Analysis Of Maniac Frenzy Barbarian Build

With the addition of the build submitter that we recently added above (if you haven’t submitted a build yet, please do), it’s now easier than ever to find a build that suites your play style. If you see a build you like or dislike, you can up-vote or down-vote it accordingly. The build submitter brings with it an easy way to see what the community democratically thinks is a good or bad build.

Using this knowledge, we at Diablo3Builds will analyze the highest (and possibly lowest) rated among the pack. Though this type of review is somewhat subjective, hopefully it will help players make better build decisions down the line.

Having 11 votes, the build currently at the top of the collective list is a barbarian build called Maniac Frenzy, submitted by Mayhem. Let’s see Mayhem’s description: “Use Frenzy to build Fury and to run down tough monsters. Then spam Hammer for crowd control. Battle Rage and War Cry should always be up. Wrath when facing tough groups or to finish a crowd off. Ideally use Axes/Maces.” Simple and direct; I like it.

As Mayhem stated, the build is centered around Frenzy with the Maniac rune, allowing the barbarian to quickly build to a 20% damage increase. While Frenzy by itself is good—75% increased attack speed is a solid boost and is especially nice for on-hit effects (such as health gain per attack)—Frenzy with Maniac is phenomenal—75% attack speed plus a 20% damage increase. Barbarians with this combination are not only going to be deadly, but when life steal becomes involved, they’ll also be quite difficult to kill.

Next we have Hammer of the Ancients, a heavy-hitting frontal AoE that is made even more “frontal” by its shockwave-inducing rune. While the skill is strong by itself, the rune certainly adds a nice component to it. Without this shockwave effect, the build would lack any real AoE options, which would make fighting waves of enemies a bit un-fun. HotA works well alongside Maniac’s stacking damage bonus. Clearing out armies of enemies should be no problem.

Revenge is a nice AoE that not only heals you but, with the rune, also increases your critical strike chance by 10%. While this build doesn’t necessarily rely on critical strike for procs, having more crit chance is always a good thing. The duration of Revenge’s rune effect is quite lengthy and as long as Revenge is used when it becomes available, the buff will probably be up indefinitely.

That brings us to the last three skills: War Cry, Battle Rage, and Wrath of the Berserker. Individually, while each of these abilities is good, none of them are exceptional. Now, you might be saying, “What about WotB!? Have you looked at all the boosts it gives you!?” First of all, stop talking to your computer. That’s what crazy people do. Secondly, yes, it is a good ability, but it’s one that will only be used for bosses or champions. The cooldown is two minutes, and in a game like Diablo that’s an eternity.

While it recharges, I could potentially end the lives of a few hundred poor, unsuspecting demons. I’d burst into their little demon huts in the middle of their demon dinner, making demon dad spill his demon porridge all over his demon daughter’s new My Little Demon Pony shirt as his demon head was cleaved in twain.

Demon mom would grab demon Billy and try to make a break for it, but I’d leap through the air and land on her demon back, crushing her demon spine. Gruesome, yes, but all that would happen without the aid of WotB. It is a good ability, but the cooldown keeps it from, alone, being great. It also keeps it balanced, which is good.

However, that’s the great thing about this build: it combines three already solid buffing abilities into a torrent of buffiness (it’s a word; learn your English). Between WotB and Battle Rage, damage will be increased by 120% for 15 seconds, not to mention the damage provided by Frenzy (up to 150%).

This amazing damage boost combined with Revenge and Bloodthirst’s life steal effects, plus War Cry’s Armor, maximum health, and passive health regeneration boosts makes the Maniac Frenzy build both an offensive and defensive powerhouse.

All that being said, there are a few things I dislike. As far as barbarian setups go, this build is fairly stationary with no movement abilities or even movement speed increasing effects. I like to be mobile, especially on melee characters.

I also think the Brawler passive might work better than Ruthless. It would allow the damage to increase up to 180%, which is pretty substantial. Finally, this build lacks crowd-control, such as slows or stuns. I think the idea is that you won’t need to stun an enemy that’s dead, but it’s still always nice to have.

If I rated this build on a scale from 1 to 5 (which I’m doing right now), I’d have to say 5. Super high damage, good defensive potential, nice overall synergy, and a cool name. I applaud you, Mayhem. I applaud you.