0
History
You know that thing where you have an idea and you start trying it out and realize it's pretty good? And you're pretty excited about it so you want to tell people about it, but you haven't really thought it through much and haven't played around with it enough?
Yeah, that's what I did in this thread earlier this year.
Don't get me wrong, that build/setup certainly was good, but I quickly felt a Berserk Barbarian had more potential, especially so after watching Kimppi's video in post #22.
So I talked to Kimppi and a few other people, started playing around with different setups etc, and arrived at a character for the winter MFO who I felt was incredibly strong, described here in the Meet the Olympians thread. That first version used a Grief Berserker Axe, which meant a 11 frame attack. Quickly after the MFO, I realized a Grief Phase Blade meant a 9 frame attack, and my average run time instantly jumped from 76s to 69s. Oops!
Since then, not much has changed. I've played around a bit with the FCR sources, but nothing major. Until I finally got him to level 94 recently, after which I made what I think might be the final major switch in his equipment, leaving me with this beastly monster (monstrous beast?) of a character:
Video
Stats
Berserker, level 94
Strength 184 (266)
Dexterity 134 (136)
Vitality 232 (244)
Energy 10 (12)
5 stat points unspent
Life 2074/2208 (after BO, kill switch/teleswitch)
AR 12356 (~91% chance to hit against most bosses)
FCR 105%
Hork 55%
MF 792 on kill switch, 672 on teleswitch
Skills
Berserk 20 (27)
Sword Mastery 20 (27)
Howl 20 (29)
Find Item 20 (29)
Shout 14 - remaining points will go here
Battle Orders 1 (10)
Increased Speed, Natural Resistance, prereqs 1
1 skill point unspent
Equipment
1.13c Harlequin Crest Cham (50)
Enigma (94)
Crafted Amulet 2 Barb Skills/8 FCR/24 MF (24)
Grief Phase Blade (39/392)
Gemmed Phase Blade IstIstIstIstIstIst (180)
Switch Dual Suicide Branch Ist (60)
Chance Guards (40)
Nagelring 30/75 (30)
Nagelring 30/72 (30)
Goldwrap Upgraded (30)
War Traveler (50)
Gheed's (40)
33 SCs totaling 224 MF, 35 max damage, 633 AR, 5 all resist, 33 mana (224)
Merc uses 1.07 Insight Thresher, eth Treachery, eth Andariel's Visage Fervor'd
Equipment ReadoutsSpoiler
Charm ReadoutsSpoiler
Equipment Choices
Note that the video above was recorded a couple days ago, before I hit level 94, and before I switched to using a 6Ist Sword on my off-hand. Before that, I've been using an Ist'd Stormshield for 100+ hours with this character, and it's what I would recommend as a "default" setup. The 6Ist Sword is arguably overkill, and arguably provides less of a benefit than what you lose out on from not having Stormshield. That said, Stormshield has the potential to slow you down, because blocking does interrupt your attack/movement and is generally annoying. I felt I won't be leveling with this guy any further than 94, so I didn't mind dying occasionally, which I imagine might happen now with my shieldless setup. The Stormshield does help tremendeously with safety, but I feel I've played the character enough that I could handle it at this point.
A few more notes on equipment choices. I would be using a 1.07 Shako over a 1.13c Shako if I had a spare one to Cham, but I don't. The +40% Maximum Life from a 1.07 Shako is the equivalent of putting ~13 skill points in Battle Orders, and while I'd very much like that, I don't think it's a dealbreaker by any means. DR% from 1.13c Shako does help compensate, too.
The weapons on switch could easily be some combination of Wizardspike, Suicide Branch and Heart of the Oak. The key is to hit 105 FCR, and the only equipment slot I can easily fit in FCR is from a crafted amulet. Using two Suicide Branch lets me exactly hit level 29 Find Item with my setup if I max it, so it works out nearly perfectly. Not having any mana is a bit of a problem sometimes, but I'm using a few mana charms to help compensate there. A level 17 Meditation roll is of course mandatory on the Insight the merc wears.
Teleport
A timesaving trick that's not in the video: When you want to teleport a long distance, say from an Outer Cloister WP to a Pit entrance, you typically will hold the Teleport button pressed and have your mouse against the edge of the screen, to cover as much distance as possible on each teleport. When teleporting up/right, I learned a long time ago that you can "trick" the game into letting each teleport cover a greater distance by doing the following:
a) Hold Teleport, while keeping your mouse in the upper right corner of the screen
b) Open your Inventory screen by pressing I
c) At this point, the mouse cursor will move to the middle of the screen, and you can move it back to the upper right corner before closing the Inventory screen again. Now, each Teleport will take you 1½ screens instead of one screen.
You can see it demonstrated here in a CS video by Corrupted. I've done this when teleporting into the CS or to Baal, but what I've stupdly never realized until Corrupted pointed it out to me after watching my Pitbarb video, is that the same trick is doable when teleporting down/left by using the Character Screen (hotkey C)! It took a few hours to learn how to execute the maneuver properly, but now I essentially reach the Pit entrance in ~8-9 teleports instead of ~12, saving well over a second right there on an already somewhat short run. I encourage everyone to learn how to use this trick efficiently
Various Thoughts
Having a kill switch and a teleswitch might look complicated and scary, but it really isn't too bad. Essentially, you use four hotkeys for this character (apart from BC and BO at the start of the run); Teleport, Howl, Find Item and Weapon Switch. When you weapon switch, Berserk is the pre-selected skill, as you don't do anything else on your Sword switch. After killing, you Weapon Switch back to the FCR weapons and start horking/teleporting away to the next boss pack. If you watch the video, you'll see it's not really too complicated. I'm strongly in favor of this weapon switch method over just fitting 105 FCR on your main switch and not bothering with a weapon switch, like I've seen other Barbs try on the forum. Of course, you should try that out if you think you'd prefer it, but I see pretty much only downsides.
You'll notice that I've only put one point in Battle Orders, and instead put points in Berserk's synergies. I've done the math, and it turns out using less Strength but more Vitality + fewer skill points in BO but more in Berserk synergies results in a better overall use of your resources, which is something that might not be immediately obvious and intuitive. What I mean is, I could respec and put x points less in Vitality and x points more in Strength, and compensate for the lost life by switching some number of skill points from Berserk synergy to Battle Orders, but the resulting total ED% would be lower for the same amount of life. Something to keep in mind if you plan a similar character, where there's high demand both on skill points and stat points and you must make sacrifices somewhere.
Conclusion
This build is, as far as I know, the most efficient "grail hunter" we have in the SPF. That is, if you wanted to maximize Uniques/Sets found per time unit (like in an MFO type situation), this is the best choice available. He moves quickly, he kills quickly, he horks, and he can carry a lot of MF, even if not going overboard with Ist swords and the like, and using Laying of Hands over Chance Guards or something.
I hope you've enjoyed reading about him, and watching the video of him in action. Any questions, I'd be glad to answerThanks for reading!
Update: This guy is pretty good at Pindle running too, see post #24 for video+details
Reply With Quote
and I am never turning over to your dark side! 
Nice character and probably best MFer around, but I'm still biased towards Pit poison necros and AT blizzard sorcs. Good luck to anyone in MFO against this thingie, I know we won't meet 
Bookmarks