Depending on Familiar, it can be up to +12.  Dodo or Comp gives you +4 to Init

Toss in Reactionary trait for an extra +2

In reply to praguepride (msg # 88):

+ Grab two levels of Inquisitor if you have any wisdom bonus :)

lol that's' what I get for going off the top of my head, yeah that should be a +4 bonus from famililiar.

Reactionary and Warrior of Old don't stack, both are trait bonuses.

The two level dip of Inquisitor isn’t worth it.
If you can go Mythic, after Tier two you add your Tier to initiative. Then you can get Mythic Improved Initiative which lets you add your Tier to your Improved Initiative bonus as well.

Yeah, hard to beat the diviner! I love Noble Scion of War though, enables you to get huge initiative with a CHA-based character the same way you could if you were a DEX-based character :)
This message was last edited by the player at 09:08, Wed 13 Dec 2017.

What's actually different with unchained barbarians compared to the old version? From what I understand, there's been a little bit of rebalancing (better trapsense thingy), better wording of some rage powers etc, and rage has become easier to use. But are the updates actually good stuff?



The rage gives a +2 bonus to hit and damage, and a barbarian with two-handed weapons would if using the standard rage strength bonus get +2 to hit and +3 to damage... Also, the strength bonus would give the raging barbarian a bonus to breaking doors, pulling up someone hanging by a rope from a cliff, pushing a heavy rock out of the way, swimming, climbing etc.
But then... The temporary HP is a life saver.

What do you guys think, what are the pros of the unchained barbarian?

In reply to Ventrikel (msg # 95):

You don't die when your rage runs out.   Happened to one of mine.

In reply to Hunter (msg # 96):

Yeah, with the temporary HP... But is there anything else to it, than fixing a bug? :P

The perfect Rage ability would be a Str bonus with the bonus to will saves and temporary hit points.

The Attack and Damage bonus of the Unchained Rage ability is great for sword and board or TWF builds, but two-handler builds are screwed since the damage bonus doesn’t get the x1 1/2 damage multiplier with 2-H weapons.

The big advantage of Unchained Barbarian is it makes for easier book keeping (does specific bonuses instead of boosting stats) and the unchained barbarian powers are quite a bit better balanced and easier to keep track of.

In addition, as mentioned, you don't die when rage ends.

Finally Unchained added cool Stance rage powers that provide specific bonuses during every rage with the cost of taking up a rage power slot and only being able to use one stance per. These are totally usable for a regular barbarian though, just stuff that was added to the unchained one.

The disadvantage of the Unchained barbarian is that you lose out on a lot of side perks that directly modifying your stats did. No more bumps to fortitude or CMD due to rage.

All in all it wasn't necessarily a nerf or even a rebalance but a way to make barbarians less book-keeping intensive. In theory the kinds of people who are attracted to Barbarians probably don't want to have to maintain two different versions of their sheets to remember what pre/ragae/post characters look like.

It was my understanding the changes were primarily intended to simplify stat-blocks so you aren't having to recalculate things regarding your STR and CON and not gaining and losing access to feats that have certain stat requirements.

I guess it hadn't occurred to me, but with the new Rage, you couldn't qualify to use a STR bow to get extra strength damage.

I believe they changed the way the Rage powers worked as well however, I think it turned some powers that were usable once per rage to either weaker ability usable all the time, or switching them to doing per day.

Honestly, I don't know that the intent of the change to range was to hurt two-handers.  I'd imagine that having it do +3 damage for two handed weapons would probably not be a giant deal-breaker. (nor making the damage boost 1/2 for off weapons, but it is a lot easier to give than take)  They might have intentionally not mentioned the 1 and 1/2 bonus for two handed weapons though because of the focus of simplification however.

For some reason I thought that they got +2 bonus on STR related skills/checks, but obviously that was not actually included in the list, so I misread/understood that.

One of the reasons I would switch the Attack/Damage Bonus back to a Strength increase. It adds some utility to Rage outside of a fight.

Simplification and less book-keeping sure is worth it, I guess if I would play a barbarian myself I'd try and negotiate a combo with my GM - +STR instead of +#, but temporary HP instead of +CON :) Got a semi-new player looking at creating a barbarian in a game with me as GM, it will for sure help to not have to recalculate CMD etc every time, that's hard enough to keep track of as a new player anyway...

That is why they introduced a bunch of rage powers that do give you huge bonuses on strength based stats.

Unexpected perk is that you can now do a Dex Weapon Finesse barbarian and still get the bonus damage.

Note: just allow the Rage to grant a bonus to STR based checks.  You don't NEED to bump your str, just get the bonus you would have gotten from the extra STR.  Not having your STR change means you don't open up new feats and things, but that primarily keep you from having feats you don't qualify for during times you don't qualify for them.  [keeping multiple stat blocks]

You are right about the fact they seemed to primarily only concern themselves with combat use of Rage.  I like the idea of there being more than just combat purposes for rage.  While I wasn't against the idea of allowing someone to get a feat or equipment they could use only when raged, I admit losing that ability for greater simplicity isn't a horrible trade-off.  However, I can see offering the +2 be extended to STR based checks.  [I could even see offering it to CON based checks, but that would primarily be FORT checks]

Totally unrelated to anything, I just wanted to get in here and snag the 1000th post.

In reply to praguepride (msg # 103):

In Oriental Adventures, the Sohei class could Frenzy which was similar to Rage, but granted bonuses to Str, Dex, and Speed. I always liked that ability.

Easiest fix to the Unchained Rage is applying the Attack/Damage bonus to Strength Ability and Skill checks as well as multiplying it by 1.5 with two-handed weapons. That would be excellent.

General consensus is unchained barb's are bettwer at TWF while regulars are better at 2H fighting.

imo...
Unchained Summoners and Rogues are practically necessary for game balance.
Unchained Barbarians vs. regular ones aren't too different power level wise, just one is more streamlined then the other.

This is accurate. If you House Rule the Unchained Barbarian Rage abilty as I suggest above, which isn’t game breaking, then the Unchained Barbarian is good for any Barb build.

So.... Sylvan Trickster Rogues... So fun-looking!

I'm making a bolt ace build that focuses on the heavy repeating crossbow

This build uses 20 point buy

Full build (breakdown): http://pathbuilder.x10host.com/fluid.php?id=5152

Level 1 (sheet): https://drive.google.com/file/...f6/view?usp=drivesdk

Thoughts?

imo a ranged character 'NEEDS' precise shot as quickly as possible. To put it another way, would you take a feat if it just said +4 to hit?

In reply to praguepride (msg # 111):

I agree, but if it's a true loner who doesn't think of the possibility of hitting the wrong target in melee, I could see it not being taken.

Personally, I normally try to get it first so I can support allies who are in melee.  Otherwise the ranged character should only target those not engaged.

I have played those characters and found them very frustrating to play at low levels. Unless you KNOW ahead of time that you'll have long sight lines, it is rough to play at it.

For example, had a loner (assassin) but his target was in a street fight with someone else. Every time he would deck his opponent someone else would engage him before I could get off a shot and at low levels, that -4 KILLS. Basically wiped out almost my entire to hit so it was just pure dice rolling.

That +4 bonus represents an extra 20% chance to hit which is big and because of the long gap between 1st level and 3rd it can be very frustrating to have to sit around and underperform because enemies keep getting into melee too early.