APS barb vs Sage vit/str barb

tweakz wrote: »

Referring to Assassins, dunno why you'd assume i'm just a caster.

tweakz wrote: »

Not much experience in TT, but don't assassins just tank aps tankable bosses there? It's not like they've updated TT lately, or they're not [?] .

Every lunar boss on the BH path can also easily be simply range tanked, and I'd rather have a Barb Devouring, and Frightening than apsing on bosses my assassins can also tank.

Did you see Puppet bosses buff? Do you realize that most pure mag mages can tank Leaf Rain Dryad, and you're more valuable for Devour on it?

The biggest problem I find in Barbs for PvE is we rarely get one that Devours. Aggro shouldn't even be an issue with Stomp of the King, and the recent improvements to Devour and Ream. Any sin that can steal aggro from that and not generally tank stuff is a fool.

You dont know what you talking about in red then b:laugh

overcomem wrote: »

b:laugh ofc aps sin fail in pvp. but don't get me wrong. i didn't play my sin for pvp bz i have a better option on another class to play.

my sin --> a ton TT money
my wizzy ---> NW/TW/PVE/PVP
my barb ---> TW/PVE

the u better-->b:shutup didn't know anything to about pvp? oh and ok go fail aps barb again. b:laugh. i guess u cound't afford R9rr gears + 12 and top shards right? well then go aps with spark still not enough damange to kill ppl in TW/NW. ( kill those ppl i mean kill those R9rr in TW/NW oh with your smart aps/spark u'r good to be aps barb in TW/NW like a clown in battle field haha. keep your aps to kill noobs only in NW then hahaha)b:kiss

lol i dont make a r999 sin just for TT, if i need one I just make one with +10 g16 nirvana hahahaha
And NW/TW is about teamwork and not solo actions HAHAHAHA
You fool an aps barb can switch to r9rr +12 also HAHAHAHA

overcomem wrote: »

but u 'r not full r9rr +12 b:spit
oh aps barb can't go alone in NW oh so FAIL f:laugh
oh and by the way what is HAHAHAHA? the OP chatting ? f:laugh

If that's supposed to be English....

What about aps barbs not being able to go solo in NW? Any class and gear level with an 11.0 mount can efficiently farm NW solo...

HAHAHA = JAJAJA = LOL if you recognize any of those.

overcomem wrote: »

but u 'r not full r9rr +12 b:spit
oh aps barb can't go alone in NW oh so FAIL f:laugh
oh and by the way what is HAHAHAHA? the OP chatting ? f:laugh

What the problem?
I'm 5 aps with 3 base vit points, i use r999 +10 and i can make easy 15k points without charm when i solo NW.

Not bad for a full pve build or not?

Sakubatou - Sanctuary wrote: »

Honestly, most people never know they're fighting aps barbs in pk unless the barb pulls out their fists (which is very very rare). The loss in hp and def is so small that its easily made up either by skills or an extra refine, and its not like aps barbs are using aps setups to pk with.

Basically, if someone is an aps barb in pve they're a strength barb in pvp.

How is HP and Def loss made up by extra refine and skills? If you were a vit barb you'd have more HP and Def with this "extra refine and skills" so it's the same loss/win. It's not like a compensation.

And still, in todays standard no one cares if a barb would pull out their fists/claws because it's not a threat. The high skills that IS a threat are the one's who cause massive damage at once, such as arma or zerk-crits. Fists/claws are way to slow and damage way to low.

tweakz wrote: »

I think the devs threw fist/claws out there so they could laugh at us. 9+ times a squad reset Leaf Rain Dryad's HP. 3 sins, 2 bms. -Wooot aps!

You pulled boss to you didn't you

Even with G13 daggers and lunar claws I've never seen a squad reset leaf's HP. You sure half your squad's weapon didn't break (fist/claw/dagger break fast lol)?

As for "threw claws out there to laugh at us," APS, for one thing, had dropped the price of all farmable mats exponentially. While you sit on this forums whining that APS sucks there are sins and BMs hard at work farming the mats to gear this entire community, their alts, everyone's alts, and beyond. So before you start crying that APS sucks again think of how much you'd be crying if tomorrow APS got called at 1.43 and every gold and green TT mat tripled in price overnight

Wearing APS-farmed gear and crying about APS, classic MMO community.

tweakz wrote: »

I think the devs threw fist/claws out there so they could laugh at us. 9+ times a squad reset Leaf Rain Dryad's HP. 3 sins, 2 bms. -Wooot aps!

go delete your sin if you hate it so much

I think this has been debated many times, anyone with half a knowledge would know,


Aps Barb > Vit Barb for PvE (unless the aps barb is aps with no refines).

Vit Barb > Aps Barb for PvP


Didn't read the posts here but I think that is something which everyone knows so don't understand why people still debating it.

FkinMaltaMan - Sanctuary wrote: »

How is HP and Def loss made up by extra refine and skills? If you were a vit barb you'd have more HP and Def with this "extra refine and skills" so it's the same loss/win. It's not like a compensation.

And still, in todays standard no one cares if a barb would pull out their fists/claws because it's not a threat. The high skills that IS a threat are the one's who cause massive damage at once, such as arma or zerk-crits. Fists/claws are way to slow and damage way to low.

What I mean is the hp difference is small enough that 1 or 2 refines per piece makes up the difference. +9 average refine vit barb is going to be similar to a +10 average refine aps barb or str barb. Or the player with a bit more experience or knowledge of their class can easily take the edge despite the build. I'll admit vit/str is preferred for pvp but my point is it's not really game changing. It's about a 10% advantage.

Now I'm going to point to you and TheDan's videos and ask you to tell me if you seriously think claws (or daggers) don't do much damage? Sometimes its the only way to kill a barb. I am a 576 strength bm with r9t3 axes and 129 attack levels and my unsparked axes do about 1/3 the dps of my unsparked claws when you average out the 20% zerk rate. Yes, you need to average it out because HA vs HA are not going to zerk 40ks on each other unless seriously debuffed. So basically, unless your axes manage to zerk 4x in a row, they're gonna do less dps than claws.

Obviously, BMs have a different pk style than barbs. I cannot fully trust using claws or switching to 1, or 2, or 3 pieces of aps gear with a barb because I do not have a BMs myriad of stun skills. Also, no cyclone heel for the 2.86 to 3.33 jump for 16% more dd. Still, I know from experience that I can pull 20-25k hp off a purged tigerform barb in under 10 seconds with claws unsparked and they're still formidable in pk and the quickest dps tool a barb can use without relying on crazy zerk crit streaks.

We can argue over the 120 stat point difference, but oddly one of the big differences to me are the barb genies. Vit barbs tend to load their genie with even more survival skills like ToP, Solid shield, Cloud eruption (to constantly sunder/invoke), and then things like Lawbreaker or an elemental immune skill like Heart of Steal/Soul of Fire. Strength barbs tend to load their genies with debuffs like TM, EP, or chi drain skills to prevent their opponents from either hitting them with 2 spark skills or avoiding the str barbs damage and then the rest are survival skills. Aps barbs like Occult Ice because their opponents have to literally sit still to aps and barbs tend to only have 50% freeze or 50% stun skills, or 1 seconds skills. Then they also use Wind Shield alot since they don't have cloud eruption and WS doubles as a defense (while standing) and aps boost. For their remaining spots they have to decide between amps (EP, TM) for damage bursts, or survival skills like the str and vit barbs have. Its much trickier to have a balanced aps barb genie with all the skills you'd want and I think this is actually one of the bigger disadvantages than the actually build.

My point is, for pk vit and strength barb does have the advantage but aps barbs really are not far off and on the rare occasion can catch another player in an unexpected combo where most barbs have a very readable BO->stun->ToP->Arma combo that people can ready from a mile away.

Sakubatou - Sanctuary wrote: »

What I mean is the hp difference is small enough that 1 or 2 refines per piece makes up the difference. +9 average refine vit barb is going to be similar to a +10 average refine aps barb or str barb. Or the player with a bit more experience or knowledge of their class can easily take the edge despite the build. I'll admit vit/str is preferred for pvp but my point is it's not really game changing. It's about a 10% advantage.

Now I'm going to point to you and TheDan's videos and ask you to tell me if you seriously think claws (or daggers) don't do much damage? Sometimes its the only way to kill a barb. I am a 576 strength bm with r9t3 axes and 129 attack levels and my unsparked axes do about 1/3 the dps of my unsparked claws when you average out the 20% zerk rate. Yes, you need to average it out because HA vs HA are not going to zerk 40ks on each other unless seriously debuffed. So basically, unless your axes manage to zerk 4x in a row, they're gonna do less dps than claws.

Obviously, BMs have a different pk style than barbs. I cannot fully trust using claws or switching to 1, or 2, or 3 pieces of aps gear with a barb because I do not have a BMs myriad of stun skills. Also, no cyclone heel for the 2.86 to 3.33 jump for 16% more dd. Still, I know from experience that I can pull 20-25k hp off a purged tigerform barb in under 10 seconds with claws unsparked and they're still formidable in pk and the quickest dps tool a barb can use without relying on crazy zerk crit streaks.

We can argue over the 120 stat point difference, but oddly one of the big differences to me are the barb genies. Vit barbs tend to load their genie with even more survival skills like ToP, Solid shield, Cloud eruption (to constantly sunder/invoke), and then things like Lawbreaker or an elemental immune skill like Heart of Steal/Soul of Fire. Strength barbs tend to load their genies with debuffs like TM, EP, or chi drain skills to prevent their opponents from either hitting them with 2 spark skills or avoiding the str barbs damage and then the rest are survival skills. Aps barbs like Occult Ice because their opponents have to literally sit still to aps and barbs tend to only have 50% freeze or 50% stun skills, or 1 seconds skills. Then they also use Wind Shield alot since they don't have cloud eruption and WS doubles as a defense (while standing) and aps boost. For their remaining spots they have to decide between amps (EP, TM) for damage bursts, or survival skills like the str and vit barbs have. Its much trickier to have a balanced aps barb genie with all the skills you'd want and I think this is actually one of the bigger disadvantages than the actually build.

My point is, for pk vit and strength barb does have the advantage but aps barbs really are not far off and on the rare occasion can catch another player in an unexpected combo where most barbs have a very readable BO->stun->ToP->Arma combo that people can ready from a mile away.

Wait wait, TheDan? Claws/Fists don''t du much damage? Of course they do much damage when it's used by BM and used on a barb. It's easily noticeable in the video I recently posted when I faced ChillaKilla in 1v1. Note that his claws are like +7 refine, note that I'm a full vit-barb and note the damage I deal to him when he's caught in APS gears.

I didn't mean that they do low damage in total, I was obviously refering to when they are used by a barb. This is the barb-forums you know.

I don't know why the video when I faced TheDan in 1v1 is relevant. I agree with you. Sometimes the only way to kill a barb as BM is to use claws/fists, but that's irrelevant. You should go to the BM-forums if you want to talk about the damage a BM does to a barb with claws/fists.

If you think that a barb should consider to APS a BM in a 1v1 situation then you should really reconsider this, or gladly demonsrate how you're supposed to play. You can watch the videos when I 1v1'd xXRavage how it looks like pure str BM with OP fists vs pure vit barb. As I mentioned before though, that's an irrelevant discussion in this part of the forum.

Barb vs BM. Are you saying I should consider to APS the BM here? Note that:

My damage is significantly lower than the damage a BM deals with the fists
The BMs got insanly high physical defense with Bell+Marrow, which results in garbage damage with claws/fists. Especially as a barbarian. lol

Even if I'd choose to go APS-style vs a BM as a barb it's so ridiculously easy countered. The BM simply changes to a dex-genie and break himself out of my occult-ice with badge of courage. This won't be needed when I use mighty swing because the 4-second stun is way to short to be able to do something useful. On top of that, imagine the total damage I'd have to take as a APS-barb when I loose defense and HP from being a full vit-barb. I'd have to solid shield right away kinda, which is proven already in the video vs xXRavage.

What is your point of including the video vs TheDan? Talk from a barb's perspective and not what a BM can actuallly do. This is the barb-forums and that's the class I'm here to talk about.

Sakubatou - Sanctuary wrote: »

My point had nothing to do with BMs, really. It was that a barb with claws should still out dps a barb with axes in pvp (99.8% of the time), even though we've reach some kind of "anti-aps" way of thinking. I only brought up the BMs with you and TheDan because most BMs know that skill spam and r9t3 axes aren't enough to kill many high hp or high def level opponents, which is why we swap. A barb vs another hard-to-kill opponent is going to be a very long fight with very limited options. One likely way to end it us an arma, and we did the math and an aps barb should be about 3% weaker than a vit barb, which is almost nothing. Another likely way to end it is setup charm bipasses with claws, or dps boosts.

We've also had numerous (numerous!) comparisons in the barb forums of barb claw damage vs bm claw damage. At equal aps it's around 5% in favor of BMs assuming both have titans. Barb out dd's if self buffed. Again, not huge but something. In pk its not going to be equal aps because a barb can't cyclone, unless he's using Relentless Courage (bleh) or Wind Shield, but a BMs claw mastery doesn't make as huge of a difference as it used to. 550 str, shards, rings, masteries, buffs... You're looking at 500% damage +50% wood damage vs 575% damage, and it'll probably come out similarly since you'll more than likely only aps HA and LAs now that all AA have Purify Effect. My point, dph barb vs bm claw damage in pk is pretty similar, it's just aps that change.

Also, properly equiped a barb can be 4 pieces r9t3 and 3.33 aps, making it much more safe and gear swaps easier to do in pk. Against Chilla you caught him with aps gear (boy needs to stunlock!) and that is a no-no. I usually only swap 2 pieces of aps gear since then I keep the 100str bonus but have 2.5 aps, personally. Makes for stronger dph but slower aps so it averages out while allowing me much more def than a full 5 piece swap.

My point in all this is vit and str are probably 5-10% more effective overall in pk. I agree. But aps has a few uses and versatilities that make them interestin, fun, and occasionally you'll find the right situation for them. Since it's not that much difference between the 3 builds and aps totally wins in PvE with like 4x the dps I'd say its a personally choice for how to build in pvp. You can also be a "strength barb" in pvp and no one will even know you statted for aps too.

I say all this then feel the need to point out that the main problem with aps barbs is barbs not using them intelligently. Triple sparking on an unstunned opponent? Apsing brambled players? Apsing AA's instead of dphing them? Its stuff like that that gives aps barbs a bad name.

Uh, clear something up for me. If you'd choose to build your barb for APS, are the rest of the points going into vit, str or both?

You're right. TheDan is one of these "hard-to-kill" opponents and the options are very limited, specielly considering that he's better geared too. And you can see the damage he does to me as a vit-barb. Would be pretty embarrassing to go DPS vs him since 1, my damage would be to low anyhow and 2, he'd have an easier time to counter me or just kill me right away, Reckless Rush hurts... The only option I found valid to go for was purge-arma. I was aware of that already in the beginning. The main thing was to try out a BM fight for me since it would be fun and interesting, even if I used a few plat charms and he used 130k charm. I had to be patient haha

It's a lil stressful to be a clawbarb, you gotta keep in mind that you can't use skills with claws equipped and you have like ... no stuns at all. That's the main-problem and comparisons between the APS-classes. Sins got numerous ways to stun-lock an opponents which makes APS effective for them. BMs got numerous stuns to lock the opponent, which makes APS effective for them. What do barbs have? Mighty Swing and Occult Ice... Untamed Wrath is kinda insignificant when you're a clawbarb considering the long channeling and cast time, at least UW is useful while being DPH barb when you use it to stun-lock with bare barb-skills. Though, sadly, still only very few barbs know how to stun-lock with UW efficiently.

OoArCsTeRoO - Sanctuary wrote: »

I think this has been debated many times, anyone with half a knowledge would know,


Aps Barb > Vit Barb for PvE (unless the aps barb is aps with no refines).

Vit Barb > Aps Barb for PvP


Didn't read the posts here but I think that is something which everyone knows so don't understand why people still debating it.

With same gear and refine, i agree.

HrunsPanda - Archosaur wrote: »

If the extra points go in vit or str depends on the gear quality.

I chose to add a bunch of vit because i have poorly refined gear. I would reduce the vit and put them in strength when i have my weapon +10 and my full G16HA set refined enough to get to 20k in tiger form.

That is a little more than i currently have. Do i need that little bit more ? Not neceserrily, but it adds extra comfort and sometimes makes that difference between a pull where you reach the end and just rapidly AD/Invoke/IG before you die and then weep the sweat of your head hoping the rest of the team will take care while some extra hitpoints may allow you to nicely turn around to tug into a corner and group the mobs better. Of course i also need to get the cube neck and warsong belt. I expect those to help me a lot more than an extra 2k HP actually.

With a non dex barb theres a good chance i might go for more than those 20k HP because the damage i do with those axes feels kind of useless anyway so i might as well become a bigger sponge.

There were a few, but i remember 1 situation from yesterdays NW where the fists came to use. I was against another barb who wouldnt hurt me much faster than crabs heal me. When using my axes, i didnt hurt him much either though. So i swich to claws and even unsparked his life starts to go down. Of course he soon realises it and runs away at half life. I chase, but he keeps running when im starting to do significant damage and the battle ended unresolved. Maybe i need occult ice or something to make it work. Without proper stun its still kind of pointless to fight barb vs barb.

Well, I rarely bother to 1v1 barbs in NW. I got better things to do as a barb in NW whatsoever, it would waste my time (except if you have to wait for something of course, like, the flag to get captured). And you're right, an APS barb without occult ice is like a BM without roar

Update:

I got past the initial period of getting used to it and learning. I know now when to be normal tanking barb and when to APS. Probably when i was new to this i made some people in my squad think APS barbs are fail and should just do their job as they are "supposed" to. but not any more

Got my tiger HPs back up to 21k, got my cube and warsong ornies, got my stomp of the king to make my tiger tanking barb do his job for real. Got the tome to be 5APS to do my fisting for real. b:dirty And i know when to use what.
Really, any barb who doesnt have the dex to wear claws/fists is severely missing out. Thats all i can say about it. All the bull**** against APS barbs just shows a whole lot of ignorance.

Certainly now that i learned that barbs are actually the GODs of APS since they can APS in full r9. Now i understand that APS is not obsolete in PvP, it is part of the reason why one of the best pvp barbs on my server is one of the best pvp barbs on my server. I have a new goal..... b:angry