Suggestions for a weird newbie Frenzy Barb's build

Hey guys! Recently i started D2 again, played online for the first time (btw thanks to the awesome people here for the trades!!!) and finally finished Hell!

I am trying to make my build a little better. My goal is not the best possible damage by itself, but an all around character who can pretty much do everything. Move around fast, be a little tanky, have a little MF, kill fast. It's not that i complain with my barb, but i think there is room for improvement without farming for months, and since i am a noob i got many many questions. So my current build is:

Azurewrath
Lightsabre
Arreat's Face
Duriel's Shell
String of Ears (8/15)
Crafted Gauntlets: 5 LL, 9CB, 10 Life, 26LR, 27FR
Goblin Toe
Highlord's Wrath
Raven Frost (20/227)
Yellow Ring: 94 AR, 3LL, 25 Life, 10LR, 30PR

Got 213 Strength, 227 Dexterity, 298 Vitality (3200 Life), And full resists unbuffed. My charms (besides 3 uniques with good rolls) are mostly FWR because i just can't stand slow moving when not under Frenzy XD

Sooo i got a GG Arreat's Face. I made the mistake of improving it and now it asks for 196 Strength. I cannot equip it.

Question 1: Do i need to have 196 Base strength or unbuffed without a helmet? (my current Arreat's gives +20 str so i hope it's that).

Question 2: Is FHR at all relevant for a Frenzy barb? I read in a guide "it's irrelevant because Frenzy cannot be interrupted".

Question 3: Are my Gauntlets GG? I was used to using Venom Grip for long and now this just seems divine, it does pretty much everything!

Question 4: With 3200 Life and maybe some +1 items increasing BO even more considered, wouldn't it be a waste adding even more vitality instead of Strength?

Question 5: I am at 9.900 attack rating buffed. What would be a good number to stay relevant for all content?

Second form: As for immediate improvements, i am considering to pay for some socket quests and do the following, please give me your feedback!

Azurewrath -> socket with ???
Lightsaber -> switch with Death
Arreat's Face -> switch with the upped one then socket with ???
Duriel's Shell -> socket with ???
String of Ears (8/15) -> Keep
Crafted Gauntlets: 5 LL, 9CB, 10 Life, 26LR, 27LR -> Keep
Goblin Toe -> Switch with Gore Rider since Death has tons CB
Highlord's Wrath -> Keep
Raven Frost (20/227) -> Keep
Yellow Ring: 94 AR, 3LL, 25 Life, 10LR, 30PR -> ???

Request 6: Fill the blanks please or give alternatives Especially for the ring

Question 7: I just love symmetrical looks and have a liking for Phase Blades. Death might be my favorite runeword and not unreachable with my budget. What do i lose if i put it on a Phase Blade instead of a Colossus Sword/ Blade?

(Almost) Final form:

Azurewrath -> keeping for anti-Undead Aura and diversified (non-physical) damage
Death Sword
Arreat's Face
Enigma
String of Ears (8/15)
Crafted Gauntlets -> ???
Gore Rider
Highlord's Wrath
Raven Frost (20/227)
Yellow Ring-> Bul Kathos ???

So this is what i consider for my mid term-goal gear. Enigma solves all my mobility, strength and MF issues. Then i will tweak between MF, attack rating, max damage, +skills, and resists i might lose with charms.

Question 8: Any other ideas not including Grief?

Thanks a lot in advance guys!

For Q1, whatever gets you to the 196 is, I believe, acceptable. So, if you want to get there via strength charms just temporarily, that is valid. Also, don't feel like more into strength is a waste. I know all the "guides" say "Strength for you gear then everything else goes into Vita or you will die instantly and be sad". Not quite that temperamental, and strength helps with damage, and therefore life, because enemies can't attack you when they are dead!

Gloves are one of those things that are dependent on what you want to do. I saw a "guide" once that said Chance Guards was BiS for a barb. Really? Chancies? I ran a pair of Soul Drainers for a bit, and now Steelrends for pure DPS and they work well for my trav horker.

I'll let others with more barb experience weigh in on the gearing. I did the cheesy 2x Grief+Fortitude Sacred Armor+all the other gear is pretty much moot gearing option.

Q1: You need to hit 196 strength with your base str + str from other gear combined, not counting the 20 from arreat's itself (you get those only after being able to equip it, pushing you to 216 with it).

Q2: I would say yes but not vital. Mainly because it helps if/when you get hit as you move from target to target. After all, single target melee means you do move a lot (added up) between kills.

Q3: Personally, I'd prefer something like Steelrend for the combination of CB and dmg (or drac's if you need the Life Tap to survive aka if you want to run ubers as well) but yours certainly aren't bad.

Q4: Yes and no. More life never hurts but it really isn't all that important if you already have 3k+. At the same time, only a little added strength doesn't do that much as it merely additively throws on extra ED on top of your other off-weap ED. Full str though..that'd be a different story.

Q5: If "all" includes Ubers, as much as you can possibly get. For everything else, honestly, around 10k is perfectly sufficient. More will of course help especially on bosses (I believe 10k was something around 70ish % hit chance on dia?) but considering how fast you attack with Frenzy, you'll still get enough hits in as is to both, stay alive and kill your target.

Q6: Do you want to run ubers? If not, then I personally would say get a Grief, a Fort and a Raven Frost to cover your dmg and anti-freeze needs and then you can use basically every other item slot and socket to get a bit of leech, MF and comfortably Cap your res. Anything outside of ubers doesn't really take all that much dmg-focused gear to steamroll. If you do want ubers though, add dracs as well, drop azure for Kingslayer or similar for extra CB and go for something like angelic to max out your AR. Generally speaking though, there's plenty of viable variations to make a Frenzy barb work very well.

Q7: Phase is baller for speed but fails in terms of base damage. Not only because it starts out a bit low but also because they cannot be ethereal and hence never get that 50% bonus. Because of that, phase blades are much better suited to things that add damage independent of base dmg (Grief) or things that you use primarily for the procs (Kingslayer, Death, ..).

Q8: Especially if you're going for Enigma, get 2 HotOs as your 2nd weapon set. They're not only the best solution in terms of +skills for your Shout (well, debateable..CTA+HotO offers +1 more to BO but costs you +2 to Shout for it) but they give you fairly respectable Teleport speed at the same time.


Just my tired last-minute-before-going-to-bed thoughts.

Thanks so much for all the replies! I will not actively go after Ubers (maybe just once for the fun of it) so i got a nice direction on how to proceed.

Specifically for Death, would you think that the proc of a Phase Blade is not so important considering the lack of base strength? Like "30% less overall damage because of this silly choice"?

I can't help you on the Phase Blade. I did dual Colossus Swords for my Grief for the base damage on them. But, I might have been myopic. The PB has the attack speed, and doesn't have repair costs, which can get quite high. There are times when I get done with Charsi and think, "well, that was $250k well spent...".

Regarding your ammy, Highlords is a good, strong choice. But, I will say consider Atma's Scarab. You miss out on the +1 skill, BUT the Amp damage proc makes things interesting. For a fast attacking Frenzy barb, you get that proc decently often, and it will break the physical immunes. I use it on my strafazon with great results. Highlords is likely overall better, but Atma's is something to consider if you find yourself not quite where you want to be or are tired of dealing with the physical immunes.

Before I had Grief, I enjoyed Lightsabre / Lawbringer for the dual Phase Blade look on my Frenzy barb. You'll get Decrepify for physical immunes and Sanctuary Aura to leech undead. I did Lightsabre over Azurewrath because of the mana leech.

Eventually I upgraded to Oath / Lawbringer and then Grief / Lawbringer. Then respec to Berzerk once I got Enigma.

Before Enigma I was wearing Tal Rasha's Guardianship w/ a p Topaz for easy mf + res, highly recommended.

For gloves Laying of Hands is amazing vs demons, I really felt the difference. Hope that helps!

As a cheap option I would recommend to look for The Grandfather sword. I even prefer it more than Grief, use it in second weapon slot, just classy weapon with solid damage and also it gives + to all attributes and additional AR.

I've been having fun doing this one.

First tester I did was Static Frenzy, Schaefer hammer and Stormlash. Put a Shael in both ( Should have got Eth Stormlash ) not bad aside from repairing Stormlash. Great for initial flurry but slowed down after they stopped receiving static reduction. Second tester was Freezing Frenzy, Voice of Reason and a Rift. Wow this was crap, every single Ice orb proc my barb stopped swinging....
Numbers looked great on paper in reality worst decision ever. Took longer finding a 4os Caduceus than I spent on barb. Third build tried was Oath to Frenzy. X2 Eth Scourge Oaths ( Know who keeps 4os Eth Scourges ? No one that's who. ) Decent damage and clear speed, not too great not too bad very mediocre. Really not much to say about it besides its very average in all aspects. Fourth and current build I'm testing, Flaming Frenzy. Hand of Justice and Pheonix Scourges maybe with a Dragon armor. Most of these can be used in a PB I just choose Scourges because no one uses em.