-YELP- Help with GF barb

[casadeERIC]

So, I've looked around and found a bunch of MF barbs but no particular builds for a GF barb. I know the basics like, chancies and ali babas on switch but as for other gear I'm not too sure. I want to be able to run hell council. I don't really care about MF, although, if it comes with the GF gear then that's alright. Thanks for the help!

P.S. Skill allocation would be helpful as well.

[SeCKSEgai]

Do a forum search, there are a few key guides that really provide quite a lot of information, my own build was a variant that I would readjust if I could a bit.

[donshi]

People don't really go into much detail, cause the idea of a gf barb is rather simple.
Two crystal swords with 6 lems in each provide far greater gf than babas. But the babas do have nice mf too.

belt: goldwrap
boots: rare
ammulet: rare
rings: dwarfstar
helm: 3 socket with lems would be best. A lot of people use Crown of thieves or IK helm with lems.
armor: enigma or wealth

enigma saves walking time, but can also help kill faster because you can teleport right on top of a mob and have ur merc take em out instead of waiting for him to walk up to him. Mercs are so stupid.

Gheeds and gf charms obviously.

And let your merc do the killing. You could even give him goldfind helm and goldfind armor. With an infinity, he'll still kick ***.

It's essential that you max find item skill. After you kill them, cast it and you'll get even more gold! (don't give your merc any cold damage or there might not be a corpse).

You don't need any other skills. Leap helps you get away (useless if you have enigma). BO for health.. and get some crowd controlling warcry. Natural res and iron skin.

Do nightmare tristram runs. Let your merc kill.

Highest lvl possible for gambling purposes. And when you gamble, there's a bow runeword that reduces vendor prices (i dont remember). Make sure you switch to it for cheaper prices. It's nice to have 15% gheeds for that same purpose too, but any gheeds will do just fine.

gluck

[mephiztophelez]

Two crystal swords with 6 lems in each provide far greater gf than babas.
umm, not really. imho, Lem/Lem Ali Baba's > 6 x Lem weapons.

%Goldfind works like %ED, it adds rather than multiplies.

to quote my own Goldfinding Skelly'nec guide: (http://diablo.incgamers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=632493)

How much %Goldfind is "enough"?
or
Why not 6x Lem Swords and 4x Lem shields?

the main advantage of this build is that it's CHEAP. personally, i don't see the point in spending up big on a character that's supposed to generate e-wealth. my build has a total of 6x Lem in it (2 in helm, one in armour, 2 in weapon, 1 in shield). Another reason is the nature of how +%goldfind works.

lets say a monster drops a base of 100 gold. if I have 2000% goldfind, thats suddenly 2100 gold falling out of it. if i have 2500% goldfind, thats 2600 gold falling out of it. an extra 500% goldfind starts to not look so good when we already have oodles of it.

as a "nice-round-number", shoot for somewhere in the realm of ~1500% goldfind, at this point you can start looking for extra survival mods.

as an aside, i prefer a skelly'nec for goldfinding duties, but perhaps that's just me.

[SeCKSEgai]

umm, not really. imho, Lem/Lem Ali Baba's > 6 x Lem weapons.

%Goldfind works like %ED, it adds rather than multiplies.

Yeah, the returns vs the cost of 6 lem pay for themselves over time, but the mf is far more likely to yield better results

450% gf on 6 lem cs

150%gf for 2 lem
Up to over 200% gf based on character level
mf based on character level

right now my ali's are providing around 700% vs the 900% of 2 6 lem cs - so for a 5k drop that converts to 40k vs 50k, so while over time it can add up, having that mf can drop something worthwhile while you hunt for gold.

While lots of builds can technically gf, What I like about a leaping gf barb is the ability to lock even uniques up against a wall with the ability to hork (find item) so you're effectively getting 2 runs out of one.

[casadeERIC]

Yeah, I found the leaping gf barb guide and currently in the process of getting all that together. Trying to get a ton of gold and gambling my life away until the ladder reset. Socketing the ali baba's with lems is going to prove to be a challenge for me. Since lems are worth something. Other than that, everything is progressing well.

Have any suggestions about the remaining skill points in the build? Wheres the best place to put them. I'm thinking shout and a few into natural res.

[SeCKSEgai]

Basically it depends on if he's a pure goldfinder or not - if he is, you want to focus primarily on what will help your merc the most (ie leap, shout, bo) then look towards supplemental skills for yourself. I'm not too big on natural res since the returns are low after a few points, but if you've got the points to spare, why not =)

[KremBanan]

I maxed Natural Res and I havent regrettet it. I still have 14 points spare, which I dont know where to put. (my GF Barb has the merc do the killing)

[pickadyp]

I have 2 Ali Babas socketed with 2 lem runes each on switch, chance guards, goldwrap, and a dwarf star to replace my Ravenfrost (so monsters dont freeze and break apart). The rest of my gear is my normal PvM gear. I use my main weapons (ebotdz, last wish zerk) to kill Hell Council and then switch to Babas and use find item on corpses. With just 1 point in find item and +skills from gear, I have a level 7 find item, which gets me stacks of 30-50k from council corpses. I net anywhere from 150-300k gold per hell council run, without sacrificing killing speed or survivability.

[SnickerSnack]

I like my singer gf barb:

find item 10
shout 12
bo 20
battle cry 18 <--- made merc nearly immune to physical damage
war cry 10

nat res 8

Standard gf gear, but I gambled a pretty nice rare belt:

Pain Strap
Sharkskin Belt
Defense: 31
Durability: 14 of 14
Required Level: 30
Required Strength: 20
Fingerprint: 0x618553c6
Item Level: 21
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Properties:
+10 Maximum Stamina
Lightning Resist +30%
Cold Resist +13%
Replenish Life 5
Attacker Takes Damage of 1
60% Extra Gold from Monsters
Required Lvl +5

I wanted light and fire res, but I got tired of gambling belts after about the fourth hour. 4 mil goes a long way when you gamble with a level 25 character and each belt costs 2k. I also used lems in ali babas so there would be some mf. It's a bit hard to come by 15 lems in Single Player.

Edit: also this decent ammy (teleport charges would have been nice):

Chaos Scarab
Amulet
Required Level: 27
Fingerprint: 0xc964e529
Item Level: 85
Version: Expansion 1.10+
Properties:
+60 to Life
+24 to Mana
Poison Resist +28%
79% Extra Gold from Monsters
16% Better Chance of Getting Magic Items
+1 to Barbarian Skill Levels

Merc gear:

eth Obedience Thresher (we're going for gold per hour, not horked corpses per run)
[recently got an eth Bonehew that I haven't tried yet]{it turns out that the merc needs another level to use it :yuck:}
eth Guardian Angel (ort)
Crown of Thieves (pammy)

Warcry does stun uniques, but it takes a few tries since it isn't guaranteed to happen every time like with normal enemies. I think he had about 800 mana, so he could just spam warcry and even the uniques were stunned most of the time.


* I've never tried a leaper or a frenzy goldfinder.

[DECOYBOY]

i mean you can do nightmare vs. hell runs. goldwise i think you come out the same for time contributed...you just end up doing faster nightmare runs and get less gold, vs longer hell runs with more gold. i think nm is special in that gives you a better chance of getting skillers and tal's ammy (correct me if i'm wrong). personally i got bored doing nightmare runs as they were too quick and easy. anyhoo, i get anywhere from 400-700K gold on hell council runs without selling any items (i find it tedious and i am lazy).

Gear:
helm: crown of thieves (non-lem worthy as it is low gf%)
armor: enigma (the teleport is invaluable as some have said)
weapons: baba x 2 (each dbl lem'd)
weapon switch: BO sticks x 2
belt: 79% gf goldwrap
ammy: +3 warcry 80% gf
rings: dwarf x 2
gloves: chancies
boots: rare tri-res 71% gf scarabshell boots
charms: torch, anni, 151% gf gheed's, the rest are goldfind GC's and SC's (some with additional resistances as the second modifier). this leaves me no inventory space but i don't usually care cuz i hate picking up stuff and selling. i just like to hork and be done with it.

This leaves me with somewhere around 4.8K life, 10K defense, and max resists

Act 2 Might Merc:
helm: Crown of Thieves (also non-lem worthy)
armor: upped Goldskin (mostly for novelty purposes, tho the extra resistances do help him a lot in terms of hell survivability, otherwise i'd use a wealth)
weapon: eth upped hone sundan ghost spear (triple lem'd, the 45% crushing blow is quite nice).

Merc ends up with 4.2K life, 12K defense, 3.8K dmg, and max resists

Skills:
- maxed shout, BO, find item, and natural resist
- 1 point in battle cry and war cry - this is the key to hell runs for me. i teleport in, isolate a reasonable sized pack of council members, stun, battle cry, sit back and let merc go to work while keeping stun in effect (once in a while you must be wary of triggering the bugged lightning enchanted bolts with the stun attack) the battle cry is really key cuz it lowers enemy defense, which aids in merc hitting and therefore leeching. also it decreases dmg done to him by any of the superunique council members that aren't being stunned. i still have a lot of skill points leftover and may add more here to increase the stun duration and/or dmg reduction