Shield throw barb experiment.

[Brimstonejack]

Making a shield throw barb based around cow set and new Butcher's Cleaver weapon. Will also be using Corrupt SS and constricting rings. Looking for input on what I should use for a belt, both cheap and expensive options, as well as ammy and gloves. Any input is very welcome, and after I complete cow set (I still need cow shako), I will report back on effectiveness. Just want to make a fun MF barb that lands somewhere in the middle of the price spectrum.

[nedamettin]

cheap belt: Lk belt
expensive belt: rare belt with uber affixes (fhr, all skills, ed, DR, all res etc)

preferred: Lk belt until you MF a good rare belt. no one mfes rares which is stupid imo.

cheap amulet: saracen's chance, highlord's wrath, diablo's rebirth, rare amulet with uber affixes (lph, edam, +4 bcomb skills etc)
expensive amulet: nephalem's birthright

preferred: HL or diablo's rebirth, up to you. rebirth gives %5 max all res and HL gives great crit chance (%75 DS) so its a matter of choice. also u dont have Lk boots so diablo's rebirth may be a little bit better with aura on eq. neph is good only if u wanna pierce hard immune physical mobs. same with saracen's but some mobs are immune to curses

cheap gloves: hysteria or dracs if you need lifesteal
expensive gloves: rare gloves with uber stats (lph, damage +, %edam, bcomb skills, %ias, all res, DR etc)

preferred: if you don't have enough LPH enchants go for dracs/hysteria until you survive encounters. then find rare gloves


also i'd like to recommend medusa's gaze which is a very underrated shield in my opinion. has a holy freeze aura on equip which is the only freeze that gets through cold immune mobs and "CBF" affixed players. also it has 75 all resistances and great stats. only %25 DR compared to SS but if you got enough DR (which you probably do since cow set gives %25 on its own) i'd totally go for medusa's gaze. only socket amount may be an issue but if you find that many physical horadric jewels you may easily switch to other shields i assume.

For weapon, a proc weapon will always be better because of the extra elemental utility that may allow you to get through physical immune mobs. basicly the easiest proc weapon to obtain atm is a plaguebringer. it is known as a slow mappo killer and stops regeneration on mobs (psn dmg) so it is a great low-end weapon to kill immunes.

[LordManhammer]

I would also recommend the Madusa's Gaze shield. That holy freeze aura combined with slow target is great for controlling you're incoming damaged a bit. The only real down side is that you have a chance to shatter monsters because of the freeze aura which sucks if you are planning on horking. If you use Madusa's Gaze I would equip a Scourgelord's Girdle for the extra DR.

I've gone down this road with my Barb. I would avoid using an elemental proc weapon like Frostmourne. Depending on where you are farming the proc is just too inconsistent to be a reliable source of damage. Amp damage and high physical is definitely the way to go. It really is hard to beat the IK set for clear speed and survivability. If you throw on a couple MF enchants and focus on -phys res enchants combined with BK rings you will really enjoy mfing with it.

[Brimstonejack]

Still farming gear and trade items to try this out with a couple other builds, as well. But I'm not sure if I want to trade in my constricting rings for BK rings. All that ez MF...

[Brimstonejack]

Still using the IK set, but I've traded the Corrupt SS for Medusa's gaze. After several runs, I seem to have less survivability against bosses, as well as slower kills vs bosses and mobs, but more mob survivability for me and my merc. I'll do more PL/DL/Hellcow runs over the next few days, or until I get cow shako and can switch from Ik gear to my intended set-up, and see how it goes.

[Brimstonejack]

I really don't like how the lower resist proc overrides my amp damage proc. Makes inferno portals and inferno cows take ages. Same with pretty much any phys immune. Back to corrupt SS for now. Maybe it will be better after I switch to the cleaver, since that applies 3500 fire damage on hit. But that still would get more damage with the amp proc and phys damage it gets on it's own.

[Brimstonejack]

Yeah, the Ik/Corrupt SS/Highlords combo definitely has the highest damage output, and I like the Constricting rings for the extra MF and max res/100 @ res. The Medusa's gaze swap was making cow runs and Inferno portal runs slow as hell.

[Brimstonejack]

Nedamettin brought up an interesting point. Use enchant from a sorc to chant the barb, making the fire damage from the Cleaver and the HS added dmg from corrupt ss more efficient against phys immunes. I'll have to remember that and try it out.

[Brimstonejack]

I put it together, and it's just not effective at breaking phys immunes or generating enough fire dmg to kill PI mobs. Back to the drawing board. On the bright side, I have a full cow set to play with now.