Conan: "Crom, I have never prayed to you before. I have no tongue for it. No one, not even you, will remember if we were good men or bad. Why we fought, or why we died. All that matters is that two stood against many. That's what's important! Valor pleases you, Crom... so grant me one request. Grant me revenge! And if you do not listen, then to HELL with you!"
The all-barbarian party is where what race you pick can really change your effectiveness. If the party picks some of the less traditional "barbarian' races (looking at aarakocra barbarian), they could really shore up some of those weaknesses.
I'm currently playing a fairy barbarian path of the giant with tavern brawler. Punching, throwing and grappling every enemy in my path. My favorite move is to grapple someone and fly into the air.
I could see an "Angelic force" of Aasimar Barbarians that use their Radiant Soul flying ability very restrictivly! and if the adventure is under water a teen turtle party sounds fun!
A played an Arakocra Barbarian in a one shot, and it was nothing short of amazing. The Paladin and Fighter dip helped alot... but it was still barbarian in my mind.
@robertb6889 a Beast Barbarian with its abilities and the proper strength can jump upwards to 60ft in the air. (Not flying, but it puts them in javelin range.)
@@robertb6889 I think the all barbarian party would KNOW they have issues with ranged combatants, and bring their own longbows for just such an occasion. They have plenty of carrying capacity after all.
I'd add magic initiate (cleric) to this list. Just for Guidance, which could really help their social. And a once per day Bless when you are out of rage, don't want to use one, or need saving throw bonuses.
Conceptually, I do love the whole party of raging berserkers, but this is probably the one group that would need some multiclassing to shore up its weaknesses, or a very tailor made campaign for them that let's the barbs thrive in their elements. As an aside, a follow up series to this series I'd love to see is "Making a campaign for the 1 class parties". Tips for the dm on how to run, design or modify a campaign for these 1 class parties
I think one of the missing things here is that barbarians have the bulk to say "no, were not fighting that, were leaving" Now, against force cage users and what not, sure But thats why you take an species with a free teleport or flight
A party of barbarian Power Rangers whose rage form is their morphing sequence Totem: Tommy Oliver green Zelot: Tommy Oliver white Ancestral guardian: Tommy Oliver red Beast: Tommy Oliver black
Before really starting the video here's my campaign idea, Gears Of War, the monsters have emerged and only the most elite squad of muscle bound warriors can stand a chance.
A great way to run an all barbarian party is to have them work for craftsmen who can make enchanted gear. "Hey, there is a filled with . Kill them and I can make you some !" That way your craftsmen can make any gear you need to compensate for the limitations of the all barbarian party. Honestly, just mix some Monster Hunter into your D&D and you're golden. :D
Alone this is a cool idea. No big bbeg no crazy lich just a bunch of loose monsters and your team is tasked with elimination and collecting parts of these beasts. Monster hunter DND would be rad
I have the build for this, assuming you can use Tasha's Customize your origin. Tiefling Ancestral Guardian Aasimar Zealot Kalashtar Totem Warrior Gnome (probably Forrest?) Giant Barbarian (because it's funny) Tiefling, bloodline: Fierna- Friends, Charm person, and Suggestion. Stats: 15 (+2) strength 14: (+1) Constitution 13: Charisma 12: Dexterity 10: Wisdom 8: intelegence This is your party face. The reason for the uneven con score is because of the feat Infernal Constitution. Additionally, medium armor and a shield with the resistances and advantage on dex saves are really useful. I'd also consider Skill Expert as a feat for expertise in Persuasion, rounding off on the Charisma score. Also, having an out of combat or even in combat if you feel so bold, casting Suggestion once per day is pretty nice. Also, Charm Person adds to this as well. Aasimar variant: Protector. Ability scores 15 (+2) strength 14 (+1) constitution 13 wisdom 12 dexterity 10 intelegence 8 Charisma Again, medium armor and a shield, taking both chef and healer as feat choices. This is your "healer" between the racial lay on hands esque feature, the temp hp from the food, the rallying cry advantage, and being able to use healers kits on allies, it makes a surprisingly remarkable combat medic for a party that resists so much. Kalashtar Totem of the Bear: Ability scores: 15(+2) strength 14 con 13 (+1) Dexterity 12 wisdom 10 intelegence 8 charisma Resistance to all damage is insane, and since you have an ally (namely the tiefling) actively promoting disadvantage on all attacks made towards you and your allies sans them, this is your GWM tough frontline that's just there to be annoying. Pair this with the Advantage on wisdom saves, and you are surprisingly strong. Gnome: Ability scores: 15 (+2) strength 14 Constitution 13 (+1) Dexterity 12 intelegence 10 wisdom 8 Charisma Gnomish cunning makes this the best at saves having advantage on all sans con saves whilst raging. This one is a good candidate for like shadow touched and skill expert granting them stealth expertise and proficiency in deception in case stuff goes sideways. And if all else fails, frail little Gnome turns into a behemoth and smashes anything in its path. Additionally, this is also a "backline" hurling hand axes or daggers, javelins, spears, or the occasional person if you feel so inclined.
@@WMoore8787 This specific assembly of 4 goes beyond a C+ indeed... . . . But definitively does NOT match other "B" 4_mono-class parties: => B- [80.50%]
I would probably have the tiefling take inspiring leader in place of chef and then have the aasimar be either an aarakokra or variant tiefling with wings(if allowed) with martial adept to knock flying creatures prone to bring them down. tiefling is preferred since they can still wear medium armor and fly. the totem barbarian could take eagle at 14 and also have a fly speed just less reliable. healing, while important, won't be as important when every barbarian has a ton of hit points and resistances.
@BFizzman The problem I find with aaracokra is that they get flight, and that's pretty much it, and even then, it's limited to light armor alone. These are medium armor builds. Also, while yes, healing is a kind of hat on a hat given the parties' resistances, hitpoints, and by extention hit dice are a resource. In fact, the only resource barbarians get outside of rage for the most part. Having out of combat healing potential saves the use of precious hit dice even slightly. Also, the reason for Chef instead of Inspiring leader is because chef is a half feat and rounds off the Aasimars uneven Con score in the same way that Infernal Constitution rounds off the Tieflings Inspiring leaders is nice, but the naturally small Charisma score lends itself to needing other things like Expertise to be able to play the party face. Again, ala skill expert feat.
@@charrleschervanik3632 that is why, so long as it is allowed, a variant tiefling with winged would be preferred since you have a fly speed so long as you aren't wearing heavy armor. The party really needs to have a consistent way to fly because if not, so many combat encounters can get shut down. Shove only works on creatures one size larger, so that's why martial adept would be a great help with trip attack. extra healing is good, don't get me wrong, but when you have the issue of being ineffective in any encounter that has flying, i think that's the higher priority. they could shove any large or smaller creature and save trip attack for huge and gargantuan. also, side note i found while double checking rules, if you can choose deep gnome for the giant barbarian you not only get gnome cunning but also disguise self and advantage on stealth checks PB/long rest, so you could take ritual caster instead of skill expert for some out of combat utility
This is a case where the species matters a ton more for shoring up weaknesses, in particular, 1. Species with flying offer a counter to other flyers and for overcoming bad terrain and getting to enemies faster 2. Species with teleportation lets you bypass and sidestep typical means of shutting down progressing towards the enemy 3. Species with oddities like Plasmoid's ability to squeeze into places pairs really well with Beast barbarian + unarmored defense 4. Species with resistance to magic helps bridge the divide between spellcasting enemies and your heroes, a Yuan Ti or Satyr with Shield Master can start to shut down fireballs and overrun their enemies. Thus, I propose in the four man team, 1. The Aarakocra Sentinel + PAM Ancestral Guardian, made to reach, and take down flying threats and get them where the rest of the party can take them on. Your allies no longer are at risk from being out of range. 2. Shadar Kai Giant, always get in position, always ready to throw, and after throwing a big weapon, anything trying to keep concentration is going to be struggling. 3. The Plasmoid Beast, unarmored, and unarmed, with claws, a real nightmare that can climb in through the holes in the walls. Anything they can see, if there's a hole, they're coming through. 4. The Yuan Ti Totem barbarian, the tankiest tank to tank, with shield master to make magic even more of a joke. An unorthodox party, almost all the races do better with other classes, but, they all have something going on that lets them try and cover a weak spot for the party. Still not very optimal, but, a good dragon slaying story needs some struggle to make it interesting.
My first character was a barbarian and my favourite moment playing her was when we were fighting a dragon that started on the ground. Part way through the combat it started to take off, so my character jumped on it's back and started hacking at one of the wings with her glaive until it went down. I don't even remember if I dealt the killing blow or not, but that bit made me feel so cool.
I ran a one shot for an all Barbarian group (3 players). Lvl 15 and I did allow them to multiclass, they had to keep the majority of levels in Barbarian though. They also had a pretty decent magic item budget. Finally they were allowed to have a mount (I gave them options). They all picked Owlbears. Then they called their group Owl Force One. They had great fun fighting through Icey tundra to go kill an Ancient White Dragon in her lair.
I think you make a fair points. However, coming up with solutions to those problems sounds fun. Fighting a spellcaster in complete darkness to avoid getting targeted by spells, or throwing sand in their eyes.
But that’s not something unique to the barbarians, any class could do that. And other classes would do that way way better like warlocks with darkness/devil’s sight
@@thedudejsb any class can do that, but how many actually will? Casters will always look to their spell list first for the solution. They don't interact with the game world nearly as much as those without class features to carry them.
@@nojusticenetwork9309 the wizard spells are their class features that’s kind of the point of playing a wizard. This isn’t a question of what class has the most creative players, it’s what class features and abilities add tools for the game. Anyone can be creative not everyone has the tools to back it up
@@thedudejsb You're right they can do it better, but part of the fun is the challenge. They can't do it as well so when you suceed it is more rewarding.
Would love to see a retrospect episode, with all the classes up on the tier board and possible re-rankings as you mentioned here and there throughout the series.
Regardless of the ranking: To me, that's the most fun single class party of them all! Maybe they can just hire minions to do the brainy work and the ranged attacks.
As a DM, I would love my party to play as all Barbarians. Unfortunately, I run for powergamers that only play wizard, cleric, bard, warlock, or paladin. I miss my barbarian player so much, she would wreck so many plans by the others by brute forcing problems to fix them.
8:29 the Acolyte background could be a saving grace here, with their feature about being able to go to a temple and receive free healing as long as material components are provided - which you explicitly don’t require to be revived as a Zealot Barbarian! Of course, this should be cleared with the DM first, but the symbiotic interaction is in the text!
THIS! This is the one I have been waiting for. I have two loves in D&D, Orcs and Barbarians! Also if your all barbarian party isn't named Brute Force then why are you even playing all barbarians?
Finally, but also this was to be expected, unfortunately. I think this really highlights something that became abundantly clear for me the longer I look at it: the barbarian is just worse in every way than the paladin. When you ranked them by party role, the paladin was on par in both tanking and damage, but the paladin has: smites, spell casting, a flying mount, healing and social skills all baked in. The barb is screwed against anything that doesn't do physical attacks, because in this case a high AC beats out the on avg 1 HP per level the barb has over the paladin. Going thru all the grunts is fun and all, but at the end of the day, the BBEG are probably going to be flying spell casters, which they are utterly useless against. Even if they get close, they just teleport away again. I also find it funny that the first example is the barbs blasting thru a wall, which is something the fantasy of a barb should provide, but they just don't. (And just let the barbs be the only one to destroy force walls / cages by just barrelling thru them pls.) They also don't necessary need flying, but when the spell casters can, they should at least be able to jump their movement speed vertically. Maybe just give them a "double" jump equal to their prof or STR mod. Also, why don't we have a quarter caster sub class like all the other? Limit them to only use first level spells / spell slots and cantrips while they're raging and you should be fine. In general, the question is, why are people so afraid to give martials cool stuff at higher levels? Spell casters are teleporting around, turning invisible, flying and throwing meteors and the barb can't even make their normal axe attacks hit more than one enemy. Not to mention that all CHA based classes get the social pillar by accident on top of every ability the class offers anyway, why the base barb is already split between STR, CON and then DEX and WIS. What good is the unarmored defense feature if it still relies on DEX? You're most likely to be equal or better off with armor, so this just becomes a nothing feature. As a barb main, I just don't feel the barb makes a big enough impact on the battlefield (it's either great but not much better than the paladin or they are a non factor, throwing javelins), while (innately) having absolutely zero to offer in the other pillars. Lastly, while most other classes have subclasses that let you kinda fulfill party roles, the barb just doesn't. No healing, no support, no negotiator nor investigator, just a bunch of "dealing damage but differently" and maybe have the hint of themed exploration. Sry, just had to get that out there.
Before watching the video, As a DM: you have a BLAST! The best games I've run have been pure martials, or martials and a half caster. Everyones turns are quick, it's easier to prep for, it's much more easy for players to know their stuff. Its all brawn and quick thinking, no finicky rules, no get out jail free spells. Its my favorite game to run, and as much as my players dont realize it, they always have so much more excited in their eyes when they win the day.
There should be a barbarian subclass that gets spell casting with access to non damaging concentration spells that you can cast while raging, but your concentration lasts as long as your rage does.
Ancestral Guardian Barbarian can work fine for range especially if they pick up the Fighting Initiate feat focused on archery. They cannot use rage for the Strength bonus to damage or Reckless Attack with it, but their tanking features do not require a melee weapon, just a weapon attack. My Halfling Ancestral Barbarian early on primarily tanked from the back of the party & the other barbarian & cleric took care of the melee attacks. with resistance to the damage & the NPC I had attacked first would have disadvantage attacking them. It worked really well. Plus because of being a halfling I later picked up Bountiful Luck and negated most "1"s in the party.
The Half Damage buff from Ancestral Protectors is no Joke. Plus it stacks with Rage Half damage. Makes the party damn near immortal vs a single Big Bad.
Was just thinking this. Just go for the start of last hero. High, high level start. First goal: find (kidnap?) a bard. Because what's the point of any of this if no-one gets to hear about it
as pointed out by others, race choices can have a huge impact! here’s one potential team: fairy ancestral guardian: take the mobile feat so you can dive in, attack somebody, and fly away - now they have disadvantage on their attacks and are going to struggle to hit you! either dual wield or hold a shield, so you don’t need to worry about heavy weapon restrictions, and either you get more chances to hit and activate the disadvantage, or you’re harder to hit yourself. potentially even leave strength a bit low to focus on making yourself tougher. also a couple of decent spells. aaracokra/owlin/winged tiefling beast: second flying member of the party, innate ability to overcome nonmagical resistance, and ability to breath underwater vedalken giant: advantage on int/wis/cha saves is huge for a barb, a little bit of water breathing, and all the standard advantages of giant(thrown weapons and overcoming nonmagical resistance.) earth genasi totem warrior: pass without trace, blade ward when not raging, and gives the advantage with wolf totem and even more flying at high levels. maybe have each non vedalken get resilient in one save, totem warrior and beast get great weapon master some other potentially useful races are gnome, satyr or yuan-ti for more saving throws, hobgoblin for some free advantage on attacks and some ability check bonuses. Wild magic can also give a small bonus to ability checks.
I think Montys C tier is a bit harsh and Kellys A tier is a bit generous. Id give them a balanced B in combat. Because yes, certain spellcasters and flying enemies destroy, but uh- those destroy a LOT of parties. Not to mention they tend to be fairly rare all things considered. Most combats are ones barbarians excel at- and they could grab enough stuff to shore them up to win even one they arent great at. Resilient wisdom for example
Nah, ranged is pretty much a possibility for everyone but Paladins and Barbarians. All the caster classes also have counterplay in other ways. Barbarians are just outright noped. 5e DOES just throw melee meatbags at the party with different names and some minor gimmicks, so I don't discount that Barbs do fine most of the time. It really is just 5e being very lax, though. If a DM picks anything more interesting, the Barb suffers.
@@RJWhitmore sure, but they tend to be weak sauce. Think about the most infamous example of a level 1 flying race with a longbow against a tarasque. 5e is notoriously bad at giving ranged options to enemies. Plus, Barbs have a bit better movement than some other classes like fighters, and it's not like they do no damage at mid range with javelins and the giant barbarian- enough to close the gap in the ordinary encounter.
@@darkestlight660I agree on the first paragraph; I was talking about ranged options for characters, not enemies. The second one is moot though; it doesn't matter if you grab some extra speed somewhere if the enemy is in the air. A dragon doesn't even need to get in range of Javelins to wipe out Barbs, all of which have zero resistance to the breath if not Totem. Likewise, if a caster makes an area no-go, or puts up a Wall of Force, or many other possibilities, the Barb is screwed. It isn't like Barbs have great stealth capability, can send in a familiar, can scry, or any other scouting ability - the best they get is via a subclass and is largely negated in a dungeon. This means they don't get to pick their battles like Rogues, Wizards, etc. So having battles that just nope them is potentially campaign ending.
@@RJWhitmore flying enemies aren't that common, even dragons tend to be rare. Enemies with wall of force arguably even more so. Again, I don't think it's unfair to bring up the possibility, but they are absolutely not common enough in the game to justify giving a full team of barbarians a C in combat. Even a shield and spear Zealot barb with polearm master does great damage with reckless attack.
Looking for this comment as I thought a Tier C or D tier is a bit harsh. I would give them a solid B. I felt like Monty was just looking to create a no-win scenario for an all barbarian party, as opposed to looking at the general big picture of things. I do think things like Forcecage or Wall of Force would be super problematic, but that holds true for most parties. I think about action economy and HP, and in that regard a barbarian is going to move fast and hit hard. Can their HPs last longer than a spellcaster's spell slots. I think it would be super fun and many clever ways to get around an encounter - I like the idea of a barbarian throwing barbarians on top of a dragon.
My friend did an all barbarian oneshot that was based on the Barbie movie. It was a lot of fun! I did an Isabelle beast barbarian build and it was amazing!
This is where breaking the rule and having one be a Valor Bard would help enormously. The Bard is there to tell the chronicle of the three barbarians. Yes, I know the rules are only one class with no MC, so it doesn't work given the thematic rules, but one skald along for the ride would deal with a lot of the weaknesses that only barbarians have without breaking the theme.
Yeah, I wasn't expecting the all-barbarian party to be ranked as the least effective, but you make good points. This is where the race, feats and background are especially important. Also, The idea of a buddy cop film staring Conan and Kratos is hilarious. I would love to see that happen.
My all-barbie team: Captain Caveman (with some Teen Angels as lackeys, henchwomen, or hirelings) Tazmanian Devil (spinning attack!) Animal (from the Muppets... with just a touch of Bard?) and their leader: Gary King (from The World's End)
This might be a little unconventional, but you could potentially use Ancestral Guardians as a ranged barbarian with great results. It is true they can go neither reckless nor add their rage modifier to their shots, but they'll gain some significant benefits as a result: a) You get to keep rage going, as the attack to keep rage going does not need to be melee. b) Your AC will benefit substantially, and your DEX saves will be very good (advantage against DEX saves you can see) c) You're the guy shutting down enemy long range attackers. It might be just one per turn, but being able to grant disadvantage to an enemy on attack rolls from a long distance is pretty significant here - they'll of course try to focus you down but now you can use stuff like cover, and your AC helps. d) You fill in the ranged gap this group had suffered from.
I'm currently playing a purposely non-ideal Goblin barbarian (because I had a cool character idea), and I think the build I used would actually fit an all-Barbarian party really well, utilizing something you guys dismissed out of hand: Ancestral Guardians. Goblins get disengage (and hide, but that's less relevant) as a bonus action, and paired with the Ancestral Guardian ability to hit a creature and impose disadvantage against any attack they make that isn't targeting you, it opens up a strategy of landing an attack on a boss-like monster then disengaging and stepping out of range while your party members surround it and are even more unkillable than normal. They could even all use reckless attack with impunity, since they'll only face a straight roll against them. Any time you're in a combat with a single enemy (or a single focus), this amplifies what this party does well. But I think that does speak to what an all-barbarian campaign has to be: The ultimate survival meat-grinder campaign. Anything else is going to be unsatisfying. But I gotta say, playing an all-barbarian party in that kind of game sounds pretty awesome....
I have the opposite perspective about creativity with spellcasters versus non spellcasters. Having to solve a problem with less complex tools necessitates a more creative solution to accomplish it. If I need to jump across a gap that's way too far, casting levitate is not a creative solution as much as it's an easy win button. Having to use your environment more complexly is much more satisfying IMO. All DM willing, though. Some DMs won't afford the players a lot of options when it comes to rube Goldberg type solutions.
99% of the time, spellcasters have access to the same degree of roleplaying and skills usage so that's a false dichotomy; nothing prevents casters from coming up with and using non-spell solutions
@@matiskrawiec But them having spells means why would they come up with a creative solution when they can just cast something that fixes it more easily? My point is having no spells FORCES a PC to come up with a probably more complex but more creative solution.
@@MrFlyingLamma Because maybe you'd want to save the spells lot for later? Also, creative use of spells is a thing. Climbing and tying a rope is more creative than flying, but I'd argue that levitating a barrel to which you tied the rope is equally creative. Double points if the place in question was non-scalable like a floating island in which case creative solutions were shafted in the first place. It's like ingredients: no matter how creative you are with 5 of them, you have the wiggle room to be more creative with an additional 5 ingredients.
@@matiskrawiec I guess I just see the lack of 5 ingredients as an opportunity to add my own ingredients I brought to the table in my own head and not on my character sheet. Or if they are on my character sheet like use of tool proficiencies or other niche features I can use in a more creative way. Like for example an all barb party dealing with a spellcaster, some would say it's a problem, and I would look at it and say the impotence should be on the players to understand they have a flaw and how they should work around it, like throwing smoke bombs so the spellcaster can't target them or setup a system for shielding themselves from mental intrusion somehow.
@@MrFlyingLamma But you can bring those 5 imaginary ingredients regardless of how many are on your character sheet. If you have 50 creative ways to cook an egg on a frying pan, do you forget 20 of them if I give you an air fryer? No, you get 50 creative ideas for pan frying AND X amount of creative ideas to air fry it. Creativity and roleplay are a given and equal.
I would love to see a return to see this concept with a Multiclass version of this. How could you use multiclassing to account for all the weaknesses in these parties? It would probably have to be each taking a different multiclass. Then there’s the idea that not all multiclasses are created equal, so which members would be better off for multiclassing and which may even be hampered by it?
I've done something similar to this for an actual campaign. The setting was a basic Tower Defense campaign. The Barbarian Tribes were defending against the Kingdoms Army, who were seeking to take the land because of gold mines. Party was to start at lv5 but their first three levels had to be Barbarian. For the setting. Three of the 5 players decided to go full Barb Builds. Totem, Ancestral, and Beast. The other two took their 2 extra levels in Fighter and Ranger respectively, and upon their first level up, took Battle Master and Beast Master.
Crazy timing, my group just did this with Lost mines of phandelin. We all went lizardfolk barbarians roleplaying as brothers all from the same swamp village. Lots of shouting "BROTHER!" and not a lot of int. Now that we're continuing into higher levels most are multiclassing.
I love the idea of an all barbarian party with the dragon as the big bad . I think that would be really cool that they have to work up to the dragon instead of just like curb stomping it with a regular party right away
I agree with everything you guys said on an individual level, but I don't think it adds up to be as big a problem as you're suggesting once you place it in world context rather than game context. If we're a group of barbarians in a fantasy setting, we know our limitations, and we also know there are things like boots of flying that can overcome them. Magic and magic items are as much a part of that world as arrows, plate mail, and spell components; if we're going to consider the characters having access to their own world's resources, then magical itens enabling you to use your strengths needs to be considered as well. If we're just considering the game side of looking at dnd, then that does come with the problem that your dm has to enable that, but I would argue that your dm preventing access to those things would be a negative interference, rather than enabling them being a positive interference.
I cannot disagree with your points, and I would also give them such a grade for how hard players have to work for out-of-scope utilities, but I do think that this is possibly one of the most exciting possible groups. I would eagerly craft a campaign honed for specifically making everyone feel like the king murder hobos they want to be, and creating challenges for this hurricane of physical force. I'd basically take notes from Gears of War.
I think probably the best move is to just take the Barbarian's strengths in stride and pick everything else, background, feats, races, to cover weaknesses instead. Thats hyper-optimizing, though. EDIT: Maybe *1* Barbarian's Barbarian, but otherwise you grab flying races, backgrounds that offer proficiency in non combat skills, and feats that offer some minimal casting.
I'm assuming the heritage is not a component of these topics but if we're evaluating the necessity of magic items then it's also fair to consider the importance of Faerie, Aarakocra, and Shadar-kai or Eladrin Elves to counter the range/fly issue and having teleportation available for forcecage and force wall. My faerie ancestral guardian barbarian with sentinel hasn't had any problems with flying encounters and has quite enjoyed dropping a few bad guys from 60' to loosen their tongue.
there is thankfully the Oversized Longbow from Waterdeep: Dragon Heist that REQUIRES a strength score of 18 and deals 2d6+STR damage so while you might not hit very often you will at least hit VERY hard
@@maulkixx740 That's why Vedalken is a nice compromise if you don't want to go with a Small race and use heavy weapons. Has its pluses and minuses. Haven't heard of a DM banning Vedalken, but I'm sure a very few do.
An interesting build to help shore up the range challenge is a path of the giant barbarian that takes sharpshooter and then throws missiles. You then get a range of 120ft as a huge creature giving you slightly more reach. You could also take a feat for fighting style archery to make it more accurate or the throwing fighting style for a bit more damage.
This is the first party where I am more excited to run than play. I would enjoy playing but I would love to run this game and give the party a few items/tools and watch them overcome. Maybe an axe that has bathed in the blood of so many wizards that it causes a dispel magic effect on a crit. Fun things like that.
First instinct would be to have this as a wilderness campaign but I think it might be more interesting to have a Barbarian party of brothers going into a city to recover a runaway or kidnapped member of their family. You'd probably need to provide an npc companion for some of the social and investigation encounters but they could probably find someone to press gang into that role.
I don't thing an all Barbarian party would really have as much trouble with ranged/flying enemies as you think. Sure, the Giant Path allows you to add your Rage bonus to thrown weapons, but that doesn't mean that no other barbarians can throw wile raging, or even use any other ranged weapons while raging. You still use Strength for attack and damage with all thrown weapons, just don't get the Rage bonus, unless you are Giant. That said, given barbarians wear, at best, Medium Armor (or go unarmored with their Unarmored Defense feature) you would then likely have a decent Dex score (about 14 with Medium Armor, or sacrifice some Con for higher Dex with UD) so you could still effectively use other ranged weapons (Bows, Crossbows or, if campaign allows, guns) even while raging. In fact, one could actually make a Dex based Barbarian (high Dex and Con with UD or Light Armor) who focus more on Ranged Combat. Likely still have a bit of Strength for engaging in melee if needed. Though, best (and perhaps only) subclass I think would best suit a Dex Barbarian would be... the Ancestral Guardian, as its features (mainly Ancestral Protector) only requires you to make an attack (melee or ranged, don't matter) while raging.
I think every dnd party is S tier or D Tier depending on the Dm and Campaign. Barbarians and Fighter can pretty much go all day with a couple short rest. Where’s the wizards and sorcerers and do world changing things over time. It is so fine to just experience a different campaign for the Barbs than the nerds
I can agree on the C, but not the D, and here's why: this is the first party combination that's going to heavily rely on race and feat choice. Flying enemies won't be a problem if you have a pixie, Arakora, owlin, or Gem Dragonborn. Likewise, force cage or Wall of Force can be overcome by taking an Astral Elf with their 30foot teleport [proficiency] times per day. And if the DM makes it an Eberon campaign and allows everyone to take dragon marks, all the better. There's loads of options there. And here's the heretical idea: Not all the Barbarians have to be on the front line raging. A Barbarian who took some support options in race or feat, like the Pixie. The Pixie can cast enlarge/reduce at 5th level. They can absolutely take rear guard and then come off the top rope with the steel chair when they get tagged in.
While listening to this, they mentioned range on thrown weapons being bad... and I had an idea. Halfling barbarian picks up javelin. Normal human regular sized barbarian picks up halfling barbarian. Giant barbarian picks up human barbarian. Human and halfling barbarian set 'held actions' for 'when I am thrown...' Giant barbarian throws human barbarian who throws halfling barbarian who throws javelin. Fast-faster-fastest-ball Special!
Second giant barbarian with some way of getting Enlarge/Reduce cast on them to bring it up a level. And/or have the javelin be thrown by a fairy barbarian, thrown by the halfling barbarian...
I would totally want to see the Barbarian party comprised of Ah-nold variants from “Kindergarten Cop”, “Jingle all the way” and “Batman & Robin”…they all expressed the same unbridled requisite rage…
I feel that in a y’all are right if we’re just talking about a bare knuckle fight but there are also plenty of equipment options to shore up most shortfalls
I once played a barbarian in an Arabian nights/blood on the sand campaign. I as the lizardfolk beast barbarian with a shield, was the only one to have kept their original character alive.
I've run an all-barb campaign (albeit, back in 3.5 rather than 5e). Sure, they struggled vs. prepared casters, but flying enemies? Wasn't a problem. Turns out if the flying enemy is low enough to hit them with a ranged attack, they're probably close enough that one barb with a Ring of Jumping can fastball special another barb close enough to land melee hits/grapples. Ranged enemies? Ain't nothing stopping a barbarian from packing an arbalest, or a longbow. Sure, their DEX isn't going to be pumped quite as high as, say, a Rogue, and they won't be getting Rage bonuses, but their raw STR is going to be high enough to use the really high poundage stuff that's traditionally gated behind a minimum STR the Rogue could only dream of. For that matter, my signature character build, from 3.0e through 4e and PF1 was an elven DEX-Barbarian (and I almost got it to work in 5e, just need a little tuning. OK, a lot of tuning- the move to a simplified skill proficiency system really hurt it). Ranged combat is not as much of a problem as you think it might be. I'll grant, however, that the Social and Exploration pillars of play can easily be their downfall, if the party is limited to rollplay rather than roleplay. It definitely relies more on player ability and imagination rather than raw stats and mechanics. Regardless, it is a ton of fun.
The first long term campaign I ran three of the four players showed up with a barbarian of some kind. One of them was a barbarian-sorcerer. We got probably 6 months into that campaign before I started dreading it because of the lack of variety of encounters I could present the party with.
Monty spittin' truths. It's not that barbarians are a lame fantasy or something. It's just a class that has unfortunately has some significant problems in 5e, and the concept of a barbarian-only party brings those shortcomings front and center.
For my all-Barbarian party, I'd go Giant, Zealot, Beast, and Wild Magic. Giant Barbarian allows for tactical positioning and more reliable ranged damage. Beast and Wild Magic have some buffing/debuffing potential, and Beast can also do some semi-tanking if they grow a tail. As for Zealot, that's the Barbarian I would use as the "healer" (ie they take the Healer feat and Herbalism kit proficiency to brew healing potions), for no other reason than because Zealot is the most Paladin adjacent Barbarian subclass.
I think race selection and background would be a HUGE component to making this party work. The party would have to plan it out in advance, but there are so many powers and available to the group with proper Race choice and background choice.
Finally, the Barbarian is HERE!!!!!!! In the book "Odyssey of the Dragonlords" that i am running right now with my dnd group there is a subclass called Herculean path where the barbarian get the ability to be a range bow user because it gives you the ability to use strength as a modifier. Also as I like to do in my games i always have the range weapons the just uses strength as a modifier period. Like a mini cannon, or mini portable Ballista. So in my games range for a Barbarian is never an issue. You can always use STR for Intimidation, and for my homebrew rules you can use Wisdom or intelligence for persuasion if i allow it when they are clever about it.
My favorite barbarian I ever made was a goblin Zealot barbarian. I worked with my DM because I wanted her to be Dex based. We modified rage so that instead of relying on strength, we used Dex. I described her rage like that of a snake, cold and calculating. She dual wielded scimitars and was a menace in combat. Since I wasn't worried about strength I was able to bump up her intelligence and charisma. She was so fun to play.
Dragons gotta get in range to use the breath weapon, two barbarians hold their actions , one holds to throw the other the other readies a grapple, dragon gets grounded, everyone dog piles.
I am reminded of Heracles facing the Nemean Lion. The Lion had skin so thick that no weapon could hurt it and claws so sharp that they could cut anything. Heracles defeated it by wrestling it and forcing it to cut itself with its own claws. THAT's your Barbarians facing enemies with resistances and immunities to melee damage types.
I realize that this comparison has been made before with one or more of the group videos. But I realized that Barbarians are essentially power rangers. They are strong, but normal people, who enter a special "battle transformation" that elevates them to supehuman levels that let them take on things they wouldn't be able to deal with otherwise.
Interesting choice of subclasses.. my picks would be the following: Totem warrior for some utility. Storm Herald for some versatility (minor as it is), but it also has the smallest of niche utility abilities. Berserker for their level 6 ability. The last one is a toss up between a beast or giant barbarian depending on what sort of campaign it is going to be. I know that berserker and storm herald aren't good subclasses, but they do bring something that the party might like. The berserker can't be charmed and the storm herald can provide temp hp, a range attack that can knock enemies prone at later levels, ignite flamsble objects (if the party doesn't have darkvision), provide a resistance in an aura. But those are just my thoughts.
Storm herald acting like a pseudo-twilight cleric and giving THP each round should not be underestimated. Also they can share their elemental resistance, which makes certain dragon encounters MUCH more manageable.
@@christopherwilliamsA That's what i was thinking, but i do also like that they can freeze water as an action. I might be wrong about this, but it says that the 5ft cube of water they freeze thaws after a minute so they could make a pseudo bridge out of ice if they act quickly enough.
Thorcqin is still one of my favorite characters. He is a fighter barbarian who really has to fight tactically and does make good use of magic items to overcome his weaknesses, resulting in a very fast flying barbarian that is immune to many conditions and who can regenerate hitpoints. He also keeps a forcebreaker club on him at all times just in case. He does well in a party, but most threats he can just blow through and destroy on his own. There are still plenty of weaknesses in higher tier play, but he is still a very powerful brute. That is essentially how one would have to play an all barbarian party, similar to fighters and rogues where they really need to get tactical both in and out of fights.
You can somewhat overcome the ranged limitations of a Barbarian party by building a Zealot as your ranged character since the OGL Zealot (not sure about OD&D) can add its damage rider to ranged attacks...plus the Giant Barbarian can help them in a pinch. Racial features like the Eladrin's teleportation can get around some magic problems.
Races can help a lot here. Take those who can fly (a giant barb, who can carry others), take elves with not-spells teleports (there is even one eladrin, who can teleport others), take tabaxies with speed and climb, maybe someone with swim.... You were too focused on classical barbs like humans and orcs!
Here is a feat that is constantly over looked, the Chef feat. It give Temp HP and heals for 1d8 BUUUTTT... If you look at the expanded tool use in Xanathar's Cook's Utensils let's everyone eating the food you make heal by one HP per hit dice spent. Doesn't seem like its worth it but considering most the the healing done in this group would be long rest or taking short rests and rolling hit dice. That one extra HP is like everyone has one extra in their CON mod. Now someone can also take the Healer feat. Over time both of those do add up to a significant amount healing. You could also look at other races that give spells. Air Genasi both Feather Fall and Levitate once per day. Being a wood elf means you can get Wood Elf Magic and that gets the team Longstrider and Pass without Trace.
A while back I ran an Icewind Dale campaign with 7 players. Three played barbarians and we didn't have any sort of healing, but they managed to brute force their way to ending the eternal winter (for anyone who's curious the other 4 characters consisted of 2 rogues, an artificer and a wizard).
My best team: Beast barb with tavern brawler and expertise in Athletics: The Grappler Wolf Totem Barb: Makes the others less reliant on reckless. GWM+PAM Ancestral Guardian with a high dex and and longbow. Snipe enemies from range to give them disadvantage. Get the Healer feat too. Giant Barb with PAM+Sentinel. Lock down enemies with your reach. Also throw stuff. Ancestries: Aarakococra, Aasimar, Variant human, Eladrin, Shifter, gem dragonborn and goblins all bring some interesting features to the table. Yuan-ti, Tieflings and Satyrs for the resistances too.
Fairies with strixhaven (or other magic) initiate feats. Comes with a handful of nominally useful spells. Eladrin, shadar-kai. You're thinking way too inside the box, and rage is not required to run at all times. Lots of feats also grant access to various tools for lockpicking, smithing hand axes, herbalism kits... I played a winged tiefling with a prismari student I already had high wis, because a barbarian has to be perceptive, and at one point I had to fly up 80 feet and lob firebolts because I had two hp, and rage wasn't going to save me. Another run I played a fairy path of the beast in an all barbarian party, and was super powerful support with JUST enlarge reduce. One dude climbed a cathedral and jumped on the dragon's back, and I was able to fly within range and enlarge him. We killed the dragon in a round or two. We all had decent stealth because we prioritized dex for unarmored defense, which also made longbows very effective. I think barbarians can get up to a lot of shenanigans that casters simply aren't expecting, and a party playing all barbarians is definitely going to pull out all the stops to make a B tier group. Someone is going to want to be the smart one, they can all arguably use strength in lieu of charisma for most persuasion and intimidation checks, because they probably have abs for miles and probably don't wear much, (barring that, someone always wants high charisma). I bet if you two got together with some of the other optimizers like Colby and DnD shorts, you'd come up with something approaching S tier. ...and path of the giant can absolutely hurl the others at flying enemies... That's what my goblin barbarian in a princess dress did.
That's the thing with barbarians. Slow, time stop, hypnotic pattern, force cage, wall of force, invisible enemies, flight, area of effect spells like web or grease and any sort of soft stat change would shut this party down. In a world of magic you have to have someone with you to help with your enemies casting spells at you or you're at their mercy.
I think this party would be really fun if the DM crafted the adventure around it. You could even go old school with it and make lovable hireling NPCs that shore up some of the weaknesses of the party, like how Conan had his rogue and wizard buddies for the parts of his adventure that he needed help with (infiltrating Thulsa Doom's temple, dealing with the demoness lady etc).
![[UNCUT] บอสพอล แผลงฤทธิ์ บอสพระ-นักร้อง ก. โดนแฉยับ! I คนดังนั่งเคลียร์ I 21 ต.ค. 67](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/XKf6HeftoPI/mqdefault.jpg)
Conan: "Crom, I have never prayed to you before. I have no tongue for it. No one, not even you, will remember if we were good men or bad. Why we fought, or why we died. All that matters is that two stood against many. That's what's important! Valor pleases you, Crom... so grant me one request. Grant me revenge! And if you do not listen, then to HELL with you!"
Where is this from. It's cool as fuck
@@kevincandelario2573from the movie: Conan, the barbarian
@@kevincandelario2573It's from the famous "Conan the Barbarian" movie (1982) starring Arnold Schwarzenegger.
@kevincandelario2573 favorite movie of all time. It's a must watch along with the conan the destroyer movie.
Now THIS is how to pray to a god.
The all-barbarian party is where what race you pick can really change your effectiveness. If the party picks some of the less traditional "barbarian' races (looking at aarakocra barbarian), they could really shore up some of those weaknesses.
I'm currently playing a fairy barbarian path of the giant with tavern brawler. Punching, throwing and grappling every enemy in my path. My favorite move is to grapple someone and fly into the air.
Vedalken shores up those saving throws
I could see an "Angelic force" of Aasimar Barbarians that use their Radiant Soul flying ability very restrictivly!
and if the adventure is under water a teen turtle party sounds fun!
A played an Arakocra Barbarian in a one shot, and it was nothing short of amazing.
The Paladin and Fighter dip helped alot... but it was still barbarian in my mind.
There's a dwarf variant can use enlarge/reduce on self. Throw it like wolverine and do the fast ball special.
As a DM, I am listening and rationally absorbing your input. As a Barbarian main, I am frothing at the mouth in anger.
As a barbarian main, a single harpy with a longbow could kite you basically indefinitely unless you had a cave to hide in.
@robertb6889 a Beast Barbarian with its abilities and the proper strength can jump upwards to 60ft in the air. (Not flying, but it puts them in javelin range.)
600’ max range - harpy has it on you - unless as they mentioned you happened to have a longbow.
I will froth with you.
@@robertb6889 I think the all barbarian party would KNOW they have issues with ranged combatants, and bring their own longbows for just such an occasion. They have plenty of carrying capacity after all.
Everyone should be sure to take a feat that’s “help the party”: Inspiring Leader, Healer, Ritual Caster, etc.
I'd add magic initiate (cleric) to this list. Just for Guidance, which could really help their social. And a once per day Bless when you are out of rage, don't want to use one, or need saving throw bonuses.
@@garion046 Good choice.
Conceptually, I do love the whole party of raging berserkers, but this is probably the one group that would need some multiclassing to shore up its weaknesses, or a very tailor made campaign for them that let's the barbs thrive in their elements.
As an aside, a follow up series to this series I'd love to see is "Making a campaign for the 1 class parties". Tips for the dm on how to run, design or modify a campaign for these 1 class parties
I actually really like the idea of a party with a huge weakness, it's interesting to play around rather than having a baked in solution to everything
I think one of the missing things here is that barbarians have the bulk to say "no, were not fighting that, were leaving"
Now, against force cage users and what not, sure
But thats why you take an species with a free teleport or flight
The new World Tree barbarian would be really useful for this sort of thing
The problem with all-barbarians is Hold Person.
Kalashtar and gnome barbarians are here for the Wis saves! Also, kalashtar gets psychic damage resistance.
A party of barbarian Power Rangers whose rage form is their morphing sequence
Totem: Tommy Oliver green
Zelot: Tommy Oliver white
Ancestral guardian: Tommy Oliver red
Beast: Tommy Oliver black
That's just Magical Girl Ore, where the main characters turn into buff men wearing frilly dresses lol
You mean the Power Ragers 😂
Ok i want to play power rager!!@@bubbles9829
Before really starting the video here's my campaign idea, Gears Of War, the monsters have emerged and only the most elite squad of muscle bound warriors can stand a chance.
Look up Egoraptor's "Gears of Awesome" animation from too long in the past, the first half of it is really very appropriate here.
Meh.
@SymbioteMullet OMG I remember those parodies, I used to rewatch them a lot when I was in high school.
@@devin5201 a wonderful time of intense silliness!
That party's got enough for all of y'all!
A great way to run an all barbarian party is to have them work for craftsmen who can make enchanted gear. "Hey, there is a filled with . Kill them and I can make you some !" That way your craftsmen can make any gear you need to compensate for the limitations of the all barbarian party.
Honestly, just mix some Monster Hunter into your D&D and you're golden. :D
I was JUST THINKING monster hunter before I clicked "show more" :D
Alone this is a cool idea. No big bbeg no crazy lich just a bunch of loose monsters and your team is tasked with elimination and collecting parts of these beasts.
Monster hunter DND would be rad
Literally searched for this an hour ago to see if they had it, happy I raged it into existence
Would you say it was a frenzied search?
Bro must be an ork
Were you searching madly for it?
I have the build for this, assuming you can use Tasha's Customize your origin.
Tiefling Ancestral Guardian
Aasimar Zealot
Kalashtar Totem Warrior
Gnome (probably Forrest?) Giant Barbarian (because it's funny)
Tiefling, bloodline: Fierna- Friends, Charm person, and Suggestion.
Stats:
15 (+2) strength
14: (+1) Constitution
13: Charisma
12: Dexterity
10: Wisdom
8: intelegence
This is your party face. The reason for the uneven con score is because of the feat Infernal Constitution.
Additionally, medium armor and a shield with the resistances and advantage on dex saves are really useful. I'd also consider Skill Expert as a feat for expertise in Persuasion, rounding off on the Charisma score. Also, having an out of combat or even in combat if you feel so bold, casting Suggestion once per day is pretty nice. Also, Charm Person adds to this as well.
Aasimar variant: Protector.
Ability scores
15 (+2) strength
14 (+1) constitution
13 wisdom
12 dexterity
10 intelegence
8 Charisma
Again, medium armor and a shield, taking both chef and healer as feat choices. This is your "healer" between the racial lay on hands esque feature, the temp hp from the food, the rallying cry advantage, and being able to use healers kits on allies, it makes a surprisingly remarkable combat medic for a party that resists so much.
Kalashtar Totem of the Bear:
Ability scores:
15(+2) strength
14 con
13 (+1) Dexterity
12 wisdom
10 intelegence
8 charisma
Resistance to all damage is insane, and since you have an ally (namely the tiefling) actively promoting disadvantage on all attacks made towards you and your allies sans them, this is your GWM tough frontline that's just there to be annoying. Pair this with the Advantage on wisdom saves, and you are surprisingly strong.
Gnome:
Ability scores:
15 (+2) strength
14 Constitution
13 (+1) Dexterity
12 intelegence
10 wisdom
8 Charisma
Gnomish cunning makes this the best at saves having advantage on all sans con saves whilst raging. This one is a good candidate for like shadow touched and skill expert granting them stealth expertise and proficiency in deception in case stuff goes sideways. And if all else fails, frail little Gnome turns into a behemoth and smashes anything in its path. Additionally, this is also a "backline" hurling hand axes or daggers, javelins, spears, or the occasional person if you feel so inclined.
Here you go Monty this here pushes the Barbarians up to at minimum C tier, personally I’d give it B
@@WMoore8787 This specific assembly of 4 goes beyond a C+ indeed...
. . . But definitively does NOT match other "B" 4_mono-class parties: => B- [80.50%]
I would probably have the tiefling take inspiring leader in place of chef and then have the aasimar be either an aarakokra or variant tiefling with wings(if allowed) with martial adept to knock flying creatures prone to bring them down. tiefling is preferred since they can still wear medium armor and fly. the totem barbarian could take eagle at 14 and also have a fly speed just less reliable. healing, while important, won't be as important when every barbarian has a ton of hit points and resistances.
@BFizzman The problem I find with aaracokra is that they get flight, and that's pretty much it, and even then, it's limited to light armor alone. These are medium armor builds. Also, while yes, healing is a kind of hat on a hat given the parties' resistances, hitpoints, and by extention hit dice are a resource. In fact, the only resource barbarians get outside of rage for the most part. Having out of combat healing potential saves the use of precious hit dice even slightly. Also, the reason for Chef instead of Inspiring leader is because chef is a half feat and rounds off the Aasimars uneven Con score in the same way that Infernal Constitution rounds off the Tieflings Inspiring leaders is nice, but the naturally small Charisma score lends itself to needing other things like Expertise to be able to play the party face. Again, ala skill expert feat.
@@charrleschervanik3632 that is why, so long as it is allowed, a variant tiefling with winged would be preferred since you have a fly speed so long as you aren't wearing heavy armor. The party really needs to have a consistent way to fly because if not, so many combat encounters can get shut down. Shove only works on creatures one size larger, so that's why martial adept would be a great help with trip attack. extra healing is good, don't get me wrong, but when you have the issue of being ineffective in any encounter that has flying, i think that's the higher priority. they could shove any large or smaller creature and save trip attack for huge and gargantuan. also, side note i found while double checking rules, if you can choose deep gnome for the giant barbarian you not only get gnome cunning but also disguise self and advantage on stealth checks PB/long rest, so you could take ritual caster instead of skill expert for some out of combat utility
This series has been super fun. Thank you so much.
I still want to see you guys do a what if everyone plays an apothecary though.
I second this.
I third this
I think they did an "Untold Tales" apothecary 1 shot... not exactly the same but you can at least watch them play.
@@Sirfinchyyy yes they did, and that is what makes me want to know their thought on the all apothecary party.
I'll be honest, as a DM this would be my favorite party to play for of this entire series
All good things must come to an end this series is amazing
Do one shots with What if Everyone Plays. You did all Wizards party, which I loved!
This is a case where the species matters a ton more for shoring up weaknesses, in particular,
1. Species with flying offer a counter to other flyers and for overcoming bad terrain and getting to enemies faster
2. Species with teleportation lets you bypass and sidestep typical means of shutting down progressing towards the enemy
3. Species with oddities like Plasmoid's ability to squeeze into places pairs really well with Beast barbarian + unarmored defense
4. Species with resistance to magic helps bridge the divide between spellcasting enemies and your heroes, a Yuan Ti or Satyr with Shield Master can start to shut down fireballs and overrun their enemies.
Thus, I propose in the four man team,
1. The Aarakocra Sentinel + PAM Ancestral Guardian, made to reach, and take down flying threats and get them where the rest of the party can take them on. Your allies no longer are at risk from being out of range.
2. Shadar Kai Giant, always get in position, always ready to throw, and after throwing a big weapon, anything trying to keep concentration is going to be struggling.
3. The Plasmoid Beast, unarmored, and unarmed, with claws, a real nightmare that can climb in through the holes in the walls. Anything they can see, if there's a hole, they're coming through.
4. The Yuan Ti Totem barbarian, the tankiest tank to tank, with shield master to make magic even more of a joke.
An unorthodox party, almost all the races do better with other classes, but, they all have something going on that lets them try and cover a weak spot for the party. Still not very optimal, but, a good dragon slaying story needs some struggle to make it interesting.
the movie "13th warrior" was my first thought.. it had 12 vikings so you could take 4 of them. lol
Would make a good campaign!
My first character was a barbarian and my favourite moment playing her was when we were fighting a dragon that started on the ground. Part way through the combat it started to take off, so my character jumped on it's back and started hacking at one of the wings with her glaive until it went down. I don't even remember if I dealt the killing blow or not, but that bit made me feel so cool.
"His name is Ser Grogg, Esquire. He's a nobleman... of sorts."
I ran a one shot for an all Barbarian group (3 players). Lvl 15 and I did allow them to multiclass, they had to keep the majority of levels in Barbarian though. They also had a pretty decent magic item budget. Finally they were allowed to have a mount (I gave them options). They all picked Owlbears. Then they called their group Owl Force One. They had great fun fighting through Icey tundra to go kill an Ancient White Dragon in her lair.
I think you make a fair points. However, coming up with solutions to those problems sounds fun. Fighting a spellcaster in complete darkness to avoid getting targeted by spells, or throwing sand in their eyes.
But that’s not something unique to the barbarians, any class could do that. And other classes would do that way way better like warlocks with darkness/devil’s sight
@@thedudejsb any class can do that, but how many actually will? Casters will always look to their spell list first for the solution. They don't interact with the game world nearly as much as those without class features to carry them.
@@nojusticenetwork9309 the wizard spells are their class features that’s kind of the point of playing a wizard. This isn’t a question of what class has the most creative players, it’s what class features and abilities add tools for the game. Anyone can be creative not everyone has the tools to back it up
@@thedudejsb You're right they can do it better, but part of the fun is the challenge. They can't do it as well so when you suceed it is more rewarding.
Would love to see a retrospect episode, with all the classes up on the tier board and possible re-rankings as you mentioned here and there throughout the series.
Regardless of the ranking: To me, that's the most fun single class party of them all! Maybe they can just hire minions to do the brainy work and the ranged attacks.
As a DM, I would love my party to play as all Barbarians. Unfortunately, I run for powergamers that only play wizard, cleric, bard, warlock, or paladin. I miss my barbarian player so much, she would wreck so many plans by the others by brute forcing problems to fix them.
Can you imagine the roleplay & dialogue? Misusing words, misunderstanding situations, social faux pas. Like picture Helga from the D&D movie x4, LOL
The rage will shatter the heavens and sunder the realms.
And it shall be glorious!
8:29 the Acolyte background could be a saving grace here, with their feature about being able to go to a temple and receive free healing as long as material components are provided - which you explicitly don’t require to be revived as a Zealot Barbarian!
Of course, this should be cleared with the DM first, but the symbiotic interaction is in the text!
Ok, who’s going to Rage and be the tank for this little skirmish?
**everyone raises their hand** 🖐️
Guys, this has been my favorite series you have ever done. I appreciate the discussions.
THIS! This is the one I have been waiting for. I have two loves in D&D, Orcs and Barbarians! Also if your all barbarian party isn't named Brute Force then why are you even playing all barbarians?
Finally, but also this was to be expected, unfortunately.
I think this really highlights something that became abundantly clear for me the longer I look at it: the barbarian is just worse in every way than the paladin.
When you ranked them by party role, the paladin was on par in both tanking and damage, but the paladin has: smites, spell casting, a flying mount, healing and social skills all baked in.
The barb is screwed against anything that doesn't do physical attacks, because in this case a high AC beats out the on avg 1 HP per level the barb has over the paladin.
Going thru all the grunts is fun and all, but at the end of the day, the BBEG are probably going to be flying spell casters, which they are utterly useless against. Even if they get close, they just teleport away again.
I also find it funny that the first example is the barbs blasting thru a wall, which is something the fantasy of a barb should provide, but they just don't. (And just let the barbs be the only one to destroy force walls / cages by just barrelling thru them pls.) They also don't necessary need flying, but when the spell casters can, they should at least be able to jump their movement speed vertically. Maybe just give them a "double" jump equal to their prof or STR mod.
Also, why don't we have a quarter caster sub class like all the other? Limit them to only use first level spells / spell slots and cantrips while they're raging and you should be fine.
In general, the question is, why are people so afraid to give martials cool stuff at higher levels? Spell casters are teleporting around, turning invisible, flying and throwing meteors and the barb can't even make their normal axe attacks hit more than one enemy. Not to mention that all CHA based classes get the social pillar by accident on top of every ability the class offers anyway, why the base barb is already split between STR, CON and then DEX and WIS. What good is the unarmored defense feature if it still relies on DEX? You're most likely to be equal or better off with armor, so this just becomes a nothing feature.
As a barb main, I just don't feel the barb makes a big enough impact on the battlefield (it's either great but not much better than the paladin or they are a non factor, throwing javelins), while (innately) having absolutely zero to offer in the other pillars.
Lastly, while most other classes have subclasses that let you kinda fulfill party roles, the barb just doesn't. No healing, no support, no negotiator nor investigator, just a bunch of "dealing damage but differently" and maybe have the hint of themed exploration.
Sry, just had to get that out there.
Before watching the video,
As a DM: you have a BLAST!
The best games I've run have been pure martials, or martials and a half caster.
Everyones turns are quick, it's easier to prep for, it's much more easy for players to know their stuff.
Its all brawn and quick thinking, no finicky rules, no get out jail free spells.
Its my favorite game to run, and as much as my players dont realize it, they always have so much more excited in their eyes when they win the day.
There should be a barbarian subclass that gets spell casting with access to non damaging concentration spells that you can cast while raging, but your concentration lasts as long as your rage does.
Ancestral Guardian Barbarian can work fine for range especially if they pick up the Fighting Initiate feat focused on archery. They cannot use rage for the Strength bonus to damage or Reckless Attack with it, but their tanking features do not require a melee weapon, just a weapon attack. My Halfling Ancestral Barbarian early on primarily tanked from the back of the party & the other barbarian & cleric took care of the melee attacks. with resistance to the damage & the NPC I had attacked first would have disadvantage attacking them. It worked really well. Plus because of being a halfling I later picked up Bountiful Luck and negated most "1"s in the party.
The Half Damage buff from Ancestral Protectors is no Joke. Plus it stacks with Rage Half damage. Makes the party damn near immortal vs a single Big Bad.
The Silver Horde of Discworld could be a great inspiration for this campaign
Was just thinking this. Just go for the start of last hero. High, high level start. First goal: find (kidnap?) a bard. Because what's the point of any of this if no-one gets to hear about it
Really enjoyed this series, dudes! Can’t wait to see what your next series will be!
as pointed out by others, race choices can have a huge impact! here’s one potential team:
fairy ancestral guardian: take the mobile feat so you can dive in, attack somebody, and fly away - now they have disadvantage on their attacks and are going to struggle to hit you! either dual wield or hold a shield, so you don’t need to worry about heavy weapon restrictions, and either you get more chances to hit and activate the disadvantage, or you’re harder to hit yourself. potentially even leave strength a bit low to focus on making yourself tougher. also a couple of decent spells.
aaracokra/owlin/winged tiefling beast: second flying member of the party, innate ability to overcome nonmagical resistance, and ability to breath underwater
vedalken giant: advantage on int/wis/cha saves is huge for a barb, a little bit of water breathing, and all the standard advantages of giant(thrown weapons and overcoming nonmagical resistance.)
earth genasi totem warrior: pass without trace, blade ward when not raging, and gives the advantage with wolf totem and even more flying at high levels.
maybe have each non vedalken get resilient in one save, totem warrior and beast get great weapon master
some other potentially useful races are gnome, satyr or yuan-ti for more saving throws, hobgoblin for some free advantage on attacks and some ability check bonuses. Wild magic can also give a small bonus to ability checks.
I think Montys C tier is a bit harsh and Kellys A tier is a bit generous. Id give them a balanced B in combat. Because yes, certain spellcasters and flying enemies destroy, but uh- those destroy a LOT of parties. Not to mention they tend to be fairly rare all things considered.
Most combats are ones barbarians excel at- and they could grab enough stuff to shore them up to win even one they arent great at. Resilient wisdom for example
Nah, ranged is pretty much a possibility for everyone but Paladins and Barbarians. All the caster classes also have counterplay in other ways. Barbarians are just outright noped.
5e DOES just throw melee meatbags at the party with different names and some minor gimmicks, so I don't discount that Barbs do fine most of the time. It really is just 5e being very lax, though. If a DM picks anything more interesting, the Barb suffers.
@@RJWhitmore sure, but they tend to be weak sauce. Think about the most infamous example of a level 1 flying race with a longbow against a tarasque. 5e is notoriously bad at giving ranged options to enemies.
Plus, Barbs have a bit better movement than some other classes like fighters, and it's not like they do no damage at mid range with javelins and the giant barbarian- enough to close the gap in the ordinary encounter.
@@darkestlight660I agree on the first paragraph; I was talking about ranged options for characters, not enemies.
The second one is moot though; it doesn't matter if you grab some extra speed somewhere if the enemy is in the air. A dragon doesn't even need to get in range of Javelins to wipe out Barbs, all of which have zero resistance to the breath if not Totem.
Likewise, if a caster makes an area no-go, or puts up a Wall of Force, or many other possibilities, the Barb is screwed.
It isn't like Barbs have great stealth capability, can send in a familiar, can scry, or any other scouting ability - the best they get is via a subclass and is largely negated in a dungeon. This means they don't get to pick their battles like Rogues, Wizards, etc. So having battles that just nope them is potentially campaign ending.
@@RJWhitmore flying enemies aren't that common, even dragons tend to be rare. Enemies with wall of force arguably even more so.
Again, I don't think it's unfair to bring up the possibility, but they are absolutely not common enough in the game to justify giving a full team of barbarians a C in combat. Even a shield and spear Zealot barb with polearm master does great damage with reckless attack.
Looking for this comment as I thought a Tier C or D tier is a bit harsh. I would give them a solid B. I felt like Monty was just looking to create a no-win scenario for an all barbarian party, as opposed to looking at the general big picture of things. I do think things like Forcecage or Wall of Force would be super problematic, but that holds true for most parties.
I think about action economy and HP, and in that regard a barbarian is going to move fast and hit hard. Can their HPs last longer than a spellcaster's spell slots. I think it would be super fun and many clever ways to get around an encounter - I like the idea of a barbarian throwing barbarians on top of a dragon.
My friend did an all barbarian oneshot that was based on the Barbie movie. It was a lot of fun! I did an Isabelle beast barbarian build and it was amazing!
This is where breaking the rule and having one be a Valor Bard would help enormously. The Bard is there to tell the chronicle of the three barbarians. Yes, I know the rules are only one class with no MC, so it doesn't work given the thematic rules, but one skald along for the ride would deal with a lot of the weaknesses that only barbarians have without breaking the theme.
Yeah, I wasn't expecting the all-barbarian party to be ranked as the least effective, but you make good points. This is where the race, feats and background are especially important.
Also,
The idea of a buddy cop film staring Conan and Kratos is hilarious. I would love to see that happen.
My all-barbie team:
Captain Caveman (with some Teen Angels as lackeys, henchwomen, or hirelings)
Tazmanian Devil (spinning attack!)
Animal (from the Muppets... with just a touch of Bard?)
and their leader: Gary King (from The World's End)
I am surprised that Hulk was never brought up
He is Path of the Giant.
My mind goes to the DS9 episode "Blood Oath".
Exactly that (2:37) happened in one of the three movies! They even had a battering ram with "Knock! Knock!" written on it.
This might be a little unconventional, but you could potentially use Ancestral Guardians as a ranged barbarian with great results. It is true they can go neither reckless nor add their rage modifier to their shots, but they'll gain some significant benefits as a result:
a) You get to keep rage going, as the attack to keep rage going does not need to be melee.
b) Your AC will benefit substantially, and your DEX saves will be very good (advantage against DEX saves you can see)
c) You're the guy shutting down enemy long range attackers. It might be just one per turn, but being able to grant disadvantage to an enemy on attack rolls from a long distance is pretty significant here - they'll of course try to focus you down but now you can use stuff like cover, and your AC helps.
d) You fill in the ranged gap this group had suffered from.
I'm currently playing a purposely non-ideal Goblin barbarian (because I had a cool character idea), and I think the build I used would actually fit an all-Barbarian party really well, utilizing something you guys dismissed out of hand: Ancestral Guardians.
Goblins get disengage (and hide, but that's less relevant) as a bonus action, and paired with the Ancestral Guardian ability to hit a creature and impose disadvantage against any attack they make that isn't targeting you, it opens up a strategy of landing an attack on a boss-like monster then disengaging and stepping out of range while your party members surround it and are even more unkillable than normal. They could even all use reckless attack with impunity, since they'll only face a straight roll against them. Any time you're in a combat with a single enemy (or a single focus), this amplifies what this party does well.
But I think that does speak to what an all-barbarian campaign has to be: The ultimate survival meat-grinder campaign. Anything else is going to be unsatisfying. But I gotta say, playing an all-barbarian party in that kind of game sounds pretty awesome....
This party would make a killer Power Metal band.
@@ActualChef Grail Knights and Pumping Iron Power
I have the opposite perspective about creativity with spellcasters versus non spellcasters. Having to solve a problem with less complex tools necessitates a more creative solution to accomplish it. If I need to jump across a gap that's way too far, casting levitate is not a creative solution as much as it's an easy win button. Having to use your environment more complexly is much more satisfying IMO. All DM willing, though. Some DMs won't afford the players a lot of options when it comes to rube Goldberg type solutions.
99% of the time, spellcasters have access to the same degree of roleplaying and skills usage so that's a false dichotomy; nothing prevents casters from coming up with and using non-spell solutions
@@matiskrawiec But them having spells means why would they come up with a creative solution when they can just cast something that fixes it more easily? My point is having no spells FORCES a PC to come up with a probably more complex but more creative solution.
@@MrFlyingLamma Because maybe you'd want to save the spells lot for later?
Also, creative use of spells is a thing. Climbing and tying a rope is more creative than flying, but I'd argue that levitating a barrel to which you tied the rope is equally creative. Double points if the place in question was non-scalable like a floating island in which case creative solutions were shafted in the first place.
It's like ingredients: no matter how creative you are with 5 of them, you have the wiggle room to be more creative with an additional 5 ingredients.
@@matiskrawiec I guess I just see the lack of 5 ingredients as an opportunity to add my own ingredients I brought to the table in my own head and not on my character sheet. Or if they are on my character sheet like use of tool proficiencies or other niche features I can use in a more creative way.
Like for example an all barb party dealing with a spellcaster, some would say it's a problem, and I would look at it and say the impotence should be on the players to understand they have a flaw and how they should work around it, like throwing smoke bombs so the spellcaster can't target them or setup a system for shielding themselves from mental intrusion somehow.
@@MrFlyingLamma But you can bring those 5 imaginary ingredients regardless of how many are on your character sheet.
If you have 50 creative ways to cook an egg on a frying pan, do you forget 20 of them if I give you an air fryer? No, you get 50 creative ideas for pan frying AND X amount of creative ideas to air fry it. Creativity and roleplay are a given and equal.
I would love to see a return to see this concept with a Multiclass version of this. How could you use multiclassing to account for all the weaknesses in these parties? It would probably have to be each taking a different multiclass. Then there’s the idea that not all multiclasses are created equal, so which members would be better off for multiclassing and which may even be hampered by it?
Thanks dudes! ❤
I've done something similar to this for an actual campaign.
The setting was a basic Tower Defense campaign. The Barbarian Tribes were defending against the Kingdoms Army, who were seeking to take the land because of gold mines.
Party was to start at lv5 but their first three levels had to be Barbarian. For the setting.
Three of the 5 players decided to go full Barb Builds. Totem, Ancestral, and Beast.
The other two took their 2 extra levels in Fighter and Ranger respectively, and upon their first level up, took Battle Master and Beast Master.
Crazy timing, my group just did this with Lost mines of phandelin. We all went lizardfolk barbarians roleplaying as brothers all from the same swamp village. Lots of shouting "BROTHER!" and not a lot of int. Now that we're continuing into higher levels most are multiclassing.
"13th Warrior" movie would make a great campaign!
I love the idea of an all barbarian party with the dragon as the big bad . I think that would be really cool that they have to work up to the dragon instead of just like curb stomping it with a regular party right away
I agree with everything you guys said on an individual level, but I don't think it adds up to be as big a problem as you're suggesting once you place it in world context rather than game context.
If we're a group of barbarians in a fantasy setting, we know our limitations, and we also know there are things like boots of flying that can overcome them.
Magic and magic items are as much a part of that world as arrows, plate mail, and spell components; if we're going to consider the characters having access to their own world's resources, then magical itens enabling you to use your strengths needs to be considered as well.
If we're just considering the game side of looking at dnd, then that does come with the problem that your dm has to enable that, but I would argue that your dm preventing access to those things would be a negative interference, rather than enabling them being a positive interference.
The "oops, all Schwarzenegger" build
I cannot disagree with your points, and I would also give them such a grade for how hard players have to work for out-of-scope utilities, but I do think that this is possibly one of the most exciting possible groups. I would eagerly craft a campaign honed for specifically making everyone feel like the king murder hobos they want to be, and creating challenges for this hurricane of physical force. I'd basically take notes from Gears of War.
1 aarakocra and 1 Goliat spear thrower, and the rest are gnomes, ODST barbarian drop troops and balistic gnome artilleri 💪
I think probably the best move is to just take the Barbarian's strengths in stride and pick everything else, background, feats, races, to cover weaknesses instead. Thats hyper-optimizing, though.
EDIT: Maybe *1* Barbarian's Barbarian, but otherwise you grab flying races, backgrounds that offer proficiency in non combat skills, and feats that offer some minimal casting.
I'm assuming the heritage is not a component of these topics but if we're evaluating the necessity of magic items then it's also fair to consider the importance of Faerie, Aarakocra, and Shadar-kai or Eladrin Elves to counter the range/fly issue and having teleportation available for forcecage and force wall. My faerie ancestral guardian barbarian with sentinel hasn't had any problems with flying encounters and has quite enjoyed dropping a few bad guys from 60' to loosen their tongue.
there is thankfully the Oversized Longbow from Waterdeep: Dragon Heist that REQUIRES a strength score of 18 and deals 2d6+STR damage
so while you might not hit very often you will at least hit VERY hard
The barb that goes sword and board could play a gnome for advantage on mental stat saving throws.
Yuan-ti > Gnome
@@chrisg8989 True, but not every table is going to let you play a Yuan-ti as where you'd be hard pressed to find a table that bans gnomes.
@@maulkixx740 That's why Vedalken is a nice compromise if you don't want to go with a Small race and use heavy weapons. Has its pluses and minuses. Haven't heard of a DM banning Vedalken, but I'm sure a very few do.
An interesting build to help shore up the range challenge is a path of the giant barbarian that takes sharpshooter and then throws missiles. You then get a range of 120ft as a huge creature giving you slightly more reach. You could also take a feat for fighting style archery to make it more accurate or the throwing fighting style for a bit more damage.
This is the first party where I am more excited to run than play. I would enjoy playing but I would love to run this game and give the party a few items/tools and watch them overcome. Maybe an axe that has bathed in the blood of so many wizards that it causes a dispel magic effect on a crit. Fun things like that.
First instinct would be to have this as a wilderness campaign but I think it might be more interesting to have a Barbarian party of brothers going into a city to recover a runaway or kidnapped member of their family. You'd probably need to provide an npc companion for some of the social and investigation encounters but they could probably find someone to press gang into that role.
The 13th warrior pops into my head its an older movie but if you haven't seen it before don't sleep on it
Love that movie.
I don't thing an all Barbarian party would really have as much trouble with ranged/flying enemies as you think.
Sure, the Giant Path allows you to add your Rage bonus to thrown weapons, but that doesn't mean that no other barbarians can throw wile raging, or even use any other ranged weapons while raging. You still use Strength for attack and damage with all thrown weapons, just don't get the Rage bonus, unless you are Giant.
That said, given barbarians wear, at best, Medium Armor (or go unarmored with their Unarmored Defense feature) you would then likely have a decent Dex score (about 14 with Medium Armor, or sacrifice some Con for higher Dex with UD) so you could still effectively use other ranged weapons (Bows, Crossbows or, if campaign allows, guns) even while raging.
In fact, one could actually make a Dex based Barbarian (high Dex and Con with UD or Light Armor) who focus more on Ranged Combat. Likely still have a bit of Strength for engaging in melee if needed. Though, best (and perhaps only) subclass I think would best suit a Dex Barbarian would be... the Ancestral Guardian, as its features (mainly Ancestral Protector) only requires you to make an attack (melee or ranged, don't matter) while raging.
I think every dnd party is S tier or D Tier depending on the Dm and Campaign. Barbarians and Fighter can pretty much go all day with a couple short rest. Where’s the wizards and sorcerers and do world changing things over time. It is so fine to just experience a different campaign for the Barbs than the nerds
I can agree on the C, but not the D, and here's why: this is the first party combination that's going to heavily rely on race and feat choice. Flying enemies won't be a problem if you have a pixie, Arakora, owlin, or Gem Dragonborn. Likewise, force cage or Wall of Force can be overcome by taking an Astral Elf with their 30foot teleport [proficiency] times per day.
And if the DM makes it an Eberon campaign and allows everyone to take dragon marks, all the better. There's loads of options there.
And here's the heretical idea: Not all the Barbarians have to be on the front line raging. A Barbarian who took some support options in race or feat, like the Pixie. The Pixie can cast enlarge/reduce at 5th level. They can absolutely take rear guard and then come off the top rope with the steel chair when they get tagged in.
While listening to this, they mentioned range on thrown weapons being bad... and I had an idea.
Halfling barbarian picks up javelin.
Normal human regular sized barbarian picks up halfling barbarian.
Giant barbarian picks up human barbarian.
Human and halfling barbarian set 'held actions' for 'when I am thrown...'
Giant barbarian throws human barbarian who throws halfling barbarian who throws javelin.
Fast-faster-fastest-ball Special!
Second giant barbarian with some way of getting Enlarge/Reduce cast on them to bring it up a level. And/or have the javelin be thrown by a fairy barbarian, thrown by the halfling barbarian...
@@ala5530 Dibs on naming it - "The Matryoshka Fastball Special"!!! ⚾🪆🤯
I would totally want to see the Barbarian party comprised of Ah-nold variants from “Kindergarten Cop”, “Jingle all the way” and “Batman & Robin”…they all expressed the same unbridled requisite rage…
I feel that in a y’all are right if we’re just talking about a bare knuckle fight but there are also plenty of equipment options to shore up most shortfalls
Mythic Heracles (Hercules to the Romans) was a rage filled killing machine, and he would absolutely be a barbarian in D&D.
RAGHHHH! Barbs are my favorite class and this was great!
I once played a barbarian in an Arabian nights/blood on the sand campaign. I as the lizardfolk beast barbarian with a shield, was the only one to have kept their original character alive.
I've run an all-barb campaign (albeit, back in 3.5 rather than 5e). Sure, they struggled vs. prepared casters, but flying enemies? Wasn't a problem. Turns out if the flying enemy is low enough to hit them with a ranged attack, they're probably close enough that one barb with a Ring of Jumping can fastball special another barb close enough to land melee hits/grapples.
Ranged enemies? Ain't nothing stopping a barbarian from packing an arbalest, or a longbow. Sure, their DEX isn't going to be pumped quite as high as, say, a Rogue, and they won't be getting Rage bonuses, but their raw STR is going to be high enough to use the really high poundage stuff that's traditionally gated behind a minimum STR the Rogue could only dream of.
For that matter, my signature character build, from 3.0e through 4e and PF1 was an elven DEX-Barbarian (and I almost got it to work in 5e, just need a little tuning. OK, a lot of tuning- the move to a simplified skill proficiency system really hurt it). Ranged combat is not as much of a problem as you think it might be.
I'll grant, however, that the Social and Exploration pillars of play can easily be their downfall, if the party is limited to rollplay rather than roleplay. It definitely relies more on player ability and imagination rather than raw stats and mechanics.
Regardless, it is a ton of fun.
The first long term campaign I ran three of the four players showed up with a barbarian of some kind. One of them was a barbarian-sorcerer. We got probably 6 months into that campaign before I started dreading it because of the lack of variety of encounters I could present the party with.
Leaning into the Conan theme a low magic, sword and sorcery campaign would make this more enjoyable.
Monty spittin' truths. It's not that barbarians are a lame fantasy or something. It's just a class that has unfortunately has some significant problems in 5e, and the concept of a barbarian-only party brings those shortcomings front and center.
*Conan, Kratos, Red Sonja, Dar the Beastmaster enter the chat*
You could have a great diverse team between conan the barbarian and conan the destroyer: thulsa doom, conan, zula, bombaata, red sonya
Dar the Beastmaster is a name I haven't heard in a long time...a long time.
I was thinking more like Thundar or Heman.
For my all-Barbarian party, I'd go Giant, Zealot, Beast, and Wild Magic. Giant Barbarian allows for tactical positioning and more reliable ranged damage. Beast and Wild Magic have some buffing/debuffing potential, and Beast can also do some semi-tanking if they grow a tail. As for Zealot, that's the Barbarian I would use as the "healer" (ie they take the Healer feat and Herbalism kit proficiency to brew healing potions), for no other reason than because Zealot is the most Paladin adjacent Barbarian subclass.
I think race selection and background would be a HUGE component to making this party work.
The party would have to plan it out in advance, but there are so many powers and available to the group with proper Race choice and background choice.
Finally, the Barbarian is HERE!!!!!!! In the book "Odyssey of the Dragonlords" that i am running right now with my dnd group there is a subclass called Herculean path where the barbarian get the ability to be a range bow user because it gives you the ability to use strength as a modifier. Also as I like to do in my games i always have the range weapons the just uses strength as a modifier period. Like a mini cannon, or mini portable Ballista. So in my games range for a Barbarian is never an issue. You can always use STR for Intimidation, and for my homebrew rules you can use Wisdom or intelligence for persuasion if i allow it when they are clever about it.
My favorite barbarian I ever made was a goblin Zealot barbarian. I worked with my DM because I wanted her to be Dex based. We modified rage so that instead of relying on strength, we used Dex. I described her rage like that of a snake, cold and calculating. She dual wielded scimitars and was a menace in combat. Since I wasn't worried about strength I was able to bump up her intelligence and charisma. She was so fun to play.
Dragons gotta get in range to use the breath weapon, two barbarians hold their actions , one holds to throw the other the other readies a grapple, dragon gets grounded, everyone dog piles.
I am reminded of Heracles facing the Nemean Lion. The Lion had skin so thick that no weapon could hurt it and claws so sharp that they could cut anything. Heracles defeated it by wrestling it and forcing it to cut itself with its own claws. THAT's your Barbarians facing enemies with resistances and immunities to melee damage types.
If I recall, Heracles killed the lion by strangling it. He only used its own claws on itself after death to secure its pelt.
I realize that this comparison has been made before with one or more of the group videos. But I realized that Barbarians are essentially power rangers. They are strong, but normal people, who enter a special "battle transformation" that elevates them to supehuman levels that let them take on things they wouldn't be able to deal with otherwise.
All they are missing is a set of battle mechs.
Interesting choice of subclasses.. my picks would be the following:
Totem warrior for some utility.
Storm Herald for some versatility (minor as it is), but it also has the smallest of niche utility abilities.
Berserker for their level 6 ability.
The last one is a toss up between a beast or giant barbarian depending on what sort of campaign it is going to be.
I know that berserker and storm herald aren't good subclasses, but they do bring something that the party might like. The berserker can't be charmed and the storm herald can provide temp hp, a range attack that can knock enemies prone at later levels, ignite flamsble objects (if the party doesn't have darkvision), provide a resistance in an aura.
But those are just my thoughts.
Storm herald acting like a pseudo-twilight cleric and giving THP each round should not be underestimated. Also they can share their elemental resistance, which makes certain dragon encounters MUCH more manageable.
@@christopherwilliamsA That's what i was thinking, but i do also like that they can freeze water as an action. I might be wrong about this, but it says that the 5ft cube of water they freeze thaws after a minute so they could make a pseudo bridge out of ice if they act quickly enough.
I just realised! Terry Pratchetts "Silver Horde" = "The Expandable"
Thorcqin is still one of my favorite characters. He is a fighter barbarian who really has to fight tactically and does make good use of magic items to overcome his weaknesses, resulting in a very fast flying barbarian that is immune to many conditions and who can regenerate hitpoints. He also keeps a forcebreaker club on him at all times just in case. He does well in a party, but most threats he can just blow through and destroy on his own. There are still plenty of weaknesses in higher tier play, but he is still a very powerful brute. That is essentially how one would have to play an all barbarian party, similar to fighters and rogues where they really need to get tactical both in and out of fights.
The all barbarian party’s weaknesses is what would make it fun
You can somewhat overcome the ranged limitations of a Barbarian party by building a Zealot as your ranged character since the OGL Zealot (not sure about OD&D) can add its damage rider to ranged attacks...plus the Giant Barbarian can help them in a pinch. Racial features like the Eladrin's teleportation can get around some magic problems.
Races can help a lot here. Take those who can fly (a giant barb, who can carry others), take elves with not-spells teleports (there is even one eladrin, who can teleport others), take tabaxies with speed and climb, maybe someone with swim....
You were too focused on classical barbs like humans and orcs!
Here is a feat that is constantly over looked, the Chef feat. It give Temp HP and heals for 1d8 BUUUTTT...
If you look at the expanded tool use in Xanathar's Cook's Utensils let's everyone eating the food you make heal by one HP per hit dice spent. Doesn't seem like its worth it but considering most the the healing done in this group would be long rest or taking short rests and rolling hit dice. That one extra HP is like everyone has one extra in their CON mod. Now someone can also take the Healer feat. Over time both of those do add up to a significant amount healing.
You could also look at other races that give spells. Air Genasi both Feather Fall and Levitate once per day. Being a wood elf means you can get Wood Elf Magic and that gets the team Longstrider and Pass without Trace.
A while back I ran an Icewind Dale campaign with 7 players. Three played barbarians and we didn't have any sort of healing, but they managed to brute force their way to ending the eternal winter (for anyone who's curious the other 4 characters consisted of 2 rogues, an artificer and a wizard).
7 players? that sounds exhausting.
My best team:
Beast barb with tavern brawler and expertise in Athletics: The Grappler
Wolf Totem Barb: Makes the others less reliant on reckless. GWM+PAM
Ancestral Guardian with a high dex and and longbow. Snipe enemies from range to give them disadvantage. Get the Healer feat too.
Giant Barb with PAM+Sentinel. Lock down enemies with your reach. Also throw stuff.
Ancestries: Aarakococra, Aasimar, Variant human, Eladrin, Shifter, gem dragonborn and goblins all bring some interesting features to the table. Yuan-ti, Tieflings and Satyrs for the resistances too.
Thank youuuuu I've been so excited for this one thank you
Fairies with strixhaven (or other magic) initiate feats. Comes with a handful of nominally useful spells. Eladrin, shadar-kai. You're thinking way too inside the box, and rage is not required to run at all times. Lots of feats also grant access to various tools for lockpicking, smithing hand axes, herbalism kits... I played a winged tiefling with a prismari student I already had high wis, because a barbarian has to be perceptive, and at one point I had to fly up 80 feet and lob firebolts because I had two hp, and rage wasn't going to save me.
Another run I played a fairy path of the beast in an all barbarian party, and was super powerful support with JUST enlarge reduce. One dude climbed a cathedral and jumped on the dragon's back, and I was able to fly within range and enlarge him. We killed the dragon in a round or two. We all had decent stealth because we prioritized dex for unarmored defense, which also made longbows very effective. I think barbarians can get up to a lot of shenanigans that casters simply aren't expecting, and a party playing all barbarians is definitely going to pull out all the stops to make a B tier group. Someone is going to want to be the smart one, they can all arguably use strength in lieu of charisma for most persuasion and intimidation checks, because they probably have abs for miles and probably don't wear much, (barring that, someone always wants high charisma). I bet if you two got together with some of the other optimizers like Colby and DnD shorts, you'd come up with something approaching S tier. ...and path of the giant can absolutely hurl the others at flying enemies... That's what my goblin barbarian in a princess dress did.
That's the thing with barbarians. Slow, time stop, hypnotic pattern, force cage, wall of force, invisible enemies, flight, area of effect spells like web or grease and any sort of soft stat change would shut this party down. In a world of magic you have to have someone with you to help with your enemies casting spells at you or you're at their mercy.
Barbarian cop - Sir Samuel "Sam" Vimes. Especially in the version of PHB 2024.
I think this party would be really fun if the DM crafted the adventure around it. You could even go old school with it and make lovable hireling NPCs that shore up some of the weaknesses of the party, like how Conan had his rogue and wizard buddies for the parts of his adventure that he needed help with (infiltrating Thulsa Doom's temple, dealing with the demoness lady etc).
Kelly has the best shirts, nice throwback!