Barbarian 5e Class

While fighters are martial experts who believe full-plate armor and complicated tactics to win battles, barbarians believe sheer toughness and rage to strike down their foes. this is often what makes barbarians unique as a category.

If you’ve made the choice to play a barbarian, you’ll want to understand how best to use barbarian abilities to guard your friends and ruthlessly exterminate your enemies.

Barbarian 5e Class

Barbarian 5e Class

Hit Points

Hit Dice: 1d12 per Barbarian level
Hit Points at 1st Level: 12 + your Constitution modifier
Hit Points at Higher Levels: 1d12 (or 7) + your Constitution modifier per Barbarian level after 1st

Proficiencies

Armor: Light Armor, Medium Armor, Shields Weapons: Simple Weapons, Martial Weapons Tools: None
Saving Throws: Strength, Constitution
Skills: Choose two from Animal Handling, Athletics, Intimidation, Nature, Perception, and Survival

Equipment

You start with the following equipment, in addition to the equipment granted by your background:
(a) a Greataxe or (b) any martial melee weapon
(a) two handaxes or (b) any simple weapon
An explorer’s pack and four javelins

The Barbarian

LevelProficiencyFeaturesRagesRage Damage
Bonus
1st2Rage, Unarmored Defense22
2nd2Reckless Attack, Danger Sense22
3rd2Primal Path32
4th2Ability Score Improvement32
5th3Extra Attack, Fast Movement⁠32
6th3Path feature42
7th3Feral Instinct42
8th3Ability Score Improvement42
9th4Brutal Critical (1 die)43
10th4Path feature43
11th4Relentless⁠ Rage43
12th4Ability Score Improvement53
13th5Brutal Critical (2 dice)53
14th5Path feature53
15th5Persistent Rage53
16th5Ability Score Improvement54
17th6Brutal Critical (3 dice)64
18th6Indomitable Might64
19th6Ability Score Improvement64
20th6Primal Champion⁠Unlimited4

That’s where this D&D 5E barbarian class guide comes in. Keep reading to seek out out the simplest races for a barbarian, best feats, skills, primal path features, and more.

Barbarian Builds

For ability scores, there are two different paths you’ll take when building a barbarian. the primary is to require your highest roll and put it into Str. this may maximize your ability to hit and deal damage with melee weapons and together with your barbarian abilities. If you select this feature, put your second-highest roll into Con to urge as much HP as possible once you level, but without sacrificing Str.

The second path for a barbarian build is to place your highest roll into Con. this may maximize your HP as you level. Since barbarians don’t wear heavy armor, some players believe this to be the simplest build for the category. If you select this feature, put your second-highest roll into Str so as to not harm your ability to use barbarian features and melee attacks.

Regardless of which of those builds you select, put your third-highest roll into Dex. If you wear light armor or no armor, having a high Dex will help your AC. Dex saves also are quite common in D&D 5E, in order that is another benefit to having a high score during this ability.

Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma aren’t very useful to a barbarian. Put your bad rolls into these abilities.

Best Races for a Barbarian

Barbarians are often of any race. But there’s no doubt that some races are especially suited to be rage-filled berzerkers. Here are a couple of races that make great barbarians.

Dwarf

Dwarves get +2 Cons, in order that they are tough enough to fight without armor. Their Darkvision is useful to any class, as is that the resistance to poison granted by Dwarven Resilience. Mountain dwarves also get + 2 Str, making them even better as barbarians.

Half-Orc

Half-orcs get +2 Str and +1 Con, Darkvision, and learn to Intimidate for free of charge because of their Menacing racial feature. Both the additional crit from Savage Attacks and defensive help from Relentless Endurance also are helpful to a Barbarian.

Human (Variant)

Variant humans get +1 to 2 ability scores. This will be wont to get +1 to Str and Con, making humans an honest choice for barbarian characters. The additional feat is often used for nice Weapon Master, supplying you with an additional attack whenever you crit or kill an opponent.

Barbarians are unique therein they’re the sole class I ever recommend NOT taking your highest ability score and putting it into your main combat stat. Instead, Barbarians should take that highest attribute score and put it straight into Constitution. This high constitution will ramp your hit points up to pretty ridiculous extremes briefly order (you do have the very best hit die within the game at D12), but it also feeds into a Barbarian’s Unarmored Defense ability.

Leave a Comment