Base Class: Barbarian
For some barbarians, rage is a means to an end — that end being violence. The Path of the Frenzied Berserker is a path of untrammeled fury, slick with blood. Your rage can become a frenzy which fills you with the thrill of battle and terrifies your enemies with your savagery. Followers of this path are warriors beyond measure. Even their allies look on them with trepidation and dread for the violence a frenzied berserker might unleash. These barbarians live violent lives and have equally violent ends.
<This subclass is meant to shore up the many shortcomings of the Berserker subclass. The goal is to make Frenzy more a part of the class and a better option for players.>
Frenzy
Starting when you choose this path at 3rd level, you can choose to go into a frenzy when you rage. If you do so you gain all the benefits of rage and for the duration of your frenzy you can make a single melee weapon attack as a bonus action on each of your turns after this one. Additionally at the start of your frenzy you gain temporary hit points equal to your barbarian level times two and during your frenzy you are not affected by any levels of exhaustion you may have. When your frenzy ends, you suffer one level of exhaustion, any temporary hits points gained are lost and you once again suffer the effects of exhaustion levels.
Beginning at 11th level your frenzy no longer causes you to suffer a level of exhaustion when it ends.
Mindless Frenzy
Beginning at 6th level, you can’t be charmed or frightened and while in a frenzy you gain resistance to psychic damage. If you are charmed or frightened when you enter your rage, the effect is suspended for the duration of the rage.
Intimidating Frenzy
Beginning at 10th level, when you initiate a frenzy you generate an intimidating aura. When you do so, creatures within 15 feet of you must succeed on a Wisdom saving throw (DC equal to 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Strength modifier) or suffer disadvantage on attack rolls while within this aura. This effect ends if the creature ends its turn out of line of sight or more than 15 feet away from you. Creatures immune to fear or the frightened condition are not affected by intimidating frenzy.
If the creature succeeds on its saving throw, you can’t use this feature on that creature again for 24 hours.
Retaliation
Starting at 14th level, when you take damage from a creature, you can use your reaction to make a melee weapon attack against that creature if it is within 5 feet. If you are in a frenzy you may move up to 15 feet towards that creature before making your attack.
Previous Versions
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Okay, that makes sense, we just have different opinions on that feature which is fine. Especially since we all have our different opinions about balance, and each group balances differently due to house rules.
If I were to made the changes my way, I would've made the DC change to str like you did, and left it as is. My reasoning, is that I felt the frighten condition was thematic, but was it strong, yes, but you have to give up your action to do so. Intimidating Presence doesn't specify that you must be raging to use it, which adds a more versatility to the barbarian since it doesn't have that restriction. Even while you are raging, yes, like you stated to be for sure that you can maintain it you must go into a frenzy to use your bonus action attack. I feel like this was a good trade off, because it gives more of a reason to use frenzy rather than just to have another attack.
It also acts as a different form of taunt for the barbarian because the way you currently have it; I feel that with yours as an aura that impose disadvantage steps on toes of the ancestral guardian a bit too much. As an aura you are imposing more disadvantages, than the conventional taunt tank subclass. The ancestral guardian can also only target one creature with its mark, but the difference is that there's puts disadvantage to everyone else, while the Intimidating Presence give the creature disadvantage for you, so I can agree with it being a bit stronger because of it being more creatures are disadvantage vs 1. Then with attacks, because Intimidating Presence uses your action and have to use frenzy to attack on the same turn, your only maybe getting 1 attack, while the ancestral guardian still gets their two attacks. So overall I feel it they balance each other out without stepping too far one way or another.
But just like you, I haven't been able to test this out either, nor have I played the berserker due to its short comings.
Thanks for the comment!
The problems I had with the original ability (Intimidating Presence) is that it only impacts one creature at a time while also taking an action which technically would end a rage since they would not be attacking someone during their turn. You would have to use the ability while not raging or in a frenzy which makes it kind of an odd duck. By making Intimidating Frenzy an aura while in a frenzy it ties it more strongly to the key ability of the class. We also don't want it to take an action, bonus action or reaction as it would get in the way of other abilities of the class. If I had left it bestowing the frightened condition it would have been too powerful so I toned it down to just giving disadvantage.
I am up for suggestions if you think of an alternate. Or if you play it a bit and have some experience to share. Unfortunately I have not had the opportunity to playtest just yet.
Overall I do like the changes that you made, because they do fix a lot of the issues of the beserker subclass. Though I think that the Intimidating Frenzy, would have been good the old way if it was just had been changes to str instead of cha. Just curious on why you changed it to an aura that imposes disadvantage on attack rolls instead.
Seems really powerful.