I know that Staff is aware that Barbarians need some love, and that it is even likely they may need a re-write. However, I think anyone can reasonably say that the writing on the wall is telling everyone that is unlikely to occur, ever.
That said, I've been playing a Barbarian off and on for a bit now and as I'm about to hit 150 and have engaged in a number of invasions and PvP duels. In that time I've noticed a bunch of smaller issues with a number of Barbarian abilities that might stand for easier tweaks which could actually make those specific abilities more appealing, or flat out usable in some cases.
No, these suggestions won't(and can't) address things like IF and Mastery function probably need to be addressed or that the 3-ladder setup of the Guild is not really desirable in a game like DR.
But in the name of hopefully seeing something one day, here are my suggestions:
1. Berserk Wildfire: I’m not a fan of abilities that “proc” in DR, and Barbarians are the only ones really suffering it in this way. The bonus weapon speed needs to be 100% of the time when this berserk is active. This is THE weapon prime guild after all.
2. Form Wolverine: Frankly I think this would be more useful if it worked like Khri Shadowstep – Starts you at Pole, moves to melee. I’ve also noticed this form is useless when the thing you’re engaging is also engaging you, it literally slows you down.
3. Roar Mage’s Lash: I’m not finding a random spell interrupter or a Primary Magic debuff to be particularly useful. Spell prep interruption is only a chance and I’d rather spend that time enacting a different disabler. I’d like to see this changed to a Rend – Removes 2 Spells with a Cooldown so you can’t spam it to remove the Mage’s entire active spell setup.
4. Roar Mana Torment: I’ve not found this particularly useful in its current setup either, because its too limiting. This ability either needs to have its cooldown restriction removed(making it similar to Ambush Clout) or it needs to reduce attunement a LOT more.
5. Roar Kuniyo’s Strike: Knockback should be removed, slot cost reduced by 1.
6. Roar Death’s Shriek: Once again, dropping to knees should occur on 100% of successes.
7. Meditation Prediction: This ability needs to either account for cyclics and other pulsing abilities, or much like the suggestion for Wildfire – it needs to work 100% of the time against the single-target types it protects against.
8. Masteries Titan, Powermonger, Duelist, Tribalist, Yogi: All of these could benefit from having a spell slot cost reduction of 1. Barbarians are the only Guild I’ve seen who are really faced with tough choices due to spell slots. I don’t have a problem with that theme but it might be a little too tough and this would lighten it up a bit. I’ve purposefully left Strategos off that list because we’re getting a good deal there with it making all Debilitations optional AOE.
9. Berserk Volcano: Volcano is one of the rarest abilities in the game, but sometimes fails to achieve its purpose and I think that’s because of how it actually functions. Volcano will prevent your death if you’re dying due to Vitality loss, but if you’re going to die due to an ability that obliterates a necessary body part then Volcano will not help you. Volcano should have a feature that prevents that total obliteration of chest, head, etc. It IS meant to protect you from death at the cost of IF.
