What barb for untwinked hardcore

[ThaCheeZe]

Hey there Barbarian forumites,

Today I started playing some coop over TCP IP with a friend. We both decided to play a character we normally don't and I picked a barbarian. I'm a bit at a loss in deciding what build to play.

My friend is playing a zon. He too has to decide his build, but it will be a ranged one.

I'm looking for some advice on what build to make. We play untwinked hardcore. So I'm looking for a build that is tough enough to tank and is not too item dependent, since he'll have to make do with what he finds.

Any general advice on weaapon masteries for example is also appreciated. Since I don't know what weapons I will find, I'm not sure what mastery to put points in. I'm thinking of swords, since they are quite common.

We already played through act 1, but I refrained from putting any hard points in skills.

Thanks for your input.

Cheers,
CheeZe

[Omikron8]

probably the regular concentrate barb build, look at Hal's guide

20 concentrate
20 battle orders
20 mastery
20 shout
1 in various prereqs and one point wonders

enough str for gear
enough dex for block
rest in vit

[zrk]

Whirlwind and concentrate are the most viable for tanking. Berserk and frenzy can do it too with war cry to keep monsters stunned, but its pretty risky with an untwinked char.

For weapons, axes and swords are the best for their large amount of runewords. Maces are great if you have access to unique ones, but thats unlikely off battlenet.

[Peresvet]

I recommend double swing.
20 pts in bash,
5-7 in double swing,
1 in mastery,
20 bo,
20 shout,
1 grim ward,
5-10 leap,
1-3 nat resist/iron skin

keep double swing on right click, plow through monsters and put up a low level grim ward periodically. it will not make them flee but will take some pressure off you.

[ThaCheeZe]

Cheers for the advice. I guess I'll try the concentrate build. I like the idea of high defence and survivability.

-CheeZe

[Jarath]

I recently started a Conc barb in HC, started out untwinked but I've picked up a few items for him in the meantime. It's a solid build for HC cuz you'll have above average defence with the bonus of a shield for blocking, the only problem is that unless you can find a nice meaty sword, your damage output is probably going to be pretty low.

Some nice low level rune words to check out would be Ancients Pledge, Stealth and Strength.

[sequoia]

Personally I don't find HC all that much harder from regular SC (it's the same game). I'd go with a Frenzy barb as it's probably the best choice for an untwinked Barb PvM, and I doubt you will be getting swarmed constantly anyway, unless you are playing MORE aggressive in hardcore than in softcore.

Both builds will have to take a backseat in the Chaos Sanctuary though. Warcry barbs aren't that great untwinked, but very very very very very very safe.