The comparison to wizard is problematic for multiple reasons as you suggested, but there is one major issue that you did not mention. Wizards are being nerfed. Therefore, I would be comparing PTR barb to pre-nerf wizards.
I did compare all era 2.6.6 classes at GR 131 and 126. Barbs were ahead of 5 classes including DH. The class that was better/more powerful was pre-nerf wizards. I think that you the implications of being ahead of DHs suggests. I did not go below that GR level.
Again you cannot pick one or two GR only. You have to take samples from the whole range. Otherwise, no one will believe you.
Was not there any new Wizard clears in the PTR? With the nerfed results? There must be, why don’t you use them? Not enough data? if so then the comparison is already flawed for your purposes.
There was new wizard records that were set this PTR 2.6.7. The top “new” wizard clear was GR 131. Before I knew that the PTR leaderboard was not reset, I did compare PTR barbs and PTR wizards. PTR barbs were ahead.
I can look at a range of GR clears. I just chose some simple numbers to illustrate the point. As you know, the top end of the curve is more noisy for any particular GR level due to the paucity of data points.
Bear with me with the two cases below:
Now are these two clears comparable?
Both are 135 rifts
Both paragons are comparable (2000 difference).
Can you use these two data for any potential damage analysis?
Note that the two clears are very different. Player B is definitely pushing and maxing out his damage potential while Player A is not pushing it to its limit. Therefore, such a comparison will underestimate Player A’s performance while it may overestimate Player B’s performance.
Can you suggest damage numbers based on data points selected in this manner?
If you had to, you could have considered only +14 minute clears, this would be more reasonable than the top 40.
I cannot stress this enough (even for developers):
Balance carried out using top performance is not going to result in a balance for 80% of the player base. Class medians must be used to determine buff numbers.
Final Wild Table
| ----------========= | Buffed Items | ==========------------ |
|---|---|---|
| Lamentation | Fjord Cutter | Remorseless |
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| Dishonored Legacy | Oathkeeper | The Three Hundredth Spear |
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| Fury of the Vanished Peak | The Gavel of Judgment | Madawc’s Sorrow |
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| The Undisputed Champion | Girdle of Giants | Dread Iron |
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| Chilanik’s Chain | Skull Grasp | Blade of the Warlord |
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| Blade of the Tribes | Standoff | Arreat’s Law |
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| Immortal King’s Boulder Breaker | Cuirass of the Wastes | Spirit of the Earth |
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| Skular’s Salvation | Ramaladni’s Gift | Bastion’s Revered |
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| Fury of the Ancients | Bracers of Destruction | Smoking Thurible |
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| Aquila Cuirass | Pox Faulds | Depth Diggers |
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| Frostburn | Azurewrath | Rimeheart |
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Click on items for details.
345 upvotes, 1,6k replies where almost all agree…but not 1 answere from Blizzards side.
But ye they hear us.
If you want ot support Diablo 4 the same way it’s already dead at arrival. -.-
Your example proves the problems that PTR sandbagging makes in trying to estimate build power. As you may recall Don Vu stated that there is the Business Intelligence team that dissects the PTR data in consideration of paragon level, augments, legendary gems, etc…
For the current non-season era, you can imagine that people tend not to sandbag as much as they take pride in beating their previous bests. If the PTR with sandbagging appears better than live era than it raises an alarm to me.
These are the summary of all the barbarian buff proposal items?
Nope, some are still missing, but I’m too exhausted, to make more. At least for now…
Some of the new ones, are my suggestions…
Please reconsider pulling the Lamentation buff, and adjust IK HotA and SS the additional levels they need!
Gasnick you have me in stitches with every Wild Table 
Also makes me wanna watch Conan again 
Current % of players on top 1000 non season US clearing GR 125
Wiz 58.7%
Nec 3.7%
Crusader 8.3%
DH 6.5%
WD 6.2%
Monk 1.3%
Barb 1.3%
PTR Barb 8.2% (That’s if I’m reading Micro’s data correctly that there were 82 clears at or over GR 125) I can’t see the PTR boards anymore so just going from what Micro reported.
I’m not saying this is the best way to evaluate overall balance but it is clear there is a certain outlier among the classes 
I took one look at AoV numbers and didn’t think twice about not logging onto one of my 'saders to test it out. Whole time on WW barb. Sheer joy.
Don’t nerf Lamentation.
I absolutely agree that wizards are OP, previously advocated for their nerf, and in patch 2.6.7 they are being nerfed. So are necromancers due to peculiarities of their thorns build.
The 82 number represent the ranking of the player with the best time at GR 125. So there are 81 players who cleared 126. Does that make sense? As Prokahn noted, players sandbag on the PTR. So the number of players who could clear a 126 is likely much higher than all classes not named wizards (that are being nerfed).
Since I do enjoy playing Crusader, I definitely wanted to be able to give good feedback for AoV. So I actually spent more time on the Aegis of Valor Crusader than I did WhirlRend Barbarian. I probably spent more time on IK:HOTA too in fact.
Everyone was testing WhirlRend. That’s why when certain players go “LOOK AT ALL OF THESE PTR GR CLEARS BY BARBARIANS” I have to roll my eyes. Literally 90% of the community was testing WhirlRend Barbarian. So of course there’s going to be A LOT of high GRs on the PTR leaderboards.
How much does the percentage lower with the nerf of 3.5 GRs? I don’t know, but I’ll bet you Wiz class will still have the highest % clearing 125.
Certainly if everyone was pushing and the PTR was extended over a longer period of time…That 8.2% would increase. Would it reach 58.7%?
Where does Barbs % clearing 125 land with the 7GR nerf with no multiplier? It will likely go up regardless given the hota buff since it could already clear 125 without really high paragon. I don’t know where the WW/rend will end up, cause surprise we didn’t get to test. Didn’t test any slam builds…not my thing, so have no idea where they will be clearing.
Necromancer as class is really in sad shape. The class needs a rework.
That data is no where near perfect, but it does show a clear outlier.
This is exactly what you need to show to prove Barb with 200% multiplier is a clear outlier. The data is not perfect, but it absolutely shows an outlier. Do you see what I’m getting at? Your data doesn’t show this. There are some implications and concerning data, but nothing like what I just showed. There is no denying that wiz currently is an outlier. That’s what you need to show and people will hop on board.
See people can concede on points…why can’t you?
Yeah, people who play the actual game understand this, glad you got my underlying point. I wouldn’t be shocked if more people played WotW on ptr than ranked live across some random metric considering that everyone who has a live account can play ptr, ptr has nearly free loot and the opportunity for testing new fun builds at no real cost. I say that because you can just re import profile for new augments if you actually burn through all yours.
We can’t know that because we can’t see the number of log ins but like I said I wouldn’t be shocked.
I am not sure precisely where wizards would land(see the last paragraph for comments on top clear potential) . The wizards GR clears are positively skewed because people like to play the strongest class. The weakest class also appears worst than it actually is.
As I wrote in the second post in this thread, removal of the rend damage buff altogether seem too extreme to me. As such, I suggested 100% rend damage modifier.
Since the PTR started, several classes have set new highs in their live non-season/era clears. This makes sense to me. Intellectually, I have a problem with the idea that 140 is the top potential of this build. If we know that the top clears in live increase, then logically, it makes no sense to me that the PTR clear of 140 somehow sets 140 as the top possible ww/rend clear. This can not be true. I can not count the number of times that I have been told that there is no evidence that the top ww/rend build can be above 140 (even though the simple fact that no FoT was equipped in the GR140 at bad ping since the guy was connecting from EU).
That’s population bias and that can definitely be a factor in the discrepancies that we see in most played and least played classes making them look better or worse than they really are.
It is also the argument I used against your PTR data vs just the live US data. There could be population bias there making the WW/rend look better than it is…
No one is arguing that 140 is the top potential, they are simply saying that the speculation of 145 or higher can not be substantiated. There is only contention with how much higher than 140 can be extrapolated.
Yes the top clear with 200% could be 143 or 145 we don’t know. But chantodo is going to be around 142 even after nerf it seems.