about the max ed% in one handers for Death. It is wrong.
Ive just made a 384% EDeathEttin, and it wasnt even a sup weapon.
Therefor a max %ed for Death is 400% (using 15%ED Sup weapons). Being a 1 or 2 hander is fortunately, irrevelant.
ELacerators will cast Open Wounds Amp Damage curse for GG damage.
Switching back to EDeathEttins, Deadly Strike and Crushing Blow will now be unbelievely effecient, with ubers receiving more damaging than what your Frenzier is even producing. :thumbsup:
Guillaume's Face will boost damage from merc more than any other helm in the game.
To be honest, I'd change out both Forts (Frenzier and Merc) and replace them with CoH.
It just adds so much more safety to the chars, the less damage you do from the change is worth it 10 fold.
Probably wise to Ber your Guillaume's Face for your merc while your at it.
Other safer options include the popular BotD and Death combo, with a Act 2 Might or Freeze Merc, Guillaume's Face, and Infinity.
Because the Drain Effectiveness on all 3 Ubers is very low, your going to have to pot a little.
UberMephisto has 0% Drain Effectiveness, so have 8 Purples and 8 Reds in your belt. Use Purples for when your really low, and Reds to just keep it topping up slowly over a period of 10 seconds.
Skeletons also have 0% Drain Effectiveness. Avoid attack these at all costs.
Hold your breath and enter portal.
Get any Uber to spawn, switch to Lacerators and cast Open Wounds and Amp Damage.
Immediately Howl (use a hot tab) to disperse minions, and switch to main weapons for immediate leech.
Minimise attacking anything other than ubers. Continue to howl minions when they come back.
Rotate this procedure every 10 seconds till uber is dead.
Repeat on next 2 Ubers.
Good luck and may the Leech be with you. :thumbsup:
Just Plain awesome Guide ! really nice i think this ones covers it all ;)
10/10 Keep Up the Good Work m8
batuchka
12-03-2007, 13:39
Kudos on the effort and thanks for sharing ^^ Some comments:
1) Same auras from 2 or more items that you equip all stack. Two 'Beast' weapons give slvl 18 fan aura. A HOJ + Dragon = slvl 30 holy fire. Aura from merc does not stack and effective higher slvl aura either from merc or character would be in effect.
2) Superuniques are immune to confuse curse and other AI altering curses. Also u mentioned drain effectiveness but just for the sake of completeness it should be made known that life tap curse is the only way to leech life from 0% drain effective monsters like Uber Memphisto. This curse also allows one to leech life from undead monsters
3) What is your suggestion for PIs that amp damage and deceprify curse cannot break?
4) Sanctuary aura also allows one to leech life from undead monsters.
5) Hmm for LW fade prebuff : Just to share - i like to go to that fire beside Hadariel near River Of Flame wp and toast myself a bit and after a short while fade triggers. Also for the sake of completeness perhaps elaborate why fade is desirable i.e. it has resist all and hidden %dr bonus
Cheers and good job :thumbsup:
Nice guide, specially for thinking out of the box.
...Unfortuately, no player can change a monsters drain effectiveness...
...When a target has 0% drain, you cannot leech, and theres no way to change a targets' drain property...
Not the monster characteristic, but the result of it can be changed via Life tap.
Dont bother blowing 2 points to run faster via this Barb skill, because you gain 45% frw (equal to lvl 25 Increased Speed) plus you get Teleport.
I dont use those points on frenziers either but R/W from gear is not the same as R/W from skill.
Crushing blow (when sucessfully "cast") reduces Uniques and Bosses life by 12.5% per attack.
But, as long as they have 50% DR, this comes down to 6.25%.
If your target has 100% DR, they wont receive ANY of this life reduction. Even if you have 100% chance of Crushing Blow.
Im not sure on this one because I never tested it myself but I recall reading that Crushing Blow is a life reduction property that does not work as damage. Has the statement above being tested?
What I am unsure of is items that grant the same aura, do they stack?
They do, this is why some BvCs switch to dual dooms during some duels.
01x +3 Warcries, with +3 Shout, +3 BO, +3 BC Rare barb helm
That helm can´t spawn, but a magical version can. The rare would be +2 warcries maximun. Also a delirium could go as high as a rare.
Congratz for the job.
sirwhere
12-03-2007, 16:15
Well, I soloed uber tristam with my frenzier 4 times already and the only suggestion here that matches what I did was infinity on merc :)
demonbane
12-03-2007, 17:27
not a bad guide and very detailed... just curious what kind of frenzy build leaves out war cry...
War cry is the bread and butter of crowd control for a frenzy barb. A frenzy barb is not a tank although with good LL you can tank a while... Warcry is such a fundemental skll for a frenzy build...
sirwhere
12-03-2007, 17:58
huh..? Aren't u confusing frenzy with berserk? A frenzier with good leech doesn't need warcry... even swarmed by minotaurs, 1 pt howl is all it takes to get out of trouble :)
Berserkers DO need warcry. Or a heck of a lot of rejuvies ;)
demonbane
12-03-2007, 18:48
I prefer 1 pt in warcry over howl,,, Maybe its just personal prefernce. Either way its a great guide frenzy is by far my favorite build, lots of fun
Metathrom
12-03-2007, 19:39
Great guide! :thumbsup:
All I want add is that, if you're going for a life tap setup, 1 point in Berserk is extremely helpful to get past the Oblivion Knights in über Izual's dungeon and the Undead summoned by Meph in über Tristram. As a synergy though, I agree with you: it's pointless to develop it. :azn:
Warpfrenzy
12-03-2007, 20:46
Will an act 1 merc really be able to survive well in hell? To merit using faith on her?
throught the game character advance from lev 1 to lev 99, so he increase his level 98 times and gaines 12 quest skills. total is 110 not 111
also the life/mana leech in hell is reduce to 1/3
there is no general 50 % dmg resists on monsters in hell as it was in 1.09
i personally prefer fortitude over enigma for pvm frenzy. teleport is nice thing to have but with all that speed u have...
themdamnducks
13-03-2007, 03:23
This guide should be stickied!!
Great guide!!
Tankmobile
13-03-2007, 08:33
anyone know where our mod has dissapeared to? quite afew good guides have been made recently and not so much as 1 sticky :smiley: good guide spankeh, but could do with afew varied gear selections (the weapon section was good) for poorer players, who cant get arreats/eni/forti/duress etc...
Thx for the replies:
Cheers for the clarification on same stack aura's. GG
For PI's that amp wont remove, just move along forget about them. not worth lowering your damage to kill 1% of monsters with that mod.
Im not going to waste time and damage, to kill OB knights with berserk... Sorry.
The FRW, you might be right. FRW skill > item frw. Thx for pointing that out.
Ive tested crushing blow on Phys immune monsters. CB animation NEVER shows. Arreat summit confirms phys resists affects cb here (http://www.battle.net/diablo2exp/items/magic.shtml#sma)
Yep, typo i made about that rare BO helm. Should have been magical, thx for clearing that up.
Warcry and Frenzy, err.... waste of time and points... sorry. By the time you cast it, you can kill it, and in Ubers its useless, because ubers are immune to it, plus you dont want their minions near you anyway, cause they stop you hitting ubers. Just get them the hell away from you by using howl. Big fundumental difference.
Monsters damage resists vary in hell from monster to monster.. the average is probably around 50%, not 50% for all monsters in hell. Big difference.
Drmurder
19-03-2007, 20:56
Awesome Guide ill be following it but the items are kinda expensive
GargonCerlan
19-03-2007, 23:43
Great guide! :thumbsup:
All I want add is that, if you're going for a life tap setup, 1 point in Berserk is extremely helpful to get past the Oblivion Knights in über Izual's dungeon and the Undead summoned by Meph in über Tristram. As a synergy though, I agree with you: it's pointless to develop it. :azn:
Only problem is that in order to get warcry, you need to put a point in howl, not to mention taunt and battle cry, but to each his own I guess.
Ive tested crushing blow on Phys immune monsters. CB animation NEVER shows. Arreat summit confirms phys resists affects cb here (http://www.battle.net/diablo2exp/items/magic.shtml#sma)
I have seen the animation for crushing blow, and it is very hard to see if you aren't paying attention. When the weapon strikes the target, and crushing blow is activated, it makes a little red starburst that emanates from the point of impact. You really need to look closely to see it, but in my opinion it's not worth staring at the screen to find out where the animation is, since you can tell when a huge chunk is removed from the target's lifebar that a crushing blow hit was triggered. If my memory serves correctly the same sort of animation happens with deadly strike but the star pattern is yellow.
Hey I followed your guide and my barb is working out great. Right now I have a EBotdZ paired with a EDeathZ. My attacking rating without angelic combo is around 7000 with a 60ish% chance to hit Baal. Should I scrap my highlords and bk ring for the angelic or is this fine. Also what should my damage be. Right now I am at 5.4k and 5.1k for the weapons. Thanks again for the guide.
Well, I soloed uber tristam with my frenzier 4 times already and the only suggestion here that matches what I did was infinity on merc :)
So, you think you could share your build/equipment? :)
-tallon
Just a question, should I use pb or zerks as weps for my frenzy barb? Thinking of having fanaticism aura along with might (last wish and beast) thx
If your going Beast and Lastwish, then go Zerker Axes.
Update:
No matter what i do to keep my merc alive, she just wont survive in Ubertrist.
If i prebuff her with fade lol, and use Lifetap instead of Amp Damage, she lasts quite a bit longer, but something eventually swarms her, even with consistant howling.
So the dual edeathettins or edeathz's with a Faith Merc aint such a good idea, in Ubertrist.
Awesome for general gameplay/baalruns though.
one nice weapon you left out,
Azurewrath unique phase blade.
It's quick, indestructable, can kill PI's.
You could pair 2 of them or mix with another weapon. Results are always insane.
I like to use Azure/last wish or azure/grief.
Thx for the update Spankeh. Do you have any suggestion for the most effecient weapons in ubertrist? (assuming lifetap)
-tallon
twitcherman
17-04-2007, 00:57
this might sound dumb, but is the good old Fury runeword of any use in this build? 40 ias, pmh, ow, ds, itd, 20% to AR, 6LL, and 5 to frenzy looks good to me, only thing is lowly 209 ed. thoughts?
Great work. Just wanted to find sth like this.
I'm going to make my uber barb with double LW zerks. I've seen that you forget that auras from 2 items give you 34 lvl might = 340%ED (!!!). It does not work with auras from skill and item (for example pala using conviction will not receive bonus from infinity and if you and merc have might auras, only higher lvl aura is effective)
ref. A1 faith merc - it is a crap. IAS from fana does not work with party - means you. It gives you little bit more dmg (120-130). It is quite a lot but will be usefull few second before merc die.
ref sanctuary: "Steal Life/Mana items work well with Sanctuary against immune to physical undead monsters; as long as they have positive drain effectiveness. (See Monsters Section.) Sanctuary does significant damage against undead compared to other auras, because it ignores the %50 Damage resistance which nearly all undead monsters have in Hell diffuculty." from "Arreat Summit"
I'm going to use CoH = NO TELE and I think that I can use 2 x Bloodletter on switch. WW is usefull to go through minions which usually are on your way to Mephisto. Spending 3 pts for WW is waste so Bloodletter would be helpfull. What do you think? Dmg very low (no sword mastery) but should works.
Stuff which I'm going to use:
Armors:
Arreat, Coh, Dungo, Draculs, Gore
Weapon:
2 x LW zerk
2 x Bloodletter on switch
Jewelery:
Highlord (considering atma because of AD vs PI)
Raven
Carrion wind (stun from twister can help)
With this gear I should have 100% CB (and I think that goreriders are not best choice maybe Nat boots for res?), 25% cast life tap - nice but I think just in case I can use marrow for LT cast where I want.
Any suggestions?
Last question. Are you sure that Meph has convition lvl 20? If yes pala with conv lvl 21 make it inactive (!) and best team would be avenger who help you with PI.
Eilo Rytyj
18-04-2007, 17:30
Awesome guide dude, you really know your bizz about Frenzy Barbs.
ref. A1 faith merc - it is a crap. IAS from fana does not work with party - means you. It gives you little bit more dmg (120-130). It is quite a lot but will be usefull few second before merc die.
That's where you're wrong, an Act1 merc with Faith DOES give you the IAS bonus to all party members in range. I know because that's what I used on an old Amazon to get to an 8 frame attack using Lycander's Aim, which is slow as hell (like 10 or 11 frames natural).
Skills to not waste points on:
Leap
I'm going to have to disagree with you here. Leap is one of those indispensible skills that make Barbs stand out from all the other characters. I believe it deserves 1 point in all Barb builds, regardless of what else you're doing. With enough +skills (which will be around +5-10 Combat skills on an Arreat's toting Barb) you'll get a range big enough to jump anywhere you want to go, and there's always that useful knockback when you land. It's basically the CoH-based or Fort-based Frenzy Barb's answer to Teleport, for those people who hate using Enigma on a non-caster character like me, who think "CoH>>>nig 4 frenzy" no matter what you say about it...
...anyway, I've said my piece about Leap. After all these years, it still cracks me up Leapfrogging in one spot for no reason. "whup, whup, whup, whup..." hehehe...
I'm going to use CoH = NO TELE and I think that I can use 2 x Bloodletter on switch. WW is usefull to go through minions which usually are on your way to Mephisto. Spending 3 pts for WW is waste so Bloodletter would be helpfull. What do you think? Dmg very low (no sword mastery) but should works.
.
Read the above paragraph. NO TELE = use Leap. Bloodletters have Sword Mastery on them for free btw, but it still doesn't justify using them.
Leap costs 2 mana and you don't get hit in the air, WW costs 25++ mana, and you can get hit and maybe even die if WWing through a dangerous pack.
With this gear I should have 100% CB
.
You will have up to 85% CB on each weapon. Two separate weapons do not add up CB. Same goes with CTC Life Tap, it's a separate chance for each weapon, the chances do not add up.
Last question. Are you sure that Meph has convition lvl 20? If yes pala with conv lvl 21 make it inactive (!) and best team would be avenger who help you with PI.
Nope, only the Paladin will benefit from the immune to Conviction with his own higher Conviction AFAIK. All other people will still get -res%.
Thread unstuck, as it is linked in the guide thread, and has been stuck for far longer than the two-week standard.
-Hal
That's where you're wrong, an Act1 merc with Faith DOES give you the IAS bonus to all party members in range. I know because that's what I used on an old Amazon to get to an 8 frame attack using Lycander's Aim, which is slow as hell (like 10 or 11 frames natural).
Nice. Did not understand this well page:
http://www.battle.net/diablo2exp/skills/paladin-offense.shtml
Althought I've used fana merc did not seen difference, but maybe not achieved breakpoint or my eyes are too slow.
With pala I used double dream A3 merc. He awake meph very fast and die immediatelly but all skelies were "confused", what gave me time to get Meph.
Leap can be good solution - 1 pt only is enough. Ref. enigma - I use it on barbs, palas etc. but not in Tristram. CoH gives huge resistances and this is main reason to use it. Forti is little bit worse because no str bonus. ED from forti is similar to CoH, because all monsters in tristram are demons or undead.
You will have up to 85% CB on each weapon. Two separate weapons do not add up CB. Same goes with CTC Life Tap, it's a separate chance for each weapon, the chances do not add up.
Do not know what math function is it - variation, covariation or sth. Anyway 2 LW give more chances for CB then 1 LW. Normal gear for most popular uber killer is: Guillame and gore for CB and exile and dracul for LT (checked not enough).
The same with life tap. I hope that wand or knife with LT charges are not necessery. Maybe Mephisto explain me that I was wrong :).
Nope, only the Paladin will benefit from the immune to Conviction with his own higher Conviction AFAIK. All other people will still get -res%.
:cry:
It is a pity that only 2H weapons which barb can take in 1H are swords. 2 x infi would be great. Great aura and animation would be funny, especially leap :)
sirwhere
18-04-2007, 20:52
So, you think you could share your build/equipment? :)
-tallon
Sorry, didn't see this before. Build was just a regular frenzy build with like 10 pts into frenzy synergies. Equip was:
gui's helm
chains of honor armor
atma's amulet
2x grief zweihanders
2x leech rings with resists (ravenfrost vs uber-meph)
trang's belt with 16x full juvies
gore rider boots
laying of hands gloves
AR, life and resists charms
~3200 life after battle orders
merc had:
crown of theives helm, with ias jewel
eth duriel's armor
infinity eth cv
Strategy was to howl at minions to isolate ubers and take them down one-by-one. Diablo is pretty easy.
Meph is scary because his aura puts my resists in the mid 20's. Each hit of his cold orb would slice my health in half. But if you manage to tank him until amplify triggers, he goes down quite easily.
Baal is quite a pain. Not that he hits hard, but he does regenerate too quick and blocks a lot of hits. Amplify frequently wears out. You need to keep whacking at him until a couple of critical hits take his last slivers of health.
I haven't tried doing them as of lately, but if it were now I might try dracul's for gloves and/or a lawbringer/highlord combo. Another thing I'd consider is to use battle cry on all of them until decrepity or amplify trigger in.
If your going Beast and Lastwish, then go Zerker Axes.
Update:
No matter what i do to keep my merc alive, she just wont survive in Ubertrist.
If i prebuff her with fade lol, and use Lifetap instead of Amp Damage, she lasts quite a bit longer, but something eventually swarms her, even with consistant howling.
So the dual edeathettins or edeathz's with a Faith Merc aint such a good idea, in Ubertrist.
Awesome for general gameplay/baalruns though.Have you tried using a doom in one hand? Wouldn't the doom keep the monsters focused on you more and a little slow to attacking your merc?
FrankWest
21-04-2007, 22:33
With this gear I should have 100% CB (and I think that goreriders are not best choice maybe Nat boots for res?), 25% cast life tap - nice but I think just in case I can use marrow for LT cast where I want.
Any suggestions?
Last question. Are you sure that Meph has convition lvl 20? If yes pala with conv lvl 21 make it inactive (!) and best team would be avenger who help you with PI.
1) Go with the Gores. Everything they have is useful against the ubers, not just the CB. You can always get more res from charms.
2) When ubering, you really don't want to have to worry about having to tap manually. With the % to cast LT that this guy has, it's as good as automatic. Those two seconds it takes to switch back and forth from LT manually might be your last two seconds on the face of the Earth. :wink3:
3) Nope, won't work. Meph will still convict you, and it's gonna hurt. :cry:
Thread unstuck, as it is linked in the guide thread, and has been stuck for far longer than the two-week standard.
-Hal
How can it be in the Guides thread with this:
Charms
02x 45 Masteries Gcs
26x 03 20 20 Scs.
05x 20 05 Res Scs.
01x 20 20 Annihilus
01x 20 20 Torch.
That's the charms section in the guide. I think that counts as suggesting dupes quite colourfully. Not that I personally would mind it, just that it seems to go against of your regular policy of no dupes.
sirwhere
22-04-2007, 00:21
those are ideal items, not 100% must have thingies.. ^^
those are ideal items, not 100% must have thingies.. ^^
Even so it's in the suggested gear section. Thus it's suggesting the usage of dupes. And such guides are clearly frowned upon in here.
So why?
FrankWest
22-04-2007, 02:01
Even so it's in the suggested gear section. Thus it's suggesting the usage of dupes. And such guides are clearly frowned upon in here.
So why?
Here's my take, though it be ever so humble... nowhere do the website's rules say "If you have any items that are likely duped on any of your characters, leave immediately." Heavily duped items aren't welcome to be traded here. There's a list. Those items on his guide are on that list. But they're also on the 'do not trade' lists. Should we delete them, too? They makes reference to them, and clearly imply that these are highly powerful items.
The Mods have passed judgement when it comes to mentioning dupes/hacks/exploits/bugs case by case, time and time again. But what's to stop someone from suggesting that somehow obtaining a potentially duped item would aid the character build they're outlining?
Should we pretend that these things don't exist, just because they can't change hands on dii.net? He's just saying they'd help the build, I think everyone knows that they can't be traded for/sold here.
Basically, whatever the Mods say goes. That's why they're always around, to pass judgement on these sensitive issues. And this thread has been around for quite some time, so I'd say that they've passed judgement already. :cool:
I also think it'd be just plain silly to completely forget these items are out there, though they're not welcome to be dealt here. Pretending won't make them go away. And heck, HRs and Baals eyes can be mentioned freely, obtaining them can be spoken of freely, and they've been deemed free to trade here. And in truth, odds are they're duped. How many times have you seen a BOTD suggested for any particular build? Countless! Now how many times have you seen a Zod drop? Defense rests.
In all things, defer to the Moderators. :grin:
Here's my take, though it be ever so humble... nowhere do the website's rules say "If you have any items that are likely duped on any of your characters, leave immediately." Heavily duped items aren't welcome to be traded here. There's a list. Those items on his guide are on that list. But they're also on the 'do not trade' lists. Should we delete them, too? They makes reference to them, and clearly imply that these are highly powerful items.
The Mods have passed judgement when it comes to mentioning dupes/hacks/exploits/bugs case by case, time and time again. But what's to stop someone from suggesting that somehow obtaining a potentially duped item would aid the character build they're outlining?
Oh please. I guess you weren't around when Blobs posted his first and second BvC guides? Both had posts by Hal and both ended up being huge flamewars because of the clear suggesting of 32020s and classical dupes in them.
Also, in all the time I've been here, I've never seen a guide with dupes in them that wasn't locked or at least not stickied quite quickly, such as Camden's smiter guide.
Should we pretend that these things don't exist, just because they can't change hands on dii.net? He's just saying they'd help the build, I think everyone knows that they can't be traded for/sold here.
Again, that's not the point. The point is that the forum's common standpoint, at least up to now, has been that no guide with suggestions of dupes would ever be stickied. So why make the exception here?
Basically, whatever the Mods say goes. That's why they're always around, to pass judgement on these sensitive issues. And this thread has been around for quite some time, so I'd say that they've passed judgement already. :cool:
If I wanted to be a meanie, I would say that I don't give a damn about your opinion. And that's just about how it might be. This is because you are not a mod, thus you have no word whatsoever on whether a topic is qualified or not. Not that I would, either. I'm simply pointing out the fact that a guide suggesting dupes is actually in the guides sticky which has never happened before and I would like to have some really good reasoning to the recent change unless it was a simple "I didn't see it" in which case I'm quite ... shocked.
I also think it'd be just plain silly to completely forget these items are out there, though they're not welcome to be dealt here. Pretending won't make them go away. And heck, HRs and Baals eyes can be mentioned freely, obtaining them can be spoken of freely, and they've been deemed free to trade here. And in truth, odds are they're duped. How many times have you seen a BOTD suggested for any particular build? Countless! Now how many times have you seen a Zod drop? Defense rests.
That's not the point. And by the way, a charm with such perfect stats is much, much rarer than any rune and also much, much more valuable.
It's not about forgetting their existence, it's about the standing point of the mod in a topic discussing dupes. Such topics are quickly closed and all links to pictures of dupes are always deleted. Why so, if "they should not be forgotten"? Give me a good reasoning for that except that it breaks the rules and you are good.
Also, if you haven't noticed by now, unlike high runes, 32020s are on the Do Not Trade-list, as you mentioned. That makes the two extremely different in the eyes of the mods and the admins. This should make you realize that it's not about them being duped or not, but some other fact. It's a common known fact that almost all if not all 32020s in the market are dupes. Yes, there are individuals with self-found 32020s but the amount of such 32020s goes into the 0.00x%-region if you look at how many of self-found 32020s there are among all of them. Not that anyone sane would ever trade a self-found 32020 either.
Eilo Rytyj
23-04-2007, 07:56
OK guys, how about I do a bit of an update for the charm section of the guide...
What you will need from your charms:
Prefixes
- Resistance. These can either be single resistance charms or all-resistance ones if you can. Either is fine. Lightning and Cold are the most important to stack with single resistance charms when countering Mephisto's Conviction. All can be self-found with a little MFing.
- Attack Rating. SCs can spawn with up to +36 AR on them. GCs can have the highest AR boost, with a possible +132 AR on a charm, which equates to +44 AR per square. Max Damage/AR charms are alright as well, but plain AR charms would be better because of the higher possible AR on them per inventory square space. A small increase in Max damage isn't as important as your chance to hit, especially in Uber Tristram where you want to hit the Big 3 as many times as you can in the least amount of time...
- Mastery GCs. Can be useful, as they increase your damage, chance to hit, defense and resistance by a small amount.
Suffixes
- Life. Pretty much self-explanatory, The Great Booyaka once said: "Life is good when your life is good". Smalls can give the highest life bonus per square (up to 20), GCs the least (up to 15life/square for a perfect 45 lifer... how about that).
- FHR. Not as important, but if it gets you to the next FHR breakpoint, then it's inventory well spent. GCs can have 12%, LCs 7%, SCs 5% as suffixes.
martbarb
24-04-2007, 15:26
Hi would like to know how to deal with Iron maiden and those physical immunes. I read the guide but dnt really understand. Enlighten me pls
Blob's guide wasn't stickied because of the references to classical item dupes; it had nothing to do with the 3/20/20 charms.
Point being, the rule in this particular forum has always been that if an item can still legitimately spawn, it can be included in a guide. Classical dupe items cannot spawn, which is why they are banned from comment. 3/20/20 charms can spawn (albeit at a very low likelihood), which is why I let them slide in guides. However, I strongly support the "x/xx/xx fine/vita" charm nomenclature, which avoids all of this in the first place.
3/20/20s are banned from trading on the forums due to the fact that they are overwhelmingly duped, and thus not a suitable trade item.
I will edit the original content of the guide to fit the x/xx/xx nomenclature.
-Hal
Iron Maiden: Tele away or get Merc to kill
Physical Immune: Decrepify or Amp Damage
Iron Maiden and Physical Immune: Tele away
Hi guys,
Have a question. What weapon will go with a Last Wish PB for a Frenzy Barb?
Since beast would be unavailable to you with swords, i would use a death or a grief. My axe frenzier uses beast/last wish for ubers, my sword frenizer i use grief/death, which works fine for pvm but would be hard for ubers. Personally, if you've got gores on, and your already using last wish, i would go with a grief pb for more damage, as your cb should already be high enough.
-Majaii
Checked and almost confirmed - this barb is better then smiter :)
Why almost?
Look here:
http://forums.diabloii.net/showthread.php?p=5450689
I had no problem with catching Meph. I've lost no more then 25% life during fight (pala lose 90%). Little bit difficult was last moment, when Meph had little life - sometimes he even healed althought I've hit him quite often (lack of DS ?). I thought that highlord and CS from axe mastery would be sufficient.
My gear:
2xLW, arreat (IAS/ED jool), CoH, Nosferatu, IK boots and Gloves - had IAS bonus from fana lvl 9 (beast). Do not know what could happen later because game collapsed :S
I'm going to use gore next time and another gloves but no draculs (nn more LT)
Thanks for great guide
HemeHaci
28-04-2007, 22:47
man you are really great, I am not interested in an uber baba however I readed it and appreciated your good work ;)
Since beast would be unavailable to you with swords, i would use a death or a grief. My axe frenzier uses beast/last wish for ubers, my sword frenizer i use grief/death, which works fine for pvm but would be hard for ubers. Personally, if you've got gores on, and your already using last wish, i would go with a grief pb for more damage, as your cb should already be high enough.
-Majaii
Hey I think I remember you. You helped me with ubers the other time right ? Do you have a guide to your Barb ? Maybe I will use axes instead for higher damage.
How about BotD + LW . Will these 2 combinations work ?
Ash Housewares
30-04-2007, 11:33
I am way late, but I just wanted to say I am glad to see people writing frenzy guides
and thank you for mentioning mine
in particular, I like abandoning leap/whirlwind/berserk we've been coddled by these skills too long, frenzy does everything!!! the skills of old are a waste and we must be rid of them!
I can kill the ubers with this setup?
Guillaume's
Grief PB
Lightsabre
CoH dusk
Mara 29
2x Raven
Gorerider
IK belt
Dracul
anni
torch(assa-.-)
86% Lightning resist from charms with anni+torch
lvl88 1998 Life
Yes you should do it. If you use treachery first to cast fade, you will be much more safe - 86 res with conviction lvl20 = -29 .
Hey I think I remember you. You helped me with ubers the other time right ? Do you have a guide to your Barb ? Maybe I will use axes instead for higher damage.
How about BotD + LW . Will these 2 combinations work ?
ok i killed uber's with LW pb and BOTDcb :smiley:
I managed to do ubers with a Ebotdz and a LW zerk.....just gotta hope the life tap hits tho cause I died once or twice cause ife tap wasn't up yet (also got dracs on)
I use LW PB and Grief PB.
Took me 8 minutes to kill all 3 ubers with baal taking 6 minutes. His last slither just wouldn't drop!
I'm only level 82 with level 3 base BO :P Not bad with the guide, although I thought a few points were left out :P
KT
struikje
12-07-2007, 01:11
Nice lay out, I'm going to read it right away:D
KillaXxX
16-07-2007, 23:53
Think I'll be able to kill last 3 ubers (baal, meph, diablo). And in what order should i try to approach them? Also I'm pretty sure i should use string instead of verdungo being the LL... Reason i ask is b/c i was wondering if my setup could hit by himself being i don't any friends i trust to help.
STATS:
2.5k damage w/ azure
2k damage w/grief
160dex
320 vita 3.8k life
My equip
PB Grief
Azurewrath (eth socketed)
Valor
2xRaven 200+ ar x 19dex
Draculs
GoreRiders
1xHighlord
1x String w/8 LL
1x Vendungos
Plenty life and damage charm
This will probably sound dumb, but why does my BotD PB do more dmg than my Grief PB according to the character screen? I thought with the +392 dmg the Grief would far exceed the BotD. Does it not show the +392 on that screen? Im starting to think that at 85 I should switch the Grief to Azure with a possible Ohm...
thoughts?
Cppo-The-Wild
27-07-2007, 16:04
the grief's added +3xx dmg doesn't appear on you char screen... grief does way more avg dmg though than your botd in reality
Excellent, thats what i wanted to hear. One more question about Frenzy barb that i dont understand... What does it matter what sword is in what hand? And on the Inv screen is the left side his left hand and right his right? Sounds dumb, but when you put the stuff on it faces you, so I thought it may be opposite of that.
I've decided to make a BotD Colossus and pair it with the Grief. my alternate will be the Grief PB with the Azurwrath for PI.
What do I need to do so I can get 90+% chance to hit the uber guys? I tried building one of these before the ladder reset and he had like 65% chance to hit NORMAL(non-uber) hell difficulty baal. WTF am I missing ??
Tetrodome
24-08-2007, 05:07
My frenzy barb will be level 90 soon.
Currently equipped:
low def 5%ll Arreats with 15ias/11max jewel (found it in hellcows)
highlord's amulet
CoH AP
ebotdz + edeathz
9%ll 12str dracul's
ravenfrostx2 (both with around 240ar)
7%ll 15%dr string of ears
gore riders
btorch & anni
hp post pre-buff = 5500
lifeleech = 29% (41 on my ebotd)
post-conviction resistance = -12% fire, -12% poison, -2% cold, +23% lightning
With maxxed axe mastery, I have over 100% chance to do double damage on my death, and somewhere near 60% to do double damage on my botd. I'm sitting just under 9k attack rating and I completely annihilate anything that isn't phys immune.
I'm nonladder, so dual lawbringers will be just about as tough to find as two eth lacerators. Lacerators will take benefit of my axe mastery and allow me to proc amp faster and switch back to the big guns. Not to mention the rather low duration of decrepify forcing several weapon swaps.
My problem is that I fit in the decrep suggestion, and my only two options are lifetap and amp. With my gear, would you suggest dual eth lacerators for amp or stick with the dracul's for lifetap? I just worry that the low 5% chance to proc lifetap could mean I'd be dead before making use of any procs. And I believe with amp dmg, I'd have more than enough lifeleech to stay alive vs the ubers (although I bet I'd have to chug full rejuvies during meph). I have treachery on a mule if that really is a requirement for doing this with amp curse (although i'm low on inventory space as it is).
I don't think that the edeathz is the best choice for ubers...I prefer lwz for the CTC life tap, prebuff fade, prevent monster heal, ignore def and the might aura doesn't exactly hurt the damage output of the ebotdz....the only problem I have with it is the frequent repair trips I need to make.....
Tetrodome
25-08-2007, 03:28
I just now did some calculations on the damage difference between lw and death. Using my stats and chance to deadly-strike with each weapon, i come up with these results:
frenzy dmg with both weapons added:
ebotdz + edeathz: 5377-16529
ebotdz + lwz (lvl17 might aura included): 5043-15316
I didn't include the chance to cast charged bolt on lw or the chance to cast glacial spike on death since there wasn't an option for those procs. I also didn't add in anything for a might merc, since I still haven't decided on what I want in a merc. I'm perfectly happy with ebotdz + edeathz in normal pvm since i swing so fast dracs will normally proc before anything can knock my 5k health down. I have yet to try ubers, although I have 2/3 organs sitting on my barb already. Also, I believe ITD doesn't work on uniques, bosses, and ubers. My only problem atm is deciding on dropping 20 HRs for two eth lacerators to try something that might not work for ubers, or dropping 8-10hrs on a last wish that'll own ubers yet still leave me hating phys immunes.
and to Galpha:
From what I've read, you want the weapon with more IAS to be sitting above your gloves on the equipment screen. The IAS from the weapon above the boots isn't even included in the calculations. So let's say you're dual-wielding GFs. If you have shael on one and ohm on the other, you'll want the shael'd GF above the gloves and the ohm'd GF above the boots.
Volvagia
26-08-2007, 19:04
Just to add to the Last Wish vs. Death argument..
Last Wish provides Lifetap, thus making dracs virtually useless provided you have another form of open wounds equipped. This however, allows you to switch them out for say...Laying of Hands. A huge fire resist boost, some extra ias, and most importantly +350% Damage to Demons. That should be enough to put LW over Death in terms of damage, at least against bosses.
exactly why I like LW over Death.....If you really really need life tap, go LW with Dracs
Tetrodome
29-08-2007, 00:48
I just did Uber Tristram on my frenzy barb last night. I accidentally pulled Meph and Baal at the same time, so I couldn't hold myself up with just pots using amp dmg. I put my dracul's on and swung away at ubermeph while howling minions away. It took a really long time to kill meph since my swings were being shared by baal and his clone, baal kept manaburning me, and meph kept regenning from me not hitting as often as I'd like. After about 4 minutes of repositioning and howling, I finally killed Meph (note, my fade and BO ran out, so I essentially killed Meph with 2500hp). Once Meph was down, I took my drac's off and easily cleared Baal and Diablo using the amp damage method. If I can pull Meph out on his own, I'm pretty sure I can kill him without lifetap.
My main dilemma now is to decide between crafting 10ias/3ll/10cb/12str blood gloves (10 attempts, not one pair of gloves with IAS) to replace dracul's stat-for-stat with ias improvements or to just spend 12 stat points on strength and get a pair of laying of hands for the bonus damage to demons.
MaStAViC
12-10-2007, 08:14
Hi, I am building a Barbarian according to this guide, but would like to know which exact weapons (and setup to compliment those weapons) would be the best for Uber Tristram. I have not used any of the weapons listed (not a single one) and have no idea which would be the best one. The Barbarian will be fighting alongside a Paladin most of the time, and the Paladin has the following auras, if that helps: level 13 Defiance, level 25 Conviction, level 15 Holy Shock, and level 17 Might.
If your Barb has,
4500+ Life, 10-25% Phys Res, 45%+ Ele Res*, 00-25% LL : use LifeTap.
5500+ Life, 25-35% Phys Res, 60%+ Ele Res*, 25-35% LL : use Decrepify.
6500+ Life, 35-50% Phys Res, 75%+ Ele Res*, 35-50% LL : use Amp Damage.
There's no point using Amp if you're weak as piss, because your just going to get ownd. Badly.
There's no point using Tap if you're buff as an ox, since you'd be limiting your damage potential.
I am a bit confused about this part, because I do not know how I would be able to figure out which of the three (Life Tap, Decrepify, and Amplify Damage) builds I should be going for until I actually have the Barbarian almost done.
Thank you,
Victor Ly
Your life, phys/element resists, and life leech are dictated by the quality of your items and charms.
to get 30x 20 life sc's with resists for eg.. dont drop from the sky, so everyones totals vary once all their items are equipped. Obviously, as you aquire better items, these stats go up, but some ppl will never get their barb to over 6500 life.
"6500+ Life, 35-50% Phys Res, 75%+ Ele Res*, 35-50% LL : use Amp Damage"
To get these stats, your going to need the following:
6500+ life: 37x 20life sc's
35-50% Phys Res: Ber'd Arreats Face CoH Armor String of Ears
75%+ Elemental Res: 10x 5%all Resist sc's Ber'd Arreats Face CoH Armor
35-50% Life Leech: Ber'd Arreats Face CoH Armor String of Ears Ebotd
Finding 37x 20 life sc's isnt that easy, especially with 10 of them also need 5% all resists.
The physical resist is a little short, but the benefits outway the loss of Arreats helm to a CoA ber ber's helm, to make over 35%.
Most (about 75%) damage in ubertrist is elemental, so 31% Physical resist is good enough.
The Fade skill would REALLY suit with its +12% phys resists and +50% elemental resists, but changing/prebuffing I try to minimise.
Equipping dual eth lacerators on switch are four fold.
1st, they do more damage than non eth (which in turn gives more leech)
2nd, etheral are easier to equip (10 less strength spenditure.
3rd, Open wounds paramout to have (and get started quickly) in UTrist.
4th, the almighty Amp Damage curse.
Amp damage curse completely blows lifetap out of the water, and is the most powerful (damage wise) curse in the game for a mellee char.
Not only does it kill enemies much faster, it increases your leech by 2/3rds. since leech is dictated by damage taken, not dealt.
Obviously to make a successful ubertrist barb using Amp Damage is very expensive, but is as fast as a smiter when killing the 3 uber prime evils.
MaStAViC
13-10-2007, 09:04
Thank you for the reply and the thorough explanation. If I were to build the character you just explained above, what would the main weapons be? Would they be two ethereal Breath of the Dying weapons (Berserker Axe or Colossus Blade?)? You initially pointed out that you used two EDeathEttins, but then later stated "the dual edeathettins or edeathz's with a Faith Merc aint such a good idea, in Ubertrist." You did not, however, make a better suggestion.
For the items (other than the weapon), this is what I am aiming to get:
Arreat's Face Slayer Guard (almost perfect/perfect)
Chain of Honor Archon Plate (almost perfect)
String of Ears Demonhide Sash (perfect and upgraded)
Raven Frost Ring (almost perfect/perfect)
Rare Ring with Decent/Good Mods similar to what you stated: 8% LL 20 Str 15 Dex 120 AR 11% All Resist Ring
Laying of Hands Bramble Mitts
Gore Rider War Boots
Highlord's Wrath Amulet
Thank you,
Victor Ly
First up, the 2x edeathettins kick massive butt, but once your act 1 faith merc dies, attack speed drops dramatically, that its best to get a good fpa without relying on your merc living.
So best to go ebotdz and edeathz for the deadly strike and crushing blow.
Axes swords decrepify amp damage... Seriously.... how rich are you. Can u afford items/charms that buff a barb so heavily that you can go the amp damage route?
Are you actually going the amp damage build?
Can you afford 37x 20 life sc's, of which 10 also have 5% all resist as second mod? Thats equivelant to over 500Hrs in trade value alone just there.
The remaining 27x 20 life sc's need 3Max/20 AR as second mod.
Add another 800+ HR's.
"Rare Ring with Decent/Good Mods similar to what you stated: 8% LL 20 Str 15 Dex 120 AR 11% All Resist Ring"
Do realize this ring would be worth over 100HRs in trade value, if not a lot more. VERY difficult to acquire one even with half the stats.
The Amp Damage casting Frenzier needs perfect items, to buff him so highly, so that he can receive massive damage without dying, whilst dealing massive damage via Amp.
Going Zerker axes would be the best choice here, because:
1st: Higher damage than colossal blades, but not much.
2nd: Lower requirements than colossal blades.
3rd: Faster swing rate than colossal blades, but not enough for max fpa.
4th: Axe Mastery increases damage/attack rating for both Zerkers and Winged Axe (for mellee)
If we Ber an arreats, we miss out on a xx%ed/15%ias jewel, which means we miss out on a 5fpa, and instead get a 5.5fpa (at lvl 32 Frenzy) by a measly 2%ias.
Yes, 2%
This is unfortunate, but, damage reduction just cant be neglected, you will get hammered in there without it.
If this was to be a Decrepify build, then you wouldn't worry about Ber'ing your arreats, because you dont need as much Damage Reduction.
You would put a xx%ed/15%ias jewel in it instead for added damage and speed hitting 5fpa.
But anyway, for Amp casting use:
EbotdZ on main hand (above you glove slot)
EdeathZ on off hand (above boot slot)
ELacerator x2 on switch
Merc
Act 2 Nightmare Offensive (Might Aura) for higher damage or Act 2 Nightmare Defensive (Holy Freeze Aura) for additional safety.
Guillemae Face Ber'd
CoH Archon Plate
Obedience Thresher or Infinity Cryptic Axe
Add in all your uber leet charms that I know you have mounting up on your countless accounts of mules, (barb torch and anni would be prudent), howl away all them damn minions, cast amp and open wounds, switch to ebotdz and edeathz and watch chunks of ubers life drop quickly, whilst you are receiving small but worthwhile leech, plus absorbing considerable physical and elemental damage.
Have fun, and let me know how leet you can get his stats to... :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :wave: :wave:
MaStAViC
14-10-2007, 19:43
Axes swords decrepify amp damage... Seriously.... how rich are you. Can u afford items/charms that buff a barb so heavily that you can go the amp damage route?
Are you actually going the amp damage build?
Can you afford 37x 20 life sc's, of which 10 also have 5% all resist as second mod? Thats equivelant to over 500Hrs in trade value alone just there.
The remaining 27x 20 life sc's need 3Max/20 AR as second mod.
Add another 800+ HR's.
"Rare Ring with Decent/Good Mods similar to what you stated: 8% LL 20 Str 15 Dex 120 AR 11% All Resist Ring"
Do realize this ring would be worth over 100HRs in trade value, if not a lot more. VERY difficult to acquire one even with half the stats.
The Amp Damage casting Frenzier needs perfect items, to buff him so highly, so that he can receive massive damage without dying, whilst dealing massive damage via Amp.
When you stated 27 "20life sc's" in your other reply, I thought you meant just plain 20 life small charms (darn, I already spent several hours trading for over a dozen of them). With some time, I am able to get each of those with a PUL rune, and eight PUL runes equal a high rune, so that would only cost about four high runes. I did not know that you meant they would need 3 Maximum Damage and 20 AR on them as well.
So no, I will not be able to afford that build, so I apologize for wasting your time. What items under this build would be able to be made with roughly a dozen to two dozen high runes? Would the "5500+ Life, 25-35% Phys Res, 60%+ Ele Res*, 25-35% LL : use Decrepify" be possible, or should I be going the "4500+ Life, 10-25% Phys Res, 45%+ Ele Res*, 00-25% LL : use LifeTap" route? And for the route that would work, should I still be using an ethereal Breath of the Dying Berserker Axe and an ethereal Death Berserker Axe?
These are the items that I will be able to get:
Arreat's Face Slayer Guard (almost perfect/perfect)
Chain of Honor Archon Plate (almost perfect)
String of Ears Demonhide Sash (perfect and upgraded)
Raven Frost Ring (almost perfect/perfect)
Rare Ring with Decent/Good Mods as similar as possible to what you stated: 8% LL 20 Str 15 Dex 120 AR 11% All Resist Ring
Laying of Hands Bramble Mitts
Gore Rider War Boots
Highlord's Wrath Amulet
Decent Annihilus Charm
19/19 Barbarian Hellfire Torch
This is actually my girlfriend's Barbarian who I am help building. Her and I are planning to run Uber Tristram for fun after she's done with this Barbarian (I'm hoping as soon as possible). She's already leveled the character up and am just standing idly by, waiting for me to find out more from you (I am going to feel so bad if this build doesn't work out after she put so many days into the character with such high hopes). Thanks for the help so far!
Thank you,
Victor Ly
90% of frenziers go the lifetap build because:
1. Its cheap
2. Its safe
3. Its quick (to make the build)
Dump BotD and Death, and go Beast and LW Zerkers, add in Dracs instead of LoH, and everyone is happy. Quick easy build and gets you ubering.
Amp Damage build just kills faster
Decrepify slower
Lifetap slowest
If you have never ubered with a frenzier before, I would never recommend going a Amp Damage build, omg just go lifetap dude, or youll get ownd.
MaStAViC
15-10-2007, 10:57
90% of frenziers go the lifetap build because:
1. Its cheap
2. Its safe
3. Its quick (to make the build)
Dump BotD and Death, and go Beast and LW Zerkers, add in Dracs instead of LoH, and everyone is happy. Quick easy build and gets you ubering.
Amp Damage build just kills faster
Decrepify slower
Lifetap slowest
If you have never ubered with a frenzier before, I would never recommend going a Amp Damage build, omg just go lifetap dude, or youll get ownd.
Thank you very much for this reply! With this, I know exactly what gear the Barbarian needs now (and I can afford it!). I really appreciate your quick replies and all of your help =)
I'm thinking the Barbarian won't need a Rogue mercenary wielding a Faith bow anymore, but I could be wrong. What hireling would work best for this Barbarian?
Thanks!
Victor Ly
For your Merc:
Want lots of aura's going? OK, ahahaa this will be a fun build.
Go
Act 2 Normal Defence Merc. Gives you Defiance Aura
Helm: Ebugged Dream Demonhead. Gives you Holy Shock Aura
Armor: Ebugged Dragon Archon Plate. Gives you Holy Fire Aura
Weapon: EDoom Cryptic Axe. Gives you Holy Freeze Aura
You will have:
LW Zerk Gives you Might Aura
Beast Zerl Gives you Fanata Aura.
Hehe, he probably survive as well (your merc)
Or... Doing it properly:
Act 2 Normal Defence Merc Gives Defiance Aura
Helm: Guillaume's Face with a ber in it
Armor: Ebugged Chains of Honor Archon Plate
Weapon: eObedience Cryptic Axe or eInfinity Cyrptic Axe
GG and have heaps of fun :thumbsup: :wave: :grin: :cool:
PS Dont forget to hot tab howl to fear off all the minions... Very important.
PPS Dont forget 2x 3+ warcry knifes for buffing on switch.
deathcharge
22-10-2007, 06:56
Hey guys, i just made that barb like 2 days ago and got it up to lvl 83. i followed the quide as close as i could and took all the advice of previous replies. I ended up useing
ELastWishZ
EBOTDZ
199% arreats
Highlords
2x +20 dex ravens
15% verdungos
Laying of hands
197% gore riders
AP COH
Switch
2x +3warcry knife
20/18 torch
18/18 anni
charms
10x 20 slc
2x 5 all res
stats
i got 5200 life
dmg is:
2004-5929
1335-3979
Took me awhile to kill baal, but D and meph where easy to me. didnt have much trouble at all really. never used a pod....except mana here and there. Used howl alot and merc survived the whole time! well i went to town after each and prebuffed over.
Merc
ACT 2 nm Holy Freeze
guillaume's face Ber'd
Obedience
E AP COH
Thanks for the quide!!! Looked around and this is the best one i could find. worked perfect in more then one way. Keep up the good work!
MaStAViC
22-10-2007, 12:52
My girlfriend and I have been running Uber Tristram, as well as the three red portals before Uber Tristram, for the last few days. I am using a Paladin that followed niner's Whateverdin guide (http://forums.diabloii.net/showthread.php?t=414604), and she is using a Barbarian that follows this great guide.
I must say, we are both impressed with our builds. Our average time to run Uber Tristram and the Mini Ubers is about seven minutes, with a record time of four to five minutes. Yup, that's including finding and killing Izual, Lilith, and Duriel (though I do use a Sorceress just to teleport to them).
If anyone wants to know the gear of the Barbarian, feel free to ask. Know this though: The Barbarian only uses approximately 15 slots worth of charms in the inventory, and the Barbarian has VERY, VERY low resistances after Mephisto's Conviction aura (by low, I mean resistances in negatives and single digits), but Uber Tristram does not serve any problems whatsoever. No potions used, no getting nervous, nothing at all. Coupled with my Paladin, this Barbarian is, in my girlfriend's word, "invincible."
Spankeh, thank you so much for writing this guide. Furthermore, thanks for answering so many of my newbie questions. I know that you got a bit annoyed at some points (or it seems like you did), and I apologize for being such an annoyance, but gosh, you were very helpful.
Thank you very, very much,
Victor Ly
*mastavicx and *mastavic (USWEST Softcore Ladder)
studmuffinkelv
02-11-2007, 00:37
****************************
1 in Bash
1 in Double Swing
1 in Double Throw
Max Frenzy
1 in Natural Resist
1 in Iron Skin
1 in Howl
1 in Shout
Max Battle Orders
1 in Battle Command
Max Weapon Mastery
Max Taunt
Max Double Swing last
****************************
I know this might sound crazy, but what if I maxed Battle Orders last? How important is it to have that extra ~10-20% life/mana from BO vs extra damage from the Double Swing synergy? Also, if I'm playing with another barb, chances are that he has a higher BO than I do, so I can still reap the rewards. I'm just coming back from a 3 year hiatus from D2 and I've never done Uber Tristram, so maybe someone can set me straight.
CNCaudata
13-12-2007, 01:00
Is there a particular reason that 2 masteries charms are recommended? Does this allow gaining a particular breakpoint? That is, why not just have more max/ar/life charms?
sunflowersmooth
13-12-2007, 08:38
u mentioned the 2 best uber tristing weaps on ur front page (ebotd and edeath), but whats the best 2 weap set up for general pvm play?
sunflowersmooth
13-12-2007, 08:40
Can you afford 37x 20 life sc's, of which 10 also have 5% all resist as second mod? Thats equivelant to over 500Hrs in trade value alone just there.
The remaining 27x 20 life sc's need 3Max/20 AR as second mod.
Add another 800+ HR's.
and ...what? i didnt know 20/5res charms were 50+ hr each
Is there a particular reason that 2 masteries charms are recommended? Does this allow gaining a particular breakpoint? That is, why not just have more max/ar/life charms?
At the time, i had 2x Masteries 32/36 life GC's and no 5 Res/20 Life scs, even now, I only have 3 of these sc's.
Masteries GC help somewhat for a frenzier by giving small bonuses to a variety or stats, defence included. when defence gets a little to low, you get hit just a little too often.
Attack rating, damage, resists, all help a little, when buffing your frenzier, specialy when i had no other charms.
Ultimately, best would be:
Max|AR|Life SC's
Res|Life SC's
AR|Life SC's
u mentioned the 2 best uber tristing weaps on ur front page (ebotd and edeath), but whats the best 2 weap set up for general pvm play?
General running around in hell, Grief Phaseblade and Lawbringer Phaseblade are the pair to beat.
and ...what? i didnt know 20/5res charms were 50+ hr each
By the end of Season 3 Ladder, HR's were in abundance, after massive duping on a grand scale, (where talking in the hundreds of thousands) made their value almost worthless.
Even so, 50HRs was an over estimate on my part, more likely 20HRs at the end of season 3.
Ragefist
14-12-2007, 17:44
I really can't see the point in playing a frenzy barb with UBER duped crap. It just makes it way too EASY! Seriously, what's the point if you do that? I can say for a fact that virtually none of the guide gear selection would be available to a nondupe hardcore player.... ever. In the past I've had at least 30 hardcore hell characters and could not come up with the runes for these words (without trading for dupes).
I've come back to Diablo but have a no-trade/hardcore policy... and in my opinion thats the only way to play this game to make it fun.
I finished uber Tristam with my hardcore Paly hammerdin/smiter using a shaeled wiz spike as his main weapon... no rune word gear at all. Now I'll make a frenzy barb with subpar gear who can do the job.
Give yourseleves a bit of a challenge and come up with a guide that doesn't rely primarily on hacks :)
studmuffinkelv
14-12-2007, 17:55
^First post! Welcome to the forums! Please let us know how your HC Frenzy Barb does!
Ragefist
14-12-2007, 18:44
Ya its my first post for a couple of years. I started playing D2 back in beta... and have let all my characters expire/ladder run out a few times. I keep coming back to the game even though I now have 2 active WoW accounts.
D2 is still fun as long as you avoid the hacks/dupes... can't see a way I could possibly kill a barb using all the stuff that's reccommeneded in the above guide.
sunflowersmooth
15-12-2007, 05:53
why wouldnt a grief/last wish combo work best? never ubered with a barb, so i wouldnt kno from experience, but why botd/death over everything else? and what curse do u cast with botd/death if ur forgoing lifetap, and how do u cast it?
Eilo Rytyj
15-12-2007, 10:14
You can use Battle Cry as your curse if you wish. Yep, Battle Cry is a curse. It basically increases your chance to hit and reduces enemy damage. The advantage over Amp or Decrep is the lower defense = much higher chance to hit against ubers = more hits. The obvious advantage of Amp and Decrep is the lowered physical resist.
You can cast Decrep with Lawbringer weapons on switch. Or Amp with Atma's Scarab. Reaper's Toll on a merc also casts Decrep easily, but it's not recommended to bring a merc to uber trist as he wakes up the ubers and dies easily.
studmuffinkelv
17-12-2007, 18:49
and what curse do u cast with botd/death if ur forgoing lifetap, and how do u cast it?
a frenzy barb doesn't need lifetap to beat ubers if he has enough life and damage. besides, there is a drain issue ONLY WITH meph. leeching on baal and diablo isn't an issue. if you beef up resistances and do enough damage, you can take down uber meph consistently without any problem.
lifetap is a fad created by smiters because smite doesn't leech.
Ragefist
17-12-2007, 19:11
I think I'll use a templar armor against meph (ya I can get 90 resist all against Meph's conviction). I've found the runes to make one kingslayer and may be able to come up with a 2nd. I'm sure that with the resists and 48% CB from kingslayers and gore riders a frenzy barb will have no issue... can't afford to die cause he is HC.
Another option might be to use a kingslayer and Lightsabre combo with 25% lightning adsorb to mitigate his lightning ball. Killing the ubers is really not an issue with a frenzy barb. The important thing is survival.
That's what I noticed too. Doesn't require super duper equipment to take out Ubers with a Frenzy Barb. If you're attacking fast enough, your high damage, Crushing Blow, and Deadly Strike make *any* boss into sushi. Last week I ran Ubers with a friend twice in one night.
BTW, buffing with Demon Limb helps out quite a bit with Ubers. First time I took out Meph with roughly 8K AR and it was a nice, easy run. Second time I boosted with Demon Limb, seemed to land Decrep faster, and Meph died in about half the time. I never felt threatened at all, thanks to "Lawbringer," and even when Meph made my resists sucktastic.
sunflowersmooth
18-12-2007, 04:00
what are the best sword combos to use for lifetap, and for non life tap? and if another character triggers lifetap, for example a smiter with dracs, would ur frenzier lose his curse and start lifetapping instead?
also, could an enigma barb conceivably do mini-ubers?
I'm making a frenzy barb to run ubers with my friend who is a smiter. He will be using fanat, and lifetap with dracs, so what would be the best weapons to pair with this? From what I have read it seems that I won't need anything amazing to do well, but I was just wondering which combo would work best with him. Thanks and great guide!
Trance757
28-12-2007, 00:50
Go for damage. Use the etheral berserker axe combos that Spankeh defines in his guide in combination with your paladin friend. Don't use items that will overwrite his curses, since paladins are weak and will die without their life tap crutch.
With his fanata aura, go maximum damage, like dual eDeathz's (you'll easilly hit last 5fpa breakpoint), or Griefz/eDeathz LoH gloves (for the demon damage) Gores, Fort (if your resists are high enough, or CoH if there not)
Watch your life bulb go UP DOWN UP DOWN hehe, so go at least some DR like a Strings belt or Verdungos, probably verdungos, because you wont need the life leech from Strings, because of lifetap.
IMO i hate ubering with this curse, but the two of you will do well because a smiter always hits.
Barbs automatically miss 50% of the time against ubers chance to block stat, and then need to get past ubers lowish defence rate, so add another 10-15% to that.
If it wasnt for those two obstacles, frenziers would own smiters in every way. (against ubers)
But on saying that, the best 2 party uber duo is (by far) a Frenzier and a Smiter.
sirBeReN
10-01-2008, 18:19
I saw another one asking a similar question, but didnt find a good answer. So, please let me ask it again:
What are the differences between the weapons? Why to choose, eg. Zerks instead of PBs? And what is the special thing on Ettins which make them a good choice?
I can use several Rwords, such as Botd and Beast. Through ALOT runs, I have several socketed elite weapons, Ettins, Zerkers, PBs included.
Also, I have a 76lvl Frenzy boy, but still havent touched his weapon mastery, because Im not sure what seapon to use.
Could someone help me with this? (*shouts* Spankeeeeeeeh!!)
Thank you very much.
And thank you also for the awesome guide! ;)
Ettins are the highest average dph 1 handers, but are slower than other weapons, so are preferable to bas if you'll still hit the last ias bp using them or one of them. Use this ias calc (http://diablo2.ingame.de/tips/calcs/weaponspeed.php?lang=english), this item details list (http://www.battle.net/diablo2exp/items/weaponsandarmor.shtml#elite) and this damage calc (http://baronsbazaar.invisionzone.com/ppr/damage_calc.html) to work what will work best. Or give enough information and maybe someone else will do it for you.
Armandhammer
13-01-2008, 07:13
I've just started playing Barbs and am considering this Frenzy build. I'm familiar with most of the weapons except for the Lacerator. From the context of the sentence that E Lacerator is mentioned in, I take it this is an ethereal winged axe of some type?? I see no mention of this when looking through the "axe" items list or looking through runewords for lacerator.. I also looked through swords looking for this as well... Help, what is a Lacerator???
Thanks
Throwing axes are under throwing weapons not axes
Lacerator
Winged Axe
Throw Damage: (17-21) To (150-186) (83.5-103.5 Avg)
One-Hand Damage: (27-34) To (140-173) (83.5-103.5 Avg)
Required Level: 68
Required Strength: 96
Required Dexterity: 122
Base Weapon Speed: [-10]
Max Stack: (180)
+150-210% Enhanced Damage (varies)
+30% Increased Attack Speed
33% Chance of Open Wounds
Prevent Monster Heal
Hit Causes Monster To Flee 50%
33% Chance To Cast Level 3 Amplify Damage On Striking
Replenishes Quantity [1 in 4 sec.]
(Only Spawns In Patch 1.10 or later)
Last ladder I made a Budget Barb and surprisingly he got by, this season I put a bit of money into it.
This season's Uber Frenzier has:
-BeastZ
-eDeath Ettin
-Arreat's, Ort
-Highlord's
-Dusk CoH
-Drac's
-Dungo's
-Gores
-Raven
-Rare Dual Leech/AR/Lit res ring
-Charms: Mostly Sharps, some Lifers, one AR, one Lit Res/FHR, Torch
He meets my build goals. 5K life, 10K AR with both weaps, 5 fpa, maxed Lit res vs. Meph, 48% FHR BP. I wanted a Barb who could walk into Tristram, BO, then start killing Ubers, no fussing and mussing with prebuff stuff. There was a bit of potting while waiting for Life Tap to kick in on Meph, though I expected that. Poor Vikhyat will have to stay dead unless/until I decide to buy him merc Chains and all that other crap, but I don't see the need. Tonight was this Barb's first stroll through Uber Trist, and a stroll it was, for the most part.
If the value of the prize was set to be commensurate with the level of difficulty, then I wouldn't be too peeved about what he got out of his cherry pop Trist session - a 14/12 Sin torch. I hope the return on my investment comes along soon. :tongue:
Armandhammer
14-01-2008, 04:42
Throwing axes are under throwing weapons not axes
Lacerator
Winged Axe
Throw Damage: (17-21) To (150-186) (83.5-103.5 Avg)
One-Hand Damage: (27-34) To (140-173) (83.5-103.5 Avg)
Required Level: 68
Required Strength: 96
Required Dexterity: 122
Base Weapon Speed: [-10]
Max Stack: (180)
+150-210% Enhanced Damage (varies)
+30% Increased Attack Speed
33% Chance of Open Wounds
Prevent Monster Heal
Hit Causes Monster To Flee 50%
33% Chance To Cast Level 3 Amplify Damage On Striking
Replenishes Quantity [1 in 4 sec.]
(Only Spawns In Patch 1.10 or later)
Hey Phool, tnx.... I should have known better...
ninjakiss
23-01-2008, 12:46
the guide doesn't really address point allocation for character points. i use double axes, which he says don't really need strength or dexterity. energy is not really needed to add to, so does that mean pretty much all vitality?
Hi,
It's taking me too long to kill all three. Here are my stats and items:
Stats for Lvl 92 Frenzy barb using:
Arreats Face (ber)
Last Wish & Beast Zerkers
Maras amulet
Enigma
Laying of Hands
Bul Kathos & Raven Frost rings
Gore Riders boots
Dungos belt
Strength: 238
Dex: 177
Vit: 549
Eng: 113
Frenzy dmg: 1606-5580/1211-4424
Frenzy ar: 9320
Life: 5761
Defense: 10208
Mana: 374
Lvl 32 : BO
Lvl 34 : Frenzy
Lvl 32 : Axe Master
Lvl 32 : Taunt
Lvl 23 : Double Swing
Other items I can alternate with
(2) Pebotdz
(2) ELacerators
Shako (ber)
Dracs gloves
Stromtrek boots
War Trav boots
CoH
Highlords Wrath amulet
I tried the dual lac combo with dual pebotdz but againt meph could not leech fast enough. The damage from Meph came off like chunks and those pestering Scepters/Blood Lords kept getting in between me and Meph. When I Howl they still stay around him and attack.
Baal kept regenerating and my weapon durabiltiy would go down fast but his life bar didnt; felt like I was not hitting Baal.
Diablo was not difficult for me. Pit Lords were no problem but Diablo just kept reviving them; was a pain.
The only way I could kill them was with the lw & beast combo switchin with lacs, but even that took long.
I ended up spending more than 1M gold for repairs in just one run.
:cry:
prebuff with enchant (demonlimb) for more ar, should help.
hi all and a special hi to spankeh for this superb guide.
i have just completed trist with my frenzy barb, it was a stroll in the park.
my reward was a 20/11 pala T.
thanku for a great guide!.:thumbsup:
Hi, ive been working on putting together a uber frenzy barb and have a few question about gear, merc, and charms.
my gear so far:
6LL 185 arreats w/ias jewel
coh in ap
edeathz
ebotdz
highlords
2x ravenfrost
LoH
Dracs
nos coil
upped string of ears
upped gores
11/20 torch
14/19 anni
what i'm looking to buy:
17x all res sc
+3 warcries ammy
+3 warcries knives
5x warcries gcs
questions:
1. should i use LoH/string of ears for baal and diablo then dracs/nos coil for mephisto (i believe this is right but wanted to dbl. check)
2. should i only use one ravenfrost and get a 8LL/AR ring
3. exactly what charms should i use. i am never planning on buying rediculous multi stat carms. but if figure i have 17 avail slots after res charms, tomb of tp, buff ammy, anni, and torch. so should i use warcries gcs, life scs, ar gcs, or a combo of all.
4. from what i understad mercs die a lot in uber tristiam so is it even worth the trouble to have one
5. ive seen some ppl say to only use 10 res scs, but the way i figure it i will need 17 are my calulations wrong. -100 base res -130 convention aura +30 anya (dont plan on dieing so am including) +30 arreats +65 coh +20 torch +19 anni +56 nat res (1 hard pt +9 skls +1 btl command) this leaves me at -10 so i would need 17x all res sc to have max res.
p.s i only plan on using the char for ubers
thx in advance for any advice
1. What curse are you choosing, if you ditch lifetap when equipping LoH?
2. With Lifetap based, no way, go dual RF. For Amp/Decrep its good, but only when going axes, where Dex is irrevelent.
3. Get AR/Life GC's and AR/Life SC's. Add in a few RES/LIFE SC's and MAX/AR/LIFE SC's
The actual quality of these charms you equip, depends on your luck and/or wealth.
4. 50/50 there.
5. I only have a few, like 6, and i'm at 62%cold|75%fire|62%lite|64%poison so not sure why your so low, *after conviction.
Might need to recalculate there...
UsmanSimjee
16-02-2008, 11:46
Hey, I'm real confused on what to do. Can someone just summarize the best possible gear to put on if I just want to have as much res, life, and strength as possible and dominate? Thanks, I'd really appreciate it.
Awesome guide by the way, best I've seen yet.
UsmanSimjee
16-02-2008, 23:40
If anyone could help out, It'd be greatly appreciated.
Hi there,
Was just curious. If I understand the role of the Lacerator correctly, and that is simply to OW and most importantly cast AMP, why do you need eLacerator? Aren't you getting AMP started and just immediately switching back to say, eBotd and eDeath to take advantage?
Thanks.
Lowers Dex and Str Req's by 10.
Higher damage always helps while yr at it.
Hi,
It's taking me too long to kill all three. Here are my stats and items:
Stats for Lvl 92 Frenzy barb using:
Arreats Face (ber)
Last Wish & Beast Zerkers
Maras amulet
Enigma
Laying of Hands
Bul Kathos & Raven Frost rings
Gore Riders boots
Dungos belt
Strength: 238
Dex: 177
Vit: 549
Eng: 113
How does one get stats this high? I'd really like to know! I'm struggling to get anywhere close to the amount of Vitality he has...
Let's say all the items are perfect for sake of ease.
Arreats Face has 20 Str and 20 Dex; Beast has 40 Str and 10 Ene; Maras has 5 to all; Enigma has 69 Str(for lv 92); Ravenfrost has 20 Dex; Verdungos has 40 Vit; Anni has 20 to all; Torch has 20 to all(we'll assume this guy has a anni and torch too)
That gives +174 Str, +85 Dex, +85 Vit, and +55 Ene
Strength: 238-174 = 64
Dex: 177-85 = 92
Vit: 549-85 = 464
Eng: 113-55 = 58
Subtracting lv1 stats from that gives him 593 points allocated!
Could his base stats be anywhere that high? What am I missing?? Do other people have similar stats? I know I don't :sad2:
Spoochie
01-05-2008, 11:10
Hey im new to barb, and i play diablo2 lod now for 4 weeks. Im doing this barb now, but does anyone know if this can solo hell baal/minions and atleast good in uber? With some decent/normal gear? Im going sword with this, anyone know good swords for it?
Chirijiraden
08-05-2008, 06:00
This is a really excellent guide that needs to be looked at more. It should be stickied.
It is, here. (http://forums.diabloii.net/showthread.php?t=231548)
Nice guide. Can I just ask you why no frenzy barbs use the fury runeword? In my eyes it's quite good.
Fury has outstanding mods for a Frenzier, but its physical damage, the one criteria that you just cant compromise, is just too damn low.
If it had:
409%ED instead of 209%ED and had the Indestructible mod, I would probably make it in an ethereal Colossal Blade and replace my ebotdcb for it.
Until that happens, lol, I'll never make one.
bavadeli
29-05-2008, 09:20
great guide. Did anyone ever consider using steelrend gloves instead of draculs? If you use LW you wouldnt need the LT from dracul. I wonder if the 60% ED on steeldrend is worth something for the frenzy build.
How much ll would a good frenzy barb need? without dracul i would only have 5 from BK ring and 6 from arreat. Would this be sufficient in hel?
Great guide, I'm redoing my frenz barb after reading this (I put way too much into str).
One clarification though...
If I go the Lifetap route, it's best to use a LW (i'm going with axes) with either dracs or steelrends (as bavadeli pointed out above), but what's the best weapons to use if I go the AMP or DEC routes?
Right now I have a Ebotdz and a Beastz (freakin great dmg with Fanat but I have to repair it more often than I have to repair my 40 year old dodge charger).
Also, what belts work best per each uber? I have a dungos and a nosferatu.
And lastly, better to use a maras or highlords?
Thanks in advance. ANd thanks to Spankeh for this awesome guide.
DufresneXV
23-06-2008, 08:42
Quick question. In the guide it says no hard points in strength and dex are needed if using axes. Most of the items are high strength requirements, so do I spend some points in strength? Or am I supposed to use charms or something to get the strength needed to use my items?
I have as follows: no Anni yet :(
19/14 Barb torch
Archon Plate Enigma
Arreats Face
BOTDZ
EBOTDZ (yes only one is etheral)
Verdungos Cord
Ravenfrost x2
Goreriders
Highlords Amulet
Draculs Gloves
Base strenght is 30, +19 from torch= 49. If I managed to aquire an Anni, that would be 20 more strength at most, which would still be short of the item requirements.
Lastly, my barb is lvl 83 with no skill or stat points used yet, so I felt I should post here before spending stat point in the wrong area.
Its loosely regarded wise to not spend points in strength when going with axes and then ubering, to gain maximum life from Vitality spenditure, and usually gain str from items like Arreats, Dracs, Enigma, anni and torch.
A little here or there will definately not hurt your build, and will add a little more damage aswell.
One or 2 str charms are good, with Max/AR prefix beneficial.
bavadeli
25-06-2008, 12:22
maybe a quick tip for those with life problems: get the unique ring: nature's peace. It can give you lvl 5 oak sage: thats 50% life increase! That make's it a very nice pre-buffer equip. You can even cast/summon it in town.
Sorry to be picky, but this calculation is wrong:
5000 x.5 = 2500 x.2 = 500 x.1 = 50 life per hit
= means is the same as
So basically it says 5000 x 0.5 is the same as 2500 x 0.2 which is the same as 500 x 0.1 whixh is the same as 50
But 5000 x 0.5 is 2500 and 2500 x 0.2 is 500 and 500 x 0.1 is 50
So, it says that 2500=500=50
but 2500 isn't the same as 500 or 50. What it should say is either
5000 x 0.5 x 0.2 x 0.1 = 50
Or it should say
5000 x 0.5=2500
2500 x 0.2= 500
500 x 0.1= 50
(meaning putting them in separate calulations)
Also, you get 110 skill points altogether, not 111
deadbeater
25-07-2008, 04:41
maybe a quick tip for those with life problems: get the unique ring: nature's peace. It can give you lvl 5 oak sage: thats 50% life increase! That make's it a very nice pre-buffer equip. You can even cast/summon it in town.
Too bad you can't let go of Nature's Peace without letting go of Oak Sage.
Question: I'm playing a Frenzier with Beast/eBotdz, and my Merc barb is using Last Wish on an eth colossus sword (jerk who used it before whittled endurance down). Why in the blue hell my stats, particularly damage, aren't reflecting 18 lvl Might and 9 lvl Fanaticism auras?
lifetap is a fad created by smiters because smite doesn't leech.
Vouch
My frenzy has
Tyraels Might (Its blue)
eOath Small Crescent
eDeathz
LoH
Arreats
upped 199 gores
highlords
240/20 raven
ar/6ll/15str/22lr ring
Upped, Perfect String
2x Echoing Glaives of Carnage (Black, style points)
2wc gcs
few random 100+ar 30+ life gcs
random max/ar scs
Btorch/Anni
Prebuff with treachery/demonlimb
5k hp
75Light res after conv
Used no life tap, solo, easy. Rarely potted, few manas on baal usually to keep OW up after his mana burn spamming.
Ubers are stupid easy with life tap. Pack some RES CB OW and there done.
In the beginning i used:
Black-Tyrant Club (runeword, cheap CB)
Uniq Razoredge axe (for OW/DS)
Gores
6CB crafted gloves (self made)
Rare 24 Str ammy (bc i didn't want to remake)
Low Low Raven frost
Rare Str ring with some life leech
155/3ll no sock arreats
Durials Shell (res)
Random 20-30 light res GCs, around 4 Plus few light SCs
No Btorch
Low Anni
no merc
2x Echoing Glaives (plain, zero style points) Bought from Anya (use the red portal to refresh her inv, its fast.
Life around 4k give or take, can't remember
Had no Prebuffing other than warcry glaives
Half this stuff you can find in free games, or while your leveling your character.
Dracs were spendy at the time (beginning of ladder)
I used a Wand with Life Tap charges (100-200k gold Act 1, Akara) replace one glaive after the initial BO for easy recasting.
Note there is only One Rune Word (Black) and after a few countess runs you can make one yourself (Thul io Nef) Though its best in a scourge, i got impatient and used a socket quest on a tyrant club i found in cows.
All in All if its your first time just try to have positive light res after the -125, have some CB and lil OW (only gores is tough if your starting *razor edge*) and you will Pwn them slowly but surely. And Howl!!
legyndir
10-08-2008, 09:17
Hi guys. Awesome guide btw. I'm planning to make a barb just for uber trist. Got a few questions here:
1. What are some of the best weapon setups? I was thinkin Ebotdcb and grief pb or Ebotdcd and Edeath. Any advice will be appreciated.
Here's the rest of the setup I'm contemplating:
Arreats with ias jewel
Coh ap
Dracs
Gore riders
Verdungoes/String of ears/nos coil? Cant really decide which one.
Dual raven frosts
Highlord's ammy
echoing warglaives on switch
Demon lib for enchant.
Some help here will be much appreciated. Thanks.
Thaquitz
21-08-2008, 00:11
First, great guide from all I can tell by reading hoping to put it to the test soon!
I am stocked up most of what I need as my barb is fairly geared, using the following:
eBotDz
Beastz
Arreats with um (plan to switch that to uber)
Enigma (will switch to CoH, have runes, looking for a good armor to make it in)
Dracs
Gore riders
Dungoes
Highlords
Ravenfrost
rare ring with 5% bonus to AR and other mods
Still working on the charms but I am really worried about my AR. At lvl 84 on my character sheet shows my AR at 8248 and 7861 for my two weapons respectively. I figure I can round up 10 charms with what I got left to trade and maybe rolling a few myself, but even if all were perfect with 20 ar thats only another 200 added on. I know 2 piece angelics (ring/ammy) gives a huge ar, but I am afraid losing the resist on highlords is gonna crucify me on uber Meph. Any other ideas? Any certain piece I could swap and not lose resists but gain so good ar?
Omikron8
21-08-2008, 02:37
weapon swap to a demon limb, it will give you another 200% AR
Thaquitz
21-08-2008, 04:08
Thanks Omi, figured I was missing something somewhere!
Last question is how much def should I really shoot for on my CoH? I got str for about anything, sacred and shadow plate might be out but nothing else should be. I found a superior kraken with 576 def, is it worth socketing?
Omikron8
21-08-2008, 07:24
i use a duress wyrmhide, with gores, ik belt, draculs, arreats and level 13 shout (level 1 base) i get near 10k defense which at level 86 gives the level 110 ubers about 40% chance to hit me
if you were rich (high CB on both weapons like death + last wish) and swapped the duress for a fortitude the high defense of that runeword with the chilling armor (over 100% defense bonus) would probably put you near 13 or 14k defense
Straight +AR from a charm/item goes through the skill/mastery math process, and comes out the other end giving you much more AR than what's originally on the item.
Looking at just 1 particular charm on a Frenzier of mine, a 5 max/27 AR LC, the total AR bonus amounts to 205 with one weapon, 211 with the other (a multiplication factor of 7.6 to 7.8). I aimed for 10K AR with both weapons (at clvl 89) and it proved to be sufficient.
This same guy is wearing a CoH Dusk, Def is around 7.5K after Shout... better to worry about the FHR BP that you reach IMO. You're just gonna get hit by a lvl 110 monster, so get used to it. This guy has 52%, which puts him over the 5 frame FHR BP of 48%. 40% of that comes from items (Arreat's and Dungo's), the other 12% is on a GC which also provides Lit Res.
Thaquitz
22-08-2008, 05:52
Well after much prep and trepidation my frenzy barb entered Uber Trist tonight.
Equip was as follows head to toe:
Arreats socketed with ort
Metalgrid
eBotDz
CoH kraken shell
Beastz
Dracs
Rare ring, 73 AR, 10 life, 23 fire resist, other useless mods
Dungos
Ravenfrost
Gore Riders
Charms were:
1x Masteries, 40 life
Barb torch 12/11
Anni 14/12
sc adding up to 66 AR
sc adding up to 52 life
After all was said and done if my math was right I had 39 lightning resist against meph (forgot to look)
Buffed with a +3 warcry ammy and 2x +2 warcry sticks on switch
My AR was over 12k with both weapons without using a demon limb for enchant, almost 5k life.
For anyone looking at this thread and wondering if it will work as easy as they say, yes it will. First time in and I was rewarded with 2 torches. For those struggling with attack rating, get a good Metalgrid. My fights may have been slower because I lost deadly strike by taking off Highlords, but I sure didn't have an issue hitting the ubers, and the resists are the same if ya get a good Metalgrid (mine is 34 resist all)
Thanks again for a great guide, cant believe how is the ubers were and how fun this guy is in general!
Deuterium
03-09-2008, 19:55
Hey peeps,
I've managed to trade and find a fair amount of the items needed to enter UT with my Frenzier - Arreat's, Drac's, Ravenfrost/BK, Gores, Torch Anni and some decent charms.
The trouble is I've hit a stumbling block. Arguably the most integral part of the UT Frenzier is his weapons, and it's more than a little intimidating having to forage for high runes with droprates in the region of national lotteries. So, to those that managed to put together these Deathz/Griefz/eBotDz - how?! I really need some advice on how to get my hands on them.
Cheers
Deuterium
Omikron8
03-09-2008, 20:46
remake him into a mace barb
2 sock heaven's light costs an um or less
stormlash costs an ist or less
upgraded fleshrender costs a pul (to upgrade it)
Deuterium
03-09-2008, 23:44
Thanks for the reply mate - actually I've earmarked all my mastery points so I won't have to remake ;)
Still wondering where people are getting so many high runes from though.
Omikron8
04-09-2008, 01:34
they aren't "getting them"
the people running the online item shops have private dupe methods constantly going, unless they magically found 100 ber runes since the start of the ladder (in which case they should have won the lottery multiple times by now)
amazing guide spankeh
after ubering countless times and testing various setups, here's my 2 cents:
1. i suggest using the gavel of pain for amplify damage (unique exceptional mace). it has 3 amplify damage charges, each lasting 29 seconds: 1 for each uber! in comparison, lacerators dont cast right away and the curse only lasts 14 seconds, which, unlike 29, is sometimes not enough.
2. it seems a lot of people dont realize frenzy has to charge up. the attack speed goes from 7% to 42% at a rate of ~7% (i think) per hit. that means that with botd/death, with which you have to make gear sacrifices to barely hit the last frenzy breakpoint, you have to hit 5 times to get to "top speed". against a high def uber mephisto... thats a LOT. not only that, but you often lose your frenzy when going from one uber to the next. so if you really must use botd, i strongly suggest you charge yourself up on some minions...
this phenomenon is why i find beast to be so much better than botd, because you can have a lot of "overkill ias" that enables you to swing at top speed right away, a luxury you'd never get with botd/death. it makes a huge difference, whatever the curse you are using. beast is of course riskier than botd when you use amplify damage since you lose ~15% life leech, but i've found the leech from belt/coh/arreats to be enough for baal/diablo (even just belt/coh). with mephisto it doesnt matter since you cant leech him.
3. AR is king agaisnt ubers... you will lose and gain back your life bulb a few times over against them... so hitting consistently is what keeps you alive... not some huge life which in reality is just a safety net. if you're missing a lot you might even lose your frenzy speed, which can be a disaster, especially with botd/death. thus, get as much AR you can (15+), and that means using plain AR charms instead of lifers if you're not rich enough to afford good ar/(max)/life charms. i'm serious, you wont regret it :) (i even tried full angelics + trang belt a few times with lifetap and it wasnt bad at all... no cold absorb means mephisto hurt a lot more but the leeching back is very reliable anyway)
4. i personally prefer guillaume's face to arreats (even for pvm). even if you dont socket it with an um (i suggest a ed/ias), you can still have max res after meph's conviction with coh, fade from treachery and 1 or 2 res gcs. deadly strike and crushing blow are YUMMY. same goes with up'd goblin toes vs gores... i think gores are better but test it for yourself.
5. if you're using beast and lacking AR, consider using metalgrid instead of highlord's, since you dont need the IAS. personally i still prefer highlord's for the overkill IAS and deadly strike, get AR from charms...
6. try amplify damage a few times on baal/diablo before trying it on mephisto, to see if you can kill fast enough. also, make sure mephisto drops your bulb relatively slowly so that you can "time" your full rejuvs, not drown yourself in them in fear of getting a half-my-bulb-disappeared-and-i'm-dead deal.
7. if you're using lifetap and death or grief in your offhand, i strongly recommend using a lifetap wand because your dracs' lifetap might not trigger quickly enough in the beginning. better yet, dump the dracs altogether and use laying of hands instead, which will add to your killing speed A LOT. just recast from your wand when necessary.
8. consider putting 1 point in find potion, especially if you pvm with the guy. you'll fill your belt with rejuvs much faster that way than by just killing stuff. even if you have a mf barb that could do that, transfering would be a pain.
9. for plain pvm, reaper's toll i.e. decrepify on merc RULES. that curse basically doubles your damage, takes cares of almost all PIs and slows monster down, making getting swarmed a joke. use enigma so you can tele your stupid merc right back in the monster's faces, especially since he's probably 2 miles away from you after you've ran off from the last pack like usain bolt. this setup means no lastwish/lifetap of any kind, which would override decrepify. thus, you need life leech, so botd > beast here (death or grief in offhand for damage). get as much leech as you feel you need (i.e. arreats vs guillaumes... dungos vs nosferatu/string... maybe switch a raven for a BK) and/or keep a lifetap wand on switch for when things get really bad (thats 3 less BO, but who cares). from experience, things very rarely go bad with this setup.
10. i agree with spankeh, forget about warcry, especially if you use lifetap. even if you dont, use howl or a lifetap wand instead. leap is a better escape skill than howl imo, so you dont feel too bad about putting a point there. decrepify on merc takes care of the berserk/PI dilemna...
so there we go, i use amplify damage exclusively and meph/diablo go down in 5-10 seconds, baal in 10-15. with max post-conviction res and the ravenfrost's cold absorb mephisto doesnt hurt enough for it to be risky, although i typically need to use 1 or 2 full rejuv since you cant leech him. baal and diablo are a zero pots joke. here's my uber setup for the curious:
beast/death
guillaume's face (40 ed/15 ias)
coh ds
nosferatu's coil (string of ears is just as good)
highlord's wrath (overkill ias and especially DS > metalgrid's AR, but thats debatable)
2x ravenfrosts
laying of hands
gores
AR/lifers (and a few AR/max/life)
2x res all GCs
anni/torch
switch: GavEl oF pAiN (yeah baby)
prebuff: bo helm/warcry ammy and knives/treachery (for simplicity's sake)
finally, anyone knows whether infinity's conviction works on ubers' defense? i just cant find this info ANYWHERE. my merc is geared for pvm anyway so i just let him die in there, but i'm curious. if it does work its arguably better than pride as far as building the ultimate uber frenzy merc goes... what do you guys think?
The -%def from conviction works on Baal and Diablo. It will only work on Meph if your level of conviction is higher than his.
bandizzle
31-10-2008, 06:09
I dunno about you guys, but I'm tempted to max double swing WAY before taunt... I don't see any benefit to max taunt BEFORE double swing... no good synergies with other skills on taunt besides the SAME synergy that frenzy gets from it, and plus double swing is the alt when I run low on mana so that will be way more helpful if you ask me
ZappaFan
31-10-2008, 13:52
Amplify Damage cancels out Life Tap doesn't it? and visa versa? Personally I like triggering LT as soon as possible and keeping it triggered.
NemesisX
02-03-2009, 09:45
i have one question why not 1 pt into zerk? how do you get around IM?
Something that I've been wanting to know is how does CB stack for dual wield? If i have two weapons with 50% CB each that doesnt give me 100 cb does it? Also, this might sound foolish, but what about CtC procs? If i'm dual wielding LW do i have a 20% chance to cast life tap? or is it only the weapon that actually hit?
with 2 weapons both with 50% crushing blow, the following happens:
First weapon swings, cb either triggers or doesnt, and again for the second weapon.
This is considered as one swing of frenzy.
The chances of both weaps connecting is 25%, the chances of one or the other hitting is 50%, and the chances of neither hitting are 25%
In other words, you have 75% chance of your two weapons "casting" crushing blow on your frenzy barbs per swing thus reducing your enemies life.
Since lifetap is only on LW, it is only that weapon that must hit to trigger LT
im new and this game as u gonna see my newbie question :P is this pvp or pvm guide and if its pvm so what is a good build for pvp and what is pvm build for? i mean u just do baal runs and get high lvl... what now? or is it mf?
deadnuts
07-04-2009, 07:15
First, I would like to compliment Spankeh for his excellent guide. It is the reason I am building one right now.
I have a few questions. I am fairly new to the game, this is my second character and I have been playing for about 2 months. I am starting my barb off mostly untwinked, but I have some limited resources from my 75 sorc. Could you give any suggestions for early/midgame gear? I am going to be walking through to hell.
Also, how does one get to level 80 without spending any stat or skill points? (someone mentioned it towards the beginning of the thread)
Thanks
Spoochie
07-04-2009, 17:38
Hey what charms would be most needed? BO's only?
satheron
26-05-2009, 07:56
so where does one get the amp damage curse from?
so where does one get the amp damage curse from?
lacerators on switch or my favorite: the gavel of pain unique. it has 3 amp dmg charges that last about 30 secs (more than enough for a good barb).
Hey what charms would be most needed? BO's only?
1. AR
2. AR
3. AR or maybe max/ar
:thumbup:
Imperium
10-08-2009, 20:09
I have decided i am going to use this guide to make my char but i dont really call myself an expert and this guide seems to be for an advanced player who knows what all that means.
It doesnt really matter yet though as i'm going to have to get to lv60+ before i have to start worrying about what i dont understand so i started a game and i have spent 0 stat points so far in getting to lv 14. This is because i dont know where to put them. I have decided i am going to specialise in axes. There is a bit where it says "virtually no points need to be spent in strength and dexterity". So... how many do you reccomend i put in because how am i going to equip things if i dont?
thing is i really think i ought to be putting points somewhere now because i am starting to die in the mobbed with a few bosses situations
Equipping a hi stat torch and anni, helps greatly to achieve str and dex boosts, followed by enigma dusk shroud.
From there, arreats and botd push those stats higher still..
Imperium
18-08-2009, 14:39
Ok, so i need these charms before i can kill the ubers or whatever it is that drop them and i read that you cant pick up more than one of these items so how can i get them? i assume no one is going to just give me them ?
ancalagon
18-08-2009, 16:22
Detailed and fantastic guide, but without sounding like a prick I would like to point out a few errors / suggestions:
(1) AFAIK Life Leech is capped at 25%, not 50%. The 50% is exclusive to Life Tap, which also exclusively ignores all other penalties.
(2) Apart from DR% and Leech Effectiveness, there is a 50% and 33% additive penalty to Life or Mana Leech in NM and Hell, respectively.
(3) Berserk's damage is hardly negligible. In the case of a frenzy barb, its USE may be negligible because he has no shield, so it would mean instant death.
(4) Mention strategies for PI's or Iron Maiden / Chaos Sanctuary. IMO, ELacerator is the best to use, followed by Widowmaker.
(5) That Mana Burn PI Minotaur pack you used to open your life leech argument was a very nice example, however a rather rare and scary situation as well. I would recommend to avoid it, since they are Mana Burn to boot. If they dont have Mana Burn, retreat and cast Lacerators like crazy till they are amped, and take a corner defensive stance and Frenzy away. You might still have to use some potions here, as they always have high physical resists even after Amp (those darn PI Death Lords I mean GRRR), and deal massive damage, esp if they are Cursed or Might / Fana enchanted (Ouch!!!). Dont be afraid to use pots!
(6) Using a Thundergods belt against Black Souls in WK level 2 works miracles. I would mention that too.
Other than that, it is a fantastic guide, and I especially love how you mentioned and compared LT / Amp / Decrep for Uber Tristram. And the variety of weapons at hand. Good job!:thumbup:
PS: Expensive inventory and charms you got :P
spankeh, excellent guide. I can't count the times I have referred people here for some good frenzy facts. I remember for years reading ash's frenzy guide over and over, and this one will have timeless value as well.
What gets me is the amount of people that still think lifetap is 100% necessary.
The pulverizer
25-08-2009, 13:39
My current setup
Death ettins 350ed and 360 ed best I could find so far. Nosferatu coil, highlords, coh,20/20 anni, 17/20 barb torch, 9x 132 ar40+ life gcs, 5x 20 life 5 all resis scs, 5 x 36 ar 20 life sc's. Gores, dracs, bitter band ring are life leech str dex resis, 250 ar 20 dex raven. 2 skill 3 bo helm 2 socket with 15 resis/15 ias jewels in it. Mephisto's takes away alot of resistance so I do good against him now. Merc uses uniques helm that has lh resis and sorb with resis jewel in it. Faith bow for extra ias and she has coh on as well. I can do torch runs in 2-4 mins usually killing them 1 at a time. The ettin axes I have were the best I could find so far. I went to ladder found some 15 ed base eth ettins and rolled some. Got a pair of 400's, 399's 398's,397's and then some 393's. Yeah I spent alot but I wanted some perf 400's for reset. Currently looking for a 2 skill 3 warcry, or bo/taunt, and frenzy skill 2 os helm with some ar per lvl.
Barb has 7k life all stats in life 5 into str
Your Barb, with 7000 life and full resists is too strong to bother wearing dracs, and therfore casting lifetap in ubertrist.
Change imediately to LoH gloves and eLacerators on switch to cast Amplify Damage curse.
Now watch ubers get cut to ribbons.
The pulverizer
26-08-2009, 02:59
With all the resis I have I checked it while fighting mephisto and it reads in the teens on all but lh which is around 50 because highlords adds 35 lh resis. The only reason for wearing dracs is because of him and his lower resis spell. Once I get some more resis/life scs I will take dracs away and use some ias crafted cb gloves. Just right now mephisto still hurts. I am also gona try a fhr/str life resis belt. Then I should be ablo to switch out dracs prety easily and not worry about mephisto.
dude just prebuff fade with treachery or lw, 60 res all is exactly what you need. also, i find tgods make quite a difference against meph (he casts charged bolts so integer absorb helps a lot, just like vs a CS zon)
with max res, tgods, and 2x ravens, mephisto only takes 1/2 or 2/3 of my 5k'ish life when using amp dmg (i only have plain AR charms). that damage takes place over the course of 5-7 seconds or so, after which he's dead.
so like spankeh said, amp dmg is more than viable for your crazy lifed barb, as long as you get max res somehow :)
The pulverizer
27-08-2009, 02:02
Dont like using prebuffs such as fade, you have to get them going before you can even use your main weapons or go in to uber trist. I want my crazy life barb to do back to back torch runs which is what I am doing without having to switch gear, prebuff ect. Casting amp dmg I do not mind. all I need is a fhr str life dual resis belt then I use loh gloves and change the 15ias/15 resis jewels to 40/15 ias 40/15 max dmg in my helm. After that just have to wait for ladder reset to get my perfect death ettins.
all I need is a fhr str life dual resis belt then I use loh gloves and change the 15ias/15 resis jewels to 40/15 ias 40/15 max dmg in my helm.
40ed/15max is bugged in anything but weapons, so dont use that.
if you change your belt you're only gonna have the 8% leech from coh, and i can almost guarantee you that wont be enough vs baal/diablo with amp dmg. i personally have 15% (coh + nos) using beast/death/guillaumes/no merc, and i can barely keep my life even or gain some. having two deaths and fana from merc wont compensate for having half the leech.
moreover, i can almost guarantee you that you will have to juv vs meph if you dont use tgods (even more so with only 1x raven). i used nos for a while thinking tgods wouldnt do much, and i had to use at least 1 juv, most of the time 2-3 (with all res maxed after conviction and 2x ravens). they really help a lot, i was happily surprised.
in the end, is it worth it not to bother with prebuff so you can do fast consecutive runs, only to have to juv like mad? after a few runs you will have to go juv hunting/xfering...
with that said, i still think its possible to get max res without fade, keep the 2x deaths, and uber with amp dmg without needing much juvs. i'd do something like this:
8x 5 res SCs (40 res)
anni/torch (40 res, total 80)
nat res (56 res @ lvl 11, total 136)
coh (65 res, total 201)
arreats with 15 res/15 ias (45 res, total 246)
24+ cold res gc with life or w/e (270+ total cold res = max)
highlords (281 total lite res = 85 max with tgods)
loh (296 total fire res = max and then some, lol)
2x death ettins
2x ravens
gores
nosferatu vs baal/diablo
all res max and massive sorb
life leech = 21%, which is more than enough, especially with 2x death ettins.
I'm currently working on gear for my frenzy barb, but I'm a bit worried about the weapons. I have a botdpb and plan on making a deathpb. All I hear about using is a CB, Ettin, or Zerker Axe. I didnt want to go the axe route because I'm not super rich and I havent found a zerker axe in the last few months. Anyway, here is the rest of my gear
Arreats (3%)
Dracs
String of ears
Gore Riders
2x raven
Highlords
Fortitude
botdpb
deathpb
Will I do fine with the PBs, or do I need to try and trade for a botdcb? I guess I was mislead on the botdpb from another guide, that has the pb as a good possibility for the botd runeword.
botdpb and deathpb are good for initial swing speed, and NOTHING else.
Hmmm lets work out how much damage you are loosing by going the pb route with those two runewords.
pb for botd
using a 385% roll
31-35 x 4.85 = 150 - 170 min/max damage
pb for death
using a 385% roll
31-35 x 4.85 = 150 - 170 min/max damage
eth cb for botd
using a 385% roll
37.5 - 97.5 x 4.85 = 182 - 472 min/max damage
eth cb for death
using a 385% roll
37.5 - 97.5 x 4.85 = 182 - 472 min/max damage
So if you can get your IAS high enough from other items (which you can, easily) WHY - O - WHY would anyone use those particular runewords with phase blades?
/end of discussion :whistling:
I know its dumb in a phase blade, but its what I have... I'm just wondering if it could be used successfully for ubers.
Also, I love drakes idea bout Crescent moon pb and Lawbringer pb on switch for OW and Decrep. That seems like a perfect solution. Any cons to it?
Arreat (15 IAS) (Started with Guil)
CoH
GriefPB - eDeathCS
Highlords
Dracul
Gore
Nosferatu
Raven - AR & Str & Resist ring
Lifetap wand
(29 lr after meph aura - 4.2k hp with BO)
Today did first solo UB with my new frenzy barb. Died 2 times in the beginning due to stupid reasons such as life tap messing, trying to get corpse etc.. First problem was AR (8k with Gui - 10k with Arreat). I think i can fix that with a demonlimb. Anyway i pulled Meph and Baal away while trying to get corpse. Then found Diablo which was so easy to kill. After that Meph went down without any problem. Lastest and most long one was Baal. First of all his regen was so high. Lack of AR was the biggest problem. I change Guil with Arreat and gain some AR. It took long but didn't have much problem. Rewarded with 12/20 Barb T.
I through Meph will be biggest challange but he was easiest of them. Heck, even diablo took a lot more than him. I had a lot more "low hp" danger with Baal. Clearly i need a demonlimb for ar buff. If i gain some more wealth i think i'll try to get an LW too. I really appreciate any suggestions.
And thanks for this great guide Spankeh!
bomberserk
14-10-2009, 08:36
How about dual Upgraded The Vile Husk with Sheal socketed?
+150-200% Enhanced Damage
+250 Poison Damage Over 6 Seconds
+7.5% Damage Against Undead per Clvl
10% Bonus to Attack Rating Against Undead per Clvl
Poison Resist +50%
6% Chance to Cast Slvl 1 Amplify Damage on Striking
Ubers are demons, not undead. Makes a nice off-hander for Pindle though.
Great guide, thanks Spankeh. I've always loved the Frenzy Barbs, and have built a few over the many times I've picked back up D2.
Since I'm just getting started again (or will be if 1.13 ever comes out...) there is no way I can afford an amp damage build - not yet at least. In the mean time:
How do you manage a Decrepify build and still use axes? Lifetap is too easy, and I love my zerkers :). Thanks!
You can only put lawbringer in swords, hammers or scepters, so if you want to use decrep you must at least use one of those. Since the physical damage of lawbringer is almost naught and it already has some CtH modifiers you could make a Sword/Axe barb with just 1 point in Sword Mastery though.
Stephan: 100% correct
Out of all three curse builds, decrepify gives 3 outstanding bonuses, whereas the other two curses give only one.
But Amp Damage is unbeatable in pure kill speed.
This is a great guide Spankeh, just wondering..about what should my ar be for ubering..and anyone have troubles with dcing games while frenzying with a torch? :x
Im running ~14,500 AR for both weapons, would prefer 20k to boost my 85% hit rate on ubers.
Never had any problems with torch going off and dcing, except when theres a damn bowazon playing and her torch causes the dc!!!
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