Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General So, is the best race for a barbarian...

Oh, look, another thread hijacked by the ASI discussion. Who would've thought.


Rage comes with a number of benefits, including defensive ones. So to me, this would indicate raging before entering melee range - so you benefit from those over the enemy's turn and can start swinging when you're there.

I'm just thinking here. You *could* go into Ranger for the Jump spell. Also, Ordinarily, I'd pick two levels of fighter just for the Action Surge, which is a godsend.
Then again. Barbie doesn't multiclass particularly well with the level cap. At least, you can't dip two levels, or go 5/7 as the Barb without sacrificing feats. You can't go 4/4/4 because either becasue you'd loose attacks. I don't know, here. It kind of depends on the gear you find. A Girdle of Giant Strength or somesuch means you can drop an ASI increase.

Gold dwarves are the best.
+2CON +1 WIS, +1 HP/lvl, if you want you can pick +1 STR instead, making it even more powerful. ( you could replace your +2 on CON somewhere else, but why would you? )
You will have more HP then anyone else, you attack with advantage due to reckless attack, if you go Bear you resist all damage 50%, if you go berserker you resist all physical damage 50%.
You will be the tankiest bastard either way.
The only thing that changed is that its the GOLD dwarf that wins out in the end.

Whether human is any good depends entirely on whether they get to have +1 in all stats or not. If they do, they are the 2nd best Barbarian race for being well rounded.
I have no idea what humans actually get, in fact nobody knows yet, but my guess is that they will either the best race or very close to being the best race.

For a melee fighter in Bg3 the most important tactical consideration is Movement.

I have seen it over and over again over thousands of hours of play in this game.

Bad tanks are bad because they aren't where they need to be - this is true regardless of build.

Sometimes it's a matter of a tank not understanding that they need to be in front, and they are not positioning themselves well in the party movement order, so when combat starts they are at the back of the party. That's just a bad player, if they can't fix it they need to play something else.

However, sometimes it's because you chose Gnome and you are trying to "baby legs" your slow ass around the battlefield.

Wood Elf, Half Wood Elf are the best choices for Barbarian because of that extra 5 feet of movement, and Fey ancestry. Half-Orc is a close second because of all the amazing racials like relentless endurance and Savage attacks.

There are other ways to strengthen wisdom saves with Barbs, sometimes equipment, sometimes pacts with dark God's (Loviatar) and sometimes you take a Level in Cleric.

Githyanki are amazing melee characters just because Jump is insane in this game. The other day I had Lae'zel leap from one house to the other during the goblin ambush at the destroyed town. It would've taken her 3-4 turns to get across on foot. One leap and an Action Surge later she's cutting down the booyag and threatening the other archer.

Then later they get Misty Step. The sheer mobility of the Githyanki is incredible, and you can always cast Jump before a fight as it doesn't require concentration.


Gold Dwarf is another good choice. Not as flashy as Githyanki but they get even more HP to make you even more of an HP sponge, plus resistance to poison is pretty nice in a game where enemies have poisoned arrows in every fight.

The best race for every class is the one you want to play.

Want to play a human? Go for it. Want a duergar? Go for it.

It's a RPG, not an EXCEL spreadsheet... there's no need to play an optimized race.

halfling barbarian tossing is a new sport if the Larian devs get their way

But they stick to the golden rule, where nobody tosses a dwarf!

No, according to Larian you are playing wrong. You must play what maxes your combat power. Thats why they changed the ASI as otherwise you would be physically unable to play anything except the best race/class combinations.

i think we define 'best' differently but thats cool

Let's do a racial breakdown, just because. I mean, why not? It's a nice Friday, and I'm finally off my dayjob.

Obviously there's always the risk that I've messed up in the table, but here goes.

https://pasteboard.co/o23tHfthDBxX.png



So let's consider things. Since we're talking Barbarian class, all the racial weapon and armour proficiencies are pretty much irrelevant. Keeping that in mind...

Dragonborn are well over 6 foot tall and easily weigh 250 lbs, so of course they're not really any better at the whole barbarian thing than your average garden gnome. They have 1 resistance and a so-so once per rest breath weapon, presumably. Not horrible but they just don't have a lot that synergizes with the Barbarian class.

Shield dwarfs have 40' darkvision, resistance vs poison, and advantage vs poison saves. Gold dwarfs have that and +1 health per level. Both have a fairly significant penalty to movement speed. Not my first or second choice, but if you want to be a dwarf barb then do pick the goldies, because shieldies are objectively inferior, full stop.

Elves are interesting. Wood elf barbarians get 35' movement speed, 40' darkvision, resistance vs charm, immunity vs sleep, and proficiency to perception and stealth checks. High elves trade movement speed for a wizard cantrip, though none of them really help barbarians that much. Drow get better darkvision but have to choose Dancing Lights, a concentration cantrip that illuminates dark areas, which is actually kind of bad.

Gith don't really have anything going for them as a martial class except for their psionic spellcasting. Cast jump before raging and you've got all the mobility you could ever want. But that's the only bonus they get. No resistances, no advantages versus anything, no extra damage. But that mobility they get is immense.

Gnomes are sort of interesting. They get inherent proficiency in Int, Cha, Wis saves, which complement Barbarian Str, Con save proficiency nicely. They get Darkvision too, which isn't bad. Deep gnomes are masters of stealth. Forest gnomes get a single cast of speak with animals. And rock gnomes get history proficiency x2. Downside, all gnomes have 25' movement speed. Not the best, but a greataxe swung by a gnome leads to exactly the same headache as one swung by a dragonborn or a gith.

Half-Elves are just flat out inferior Elves, so in that sense it makes sense to skip them. Worth nothing that Half-woodies are still significantly better than non-woodies for barbarity because of their movement speed.

Halflings are an amusing choice for a Barbarian, but they're not that well suited. Rerolling d20 rolls of 1 is nice but it's probably better for skill monkeys. Lightfoots get stealth proficiency, Stouthearts get advantage versus frightened effect. Neither get darkvision and both have 25' movement speed, which kind of sucks.

Half-orcs have darkvision, standard movement speed, and two unique abilities, both of which work well with a martial tank class. Relentless Endurance lets them stay at 1 health if they're reduced to 0 without getting killed outright. Savage Attacks lets you deal your weapon die as additional damage when you crit. Pretty good.

Humans get +20 bls of carry weight and regular movement speed. Garbage. Skip.

Tieflings get regular movement speed, darkvision, and resistance to fire. And they get some spellcasting that doesn't synergize at all with Barbarian. Not horrible, not exactly great either.

So, to summarize, my tentative ranking would be as follows.

S-tier: Half-orc, Wood Elf
A-tier: Woodie Half-elf, Gith
B-tier: Tieflings, Gold dwarf
C-tier: Dragonborn, deep gnomes, Drow elf, High elf,
D-tier: Shield dwarf, forest gnome, rock gnome, Drow half-elf, high half-elf
F-tier: Human, Halflings

Note that all reasonable disclaimers apply. The game is not released yet, this is not playtested, and speculative guesswork is ultimately just that.

yeah, that's pretty solid right there.

People have been arguing about Gnomes being the best because of the saves, and it looks good on paper but the movement penalty isn't a minor problem. In practice it's a big problem.

Humans are going to be last place on most build lists for a while until Larian decides to unscrew them or we mod them. I guess they make decent Wizards and Sorcerers due ro the armor proficiencies, but Githyanki are still better for wizards.

For me, “best” are half orcs, humans, strongheart halflings, tieflings. Because they fit best from RP perspective.

After raiding in a hardcore guild in WoW very seriously, it seems weird to me when people try to “meta” a single player game😂

But if we go meta, movement speed and durability are most valuable for melee DPS, so I agree with poster above - half orc and wood elf / wood half elf.

Most people don't try to "meta" but they do try to have their choices make sense and not end up with them being gimped. Making builds and trying to find strong setups is a large part of the fun for many people in these games, and even then very few people literally abandon RP entirely, they just make the strong build and then RP around it. I like to RP as a killing machine, it's fun.

All races are best for any class - unless you are a min/maxer or want the perfect build you can enjoy anything you want - especially with spells, potions & the purportedly huge range of magic items

Well, Ive played dwarves for as long as I can remember, and regardless if they lose a +1 to my str or my con

Im still playing a half orc barbarian for FUN!!!

AND as I stated before I WILL be RP him fully naked , with hopefully full gentile armorer with piercings and a purple horn!!
because you have to cut loose once in a while,

Don't take this the wrong way, Doom, but I reckon the less I know about your half-orc barbarian's purple horn, the happier I'll be.