Frenzy Barb! Patch Notes!

Barbarian
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Ok, here are my results in testing H90 so far. I’m highlighting a few of the most important points in bold.

H90 2-piece does appear to double the rune effect of most of the important shouts properly.

TS: Terrify + Demoralize are both double duration. Falter’s dibs bonus is doubled.

WC: Veteran’s Warning gives 60% dodge. Impunity resistance buff is increased to 40%. For some reason, it seems to be a little screwy with Hardened Wrath. The base effect of WC is doubled from +20% armor to +40%, but the “extra 60% for 5 seconds” that is the rune effect is for some reason giving +100% of your initial armor. I think you’d expect to see either +120% (.60 + .60) or +156% (1.6 * 1.6), so I’m not sure what’s going on there. My actual numbers (with, btw, paragon armor% at 0) were 8886 armor before shout, 21326 for 5 seconds, and 12440 after that.

For Battle Rage, the base effect is doubled - +20% dibs and +6% CHC. (30% dibs for Marauder’s). Bloodshed damage is doubled-- 40% of recent critical hits. Into the Fray gives 2% chc per nearby mob. Ferocity move speed is doubled to 30%.

Swords to Ploughshares healing is doubled as well.

In addition, the “chaining” effect definitely procs both Bloodshed and Swords to Ploughshares. For Bloodshed, the result (assuming you’ve got optimal CHC + CHD rolls) is that Bloodshed procs deal about 37% of the total damage you’ve dealt via Frenzy, as an aoe. Pretty good. This amount is unchanged no matter the density you’re fighting in, since Frenzy deals the same overall damage, whether that’s focused on 1 mob or spread between 30 mobs.

STP seems bugged. Not only is its effect doubled by the 2-piece, but it can also trigger once for every crit scored by the Bastion’s “chain”. Furthermore, somehow it is getting doubled again. For instance, StP, discounted to 75% effectiveness for Frenzy’s .75 proc rate, should heal 16092 per crit. But, I was healing 32k per crit, twice (two different green numbers, each 32k, for 64k total). So there’s an extra doubling happening somehow. When you get into density, you can heal hundreds of thousands of life with one hit.

I’m pretty sure the chained Frenzy also procs AD, although not 100% sure-- even going through my footage frame by frame, it is tough to separate out a non-crit hit from the “chain”, from an AD proc. Ultimately, though, I did see some white damage numbers popping up on enemies not hit by the chain, and at the correct proportion for AD based on a nearby damage number. (i.e. Mob 1 gets hit by the chain, takes 100m damage, Mob 2 doesn’t get hit by the chain but takes 68m white damage. I had 68% AD.) Let’s call it “95% certainty”.

The Bastion’s chains roll independently for crit on every enemy. I think how it works is that if you have 10 stacks, the game says to itself “ok, that’s 11 hits”, calculates the “base” damage for this, divides this up between the number of targets, and then rolls independently for each one to see if it’s a crit. So if you are attacking a big group of enemies, some of them will most likely be hit by a crit, and some by a non-crit.

I’m not sure that the chain effect has an animation for every single Frenzy hit- I think it’s a bit like Bloodshed, in that it “keeps track” of the damage for a bit, and then dumps it all at once. The period is much shorter for the chains than for Bloodshed (way less than 1 second) but I don’t think it’s as frequent as the 5-6 times per second I was hitting with Frenzy. This may be why, despite fighting in pretty high density in the GRs I played, there was not much lag, despite the game obviously needing to calculate Bloodshed as well as (probably) AD. Not 100% sure about this animation thing, but the major takeaway here, as far as I can see, anyway, is “no game-crushing lag”.

Stricken stacks at the rate I expected it to (the Frenzy attack rate). I ran a test using some low-level crafted weapons that gave me a 13 frame Frenzy. I tested initial conditions with Rend damage, hit my test subject for a minute with Frenzy, then Rended again, and the damage afterwards showed Stricken stacking at the Frenzy attack rate (i.e. you are not getting extra Stricken stacks from Bastion’s). One thing I still ought to check is a similar test on 2 enemies, because I suppose it’s possible that when the chain animates, it could apply an extra Stricken stack. Unlikely, I think, but somebody should make sure.

As for the Fear bonus, well, as I’m sure you all know it is a bit hard to deploy properly. If you want to do damage to a group of mobs, you need a second source of hard cc with a long duration. The 1.5 second stun from smite is inadequate, as soon as you pop terrify, the guy de-stuns and runs away.

I tested with Ground Stomp and FC: Cold Rush, and in both cases, they work much better if you freeze/Stun the mobs and then pop fear. If you do it the other way around, the freeze/stun will sometimes not stop the mobs from running away.

Finally, I did check to see if the 6 piece might be increasing thorns damage, even though it’s not written anywhere in the set. It does not appear to be. So: no thorns, just straight-up Frenzy.

That’s it for now. Sorry for the wall of text!

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298

I concur on the Thorns, only benefit it gets is the increased number of hits, the damage itself isn’t boosted. I struggled to finish a GR 90.

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Some testings with LON ?

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Right, this make sense. But 3-5s is too short. Make it 10s.

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I’m going to revise these numbers a little, since we are now pretty sure that Bloodshed and AD are in the mix.

I’ll have to think about what the optimal AD% really is, since it’ll be competing with CHD, CHC, and CDR in a lot of places. It will for sure be good in Paragon, on your Oathkeeper (Dmg% - AD - CDR), and on your shoulders. Getting AS on your gloves takes you from a 10 frame Frenzy to a 9 frame, which is an 11% damage increase, and also helps you stack Stricken and heal. So I think AS could outweigh AD there.

Anyway, let’s assume you’ll have 50% AD in paragon, 20% shoulders, 24% Oathkeeper, and one other 20% roll somewhere. That’s 114% AD.

If you’re maxed out on CHC + CHD, you’ll have 60% CHC (not counting WOTB), and +610% CHD. With these numbers, 91.4% of your total damage comes from crits. Bloodshed “repeats” 40% of these. 91.4 * 0.4 = 36.56. So, Bloodshed deals 36.56% of the damage you deal with Frenzy as an AOE, around you.

Because your Frenzy always deals the same total damage no matter how many enemies you hit, the numbers Bloodshed are essentially fixed.

Assume that 1 Frenzy hit does 100 damage, and that you’ve got 10 stacks of Frenzy.

Frenzy does 1100 damage, spread between however many enemies are within 15 yards, with the first enemy hit taking at least 1/11th (9.09%) of that damage.

Bloodshed does 1100 * .3656 = 402 damage, to all enemies within 20 yards.

AD is a little irregular because of the way the chained damage is spread out and the fact that enemies can’t deal AD to themselves. If you hit 1 mob, obviously there’s no AD. With 2 mobs, the first will take 600 Frenzy damage and thus deal an average of (600 * 1.14 * 0.2 = 137 damage) while the second mob will take 500 Frenzy damage and deal (500 * 1.14 * 0.2 = 114 damage).

As the number of mobs increases towards infinity, you get closer and closer to a situation where mobs 2 - infinity take the full AD amount, which is (1100 * 1.14 * 0.2 = 251 damage), and mob 1 takes the AD amount minus 9.09% (228 damage)

So damage totals are:

Frenzy: 11x / 1100 total damage, possibly spread around a bit.
Bloodshed: 4.02x / 402 damage, to all enemies within 20 yards.
AD: 2.51x / 251 damage, spread around a bit, for any # of targets above 1.

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Focused Feedback thread is live in PTR Forums.

Folks, try to collate your feedback there. Whenever possible, include videos!

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Rage do you happen to have an updated BIS stats for each item? Or is the same d3planner you referenced before?

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@Rage

Would a Pigsticker perform better than Sankis or SK?

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Y’all, I’ve combed PTR results and posted a down and dirty rundown of the build here. If you reply, please do so in the PTR thread.

Negative. Sankis offers an effect comparable to IP and Fire damage, and Sunkeeper offers elite damage. Both are better than Piggy.

More info can be found in the post I linked above.

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Free, I can’t remember: is the PTR results forum always available to us? I know it is not always writeable, but is it always readable? If not, we should keep duplicate records both here and there, because it would stink to lose track of all the info we collect.

Hmm, let’s see.

So, with a Pig Sticker (and this is assuming you’ve got a 7% AS roll on your glove), every other hit is going to be an 8 frame rather than a 7 frame (and this is the case even if you have IAS on that PS, so you’d rather take a different stat there). That extra frame on half your attacks adds +5.875% damage. But, you lose a bunch of weapon damage going from EF or Sun Keeper to PS, so you then actually lose 11.27% damage, suffering a net loss of about 6% damage.

You do get to pick up an extra stat. You’ll always want AD - CDR - DMG%, and for a 4th I guess it would be STR at lower paragon or, probably, elite damage at higher paragon.

Overall I’d say EF is better for sure. Here’s how much damage each EF stack adds, compared to 0 stacks:

1 stack: +5.875%
2 stacks: +12.5%
3 stacks: +28.6%
4 stacks: +28.6% (no change)
5 stacks: +50%

So even with only partial uptime, EF definitely has the largest upside of any off-hand option.

Sankis + SK are both probably better, too, since Sankis will give you about 14% dps from elemental, and SK a healthy chunk of elite damage, both while having higher weapon damage, and less of a decline in attack speed than you’d think, because of the particular breakpoints involved.

I’ll update that, though there is still a lot of uncertainty…

Note: forgot to include a Ramaladni’s socket on EF, obviously it should have a socket with Emerald.
Link: https://www.d3planner.com/432287247

Here are the things that have definitely changed:

BR: StP to Bloodshed

Superstition to Brawler (since it ends up you’ll be fighting in density after all. Though if survival is a problem, you could still take Superstition, NoS, Relentless, etc)

Here are things that are really up in the air:

Bracer: Vambraces or Mortick’s? (or heck, JustinFan used Lacunis…)

TS: Terrify, Falter, or Demoralize? (IF you can freeze/stun the mobs in conjunction with Terrify, this still adds the most damage, especially when timed with CoE/WOTB. BUT that eats a slot on the bar. Most efficient is probably using FC:Cold Rush since this preserves your ability to use all 3 shouts).

How much AD do you want? I’m pretty sure the answer is actually 114%, which is Paragon + Shoulders + Oathkeeper + 1 20% roll elsewhere.

The reason you don’t want to trade more CDR for AD is that at 46.66% CDR, you reach an “alignment point” between CoE and WotB where you have exactly 1.25 cycles (20 seconds) on, and 1.75 cycles (28 seconds) off, which lets you line up Insanity with whichever damage element you’ve picked. Fall below that 46.66% number and you lose this synchronization, which can drop your damage a lot. To get above this number, you need 10% CDR on both weapons, diamond in helm, 10% in Paragon, and 3 other 8% rolls (this gives you a total 50.33% CDR).

Furthermore, because of the mechanics of the Bastion’s chain, your AD is never going to deal more than 35.6% the damage of your Frenzy (with 178% AD on your gear).

Going beyond 114% AD would cost you either a CDR roll, which will drop significant damage, a CHD roll, which will cost you 6.44% directly + 1.93% from Bloodshed, for a net loss of 8.37% damage, or a CHC roll, which will cost 7.85% directly + 2.35% from Bloodshed, net loss 10.2% damage.

Edit 2/8/20: Revised the ideal AD number, because I realized I was accounting for one too many CDR rolls. So it’s now 114% AD, 50.33% CDR. I also switched from Cold Rush and Terrify to Merciless Assault and Falter, since it seems like most people are using this combo. I stuck all this stuff in the D3 planner, and the link is updated. I’m still using the R6 set as a shoe-in, rather than using the ptr version of D3 planner, btw.

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307

Thanks Bud! I want to try to match ideal stats as much as possible for testing. I used Vambraces last night and did a 110 in 11 min at 2k paragon but that was literally my first attempt and really didn’t elite hunt. I’ll bookmark that link and try to test/record tonight once the family goes to bed.

you still have terrify for TS. That ain’t right correct? Should be Falter? Since we aren’t worried about Fearing anymore?

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No problem, man. Oh, one thing I should mention: at lower paragon, STR is going to be better on weapons than DMG%. Break-even point is when you have about 20k STR, before considering the rolls on those 2 weapons…

Well, that’s something I still listed as “uncertain”. Like I said, the biggest damage bonus still comes when you use Cold Rush or Ground Stomp to Freeze/Stun mobs right before popping Terrify, ideally right as you get to a CoE damage cycle and pop WOTB.

But, if dealing with the whole mass fear thing sounds terrible to you, then I’d swap FC: Cold Rush back to Merciless Assault, and Terrify for Falter or Demoralize.

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New Video up of GR128. Used CoE in cube, Threatening Shout:Falter, War Cry:Veteran’s Warning, Furious Charge:Merciless Assault with Echoing Fury and Vambraces of Sescheron equipped. 6.2K Paragon, 109% AD, 46% CDR, 2.04/2.02 Attacks Per Second with WOTB, 66.5% CC, 593% CHD with WOTB and BR active and my CoE cycle is on physical. 140 Bane of the Sticken and Bane of the Trapped, 129 Simplicity’s Strength.

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Very well played, sir!

Good thinking on the PP at the end. Better, I think, to use it to get the last bit of progression you needed, rather than saving it for the boss.

You still on “team EF”? I crunched the numbers earlier today, and it looks like EF surpasses Sankis or Sunkeeper for damage (by a fair margin) whenever you’ve got 3 or more stacks…

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Yeah, definitely sticking with EF. The damage bonus in big density cannot be denied. I wish I could put audio voice recording over the video. There are a few spots where that clear was carried along by trash density over elites. Like when I hit the 2nd floor and the Elite frosty porcupine was trying to run from me, I ditched him and just cleared the room. You can see when EF melted one of those Hive Mothers, too.

With how fast this build has been killing RGs (would maybe not be the same for 2K paragon players), I think Power Pylons can be used like a Conduit, if you really need it.

Lastly, I need to re-work my CDR and also time my WOTB cycles better. A few times I was using it just as a panic button and one time I hit it on accident out of habit (keeping it up all the time for Rend or IK builds, etc) when I was on the 3rd floor before I even saw that 5 pack of blues.

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What level are your gems at, btw?

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140 Sticken and Trapped, 129 Simplicity’s Strength, I’ll add that it an edit.

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I’ve been trying Juggernaugt with CC roll on helm and feel like it is a decent option for countering the elite CC affixes. I’m only frozen for a split second. Since I play in HC i’ve been trying to counter the CC cause it can be a real problem. Did some runs using IP with only 90% uptime and that help a lot but feel like Jugg + roll on helm is decent enough for me to not worry about CC.

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315

Should this new Barb set include all primary skills not just Frenzy?

Or simple because Frenzy has more items (Undisputed Champion and Bastion) and thus more meaningful to make it as a Frenzy set?

Weapon Throw, Cleave and Bash only has 1 support item…

OK time to farm Frenzy gears…

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Yes it should, because right now it’s just like playing HotA with different animations and no interesting mechanics.