HotA Barbarian

[Guest Karek]

On 14.11.2017 at 4:02 PM, Guest Guesy said:

Secondary rolls merit a comment (and not only in HotA but in many builds). I cleared 100 with ok/good gear at 1200 paragon and then replaced 4 pieces, which got me 3 health globe bonuses, 2 melee reduction % and 1 physical resistance. Instant 104 and with a proper rift I can get 105. The difference in toughness is noticeable but what really changed everything was replaceing NoS with bloodthirst. If you learn to play the build and not stand on ground effects, NoS is unnecessary. On the other hand, bloodthirst with 3 HGB provides immense sustain that lets me smash continuously for at least the entire fire cycle. Huge difference. 

I can confirm that.  Just switched to some bloodthirst friendly gear. 3 HGB was enough to notice survivability peak. Still waiting for another istvan to start rerolling (no luck finding ancient ones so far). GR 83 with ~600 paragons and no caldessans. This build definitely has the potential. Really enjoying it.

[Valks 2,375]

On 11/14/2017 at 3:02 PM, Guest Guesy said:

Secondary rolls merit a comment (and not only in HotA but in many builds). I cleared 100 with ok/good gear at 1200 paragon and then replaced 4 pieces, which got me 3 health globe bonuses, 2 melee reduction % and 1 physical resistance. Instant 104 and with a proper rift I can get 105. The difference in toughness is noticeable but what really changed everything was replaceing NoS with bloodthirst. If you learn to play the build and not stand on ground effects, NoS is unnecessary. On the other hand, bloodthirst with 3 HGB provides immense sustain that lets me smash continuously for at least the entire fire cycle. Huge difference. 

NoS lowers the chance of an unclearable rift though - with things such as jailer, lacuni mobs, melee range Frozen Pulse etc., you can use NoS to avoid the one shot. If you are fine with fishing for rifts more, then it's fine to replace with BT. If you don't want to remake rifts with 1-shot elites or floors of 1-shot leap/range mobs, you should play with NoS.

[Guest Guest]

1 hour ago, Blainie said:

NoS lowers the chance of an unclearable rift though - with things such as jailer, lacuni mobs, melee range Frozen Pulse etc., you can use NoS to avoid the one shot. If you are fine with fishing for rifts more, then it's fine to replace with BT. If you don't want to remake rifts with 1-shot elites or floors of 1-shot leap/range mobs, you should play with NoS.

I'm sorry if I sound disrespectful since I'm really not trying to be, but your last comment makes me think that you haven't pushed HotA IK. If you die, then your gear is wrong (no physical resitsts, no meele damage reduction, no HGB bonuses) or you are playing the build wrong by staying on ground effects or smashing during non fire cycles - no bueno. At my lowly paragon there is no fishing involved at the 100-105 range, I complete almost any grift I enter. I checked the EU non season leaderboards: if I counted correctly, in the top 50 barbarian spots there are 31 IK Hotas, ranging 108 - 113. The fourth passive was divided between brawler (and fishing due to lower mitigation) or bloodthirst. Only 2/31 had nerves of steel and 1 had superstition. NoS helps the new player to get accustomed to the build. In lower grifts you won't ever need it because you won't die. In higher grifts, 1-2 deaths will mean nothing compared to the time you gain by continuously smashing. A death with IK HotA means nothing, it's not the disaster that death is for example with Vyr where you lose all your stacks. You're immediately good to go. In the highest ones where fishing is involved, NoS is out of the question - a wasted passive. 

 

PS: check the EU wizard leaderboards, spot 2 at 117. Vyr frozen orb. Can't argue with the results.  

[Guest]

2 hours ago, Blainie said:

NoS lowers the chance of an unclearable rift though - with things such as jailer, lacuni mobs, melee range Frozen Pulse etc., you can use NoS to avoid the one shot. If you are fine with fishing for rifts more, then it's fine to replace with BT. If you don't want to remake rifts with 1-shot elites or floors of 1-shot leap/range mobs, you should play with NoS.

I haven't played that much and not that high (GR 98 is my top atm), but I definitly like NoS.

It happened several times that I was stuck in a wall and got hit by a charger, or just was stupid, got hit my the Rift-Boss and things like that. RoN kicked in quite often, and it was often that I was nearly (or totally) at full health before. NoS would have done nothing this way and NoS saved my ass.

My guess is the bette you play the less necessary NoS becomes, but personally I don't want to miss it.

[Valks 2,375]

On 11/17/2017 at 12:42 PM, Guest Guest said:

I'm sorry if I sound disrespectful since I'm really not trying to be, but your last comment makes me think that you haven't pushed HotA IK.

Not at all, I'm not a Barb main at all, I main Necro/DH on season and only leveled/geared other classes for each set so I can test stuff for answering comments. No offense or disrespect here at all, I'm at a measly GR97 on Barb.

On 11/17/2017 at 12:42 PM, Guest Guest said:

if I counted correctly, in the top 50 barbarian spots there are 31 IK Hotas, ranging 108 - 113. The fourth passive was divided between brawler (and fishing due to lower mitigation) or bloodthirst. Only 2/31 had nerves of steel and 1 had superstition. NoS helps the new player to get accustomed to the build. In lower grifts you won't ever need it because you won't die. 

In their cases though, at least from what I can see, the majority that aren't using NoS then sacrifice a gem slot to run Esoteric over Pain Enhancer, so it's surely not just secondary rolls that matter. They're making a direct swap from a DPS to survivability gem. With NoS, surely there is the potential to still use PE instead of Eso?

Regardless, I've passed your comments on to Deadset to look at as well.

[Sabrast 7]

hello.

i wonder how much crit hit chance do we need with this set? i mean we get 10% crit with wrath of the berserker and at least 20% crit with HOTA because it gives crit change based on fury (which can go up to 25% crit with paragon, or even more with some +max fury gear). lets say i have a ring and i have to choose between crit chance and crit damage, and i have 35% base crit chance -which makes 65% during fight- . is that enough and shall i roll crit damage?

i hope you get what i mean :)

 

[Metro 2]

On 11/17/2017 at 3:20 PM, Sabrast said:

hello.

i wonder how much crit hit chance do we need with this set? i mean we get 10% crit with wrath of the berserker and at least 20% crit with HOTA because it gives crit change based on fury (which can go up to 25% crit with paragon, or even more with some +max fury gear). lets say i have a ring and i have to choose between crit chance and crit damage, and i have 35% base crit chance -which makes 65% during fight- . is that enough and shall i roll crit damage?

i hope you get what i mean :)

 

Yeah, I have wondered the same thing myself. I am doing a HOTA Barb exclusively this current season and when given the choice of crit chance or HOTA bonus on the helm I chose the skill bonus just for what you mentioned: there's already plenty of crit chance from multiple sources.

[Dallium 2]

If the ONLY concern is the damage from crits, you can multiply your crit rate by your crit bonus to give you an average of your bonus damage. So if you have +200% damage and a 30% crit chance, you can expect an average damage boost of +60%. Then you can see if another +50% damage is "better" than another +6% crit. 250 at 30% is 75 and 200 at 36% is 72. That's not the whole story, though. HOTA barbs have a number of "on crit" effects that make more but slightly weaker crits more desirable. It's also the case in D3 that crit stats almost never compete with each other: for the overwhelming majority of builds, they're individually better than every other stat they compete against, so you're always aiming for both anyway.

 

IRT choosing +HOTA over CHC on the helm, that's only good at low CDMG levels. It may "feel" like you have "enough" crit, but the levels you can push CDMG to means mean that anything less than 100% CHC isn't really enough. That's just how the math falls out.

[Grimfist 0]

First of all, great guide for the newly shiny HotA build, I like this build a lot after all these years Spin2Win.

But one thing I clearly miss from this guide is an alternative in weapons, because getting the Istvans set can take a decent amount of time, and until then it is necessary to equip some weapons. (I just completed conqueror tier in S12 with my HotA Barb and haven't gotten a single Istvans blade).

The natural choice for decent and easy to aquire weapons for this build are a Burning Axe of Sankis and the crafted mace Devastator. Both coming with 15-20% fire dmg increase, these weapons easily got me into the mid 80 GRs for now. With more Paragon, higher Gems etc. these weapons will be my choice until getting Istvans.

I also tried the lightning rune on HotA and running with Thunderfury and Odyn Son, which gives you a lot more CC effects (and a nice lightning storm visualy on screen :D) but for a bit less damage overall. But it is fun to play anyway and sufficient for T13 farming.

Speaking of gems, I rambled with some guys in the barbarian chat, and the majority of the higher HotA Barbs now seem to run Gogok of Swiftness instead of Pain Enhancer. Reason is manifold, main aspect seems to be the higher possible AS from Pain Enhancer gets lost because AS Breakpoints being unreachable. (Only with about 30 bleeding mobs around you). So the base 15% AS, a lot of dodge, and the additional CDR (which makes keeping up Band of Might a whole lot easier, a necessity for high GR), makes up the better package overall, because less AS is lost due to breakpoint mechanics, while getting additional mechanics. Stricken and trapped are set in stone though. I am no diablo math expert, but overall this seems a worthy change, alone for the CDR increase to keep up Band of Might all the time even on single mobs.

Just wanted to get this info to you, especially the weapon thing. ;)

[Valks 2,375]

On 11/21/2017 at 6:35 AM, Grimfist said:

Just wanted to get this info to you, especially the weapon thing. ;)

I'll pass it on to Deadset and see if we can add an alternative weapon for those that can't farm Ist :)

[Sabrast 7]

10 hours ago, Blainie said:

I'll pass it on to Deadset and see if we can add an alternative weapon for those that can't farm Ist :)

the furnace maybe?

[Valks 2,375]

16 hours ago, Sabrast said:

the furnace maybe?

This would run into the exact same issue as being hard to farm. You might as well just farm the Ist set then. The idea of the crafted +Fire% weapons is a decent idea, though.

[Grimfist 0]

Furnace, as any other 2handed weapons is suboptimal in this build, because you already hit like a truck with HotA and all its dmg multipliers, so you really want to hit fast, especially to get more life back from Life per Fury Spent. I now have 3 items with globe bonus and Bloodthirst passive, which also helps in sustain, so one can swap out one of the many defensive options, mainly Aquila for a Magefist in the cube.

Also 40-50% elite dmg vs 40% Fire dmg, you don't need to be a math expert to know who is the clear winner here ;)

[Valks 2,375]

On 11/24/2017 at 9:35 AM, Grimfist said:

Also 40-50% elite dmg vs 40% Fire dmg, you don't need to be a math expert to know who is the clear winner here ;)

I gave the suggestion to Deadset and the conclusion was that neither of them were going to be worth using. You just need to spam upgrades in the cube for an Istvan set by farming Death's Breaths. As it stands, the difference in bonus damage from the crafted weapon to the set bonus is just huge. It would only be considered a good replacement in the very early season, when farming is still pretty difficult.

[CrizpyNutz 0]

Just a quick question for a new player.  I noticed on the BiS Gear, Gems, and Paragon Points page the last update was Oct 31.  On the page it seems that Smash is referencing that it does fire damage, which no longer appears to be the case per the current tool tip - maybe I'm mistaken/missing something, I am new here.  Is cubing Magefist still ideal, I'm using Strongarm Bracers in the cube right now?

Additionally I'm using Esoteric over Pain Enhancer, but the suggestion of Gogok sounds pretty solid, thoughts?

[Valks 2,375]

6 hours ago, CrizpyNutz said:

Just a quick question for a new player.  I noticed on the BiS Gear, Gems, and Paragon Points page the last update was Oct 31.  On the page it seems that Smash is referencing that it does fire damage, which no longer appears to be the case per the current tool tip - maybe I'm mistaken/missing something, I am new here.  Is cubing Magefist still ideal, I'm using Strongarm Bracers in the cube right now?

This is still the case, the smash rune still deals damage as Fire.

[Guest ss4]

Isnt it a much better idea to cube Strongarm bracers and wear BOTFM? you get 30% extra damage with Strongarm but 20% with the gloves.

[Valks 2,375]

On 11/29/2017 at 8:48 PM, Guest ss4 said:

Isnt it a much better idea to cube Strongarm bracers and wear BOTFM? you get 30% extra damage with Strongarm but 20% with the gloves.

Magefist is a persistent bonus no matter what is currently happening. It lets you stack inside an Oculus zone and spam, not requiring you to change positioning other than to charge on the spot. Since Strongarm only affects those hit by charge, you'll need to charge out of the zone often to proc it on everything. This can lead to wasted uptime on Strongarms.

At the same time, if you can reliably proc SA, it's better to use them, yes. It all depends on how much time you want to spend re-positioning. It's honestly a personal choice.

Aquila fits into the same argument of personal choice. You get bonus damage from being able to run rubies over diamonds, as well as higher survivability.

[Grimfist 0]

On 25.11.2017 at 6:36 PM, Blainie said:

I gave the suggestion to Deadset and the conclusion was that neither of them were going to be worth using. You just need to spam upgrades in the cube for an Istvan set by farming Death's Breaths. As it stands, the difference in bonus damage from the crafted weapon to the set bonus is just huge. It would only be considered a good replacement in the very early season, when farming is still pretty difficult.

Well until getting Istvans (which I now thankfully have) two fire weapons were my best bet and served me well until GR88. Could have pushed further into the 90s, but with Istvans it is a lot easier now. So the fire weapons still stand as a budget option for more casual players, which was my original point. ;)

[CrizpyNutz 0]

On 11/28/2017 at 5:05 PM, Blainie said:

This is still the case, the smash rune still deals damage as Fire.

Interesting, okay cool, thanks!

[Guest SRA]

Great guide and discussion. This thread really helped me with this build: https://us.battle.net/forums/en/d3/topic/20759250285. The thread really goes over the options. Especially the limits of attack speed,  the use of Band of the Powerful vs Pain Enhancer, area damage, elite damage or 10% damage on weapons, mitigation, etc. I hope this helps someone.

[Guest HerAlpha]

Crit rate, 51% with or without beserker rage?

[Guest SRA]

Here is a link to the build I'm using: http://www.diablofans.com/builds/95522-hota-barbarian-2-6-1. I hope the information helps.

[Valks 2,375]

On 02/12/2017 at 6:57 PM, Grimfist said:

Well until getting Istvans (which I now thankfully have) two fire weapons were my best bet and served me well until GR88. Could have pushed further into the 90s, but with Istvans it is a lot easier now. So the fire weapons still stand as a budget option for more casual players, which was my original point. ;)

You have to remember that the fire damage bonus you see on those weapons isn't a straight 40% buff. It is devalued by other elemental damage increases. This means that you end up only getting a very slight increase by equipping them. 

You'd be better off at that point saving your crafting resources and using them instead to roll for Istvan's while using any well rolled Ancients you find.

[Valks 2,375]

On 23/12/2017 at 6:37 PM, Guest HerAlpha said:

Crit rate, 51% with or without beserker rage?

Without.