need feedback on Barbarian

[dier_cire]

The two weapons with vorpal doesn't actually help. You can swing one weapon as fast as two when calling vorpal, and a second weapon is just one more thing for your opponent to hit. Considering the light armor restriction their hp will be more than half your total, you'll lose head to head.

Crush, when fighting a shielded rager is just brutal. Wielding 2 crush while nice isn't optimal due to the increased hits and vorpal damage. 1 crush is enough as you have a huge target area. Since you take vorpal, heavy or light armor is meaningless. Going into a cave with a crush guy beside you is huge. The 5 second shutdown allows you to switch to damage absorbtion if the situation dictates.
This change would make crush a one trick pony, which is why I don't like it. Having to choose what role you'll take before combat and being stuck there is not worth it.

Crush vs. Vorpal
In most situations, Crush is preferable over vorpal as your opponent's style works against them. With vorpal, sure you reduce the hits required but you lose your ability to block (which porbably absorbs more damage than you'll deal out) and in this case your style will work against you.

As far as fear at 2nd, I'd have to look at numbers but I'd say it should stay third. The root + fear + vorpal is really nasty and even though there is no common with fear, it opens the possibility.

[GM_Chris]

you can choose to swing 1 weapon for 2 vorpal if you would like.

[dier_cire]

Yes, but part of your point was you have two weapons...

Swash is different. Here you have 2 weapons and you swing voral.

[Wyrmwrath]

Vorpal is a hit and run skill and the swashbuckler is intended to be a hit and run skill set...did you even SEE either Pirates movie? (*winks*). anyhow Barbarian has been a sad skill set since thier crush skill was gutted.

Also, the "cant use a shield" ISNT a minor hinderence. I'll take a 1 crush and a shield against a warrior not using defensive matrix any day. I STILL think the old barbarian wasnt tough because of the 2 cruch and a shield, it was because of the maximum allowed shield sizes in FH. LARPs have been shrinking max shield size for a decade because of the advantage sword and board gives in simulated combat that doesnt allow shield hooking or have attacks to simulate a shoulder bash to the shield to fell the shield user ( AKA knock down or crush style damage directed at shield users)

[dier_cire]

Agreed. 2 crush against a warrior is still 1 once you hit life points anyway. A single weapon knight versus a crusher with a normal sized shield was fairly even as the effective 2 vorpal (as the knight can still use parry once his armor is depleted) countered the 2 crush. The knight's job is to wrap and the crusher's job is to avoid that.

[General Maximus]

I say lets make it simple.

Change both crush and vorpal skills to this

Take 1 life to activate, can swing 1 crush/1 vorpal, takes a 5 sec cool down. Can not use any other skills whill using the crush/vorpal skill. The max damage when crushing or vorpaling is 1.
Crush skill - no armor restirctions
Vorpal - light armor only

I see this being balanced with the focus head skill, etc..
Is this idea broken? I personaly don't think so, but what are your thoughts

[Todd]

I think it becomes nearly useless against anyone with Def Matrix, but other then that...

[GM_Chris]

I know some people want to take a discipline and compare it against another discipline and say this 1 cancles this one. This will only be 1 way we will look at a discipline.

If the knight is the ONLY way to defeat the crushing barbarian then the barbarian is broken.

On the other hand if the barbarian skill set as a whole is weak in comparison to ALL other discipline not just 1 or 2 then it is broken.

Also, no 1 skill should be the defining skill of any discipline. If the barbarian turns crush on in most every situation then the skill is broken.

Then we have RP profile and how a person invisions a barbarian and does the skill set validate that idea.

All skills are situational. I see the barbarian as a demoralizer. A barbarian comes in swining 1 crush and calling fear and they can remove a line of warriors and non warriors.

The blocks to a barbarian is resist fear and defensive matrix. Crush, since it cannot be blocked has a psychological factor that forces people to run because they keep getting pounded.


My major beef with the barb is they currently do not have an armor restriction. I would like to restrict to medium armor. I also have an issue with crush making their combat reflexes useless. I also have an issue that in alot of situations I dont know if it is adventagous to use crush.

I think I might want to play test more. Line of barbs and backup type characters vs a line of other types. (and not just a line of knights but a mixed group)

My original thought was to change combat reflexes to LP's and then change crush to give plus 5 life that leaves you when you drop the skill. This would give about 6 to 7 more soak to the barb while they are crushing.

Every situation should not end with 1 way of doing things. You as a player should adapt. At times swinging 3 without a shield may be good. At times swinging Crush may be good with or without a shield.

We could allow Parry to be used while crushing which then means all incomming melee damage would be reduced to 1 IF you are a warrior barb.

[Todd]

.. and I am against adding more LP to compensate for the C-Reflex's, but agree that loosing its effect is unfortunate.

[General Maximus]

The counter with crush or vorpal when some one puts up defensive matrix is drop the skill and rage on them! Vince, Eric, and I have done some play testing with these skill's and it seems to work pretty well. The large negative for using Vorpal and Crush with my suggestion is they have no defense skill avaialble to them when the skills are active. That makes them very vunerable to all the special skills as they attack. So certain stituations make crush and vorpal skills to use, and other times it is not.

[GM_Chris]

Why not rage with the skill active?

Swing for 2 crush or 2 vorpal with 1 weapon?

[General Maximus]

With my suggested skill change, swinging 2 crush / 2 vorpal would be broken. Additional negatives would have to be added to counter the extra damage. I'm going to assume that's why taking crush/vorpal damage while using the skills, was to balance the skill being able to do 2 damage. Remove the 2 damage and the major negative and you get a clean, easy to use, but very useful skill.

[General Maximus]

The current counter for the current crush and vorpal skills.

If some one starts to Vorpal you, block there weapons, and just beat on them. They are taking crush damage and will drop before you. Just hit there incoming weapons.

If some one starts to swing crush on you, drop you defense and go all out and just hit them as quickly and as often. You are doing direct life damage to them and the crush guy has to go through your armor and life. Typicaly the non crush guy will win.

Also, just fear them (becasue they can't resist) and beat them down. throw a couple booms in for good measure and they are dead. It make the skills not so useful and some what diffucult to use.

[GM_Chris]

We are going to put it in the book.

YOU CANNOT and I will repeast CANNOT just block incomming attacks calling crush and expect the other person to take the damage.

That is teh cheesist lamist thing in the world. All I picture is a person holding a shield and everything you hit the shield you take mystic damage because they dont move. maybe buildings should force you to take crush because they are stronger than you.

The only way a crush attach counts is if you actually swing and atatck the person.

Now you might say it is subjective and I assure you it isnt.

[General Maximus]

???????? Yeah, I agree with you. You must swing a sword and call damage. But you can swing your sword to block there's and call damage. Would that not translate into crush damage on the Vorpaling person?? I personal would just swing at the person not carying if I hit them or their weapons, but they would know I was attacking them.