Very low AC/ Very high HP Barbarian

[299103]

Long time lurker, first time poster. Hail to all the denizens of the playground.

I had an idea for a new character for an upcoming campaign, (starting at 4th level and probably going up to about 12th) and wondered if anyone had tried anything like this...

Going for a 32 point-buy barbarian with literally all the points put into STR and CON. I'll choose a race that gives bonuses to those stats- I'm thinking neanderthal (Frostburn) or perhaps mongrelfolk.

For feats I think I'll go for reckless rage and power-attack.

My theory was that since a raging barbarian in light armour has a pretty low AC anyway, and because in d&d a hit does the same damage whether it beats your AC by 1 or 100... to hell with it- I'll just take the hits. It certainly sits well roleplay wise to represent the berserker mindset.

Workable? terrible? anyways to improve it while keeping the same mechanic?

[DeltaEmil]

Terrible, meaning, your hit points go down really fast, fast enough for you to be dead in 1 round, 2 at most, especially at the higher levels.
This is only a viable tactic if you can make an enemy dead in one hit, like with the everpopular shock trooper-build.

But if you expect your enemies to hit you often enough, you're going to die, and damage can and will be higher than the numbers of hit points, unless you have a very dedicated healbot (who'd be better off killing the enemies - and ditching your character, but that's going perhaps already too far).

[Nohwl]

i played a character like that once, it was in a very low magic game. the character died because of a couple of bad rolls. if the enemy wasn't dead after i hit them, i'd be taking a lot of damage.

i was using a barbarian/dungeon crasher fighter and planned on going into bloodstorm blade and master thrower.

make sure to pick up shock trooper, since you don't care about your ac.

[Frozen_Feet]

If you want to have any defense-based staying power, you need both decent HP and AC. Don't fool yourself into thinking that AC makes no difference in damage taken - being hit 85% of the time means taking much less damage overall than being hit 95% of the time. Having AC also means that the enemy can't trivially use feats like Power Attack against you, which also lessens damage taken - you're being hit as often, but for less damage because the enemy can't sacrifice extra points of AB for damage.

It is possible to scrap AC - but you need alternate defense form in that case. Miss chances, granted by spells like Displacement and Blink, and items like Eversmoking Bottle (?) and other forms of concealment are popular.

Since the enemy always has 5% chance of hitting your AC, after a point stacking miss chances becomes better, as it can divide that 5% to make it into some absurdly small chance.

[Eldariel]

AC is quite expensive so this is quite workable, really. Though yes, you want some other means of defense; damage negation, miss chances, whatever. Just remember that only a part of the attacks (numbers depending on the world, but I'd expect about 25% in your average D&D game) target your AC; rest target your Fort, Will or Ref and Fort & Will-targeting ones are the most dangerous (a very small handful are direct ability checks, auto hits or such but I won't delve into those - sufficient to say, HP is the best defense there).

So dumping AC weakens you against about 25% of the attacks but that's not really that big a deal in the long run. On higher levels, AC is a poor defense anyways, except if magically buffed (since monsters scale pretty fast and you need to invest about ½ your WBL to keep up, even if you get full WBL).


Combat Reflexes, reach weapon, tripping/stand still with Enlarge Person is a great defense against attacks you'd normally have AC for, for example. Elusive Target [Complete Warrior] negates Power Attack which is likewise excellent. Ring of Blinking gives you a 50% miss chance against basically anything using such barbaric means as basic attacks.

Displacing Armor [Magic Item Compendium] is a cheap armor ability that allows you to use a swift action to gain the miss chance a few times per day. Starmantle Cloak [Book of Exalted Deeds] halves all damage if you can make a DC 15 Reflex-save (easily all the time with Pride-domain from Planar Touchstone [PlH] and just boosts to get to +15).

[Redland Jack]

Maybe look into having a sling or some sort of throwing weapons. Then, if you're encountering a large group of enemies, you can stay out of harm's way and still get some advantage out of your massive strength.
In encounters with 1 or 2 tough enemies, you can just dive in with your melee weapon (as you planned) and use your superior hit point total to survive.

[Urpriest]

Isn't there an iconic build that dumps AC like this, using Karmic Strike et al. and a Vampiric Weapon to survive?

[Zaq]

Get a Shadow Sibling (Magic of Eberron, 8k GP) as soon as you can afford one. It gives you a 50% miss chance as an immediate action, and works [CON mod] times per day. Since you'll be pumping CON, this is pretty perfect for you.

[Eldariel]

Isn't there an iconic build that dumps AC like this, using Karmic Strike et al. and a Vampiric Weapon to survive?

Vampiric doesn't get the job done but Wrathful Healing [Enemies & Allies] is v. good; it actually HEALS you a part of the total damage you deal. Don't remember other sources for it off-hand tho.

[Draz74]

Well, there's the classic King of Smack with the Claws of the Vampire psionic power.

[grarrrg]

You sir could stand to go for some Mineral Warrior (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20031003e).

LA+1, +2 Str, +4 Con, -2 all mentals, and DR 8/Adamantine

Granted, the LA hurts your HD (and therefore your HP), but the DR should MORE than make up for it.

[WinWin]

Isn't there an iconic build that dumps AC like this, using Karmic Strike et al. and a Vampiric Weapon to survive?

I had an IC entry do this. Animal Lord.

Pure Soul Eater does it better. Karmic Gambit and generate temporary hp via opportunity attacks. If it can be combined with some form of DR, fast healing or other regeneration, so much the better.

It is an attrition build, designed to wear down foes vulnerable to energy drain. Works better against multi attackers than power attackers. Including Elusive Target would minimise this flaw.

[Runestar]

That's actually the idea behind the masochist (basically a frenzied berserker build variant). The idea is that since your AC is already going to be crap from shock-trooper, may as well dump it all the way via rage, frenzy, robilar's gambit and any other effect which degrades your AC. You also have a spell in BOVD which grants attack/damage bonuses when you take damage.

Survival can come in the form of buffs like mirror image, miss chances, wall of blades maneuver, and simply going first and killing your foe in 1 hit before he gets a chance to retaliate.

So yes, definitely workable and a rather viable concept. :smallsmile:

[299103]

Thanks for the advice

I was going to look for a good item to give miss chance- shadow sibling looks great.

I've seen mineral warriror before. Its almost perfect for this build but there is no way that beast is LA+1. if it was LA+2 (maybe even +3) I might feel less dirty using it.

[Keld Denar]

Another thing you can do is something like a Fistbear Bearfist (google it, trust me). Get +Con to your AC twice (from Deepwarden and Fist of the Forest), then focus on abilities like Rage and Bear Rage and the Warshaper PrC to increase your Con to rediculous amounts. Now, not only are you blocking swords with your bare chest, you are blocking swords with your bear chest!

Oh yea...I went there.

[sonofzeal]

Greatsword of Wrathful Healing has already been mentioned for HP recovery.

More important (And more cheesy) is an Amulet of Retribution (BoED). This amulet reflects half the melee damage coming at you, meaning you actually take way less damage, don't die, and can heal back up with Wrathful Healing. It's a brutal combination, but also extremely cheesy. I wouldn't use it except in explicitly high-OP games.

[Grommen]

What Raging barbarians have Armor Class? This is news to me! Just hit them harder. If your the last man standing cause they didn't have a chance to hit you. You still win.:smallbiggrin:

Coarse your gonna stress your local healer out big time. :smalleek:

My Level 12 Barbarian has a really low AC. He takes a lot of damage but he deals out a lot more than he takes every round. And when our healer remembers he can heal people it's all good.

Keep in mind though that they don't have to be mindless raging machines of doom (really no, it's ok). I also keep a shield and a one hand weapon on him. He is also smart enough to take Combat Expertise. So when he does have to tank and keep his kool till the party takes out the bad guy. He can do that too.

[ericgrau]

You can't truly give up on AC until you're at least 10 points behind. Even with light armor and a lousy dex you aren't more than 5 points behind, if that. Anyway I always make str and con my first two stats for any melee character. I fail to see how this is any different unless you want to lay down craziness like shock trooper.

[Zaq]

You can't truly give up on AC until you're at least 10 points behind. Even with light armor and a lousy dex you aren't more than 5 points behind, if that. Anyway I always make str and con my first two stats for any melee character. I fail to see how this is any different unless you want to lay down craziness like shock trooper.

Behind what, exactly? The AC of your armor-pumping sword and board Fighter buddy? The average attack bonus of melee things of your level? The AC you would have with relatively low investment?

[Sacrieur]

Gonna need a lot a lot of HP man...

I made a base class called Sakrier that functions as what you're describing, but to cope the class has double con modifier to HP, double HP at first level, and + con bonuses throughout the class. Damage reduction STILL needs to be added to make the class worthwhile and not die like mad.

[LOTRfan]

Mongrel Folk have +4 to Con. Using Mineral Warrior and 32 point buy, you can have Str 17, Dex 10, Con 26, Int 6, Wis 8, and Cha 4 at ECL 2.

Add in rage, and you get Str 21, Con 30, and the Will save penalty is negated. Its useless for everything else besides combat, but you have 30 Con at ECL 2.

By level 20, you can have up to 400 hp (440 when raging).

[Larpus]

Another possibility is use a race with a decent Natural Armor modifier (still, I think that DR tops it), from the top of my head I can think of Lizardfolk:

LA 1, +2 Str, +2 Con, -2 Int, 5 Nat.Armor and you get 2d8 HP for your humanoid level (you also get some assorted bonuses, but these would be the main draws).

Known languages are Common and Draconic, which is sort of nice too.

[Daftendirekt]

Mineral Warrior.

/thread.

[LOTRfan]

How does the Damage Reduction 8/Adamantine interact with the Damage Reduction/---?

[Vangor]

How does the Damage Reduction 8/Adamantine interact with the Damage Reduction/---?

Best works. If you have 3/- and 8/Ada, only the 8/Ada will function most of the time. If someone bypasses the 8/Ada, such as by using an adamantine weapon, the 3/- will function.

[Kaeso]

Try the Fist of the Forest PrC (Complete Champion page 80). It has extremely easy entry requirements and it only gives you advantages, including COn to AC. This way you'll have a decent AC AND high HP without actually needing DEX. The downside is that you have to wait until at least level 5 to enter it.

If you combine this with a 2 level dip int he Deepwarden prestige class (RoS), you get Con to AC twice. The downside to this is that you have to be a dwarf.

[MarkusWolfe]

Disregard AC, acquire hitpoints!

I'd only recommend this if you're playing a game where the PCs get full HD. (12+CON)*Level can give you truly impressive amounts of hitpoints. Just be sure to have SOME armor at the lower levels, and if you don't have a fullblown healbot, at least have someone who can fix you up between fights for the mid and high levels.

Monsters attack bonus gets ridiculously high after a while, and AC is quite worthless at that point in addition to being expensive. Use the money you save to focus on your weaponry (the best defense is a good offense) or on other defenses (such as a flat miss chance).

For offense, you'll want to kill your enemy as fast as possible, so Shock Trooper is the way to go.