For players who want to push their limits in group play, a member or two of a party often opts to take on a support role to offer buffs, healing, and crowd control. While typically a Witch Doctor or Crusader steps up to this task, Tacotrap#1306 shares his take on a support Barbarian with us in today’s Play Your Way.
About the Build:
Greater Rifts can be a terrifying place, especially once you start exploring past level 30 and above. Many players will often explore this dangerous territory with their friends, filling the gaps in their build by synergizing their skills, gear, and buffs to reach a higher level than they might on their own. Some will even forego their damage capabilities altogether, opting instead to provide their friends with the extra boost they need to succeed. Tacotrap#1306 has chosen to break the traditional mold and tackle the support role with his Barbarian.
Come to me, my pretties. Or uglies.
Similar to the Barbaricare build from our first ever Barbarian feature, the Double Scorpion Support Barbarian drops health globes galore for you and your buddies. However, rather than weaponizing them, this build gives to its allies more than it dishes out damage. With a heavy focus on survivability and crowd control, this helpful Barbarian relies on his friends to bring the pain to the unwilling enemies he drags in and shuts down.
The Skills:
A combination of survivability and crowd control abilities make up this build, though bear in mind its items are just as important as its skills!
Active Skills:
- Ancient Spear (Harpoon)
- Useful for snagging that one pesky enemy that’s running away
- The first half of the “Double Scorpion” theme
- Whirlwind (Hurricane)
- Primary damage dealer (though not the focus of the build)
- Allows a constant and frequent way to apply the many debuff abilities and skills from your gear
- The ability to ignore unit collision ensures you can roam wherever you’re needed on the battlefield
- Ignore Pain (Mob Rule)
- Provides an impressive amount of damage reduction to the entire group
- Allows your group to ignore movement impairing effects, vastly increasing survivability for all
- War Cry (Invigorate)
- Gives the gifts of Armor, % Life, and Life Regeneration for your party
- Offers a great way to get your Whirlwind going (or keep it going) by generating a small amount of Fury
- Ground Stomp (Jarring Slam)
- Provides group crowd control, stunning the enemies you’ll constantly be pulling toward you
- Increases the number of health globes available to your group, providing healing and resources for those with Reaper’s Wraps equipped
- Threatening Shout (Grim Harvest)
- Reduces incoming damage to your party, increasing survivability
- Further increases health globe availability
Passive Skills:
- Inspiring Presence
- Your shouts are your big buffs, and doubling their duration comes in handy
- Adds even more utility, giving you and your allies a boost to life regeneration
- Nerves of Steel
- Toughness…
- Superstition
- Toughness…
- Tough as Nails
- …And even more Toughness!
Alternative Skills:
- Hammer of the Ancients (Birthright)
- An option to swap out if you want yet another method to spawn health globes
- Battle Rage (Swords to Ploughshares)
- A more personal, offensive option that still provides additional health globes
- Wrath of the Berserker (Striding Giant)
- A great option for increasing your personal survivability and mobility
The Items:
The list here is long, but beyond stacking a few key items for Cooldown Reduction, the items you ultimately use are fairly flexible.
A combination of found and crafted items makes the core of this support set.
Required Items:
- Reaper’s Wraps
- Ensures you are also benefiting from constant Health Globe spawns
- Allows you to virtually keep Whirlwind going indefinitely
- Leoric’s Crown
- Doubles your Cooldown Reduction when socketed with a Diamond, increasing the uptime of your various buff skills
- Pride of Cassius
- Increases the uptime of Ignore Pain, boosting the survivability of your whole party
- The Ess of Johan
- Frequently brings your enemies in, grouping them up for friendly area of effect skills
- The Butcher’s Sickle
- Provides yet another method of GET OVER HERE, completing the second half of the “Double Scorpion” theme
- Frostburn
- Greatly increases the freezing capability of Whirlwind
- Increases the uptime of bonus damage from Bane of the Trapped
- Azurewrath
- High % chance to freeze enemies benefits the bonus damage from Bane of the Trapped
- +% Cold Damage boosts the damage from your Whirlwind
- Born’s Command
- A craftable source of Cooldown Reduction
- Bonus +15% life from the 2-piece bonus allow you to stay in the fray to support your friends
- Recommended pieces: Shoulders and Chest
- Captain Crimson’s Trimmings
- A craftable source of both Cooldown Reduction and Resource Cost Reduction
- Recommended pieces: Pants and Boots
Complementary Items:
- Chilanik’s Chain
- Adds extra utility to your War Cry, increasing the movement speed of affected party members
- Vigilante Belt
- Reliable option for Cooldown Reduction, since it will always roll on this belt
Recommended Legendary Gems:
- Bane of the Trapped
- With plenty of methods of crowd control, all party members will benefit from this gem’s bonus damage
- Rank 25 ensures no enemy escapes
- Gogok of Swiftness
- Rank 25 grants a substantial amount of additional Cooldown Reduction
- Interacts quite nicely with Whirlwind, greatly increasing your Attack Speed
- Gem of Efficacious Toxin
- Rank 25 provides yet another damage boosting buff for your allies to take advantage of
- Adds a little more damage to the build, increasing your damage contributions
Recommended Stats:
- Cooldown Reduction should be your top priority to ensure maximum uptime and availability of all your cooldown-based skills
- Toughness should be your primary concern over damage dealing stats; your role in a group is to stay alive and provide buffs, so it’s okay if you’re not dealing a ton of damage
- Life on Hit or Life Regeneration should both be considered to ensure you can stay in the midst of combat against any threat
Recommended Difficulty and Game Mode:
Before we get into difficulty, it should be noted first and foremost that this is a group build. While your survivability can easily rocket straight to handling Torment VI, killing enemies will go slowly on your lonesome.
That said, Tacotrap has taken this build beyond Greater Rift 40 with a well-formed group of friends in Normal mode. This would be an excellent build to offer up to Hardcore friends as well, provided you can ensure the buffs you’re bringing can be kept up consistently. The ability to bring reliable Toughness will make you a valuable addition to any group.
Why We Like This Build:
It admittedly takes a certain personality to play support, regardless of the game you’re playing. It’s a selfless role and sometimes you just miss seeing big numbers all over your screen. Still, it can be very satisfying knowing that everyone in your group is glad to have you there!
Just rewards await a generous companion.
It’s an added bonus to see a support-style build from a class that doesn’t typically take on that role. Expanding horizons and experimenting outside the box are both values of Play Your Way, and the Double Scorpion Support Barbarian embodies both those qualities.
Tell Us What You Think!
Do you enjoy playing support? What kind of support build do you run? What kind of character would you play with a support Barbarian like Tacotrap’s? Let us know in the comments or send your build in so we can try it out!
The Crusader is up next week, so be sure to stop by with your shields and flails at the ready. See you then!