the magic find frenzy barb

[Keluthas]

introduction:

everybody is talking about magic find sorceresses, but i have thought about a magic find barbarian. you guys can suggest, comment or rate, this build.

1. skills
2. stats.
3. inventory
4. merc
5. strategies and suggestions


skills
this barb works on a frenzy skill, aswell as a skill in warcries called find item. yes you all have seen this skill but nobody really thinks, wow maybe this could work, but i have found a way.
skills you must max:
the only skills you really need to max are frenzy and find item.
other points...
10 double swing - synergy to frenzy
10 iron skin- great defense bonus!
10 natural resistance- great passive for all barbs
1 bash- needed to get frenzy
1 double throw- also needed for frenzy
1 increased stamina- just a useful skill
1 increased speed- useful
put about 5 in sword mast, but can put more, 5 is minimum

stats

strength, vitality, and dexerity are the stats you need. you can spread out ur stats in your own choice. i chose to put strength at 165, dexterity at 150 and vitality at 125 i left energy at the base number of stats, im currently lv 70. you can spread your skills out in any of the 3 mentioned. but quite a high vitality is needed.

inventory

helm: try get a harlequin crest shako and socket it with an ist rune if you can get one, otherwise a perfect topaz will also work. if you cant find one, look at a steelskull casque.
weapons: try get 2 non ethereal blade of alibaba tulwars with 2 sockets, and socket them with a shael and an ist rune, shael is needed because their speed is slow. i cant think of any other weapon needed, but these arent that rare so you should be able to get them.
armor: first option is an enigma can be dusk shroud, archon plate, doesnt matter really, or skullders ire ruset armor, but the teleport from enigma is very useful, so try get an enigma.
rings: 2 nagelrings
amulet: try get a maras because the 2 skills are useful aswell as the other mods.
gloves: chance guards great mf
belt: you could either use a goldwrap heavy belt or a string of ears, i chose string of ears as it has life steal aswell as dmg reduct.
boots: war travellers will be the best option.

merc
go for a nightmare act 2 defensive merc with holy freeze, this way you can kill your enemies easier, and its easier to escape from big armies of monsters.
give him also an enigma or a skullders ire. and a shako, with a topaz/ ist if possible. try get a tomb reaver cryptic axe - it has great mf. or even an infinity as not bad mf. if you cant get either just get a meatscraper lochaber axe for 25 mf, but if youre looking to get your merc on high dmg, go for a botd, or a doom.

strategies

the way this character works is that, he kills people with frenzy going really fast, then uses find item to get great items. the way find item works is that it will give you only what it can, for example, when you use it on a unique monster it will give you what it normally does, which is 4 potions and an item or two, so it basically gives a double dosage of the items the monster you kill gives. and your mf works here just as it does when a monster drops an item normally. i have found many rare, unique, set and magic items. it really is useful. if you have an enigma, the teleport is also very useful as you can get awat from monsters quickly when in trouble.

please feel free to comment and or give suggestions on my first build thanks a lot

oh yes forgot to add very important: gheeds fortune and anni is also pretty useful to have.

[kwittstruck]

Sounds like a great idea for MF.Ive got 3 MF type charactors, never thought of a barb doing it. My sc necro is mf and i also am working on a sorceress MF both sitting at little over 200. I really want to get that at 300-400 each. SP so its a little more difficult to gain the items needed for high MF. anyway gl to you, let me know how it turns out.

PS: does that find item work with act bosses?

[saracen85]

since this is a general build, it's probably better to ask the mod to move this to the barb forums where more people can give their points of view..

here in SP, it's kinda hard to get certain items like enigma, infinity and annihilus is certainly unavailable unless you use a certain mod =)

[Keluthas]

no unfortunately not :( but that would be awsome!!

will move it now :)

im pretty much new to this, can you tell me how to move it to the barb forum??

[kwittstruck]

Mod has to move it pretty much, cause if we could then the whole forum would get messed up with a bunch of ppl moving threds where they "think" it should go, Best to have 3-4 ppl only that can do that (Mods/Admin)

[Habit88]

i would go with diff weps and have the ali baba's on switch.

[Skullcaptain]

Hmmm... Should try this out one day

;)

[DK_MelMan]

Hmmm... Ever heard of resist? :) That build wouldn't survive a second in Hell... Maybe 1 second! :)

Ist in Shako = 25MF
Perf Topaz in Shako = 24MF

I don't think that 1 MF make a huge difference, and a pgem is a billion times cheaper!

2 x Heart Carver could also be a funny weapon to have on switch. I've often thought about that, but I've never made a good enough Barb! But Heart Carver has 4+ Find Item.

Does MF work with the Find Item skill? Or does it depend on how many points you put in it!

[Keluthas]

Hmmm... Ever heard of resist? :) That build wouldn't survive a second in Hell... Maybe 1 second! :)


2 x Heart Carver could also be a funny weapon to have on switch. I've often thought about that, but I've never made a good enough Barb! But Heart Carver has 4+ Find Item.

Does MF work with the Find Item skill? Or does it depend on how many points you put in it!

natural resistance will up your resists, and so will maras with a + 25 - 30 all resists, you can put your skill points on natural resist and sword mastery, spread between them.

never thought of heart carvers... will try them out too!

and if you put enough skills on iron skin, your def will be over 5000, which is pretty good!

[saracen85]

usually people prefer shout to iron skin...

[Keluthas]

i chose iron skin, but you could use shout if you want to, and for resists, in nm act 5 i have full resists, but in hell, im sure it will decrease, so you could put moer skills in nat resist, or find resist small charms.

and i tries using the heart carvers, wasnt as good, only upped the chance of finding a item with find item by 2 percent, and decreased my a r by quite a lot, as my alibabas give 30 to dex all together, so it wasnt really worth it, but i have them as switch weapons.

[saracen85]

btw, how efficiently/fast do you kill with alibabas? they're slow and have poor damage. plus you don't have a fully synergized frenzy (or at least 1 full synergy), means you'll deal a pretty low damage.

rune masters with 5 ists each seem so much better in terms of damage. or mixture or shaels/ists for the balance between damage/speed..

imo mf-ing is all about speed. faster kills = more drops in the long run. barbs are already disadvantaged in this area as compared to casters (due to monsters physical resists, chance to hit dependency, need to engage monsters toe-to-toe etc..), so anything to speed up kills should be implemented.

as for iron skin, not really a necessary skill to put in. 1 hard point is enough since +skills from gear would boost it well. these points should go into a frenzy synergy or shout/bo if you choose survivability.

as to shout vs iron skin debate, the former trumps due to the fact that it lengthens your bo/bc + party friendly =)

[Keluthas]

the alibabas arent that bad with frenzy and the shaels but yes youre right the rune masters would do better, i will try them out! thanks!

the alibabas arent that bad with frenzy and the shaels but yes youre right the rune masters would do better, i will try them out! thanks!

[DK_MelMan]

natural resistance will up your resists, and so will maras with a + 25 - 30 all resists, you can put your skill points on natural resist and sword mastery, spread between them.

never thought of heart carvers... will try them out too!

and if you put enough skills on iron skin, your def will be over 5000, which is pretty good!

I know, but lvl 10 Natural Resist is only around 50 if I remember correct, and with a Mara 30, you have 80 all res in total - On Normal!... On Hell difficulty you'll have close to nothing, even with the Resist Scrolls you get from Anya quest!

[Orbit Hero]

you forgot about anni and torch if those are ubtainable and/or mentioned in this guide. Personally I love this guide. I like Barbs, I like to mf, and something new is always fun, so wth, it sounds awesome.

I would give the merc skullders tho, hence he probably will teleport with you ;)
Maybe some mf sc's if you want the extra mf....
I'd keep the ali babas....maybe 2 6socketed Ist PBs....but that isn't as good as ali baba i dont think....

anyway, good guide! i'd rate it..... like 8/10 or 4 stars ;)

EDIT: at dk melman, you're only about lvl 79 with the skill choices I believe, so you have more room for more skill points. you could always add more to Nat Res...or if you wanted you could always change around the skills to your liking. keluthas is just making suggestions. :)

[DK_MelMan]

^^ I know... But what's the point of making a char with great MF, if you die as soon as you see a monster? :)

And Natural Resist doesn't get much higher. lvl 20 doesn't even reach 70 all res! I would any time prefer CoH. Then you'll get some MF AND get A LOT res, enough to get Max all res in Hell difficulty if I've calculated it right!!... And Anni and Torch isn't availiable on SP! And Enigma is close to impossible to get too! :)