By:Zer0-unit -Welcome back to my guide!
So..Some of you have a Wolfhowl sitting in your stash, other seek how to make a Wolfbarb..Want to make use of it or find a place of information? You came to the right place this guide will tell you how!
I. Introduction
II. Stat point distribution
III. Skill point placement
IV. Equipment
V. Charms
VI. Strategy
VII. General Information
VIII. Credits
I. Introduction-
In the vast peak of Mount Arreat had once stood a formed alliance within the Barbarians and Druids, the relationship between the two tribes were strong together. However it came to a day where King Bul-Kathos and Master Fiacla-Gear were thrown into augment about the period of the Uilescadh Mor, the final bout with Man and Demons. So it came to past that the leaders have chosen their seperate ways. Many Barbarians of Mount Arreat had taken sides with Fiacla-Gear to study the arts of the Caol Dulra, the nature arts of the druidic ways. In time of these teachings the students were able to moprh and change their bodies to now become Werewolves! Now, these warriors stand in the fight of the Uileloscadh Mor.
II. Stat point distribution-
To get started, stat points are the skeleton to a successful Wolfbarb. How you displace them later gives results how well your Wolfbarb performs. There are some things to consider when doing your status points such as life, damage, block, attack rating, and defense. For best results follow this.
Strength: Strength, this would only be important for wearing your equipment. For the fact that each point of strength is 1% enchanced damage a Wolfbarb's damage won't be greatly suppled by it. Find out your highest strength requirement and find out any added from equipment or charms. Add a minimal amount.
Dexterity: Now for those who are using shields dexterity plays a role in the chance to block. This is based on your level and how much dexterity you need, Formula: (2*clvl*75/Shield Block)+15. So an example for a level 85 Barbarian using a Stormshield would be (2*85*75/72)+15=193 dexterity for maximum block. dexterity also adds attack rating and defense, the attack rating would be formulated: ((Dex*5)-35+class bonus= base AR, so an example on 193 dex would be ((193*5=965)-35+20=950 base AR. As for defense every 4 poins of dexterity provides 1 defense.
Vitality: This is probably the most important of all your stats, life! The main advantage of a Wolfbarb is the insane life bonus's you can achieve. After strength and dexterity has been taken care of drop your remaining stats into here, each point of vitality gives 4 life. Teamed with Werewolf, Lycanthropy, and Battle orders gives a good sum of life.
Energy: Energy? There's no need for energy here, Battle orders adds enough for PvP or PvM.
III. Skill point placement-
Now to get to the meat of the Wolfbarb, every class has its advantages and disadvantages when it comes to skills. Wolfbarbs get a great advantage in this area, where as they draw strenght from Combat masteries and Warcrys. Heres a list of skills to follow.
20 to -Weapon- Mastery: Depending on your weapon of choice, choosing a weapon mastery will increase your damage and attack rating. Per point this skill grants 5% damage/ 8% attack rating/ Critical strike based on skill level.
20 to Iron Skin: This skill increases your base defense by a % making your oponents chance to hit minimal. Starting at 30% per point this skill grants 10% base def.
20 to Shout: Another defense modifyer this multiplys your over all defense by a % making you an even harder stone to break. Starting at 100% per point this grants 10% over all defense.
20 to Battle Orders: The main life mod for any Barbarian. This increases your maximum life, mana, and stamina by a %. Per point this skill grants 3% life/mana/stamina.
1 to Howl: A prequesite for Shout, Battle Orders, and Battle Command.
1 to Increase Stamina: A prequesite for Increase Speed.
1-5 to Increase Speed: Makes you run/walk faster, has its advantages over other runners.
1-10 to Natural Resist: Natural Resist is fairly useful for those who plan on fighting casters or elemental/melee, even those of monsters that have powerful attacks.
1-10 to Battle Command: A skill that increases every other skill by 1 point. Only add more to this skill if you wan extended cry duration. The extra extended time could outlast your Werewolf duration.
IV. Equipment-
Here we get to the skin of a Wolfbarb. Equipment! Here you want to look for faster hit recovery, attack speeds, defense, damage, and life in your gear. There will be two sides to this, battle equipment and prebuff gear. This also includes options for both rich and poor.
The Weapon-
A Wolfbarb is not tied to any specific weapon. Depending on the speed or damage you want will determine what you use. Usually you either go for the slower but more powerful or the faster and less powerful, to figure the speeds refer to TheDragoons calculator here . (Use the Normal Attack speed chart. The Feral chart is inaccurate.) Your weapon of choice would correspond to the correct -Weapon- Mastery you choose. Some weapons I would suggest are.
Lightsabre Phase Blade
Baranars Star Devil Star
Aldurs Rythm Jagged Star
Breath of the Dying:
Grisworlds Redemption Caduceus
Beast:
Azurewrath Phase Blade
DeathCleaver Berserker Axe
The Armor-
For your armor slot you would want to use this as your main source of defense. Iron Skin and Shout would receive most of its defense bonus from this. Seek an armor within the defense ranges of 1500-2000+ defense with likeable mods. Some armor of choice are.
Que-Hagens Wisdom Mage/Archon Plate
Shaftstop Mesh/Boneweave Armor
Stone:
Steel Carapace Shadow Plate
Arkaine's Valor Balrog Skin
Enigma:
Stone:
The Helm-
Your most obvious choice for a helm is a Wolfhowl! I really couldnt recomend another. it offers good defense, your shifting capabilities, 2-3 to Warcrys, and most importantly you only wolf attack. Belive it or not Feral Rage does help your damage and attack rating quite a bit, and has two nice additions. Life leech for PvM'ers and faster run/walk for any kinds of runners and caster killing.
The Shield-
As far as I know for all players a shield can be your best freind, PvP or PvM. As for those who like 2-handers That would only be useful as far as PvM. Refer to TheDragoons caclulator here for block speeds. However the shields I recomend are.
Sanctuary:
Spike Thorn Blade Barrier
Stormshield Monarch
Pheonix:
The Gloves-
Find a sutible glove that could help in places such as life, or hit recovery, even damage on the gloves. Gloves like these.
Bloodfist Heavy/Sharkskin/Vampirebone Gloves
Soul Drainer Vambraces
Dracul's Grasp Vampirebone Gloves
Steelrend Ogre gauntlets
The Boots-
For those who plan on fighting runners or such you may want to find a boot with a decent run/walk %. Otherwise find mods here similar to gloves or any other helpful mod. I suggest these boots.
Waterwalks Sharkskin/Scarabshell Boots
Wartravelers Battle/Mirror Boots
Sandstorm Treks Scarabshell Boots
Gorerider War Boots/Myrmidon Greaves
The Belt-
In this slot you would need to find phsyical damage reduction here and other helpful mods such as life. The belts of choice are.
String of Ears Demonhide Sash/Spiderweb Sash
Verdungo's Hearty Cord Mithril Coil
The Rings-
The rings are very helpful for the many mods rings can give you, look for attack rating and stats here. Find some rings like these.
Bul-Kathos Wedding Band Ring
Raven Frost Ring
Wisp Projector Ring
Angelic Halo Ring
The Amulet-
The amulet should correspond with your rings, combining them for maximum stat effect. The amulets I suggest are.
The Cat's Eye Amulet
Highlords Wrath Amulet
Mara's Kaleidoscope Amulet
Angelic Wings Amulet
Now we come to the prebuff side. Prebuff meaning that you acquire certain + all or skill tab skills and cast to improve any given stats. For maximum efficency especialy PvP you would want to have all your shift and Warcrys at the most it can be. The prebuff gear is lsited here.
Less unfortunate-
Arioc's Needle Hyperion Spear
Skin of the Vipermagi Serpent Skin/Wyrmhide Armor
Stone of Jordan/Bul-Kathos Wedding band Rings
The Eye of the Etlitch Amulet
Wolfhowl Fury Visor
More fortunate-
x2 Heart of the Oak's Flail
Chains of Honor -armor-
Stone of Jordan/Bul-Kathos Wedding Band Rings
Maras Kaleidoscope Amulet
Arachnids Mesh Spiderweb Sash
Wolfhowl Fury Visor
Well that's the end for equipment, but for those who need to find out about faster hit recovery once again refer here to TheDragoons calculator here .
V. Charms-
Charms! Who could play with out them. This offers a big importance to your wolfbarb search for these types of charms.
Assorted Small/Large/Grand Charms with attack rating, life, and maximum damage or hit recovery.
Annihilus Small Charm (If possible).
Combat Mastery Grand Charms with life or hit recovery.
VI. Strategy-
At last we are at the strategy part of the page! For all those duelist and PvM'ers this will tell you how to make the most of your Wolfbarb in certain cases.
For those who plan to be mage slayers, the advantage you have here is the fact you can take many many hits due to high life, speeds, and resist. Make use of the so helpful Anya quest do each of them 30 permanent resist you cant beat. Now Barbarians have this magical skill, Natural Resist puting at least 10 into this puts you well over the the 0 point. Make great use of Guardian Angel since it offer 15% to you maximum resist increasing its capacity, after that find ALL posible ways of gaining resistance either through 3-5 all resist charms or the Sanctuary runeword helps the most in this subject it offers 50-70 resist! Now the other things that casters do is that...they run! Or teleport, this becomes a problem you'de think but not for Wolfbarbs. Due to the awsome skill of Feral rage which offers an increase in run/walk speed up to 5 charges this teamed with Increase Speed and your boots would make a running force to be feared with. Since most casters have no really good source of hit recovery this is where you can shine in stunning them till they're dead find a really fast attacking weapon. Follow this and any caster would be toast. (Necromancers and Hammerdins will put up a tough fight.)
Howbout those Bowazons? Well the strategy kinda reflects upon the way of killing casters except most of them deal in physical damage. your plan here is to have maximum physical damage reduction, the "cannot be frozen" mod, top life, and the most run/walk you can acquire. In my experience of dueling Amazons I had seen that not many specailize in phsyical damage reduction and hit recovery so like casters a fast attacking weapon would be suitable for a case like this. The Feral Rage skill has its use here making it so that you would corner any Amazon.
Now for a melee subject, there are Barbarians and Paladins that have massive defense bonus making any one have a hard time hitting them. This kind of thing can be countered by the awarding attack rating Wolfbarbs can get. Being that there are five sources of attack rating it would make it posible for most defense to be peirced. Werewolf, -Weapon- Mastery, equipment, charms, and Feral Rage skill. So to make the most of your attack rating make sure you have the most of your prebuff as explained earlier in the guide. Your -Weapon- Mastery should be at its max, and you charms should be assorted life, attack rating, damage Small/Large/Grand Charms, finally the most important part of you attack rating set up the Angelic Halo/Wings combo this is very effective becuase when teamed together each ring gives 12 attack rating per level at 99 the attack rating given off is 1188. In the end your results should be within 26-30k or more attack rating.
As for the Werewolf Druid counter-part this should pose no problem towards us since they do not have the defense to compete with ours and constant attack speed like we do.
Leveling. Well we all have to go through it, and sadly Wolfbarbs get it bad. The best way I was able to level was to start with groups and play on through he game until level 24. Now It's important to conserve your skills so that later when developed, you can invest fully on your primary skills. After youv'e reached level 24 go as a group or have some high level take on the ancients and then proceed to Baal runs. Normally from there on you can leech upto level 44 and do Ancients yet again and on to Hell Baal runs. Most of the the time your a sitting duck becuase of Wolfhowls high level requirement however on the way of leveling you can make use of the Passion runeword which grants some nice skills.
That is about all the strategy information I have, unfortunatly for those of classes that have magic attacks I have no real strategy for them.
VII. General Information-
Well it's important to know your advantage and disadvantage to what ever you do as a Wolfbarb. Here is the list of those.
Advantages:
-Being frozen does not slow your attack speed at any frame.
-The speed you can go at is not limited. (4 frames being top which is fast enough.)
-Your Combat Masteries and Warcrys still apply in Wereform.
-Huge amounts of life, defense, attack rating, and speeds can be attained.
Disadvantages:
-Being frozen affects you run/walk speed. (Unless resisted by "Cannot be Frozen" mods.)
-Lack of damage.
-+ all Druid skills or Druid skill tab skills will not increase shift
VIII. Credits
This goes to the freinds that helped me with the information and helping me put together the whole guide. Thanks
Zabo
F1r3str1d3r
Kodachi
Thank you for reading this guide, and good luck for those who do attempt Wolfbarbs. Many thanks to my freinds that have supported me!
Dr@kE~|||Looks like alot of fun, I've just found one of these helms so this should give me something to do, rather than equiping a sword i found, casting some hydras then turning into a wolf and running round like a barb with a personality crisis, nice one
Edit. I should be constructive to, well written guide, I guess you use this mainly for pvp, but a bit more fleshing out on the pvm stratergy side would complete this good guide|||this looks like a fun character to make/play. I'll consider this one if i ever find that helm.|||Nice guide, much more informative in terms of alternate gear choices etc compared to the last one.
@D34D yes this is mainly a PvP build.
Once again nice additions, including the strategies for general PvP against classes.
@Zer0 Shall I start on the PvM aspect of the build?|||Nice alternate gear selections, more in depth with the stat allocation, and dueling strategy.
Also another weapon choice is a Beast runeword for pvm, and transform into bear! This build is made for it. Also if you're on ladder a Shael'ed Azurewrath is nice|||Nice guide drake, i think it is very good, and very well written.
BTW tell bryn i pwn him more.|||props to zer0-unit for the well written guide. (even though my wolfbarb still owns his
)oh ya and pvm get dracs there life savers|||Nice buddy, unless you play NL
theres not a single chance that a poor person can afford a soj or BK|||Kind of figured on that note, thank you all for the replies on my guide. I am aware an SoJ or BK ring can be quite pricey on ladder, in fact i play non-ladder so i am not up to date what goes on in ladder. Of course not every Wolfbarb needs one of these rings many do just fine w/o them.
Dr@kE~|||Much better
got everything you need...and btw, you did your sticky?
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