Frenzy Barb Theorycrafting - A3 Merc

I've been playing around with a

Frenzy Barb or three for most of the season, and have tried numerous set-ups at various level ranges. And as anyone who plays a physical class will tell you, there are 2 huge hurdles to overcome when leveling something like a

Frenzy Barbarian. The first one, and perhaps the biggest, is the Accuracy Formula which is

• Your attack rating (AR)
• The target's defense rating (TDR)
• Your level (Alvl)
• The target's level (Tlvl)

Chance to hit = 200% * {AR / (AR + TDR)} * {Alvl / (Alvl + Tlvl)}

This means in mid until high levels (88+), farming things like

Terror zones, Chaos sanc, and

Baal run's can cause accuracy issues normally due to the level difference alone. There is nothing that we can do short of over leveling an area in order to affect the second half of this equation, so for the purpose of this thread, I am going to ignore it and instead focus on the first two points, Attack Rating, and Target Defense Rating.

The second hurdle we have to overcome is Physical Immunities. This is typically done on guides by using an a2 merc with Reaper's Toll, though I believe there is a better option.


My solution -
Mercenary - Using an A3

Enchant Merc and changing up our gear a little bit.

Enchant gives us a huge boost to AR as well as some fire damage which helps with physical immunes and general clear speed.
Primary Weapons - Grief PB + Lawbringer PB - This gives us raw damage from Grief, as well as

Decrepify.

Decrepify allows us to deal more damage, breaks physical immunities, and gives us a better chance to hit. The knockback is barely noticeable with our increased move speed.
Swap - Death

Eth Runic Sword + Crescent Moon PB - A large source of crushing blows, as well as static for bosses (or ubers). This does remove +6 to our BO, but we have plenty of life to begin with.

tldr:
Use A3

Enchant Merc, and Lawbringer in offhand until at least level 90.

I love frenzybarbs, easily my favouritest build

I’m currently running a Beast,

Eth Oath combo with

Demon Limb non

Eth Oath on swap (

Iron Golem ftw)!

I’ve also made forum posts on these subjects:

forums/act-3-fire-merc-actually-amazing-t1013134.html

forums/grief-fury-frenzy-combo-t1079740.html

I used to go the Grief PB + Lawbringer PB until I tried dual Grief PB. There is no comparison. Put Lawbringer on an A5 merc or get an A2 merc with might aura and reaper's toll for

Decrepify.

Azurewrath is another decent offhand option to use for PI's early on.

But I think dual griefs is probably the best way to go for endgame (as EMzx25 stated) and just kill Phys Immunes with

Berserk. I'll let my merc tank them and just stand right behind him so they don't touch me, and take em out one by one. Usually only 1-2

Berserk hits per monster, so can be pretty quick. If only there was an option like Lawbringer,

Azurewrath or Reaper's Toll without the dreaded cold damage..

Grief has ITD, Lawbringer -50% target def, 136 dex for phaseblades, i've never needed

Enchant. furthermore, as most PI's are undead and sancuary sets all undead physical resist to zero, u don't evem need

Berserk with this setup!

If you're not using Grief or any other ITD weapon, you could also use

Battle Cry to lower monster defense.