Throwing barb memoire - fun, but only to a point

So barb is my favorite class, i just like the idea of tankiness and big physical damage appealed to me. I remember when playing original D2 back in the day I’d argue with my brother about how the barb was the best (his fav was paladin).

Frenzy barbs were fun, but also only to a point, WW barbs were fun, but again only to a point. I’ve ran max damage

Concentration and

Berserk builds as well, all falling short of sheer kill speed. I’ve even ran the gold find and horking barbs… they have their utility - mind numbing as they are. I haven’t tried a

Leap Attack barb, but by all accounts its about the same.

And there’s the throw barb, it’s usually my preferred method of leveling a barb, it’s fun, fast and enjoyable to play. However once you get to level 87ish it starts to slow down too.

I had found an

Eth gimmershed and a flaming small charm of flame, using the Nintendo switch airplane mode glitch i had dual

Eth gimmersheds, a back-pack full of fire small charms and i also made 7 extra copies of my 5/5 fire facets. I geared up my char and started to test it out.

It was good, but not great, i went more back to the physical side, still only good. I tried every combo: arreat’s face/Wisdom/

Giant Skull (with both fire facets and +40 ed jewels), , switching to pure poison (trang gloves, Treachery, pack full of 175 psn small charms), act 2 might with Pride, act 2 might with Infinity, act 2 might with reapers, act 1 with Faith, act 3 fire, act 5 with dual Last Wish, act 5 with dual plagues, gimmershed/

Lacerator/warshiek. i tried

Frenzy/warcry/

Grim Ward… all combos just sorta meh…

Not to say it was bad, all versions can clear P7 content safely, just not fast, the throw barb really slows down because he just doesn’t pack enough punch, single targets at least take 1-2 hits, with hard guys maybe taking 6-7. When there’s like 20 on screen in the

Chaos Sanctuary, it really Boggs down and sorta stops being fun. *to be fair they are all really good at act 1-3

Terror zones*

The fastest in my testing seemed to be the fire focused throwing barb - dual gimmershed,

Giant Skull with 2 x 5/5 fire facets, an armour with 4 x 5/5 facets (could’t find jewler’s of the whale so just a 4os

Archon Plate), other standard gear, Infinity might merc, a pack full of fire small charms, max dex build.

In my mind how the Mosaic assassin one-shots entire crowds is what a barb should be like - just with physical attacks.

If i were to change anything I’d maybe make some new throwing weapons, either a sweet new crafting recipe or uniques, put some extra damage into the weapon mastery skills, or improve synergies - the barb just needs a little extra ‘something’

Amiright?

Is there barb build that could keep up with a zealer, or Fury druid, or spearazon on P8?

Throw barb still have room for improvement.

GG weapon are rare, Ethereal, +350ED, ctc

Amplify Damage and so on.

They are just really rare

Yea i save all my

Charsi imbue quests for ethereal throw items… but it’s only been disappointment thus far

mockingbirdreal wrote: 5 months ago

Throw barb still have room for improvement.

GG weapon are rare, Ethereal, +350ED, ctc

Amplify Damage and so on.

They are just really rare

I created a throw barb on offline in gg gear (450ed ethereal

Stygian Pilum with
40 ias, amplify trigger, +min/max) yesterday. It sucked balls despite dealing like 4-8k damage per javelin per throw and went to near Death too easily.

Then I remembered it was p8.

Still the biggest problem is everyone and their mother having 15-33-50% phy res. The 2x 5% amp is hardly reliable even at the cadence of your attacks.

And the damage difference from

Deathbit,

Warshrike,

Lacerator compared to something like that rare stygian above is like chalk and cheese. Only a third of the total possible power.

There is a solution to ALL of this. Enigma(on you)+reaper's toll on merc. Solves all physical issues, even on p8. Click on pack, get decrep, destroy.
Worked with physi bowa, works on my ww barb now. It'll never be a

Nova sorc, but it's fast and then you hork, meaning you killed twice.

(Didnt play throw barb though I cant see how different it'll be, the decrep is a massive increase and is so reliable with Enigma)

or.houster wrote: 5 months ago

There is a solution to ALL of this. Enigma(on you)+reaper's toll on merc. Solves all physical issues, even on p8. Click on pack, get decrep, destroy.
Worked with physi bowa, works on my ww barb now. It'll never be a

Nova sorc, but it's fast and then you hork, meaning you killed twice.

(Didnt play throw barb though I cant see how different it'll be, the decrep is a massive increase and is so reliable with Enigma)

How was the survivability of bowazon in p8?
I doubt that it is a dangerous play style for ranged attackers such as physical bowazon or throw barb.

mockingbirdreal wrote: 5 months ago

or.houster wrote: 5 months ago

There is a solution to ALL of this. Enigma(on you)+reaper's toll on merc. Solves all physical issues, even on p8. Click on pack, get decrep, destroy.
Worked with physi bowa, works on my ww barb now. It'll never be a

Nova sorc, but it's fast and then you hork, meaning you killed twice.

(Didnt play throw barb though I cant see how different it'll be, the decrep is a massive increase and is so reliable with Enigma)

How was the survivability of bowazon in p8?
I doubt that it is a dangerous play style for ranged attackers such as physical bowazon or throw barb.

Great. With the bowa I clicked to decrep then step back a few of course. Reaper's makes the merc a wall so he takes the heat, and you have Enigma to

Dodge if need be.