Barbarians Feel Weak

[KorvinStarmast]

add 200 ft to throwing weapon

Add 40 to short range and add 120 to long range - bounded accuracy, remember?

Grapple one size larger

Heck yeah.

At will jump spell

At will first level spell?
No. But how about just double all jump distances (vertical and horizontal) for an unarmored barbarian?

Add str mod to shove distance

Yes, and to add to that, a bonus action knock back/shove (not prone) of 5 or 10 feet on a successful attack, beginning at first or second level.

[LudicSavant]

What if there was a system like invocations that allowed barbarians to augment their abilities?

I wouldn't see anything with barbarians getting a knock back on melee weapons strikes seeing how repelling blast hasn't broken anything.

add 200 ft to throwing weapon

Grappling no longer reduces speed

Grapple one size larger

At will jump spell

Add damage on shove/grapple. Have to keep it small but would be super flavorful.

Bypass DR on objects

Add str mod to shove distance

Yeah. Make Barbarian attacks the new Repelling Blast.

[stoutstien]

Add 40 to short range and add 120 to long range - bounded accuracy, remember?

what does bounded accuracy have to do with throwing a weapon further? most of the time it would be a non issue but it would give the feel of being super strong. they won't be able to apply rage damage or anything still so it just flexibility.

At will first level spell?
No. But how about just double all jump distances (vertical and horizontal) for an unarmored barbarian?

warlocks have jump at will and it hasn't broken anything. i could see limiting it to long jumps only.

Yeah. Make Barbarian attacks the new Repelling Blast.

should have been that was from the get go. once i get back from walking the dogs im going to flesh this out.

[firelistener]

Haven't seen much mention of Danger Sense in this thread. I played a barbarian for a longer campaign, and I found it easy to be the "strong guy" and super tanky. Danger Sense gives advantage on dex saves, which means most traps in dungeons and a ton of damaging spells (like fireball). This translated to always taking point in dungeons because I could trip traps and come out just fine. In addition, damage output doesn't need to be super high. The barbarian is all about rushing enemies and getting in their face so they try to hit you. For most enemies, your AC is fine because of how bounded accuracy works in 5e. For stronger foes that can reliably hit you or gangs of enemies that surround you, you just pop into Rage which is trivial to sustain for a whole fight. IMO, a barbarian doesn't even need to Rage to actively contribute really well in battle.

[Chaosmancer]

If there's anything to change about Barbarians, I have a few ideas:

- Getting Powerful Build at level 4.

I kind of like this, I can't think of a barbarian who this wouldn't be a good fit for.

Some folks are talking about raising the Str cap or giving some more little bonuses to Strength checks. That won't really fix the feel.

- You still won't be able to lift, because the math for lifting is garbage in 5e. You could have 30 Strength and still not have very good lift/push/drag feats (in fact, you wouldn't even come close to being able to lift, push, or drag the amount of material that a Wizard can move with a cantrip like Shape Water or Mold Earth). You could have 40, or 50, and you still wouldn't be able to push that block of ice. It's ridiculous. This isn't an issue of how much Strength you have, it's an issue of how your ability to lift, push, or drag scales with Strength in the first place.

- You still won't feel like your attacks are powerful in the way that genre fiction characters of this sort do. When the viking Thorkell the Tall gets an attack blocked, the person goes flying into the air and then becomes injured by the fall. When Thorkell the Tall throws a javelin, it doesn't just do a little extra damage, it has a range like a longbow sharpshooter, and can impale multiple men and pin them to a wall. A javelin with a Battlemaster's Pushing Attack feels more powerful than anything the Barbarian's throws do.

- If we instead want to talk about feeling like Conan, the guy has skills that would make a Rogue jealous and great all-around mental abilities. And still feels stronger than the 5e Barbarian does.

I understand your position, but I am hesitant to actually make Barbarians better in combat, because despite people saying they've seen Fighters or Paladins pump out more damage, I've never seen Barbarians slouch in the damage department.

The weakest barbarian I've ever seen, was one I built to play defensively. He was a Kinght (background) Ancestral spirits and Shield Master (human)

But, I think you might have hit upon a more real problem here. I think the shoving and lifting rules need to be adjusted to better show off the type of strength we are wanting.

So, let us work backwards. A medium sized barbarian, with strength 24, let us say he has powerful build to count as Large (because I like that idea). That makes him stronger than a Stone Giant, but counting the same size as a Troll or Ogre.

Could he lift a car over his head and throw it? Should he be able to lift more, or less?

From there we can get a multiplier that is "close enough" and start working back the math for this stuff.

Haven't seen much mention of Danger Sense in this thread. I played a barbarian for a longer campaign, and I found it easy to be the "strong guy" and super tanky. Danger Sense gives advantage on dex saves, which means most traps in dungeons and a ton of damaging spells (like fireball). This translated to always taking point in dungeons because I could trip traps and come out just fine. In addition, damage output doesn't need to be super high. The barbarian is all about rushing enemies and getting in their face so they try to hit you. For most enemies, your AC is fine because of how bounded accuracy works in 5e. For stronger foes that can reliably hit you or gangs of enemies that surround you, you just pop into Rage which is trivial to sustain for a whole fight. IMO, a barbarian doesn't even need to Rage to actively contribute really well in battle.

Oh yeah, Danger Sense is amazing. My Knight Barbarian build took full advantage of it with Shield Master, often taking no damage from dex saves. It really is a bit of an unsung hero.

[Segev]

Hm. At least one post (possibly more) on the notion that 5e's lift/carry rules are too limiting in general.

Does this mean that they maybe should be quadratic or exponential rather than their current linear value? Right now, basic strength-based lift/carry is 15x Strength score in lbs. Size-changes, Powerful Build, etc. can alter this, but that's the basic rule.

Strength 2 unseen servants can thus carry 30 lbs., which seems reasonable. A Strength 3 PC (has anyone seen one actually played?) could carry 45 lbs. This also means the Strength 3 Tiny owl can carry 45 lbs., and arguably thus lift a gnome.

So perhaps things are too high on the low end and too low on the high end?

(Please do correct me if I'm wrong; I am having trouble finding the "how much can you carry while flying?" rules at the moment.)

Let's say you want a strength 3 cat to be able to carry 3 lbs. and drag 6. (I might actually be underestimating, here.) How much do we want an "average" human to carry? By current rules, they can lift/carry 150 lbs. (10 Strength x15 lbs/1 strength)

How much do we want a 24 Strength Barbarian or 29 Strength Storm Giant to be carrying? (The giant, admittedly, benefits from being Gargantuan for an x8 carry capacity.)

[Amechra]

One possibility I'm considering is converting the rage damage bonus to +d4/+d6/+d8 instead of +2/+3/+4 - I've actually played in a game where we did that before, and it felt really nice without overshadowing anyone else damage-wise.

It could be cool if Barbarians dealt some damage when they shove or grapple people. Maybe tie that in to Reckless Attack and Rage - you get to deal your Strength bonus in bludgeoning damage if you're reckless attacking, and your rage damage if you're raging. It'd be a reminder that grappling and shoving exist, and would nudge people towards the control-related aspects of being a tank.

---

As for things people have brought up...

1) A thousand times yes to giving them Powerful Build - maybe give it a different name so that races that already have Powerful Build can stack?

2) I'm not a big fan of giving the Barbarian invocations. I dunno, I just don't feel like that hits the right mechanics I personally would want for a Barbarian.

3) I don't think we need to remove things that the Barbarian already has, and I don't agree with the idea that you have to focus on particular aspect of "be strong". Seriously, unless you're giving them stuff like "you can lift objects of any size regardless of their weight", low-grade super strength just isn't that extreme.

4) Short rest Rages would really help matters. Honestly, I think having Rage as a discrete buff isn't the best way to handle it - I'd almost prefer something like a Battlemaster Fighter, Monk, or Swords Bard, where you have a pool of "rages" that you spend fluidly to do stuff.

[MaxWilson]

Hm. At least one post (possibly more) on the notion that 5e's lift/carry rules are too limiting in general.

Does this mean that they maybe should be quadratic or exponential rather than their current linear value?

Yes. My instincts say it should be weakly exponential in Str and also cubic in linear size. (Yes, I know that for real-world creatures, it's not cubic--but it's a D&D trope for giants to behave like scaled-up normal humans.) I haven't found a formula that makes me really happy though.

I agree with those pushing for short rest rages. That would help the flavor of the class quite a bit. Say 1 Rage per rest at levels 1-6, 2 per rest at 7-13, 3 per rest at 14-19, then unlimited. At level 9 you also get one extra rage per long rest.

With long rest rages it's a bit silly that a warbearian (e.g. Barb 1/Fiend Bladelock 6) gets to act more spontaneous and reckless than the equivalent full barb (Barb 7).

[Kane0]

Hm. At least one post (possibly more) on the notion that 5e's lift/carry rules are too limiting in general.

Does this mean that they maybe should be quadratic or exponential rather than their current linear value? Right now, basic strength-based lift/carry is 15x Strength score in lbs. Size-changes, Powerful Build, etc. can alter this, but that's the basic rule.

Strength 2 unseen servants can thus carry 30 lbs., which seems reasonable. A Strength 3 PC (has anyone seen one actually played?) could carry 45 lbs. This also means the Strength 3 Tiny owl can carry 45 lbs., and arguably thus lift a gnome.

So perhaps things are too high on the low end and too low on the high end?

(Please do correct me if I'm wrong; I am having trouble finding the "how much can you carry while flying?" rules at the moment.)

Let's say you want a strength 3 cat to be able to carry 3 lbs. and drag 6. (I might actually be underestimating, here.) How much do we want an "average" human to carry? By current rules, they can lift/carry 150 lbs. (10 Strength x15 lbs/1 strength)

How much do we want a 24 Strength Barbarian or 29 Strength Storm Giant to be carrying? (The giant, admittedly, benefits from being Gargantuan for an x8 carry capacity.)

Yes. My instincts say it should be weakly exponential in Str and also cubic in linear size. (Yes, I know that for real-world creatures, it's not cubic--but it's a D&D trope for giants to behave like scaled-up normal humans.) I haven't found a formula that makes me really happy though.

My interest is piqued. New thread?

[MaxWilson]

My interest is piqued. New thread?

Sure. I don't have a good formula but I'm happy to discuss the issue some more.

[Segev]

I'm not keen on short rest rages. My experience is, admittedly, skewed by how little actual dungeon-crawling has happened compared to "exploration days" that tend to have 0-1 encounters, with 2 encounters in the same day being rare, but in my experience, my barbarian player is rarely concerned about spending her first rage, and her second only gets stingy if they have a second encounter before a short rest (which is rare).

They've moved from chapter 2 to chapter 3 of Tomb of Annihilation, however, so perhaps their encounter rate will go up.

I do, as I said before, find it concerning that a raging barbarian might fall behind a "doing nothing special" Fighter as levels progress. Raging should put them above the fighter, while not raging can reasonably leave them "below" the fighter by a bit, but otherwise....other than flavor, would there be a reason not to just give them unlimited rages?

[Chaosmancer]

Hm. At least one post (possibly more) on the notion that 5e's lift/carry rules are too limiting in general.

Does this mean that they maybe should be quadratic or exponential rather than their current linear value? Right now, basic strength-based lift/carry is 15x Strength score in lbs. Size-changes, Powerful Build, etc. can alter this, but that's the basic rule.

Strength 2 unseen servants can thus carry 30 lbs., which seems reasonable. A Strength 3 PC (has anyone seen one actually played?) could carry 45 lbs. This also means the Strength 3 Tiny owl can carry 45 lbs., and arguably thus lift a gnome.

So perhaps things are too high on the low end and too low on the high end?

(Please do correct me if I'm wrong; I am having trouble finding the "how much can you carry while flying?" rules at the moment.)

Let's say you want a strength 3 cat to be able to carry 3 lbs. and drag 6. (I might actually be underestimating, here.) How much do we want an "average" human to carry? By current rules, they can lift/carry 150 lbs. (10 Strength x15 lbs/1 strength)

How much do we want a 24 Strength Barbarian or 29 Strength Storm Giant to be carrying? (The giant, admittedly, benefits from being Gargantuan for an x8 carry capacity.)

Tiny halves the weight, so a tiny owl can only carry 22.5 lbs. (tiny being a misnomer, since this is a normal sized owl.)

So, that makes some sense.

Storm Giants are only Huge, so that is actually a x4 modifier. So they can lift 1,740 lbs. The average car is 2,870 lbs, so they can't even lift a car.

Tarrasque is our upper limit, 30 and gargantuan. 3,600 lbs. The smallest elephant (the african forest elephant) weighs 6,000 punds. So a Tarrasque can lift it, but can only drag it. What we think of for elephant (the african bush elephant) weighs 13,000 lbs and the Tarrasque can't come close.


So, I think the low end could be a little high, but the high end is definitely too low.


Also worth noting "An animal pulling a cart or ect can move 5 times it's base carrying capacity"

So, with this, a draft horse (lg 18 str) can move a wagon weighing 2,700 lbs. Which seems close.

[Segev]

As a brainstorming idea, what happens if we make Constitution a part of lift/carry, by adding its modifier to Strength before we go?

First thought: low Con means lower carry, which seems reasonable, but it's still linear, and that means we're not doing much for the high end. The terrasque has, what, a 20 con? +5 bonus, times 8 is +40, x15 is only another 600 lbs. So it doesn't do what we want.

Making it geometric doesn't work for two reasons: 1) it expands too fast, I think, and 2) negative con mods now make you carry less than 0, which is silly.


Similarly, just adding Athletics proficiency mod is a linear effect. Multiplying by it probably gets silly. If the terrasque (30 Str, gargantuan) had Athletics proficiency (+6, because he's CR ridiculous), that'd put him up at 21,600 lbs. That...actually is probably getting more reasonable.

The Storm Giant (CR 13, so proficiency bonus +5), assuming Athletics proficiency, would have 8,700 lbs. lift. Could lift a that 2,870-lb. car, now, fairly easily. But could barely lift the smallest of elephants, and wouldn't be able to lift (but could drag!) an African Bush Elephant.


This, however, is assuming Athletics proficiency. Do we want to have to assume that?

...actually, at least for the Storm Giant, multiplying by Con mod would give the same results. But we still have issues with con mods of 0, even if we made negative con mods divisors and positive con mods multipliers. And patching THAT makes this a bit more complex a formula than I really feel comfortable advocating.


Could just assume proficiency multiplies in with or without Athletics, but that...doesn't make sense for itty bitty critters, since they still are getting x2 from a +2 proficiency that everyone has.



A different approach: add your strength (or con?) modifier to the x15.

Let's just try it with strength, first. The Terrasque would be multiplying by x25 instead of x15, which would make his lift go from 3,600 lbs. to 6,000 lbs. ...that's not enough. Not if we want him casually picking up elephants of Huge size. (Heck, Rocs - at 29 strength and gargantuan - can't pick up elephants by this metric, either, and that's the iconic image of them. For reference, base rules make tahem ble to lift 3,480 lbs.)


Okay, a really simple one: Strength squared (modified further by your size). Terrasque: 30x30x8 = 7,200 lbs. Nnnnope. Still too small. (Meanwhile, a 3 Str Tiny owl would lift 3x3/2 = 4.5 lbs, which...might work out, actually.)



Maybe make Size the exponent? Tiny = 1/2, Large = 2, Huge = 3, Gargantuan = 4?

Terrasque becomes 41 billion lbs. I think that's a little excessive. But... hm. That would let the Terrasque lift and carry the Three Gorges Dam in China (20.8 billion lbs.), but not the Great Wall of China (116 billion lbs.).

The Storm Giant would be able to lift 82.3 million lbs. A 747 only weighs 970,000 lbs. An aircraft carrier weigh22.44 million lbs, so they could trivially pick up a 747 but could only drag an aircraft carrier.

Considering that they could stand on an aircraft carrier with room to spare, I think this is ... a bit excessive, still, but we might be getting close to the ballpark.


This is tricky.

[KorvinStarmast]

warlocks have jump at will and it hasn't broken anything. i could see limiting it to long jumps only.

Warlocks have to Spend An Invocation for that. It has a cost.

[stoutstien]

Warlocks have to Spend An Invocation for that. It has a cost.

which was what i was looking at. giving the barb a list of ways to augment how their rage manifests. so they could gain extra jumping or they could gain the ability to apply rage damage to grapple/shove/disarm attempts.

[Boci]

which was what i was looking at. giving the barb a list of ways to augment how their rage manifests. so they could gain extra jumping or they could gain the ability to apply rage damage to grapple/shove/disarm attempts.

Yes, but you're giving them to the barbarian for free, on top of what it always gets. I think KorvinStarmast is saying that even if the barbarian is lacking, giving them abilities on par with warlock invocations for free might be a bit much.

[stoutstien]

Yes, but you're giving them to the barbarian for free, on top of what it always gets. I think KorvinStarmast is saying that even if the barbarian is lacking, giving them abilities on par with warlock invocations for free might be a bit much.

the barb IS lacking. one could comfortably increase their flexibility with knock-back melee attacks, added range with thrown weapons, a small bump in mobility, augment shove/grapple with more distance on shove and/or adding a small damage rider, and give them a 10-15% in damage and they still wouldn't come close to being out of line.

[Boci]

the barb IS lacking.

Yes, that wasn't being debated. Merely that using a warlock invocation as a balance point for the free stuff you give the barbarian might be a bit much. KorvinStarmast said jump was too good and that you should instead consider "But how about just double all jump distances (vertical and horizontal) for an unarmored barbarian", not that the barbarian was fine as written.

[Dienekes]

Yes, but you're giving them to the barbarian for free, on top of what it always gets. I think KorvinStarmast is saying that even if the barbarian is lacking, giving them abilities on par with warlock invocations for free might be a bit much.

While I get it, I’m not 100% sure I agree. But it can’t be every invocation. Giving some invocation that directly increases the Barbs base combat effectiveness I’d be very wary of. But I can’t really see any balance issues that come from giving them a smattering of utility options, especially ones that take up part of their action economy.

There’s the possibility of going over board, I admit, but limiting the number to something like 8 useful utility options spread over 20 levels. And honestly I kinda think all the martial classes should have at least that.

[stoutstien]

Yes, that wasn't being debated. Merely that using a warlock invocation as a balance point for the free stuff you give the barbarian might be a bit much. KorvinStarmast said jump was too good and that you should instead consider "But how about just double all jump distances (vertical and horizontal) for an unarmored barbarian", not that the barbarian was fine as written.

i was just modeling the new subsystem after warlock invocation as a starting point not just copying them over. most likely replacing brutal critical because it very under whelming. could even make it an option for those who do like it.

first pick lv 5-instread of fast movement you can instead:
increase size you can attempt to grapple by one
increase thrown weapon range and damage (add rage?)
melee attack knock back FT=str mod. starts lower than other classes but grows
increase jumping. triple seems the standard amount

9ths level options:
anything from lv 5 you didn't choose
brutal critical-add crit dice with max damage
weakling strike. reduce movement speed with attacks.
bypass DR on objects, buildings, and so on.
13th


17th

far as ive got so far.

[Satori01]

Nobody in this thread pointed that out. The first mention of Conan here is from you.

That said, if D&D did a good job of representing Conan, that'd be neat.

Using this quote as a springboard, but Conan in D&D terms just has crazy stats!

Conan starts at 1st level with 18 in Str, Con, and Dex. Conan likely has scores of 12-14 in the rest of the scores.

A barbarian at the table with those stats, is going to feel rather epic.

Now that said, of all the classes it is the only class that I have seen voluntarily retired twice, each in separate campaigns.

After 9th level, there is not that much different from what came before.

In effect, Barbarian is a tactical class at early levels, that does better with a shield for synergy with the Shield Master feat, but fails to deliver further tactical elements latter in the base class progression.

I also think the class should have 3 skill points. The 1e class had Non Weapon Proficiencies, before NWP even existed.

As for Conan being a polyglot, all of REH protagonists were as well. Solomon Kane was, this is more of a story conceit so dialogue...(such as it is in REH stories), can occur.

[Trask]

Not to derail this thread, but Conan is pretty solidly a Berserker Barbarian with really good starting ability scores. One needn't even multiclass to get the feel of the character, Barbarians can be plenty sneaky with a good dex and proficiency in stealth, and while Conan was definitely sneaky, he wasnt the sneakiest guy in Hyboria. Dedicated thieves like Taurus were sneakier than him.

In the stories he goes into a "battle madness" and in the words of REH "...he was no defensive fighter, he always carried war to his enemies." Perfect for reckless attack. Hes always been very strong, but his primary power is actually his ungodly endurance. He can take a ridiculous amount of punishment and still be standing, to the point where strips of his flesh hang off of him and hes soaked head to toe in blood after grappling with some eldritch horror. And yet he can still fight after that if he needs to. He has near unlimited stamina that the reduced damage taken from rage represents very well.

You could make the case for a splash of thief rogue in there, I think that would be fine, but the Berserker Barbarian is all you really need to capture the character (also convince your DM to let you drop the exhaustion :P)

[Monster Manuel]

Honestly, I think having Rage as a discrete buff isn't the best way to handle it - I'd almost prefer something like a Battlemaster Fighter, Monk, or Swords Bard, where you have a pool of "rages" that you spend fluidly to do stuff.

You know, that would be a fun way to introduce that "invocation" like mechanic. If you got X rages per short rest, but had other abilities you could spend a "rage" on to fuel, that would be a fun mechanic. Say, a 10th level Barb gets 3 rages per short rest, but you could spend one of those rages to deal massive damage to a struture, or lift some silly amount of weight, or other feats of strength and barbarity. That sounds like fun.

One other thing that gets overlooked a lot is that Reckless Attack is one of their best tanking abilities, in secret. Someone acting as a tank is only effective if they are drawing attacks away from their weaker companions, and while the Barb has nothing that COMPELS an opponent to attack them, granting advantage to your opponent does INCENTIVIZE them to attack you. Relatively lower AC and Reckless Attack makes you a more appealing target so, unintuitively, these are features that make them better tanks, not necessarily weaknesses.