This is my first character in 5e and I wasn't trying to power build, this is just the type of character I thought would be fun to play. I have a 5th level half-orc bear totem barbarian with GWM. Everything I do that gives a power boost comes with a downside but for all the downsides I have an ability that negates it so its all upside. GWM has a -5 to hit? No problem, reckless attack. Reckless attack lets monsters attack with advantage? No problem most all damage is halved.
He's an indestructible wrecking ball and feels way stronger than the other players. He's a lot of fun to play but I don't want to take away the other players fun. The rest of the group are fairly experienced players and don't seem upset by it though, they seem to enjoy the massive crits and damage sponge keeping them safe.
If the party isn't upset about it, I wouldn't worry too much. Bear Totem and GWM are both really strong, and you're making good use of other abilities to mitigate the drawbacks. If your DM gets tired of it, they'll throw some sort of mind-control or just start making you make saving throws at every opportunity. There's always a workaround for the DM to keep things fresh and exciting.
Wizards will fly/teleport through buildings and bypass entire adventures.
Everyone has their role, and as said, the DM has the power to tip the scales. Keep doing you. As long as you invest in your character's story as much as their stats, you're going to continue having fun.
Well, at level 5 you have 3 rages per long rest. If the DM thinks there's an issue, they can make it difficult to find opportunities for a long rest after fewer than 4-5-6-7-8 combat encounters, for instance. Spells that attempt to hinder you or control you are not subject to your resistances. Using more but less tough opponents per encounter means your damage potential is overkill and the enemy's superior number of attacks can make attacking recklessly a bad idea. You standing next to an enemy can be sufficient to trigger sneak attack damage, so you can be assisting a rogue PC in the party. Your barbarian is likely less effective than other characters in situations where words carry more weight than swords - time for someone else to shine. There are plenty of options both to challenge your character and to let the others share in the glory.
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Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
If it makes you feel any better, level 5 is probably your strongest point. You are going to start scaling slower than a lot of other classes, which means they will start catching up to you.
Yeah barbarian with GWM is totally normal. Power builds are only a problem if you're trying to push game boundaries to upset the balance. That's not happening here and it sounds like no one at your table is upset either. You're fine.
If it makes you feel any better, level 5 is probably your strongest point. You are going to start scaling slower than a lot of other classes, which means they will start catching up to you.
Can't really echo this enough. From a combat perspective, you are extremely front loaded. You'll get some brutal critical die, and some more movement but essentially you are done.
That’s exactly what Barbarians are supposed to do. Now go find that rare and obscure tome needed so you can learn how to draw the arcane vevers required to summon the great Quetzlecoatl located somewhere in the largest library in the known world. See how good you are at that.
This isn't really "cheating", even if the party was upset. As long as they aren't upset, it's fine. And as many others have said, a barbarians general role is to be an absolute tank. There are deviations, but most follow that general role. As long as nobody is upset, don't worry about it.
I have a half-orc eldritch knight (fighter), he doesn't go down easy, and he should in theory be great with critical hits because of his racial ability, but yet, I've never actually rolled a nat20 on an attack roll. He's now almost level 5.
By the time you reach 7th level, you'll notice that the other characters in your group are increasing in power while your relative power starts to plateau.
This happened to me. I was in a group with a paladin and a rogue. Their damage output was massive compared to mine. Sure, as a barbarian, I could take a beating, but the rage bonus was nothing compared to a sneak attack and the various OP abilities of a paladin.
A Youtuber called "Treantmonk" who became popular as the result of his his powerbuilds and class analysis, ranks the barbarian and all of the subclasses as no more than a "C".
By the time you reach 7th level, you'll notice that the other characters in your group are increasing in power while your relative power starts to plateau.
This happened to me. I was in a group with a paladin and a rogue. Their damage output was massive compared to mine. Sure, as a barbarian, I could take a beating, but the rage bonus was nothing compared to a sneak attack and the various OP abilities of a paladin.
A Youtuber called "Treantmonk" who became popular as the result of his his powerbuilds and class analysis, ranks the barbarian and all of the subclasses as no more than a "C".
Barbarian does well throughout for what its intended for....soaking damage and putting out enough to be a threat but not outright the best at damage.
Funny you mention rogue though as its damage is entirely average...so much so its commonly used as a benchmark for damage output for other classes. Treantmonk uses EB + Hex a lot for damage averages and rogue scales approximately with that for output.
Sure Paladin and Rogue will have flashier crits...but a barbarian will crit much more often thanks to at will ADV on attacks.
If you find yourself bored with the straight up barbarian route and do not plan on going to level 20 I would dip into:
1. Fighter 2: Action Surge and some healing will go a long way. Also you can get Blind Fighting to be able to swing effectively in the dark or anywhere or Defense to up your AC a bit.
2. Rogue 2: Cunning Action makes you a beast for running around doing harm. BA Dashing will get you into the frey so much more often. Expertise in ATH makes it so you not only get ADV on your STR checks to grapple/shove/trip but now a bonus that is pretty much guaranteed to work on most things.
Barbarian with GWM is a powerful combination. It feels a lot less powerful once you start meeting AC19+ opponents, at which point you'll probably stop using the feat as much. It's quite a power drop when the DM ups the monsters' AC, but while you're fighting Ogres with AC11 then yeah, it feels overpowered.
Bear in mind that PCs can never be too powerful; the DM can just say "the ground opens, you plummet into an eternal abyss and die" any time they want to. The DM is trying to set you fun challenges that tax your thinking and resources, and they can counteract your character's power the moment they wish to.
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This is my first character in 5e and I wasn't trying to power build, this is just the type of character I thought would be fun to play. I have a 5th level half-orc bear totem barbarian with GWM. Everything I do that gives a power boost comes with a downside but for all the downsides I have an ability that negates it so its all upside. GWM has a -5 to hit? No problem, reckless attack. Reckless attack lets monsters attack with advantage? No problem most all damage is halved.
He's an indestructible wrecking ball and feels way stronger than the other players. He's a lot of fun to play but I don't want to take away the other players fun. The rest of the group are fairly experienced players and don't seem upset by it though, they seem to enjoy the massive crits and damage sponge keeping them safe.
If the party isn't upset about it, I wouldn't worry too much. Bear Totem and GWM are both really strong, and you're making good use of other abilities to mitigate the drawbacks. If your DM gets tired of it, they'll throw some sort of mind-control or just start making you make saving throws at every opportunity. There's always a workaround for the DM to keep things fresh and exciting.
Barbarians are beast with melee damage.
Bards can charm their way past any encounter.
Wizards will fly/teleport through buildings and bypass entire adventures.
Everyone has their role, and as said, the DM has the power to tip the scales. Keep doing you. As long as you invest in your character's story as much as their stats, you're going to continue having fun.
Well, at level 5 you have 3 rages per long rest. If the DM thinks there's an issue, they can make it difficult to find opportunities for a long rest after fewer than 4-5-6-7-8 combat encounters, for instance. Spells that attempt to hinder you or control you are not subject to your resistances. Using more but less tough opponents per encounter means your damage potential is overkill and the enemy's superior number of attacks can make attacking recklessly a bad idea. You standing next to an enemy can be sufficient to trigger sneak attack damage, so you can be assisting a rogue PC in the party. Your barbarian is likely less effective than other characters in situations where words carry more weight than swords - time for someone else to shine. There are plenty of options both to challenge your character and to let the others share in the glory.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
If it makes you feel any better, level 5 is probably your strongest point. You are going to start scaling slower than a lot of other classes, which means they will start catching up to you.
Yeah barbarian with GWM is totally normal. Power builds are only a problem if you're trying to push game boundaries to upset the balance. That's not happening here and it sounds like no one at your table is upset either. You're fine.
Can't really echo this enough. From a combat perspective, you are extremely front loaded. You'll get some brutal critical die, and some more movement but essentially you are done.
It's fun to build the character that can wipe the rest of the party if they get mind-controlled...until you get mind controlled. Then it's really fun.
Happened to me back in 3e and I killed the bard. Best day ever!
That’s exactly what Barbarians are supposed to do. Now go find that rare and obscure tome needed so you can learn how to draw the arcane vevers required to summon the great Quetzlecoatl located somewhere in the largest library in the known world. See how good you are at that.
This isn't really "cheating", even if the party was upset. As long as they aren't upset, it's fine. And as many others have said, a barbarians general role is to be an absolute tank. There are deviations, but most follow that general role. As long as nobody is upset, don't worry about it.
SAUCE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I have a half-orc eldritch knight (fighter), he doesn't go down easy, and he should in theory be great with critical hits because of his racial ability, but yet, I've never actually rolled a nat20 on an attack roll. He's now almost level 5.
Altrazin Aghanes - Wizard/Fighter
Varpulis Windhowl - Fighter
Skolson Demjon - Cleric/Fighter
By the time you reach 7th level, you'll notice that the other characters in your group are increasing in power while your relative power starts to plateau.
This happened to me. I was in a group with a paladin and a rogue. Their damage output was massive compared to mine. Sure, as a barbarian, I could take a beating, but the rage bonus was nothing compared to a sneak attack and the various OP abilities of a paladin.
A Youtuber called "Treantmonk" who became popular as the result of his his powerbuilds and class analysis, ranks the barbarian and all of the subclasses as no more than a "C".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQPZTOHDmfU
Barbarian does well throughout for what its intended for....soaking damage and putting out enough to be a threat but not outright the best at damage.
Funny you mention rogue though as its damage is entirely average...so much so its commonly used as a benchmark for damage output for other classes. Treantmonk uses EB + Hex a lot for damage averages and rogue scales approximately with that for output.
Sure Paladin and Rogue will have flashier crits...but a barbarian will crit much more often thanks to at will ADV on attacks.
If you find yourself bored with the straight up barbarian route and do not plan on going to level 20 I would dip into:
1. Fighter 2: Action Surge and some healing will go a long way. Also you can get Blind Fighting to be able to swing effectively in the dark or anywhere or Defense to up your AC a bit.
2. Rogue 2: Cunning Action makes you a beast for running around doing harm. BA Dashing will get you into the frey so much more often. Expertise in ATH makes it so you not only get ADV on your STR checks to grapple/shove/trip but now a bonus that is pretty much guaranteed to work on most things.
Barbarian with GWM is a powerful combination. It feels a lot less powerful once you start meeting AC19+ opponents, at which point you'll probably stop using the feat as much. It's quite a power drop when the DM ups the monsters' AC, but while you're fighting Ogres with AC11 then yeah, it feels overpowered.
Bear in mind that PCs can never be too powerful; the DM can just say "the ground opens, you plummet into an eternal abyss and die" any time they want to. The DM is trying to set you fun challenges that tax your thinking and resources, and they can counteract your character's power the moment they wish to.