Thanks everyone for your responses, you bring up some interesting points. Sadly I got gateway timeout for 3 days straight so I couldn't reply earlier.
About my build, I followed that reddit guide and for Act 1 and most of Act 2 with elixirs and the Tavern Brawler feat it went great, 90+ chances in every target. However by act 3 even with Nyrulna, Cloud Giant elixirs and about the same hitting chances the Barbarian got surpassed by the other damage dealers. I ended up going for a full Battlemaster build with the Bhaalist armor and Nyrulna setting up piercing vulnerability for the archer Swords Bard. It went great, we finished our run today! Our Astarion was shooting arrows like a sniper lol
Let me be clear, I don't think it's a bad build by any means! I just think it can fall short in the end game and ends up being overshadowed by other builds. I may give it a chance again, see what other items I can make work.
About the elixirs... I don't really ~like~ that there's an item that can just take your abilities to that high of a number until long rest, it's just weird that a martial melee character has to set their strength to 8 on purpose to use those. At the same and like in all games, if there's an op thing there why don't use it? There's that feeling there that you're crippling yourself on purpose if you don't take that simple solution. If instead of just setting the value on 21 it could just give you a temporary +2 or +4 I could see how it can be more balanced.
On the long rest issue, I remember when I found out that I could long rest just before entering the area of the final boss in Act 2 it did not make any sense if the same would happened in a tabletop setting... But let's face it, it's near impossible for a videogame to ever replicate all the possible permutations of scenarios a tabletop rpg can have. Also probably many of these game design decisions come from testing and trying to accommodate for a more flexible and flashy experience.
Again, thanks everyone for your kind responses. The discussion about game difficulties and how to balance op or not op mechanics is one I always enjoy reading. I'll definitely try the build again in another playthrough, perhaps with a different party comp.
