Tales of the Valiant Barbarian Guide

Introduction

The Tales of the Valiant Barbarian is a durable Strength-based melee class. Choose it if you want to absorb physical damage with Rage, make decisive melee attacks with Reckless Attack, and hold the line while the party works around you.

For a class-by-class overview before choosing a character, see the Tales of the Valiant class guides.

ToV's Barbarian is lean, direct, and built around better rage uptime. Unarmored Defense is 13 + CON modifier, which simplifies the math and means you can stack CON without compromising AC. Brutal Critical activates on a 19–20 starting at 9th level, making crits meaningfully more common before you've loaded up on any other crit-fishing tools. The progression table uses ToV's standard terminology: Improvements, Heroic Boon at 10th level, Epic Boon at 20th, and the capstone feature Unyielding Might at 18th.

Player's Guide 2 adds three distinct Barbarian paths. Chaos spends a pool of Chaos Dice for force damage, banes, rerolls, and defensive reactions. Four Winds turns rage into a storm-mobility package with thrown-weapon support and damage reduction. Kraken adds spectral tentacles, grapples, throws, and reach.

Book of Blades expands the Barbarian in the places that matter: Frostborn Raider and Undying Warrior subclasses, martial-society heritages, martial backgrounds, Book of Blades martial talents, mounted-play support, and the Barbarian-specific Unyielding Rage heroic endowment. The strongest additions do not replace the greataxe Berserker baseline, but they do add credible alternatives for storm raiders, deathless berserkers, commander Barbarians, mounted raiders, and unarmed brutes.

The Labyrinth Worldbook adds the Barbarian's best spirit-haunted option: Forsaken. It is built for campaigns about lost worlds, unjust deaths, Void corruption, and vengeance. The subclass is not a greataxe nova engine like Berserker, but it gives Barbarians tools they rarely get: passive aura damage while raging, flexible rest-based proficiency, bonus-action condition removal, short-rest fear pressure, and a late feature that can bring you back through another body after yours is destroyed.

One important framing note: ToV Barbarians do not have access to Technique Points or Martial Actions. Those mechanics belong to Fighters and Rangers. The Barbarian's toolkit is narrower and more focused — Rage, Reckless Attack, and subclass features are your levers.

Disclaimer

This guide uses a color-coded rating system to evaluate every option. These ratings assume you are optimizing for combat effectiveness. Roleplay value and flavor remain useful considerations, but they are outside this rating scale.

Ratings assume standard dungeon-delving adventuring with a mix of combat encounters. Highly specific campaign considerations (all-undead enemies, all-social campaign) are outside scope.

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Class Features

Rage ●

Everything the Barbarian does flows through Rage. Damage bonus on STR melee attacks, resistance to bludgeoning/piercing/slashing damage, and advantage on STR checks and saves. You start with 2 uses at 1st level and scale to unlimited at 20th. Managing your Rage uses in early levels is the entire class resource game — spend them wisely before you have 4+ at level 6.

The condition that ends Rage early (no attack or damage taken since last turn) matters in practice. If combat has a lull or you're stuck on your side of a pit, you'll burn a use for nothing. Position yourself to guarantee contact.

Note that you cannot cast or concentrate on spells while raging. This is a firm restriction. If you're planning any spellcasting multiclass, you're building around Rage interruptions, not alongside them.

Unarmored Defense ●

Your Unarmored Defense is 13 + CON modifier, with DEX contributing nothing. It means:

• A 20 CON gives you AC 18 unarmored. That matches scale mail.
• Stacking CON is the only path to improving this. DEX investment is purely for initiative and DEX saves.
• Medium armor (scale mail, AC 14 + DEX cap of +2 = 16) is strictly worse than Unarmored Defense at moderate CON scores. Don't buy medium armor unless your CON is terrible.

The practical result: pure STR barbarians can focus on STR and CON without apologizing to the AC math. DEX still helps initiative and DEX saves, but it is no longer part of your core armor plan.

Danger Sense ●

Advantage on DEX saves while not blinded, deafened, or incapacitated. Covers fireballs, lightning bolts, and most of the things that will ruin your day when enemies realize you can't be killed in melee. You can't modify this, but you also didn't ask for it — it just shows up at 2nd level.

Reckless Attack ●

Advantage on every melee attack in a turn, at the cost of giving enemies advantage against you until your next turn. The math strongly favors using this. You have damage resistance while raging. You have massive HP. Enemies attacking you with advantage isn't free — it's the cost of doing enormous business. Use this on every turn you can.

Reckless Attack also enables Brutal Critical crit-fishing. Once Brutal Critical comes online at 9th level (crits on 19–20), Reckless Attack gives you two d20s per attack, dramatically increasing your crit frequency.

Fast Movement ●

+10 feet of movement at 5th level, plus a half-speed move immediately on rolling initiative. The initiative bonus movement is practically a free disengage / repositioning tool at the start of combat. Reach a target you couldn't touch with a normal move. Excellent.

Multiattack ●

Two attacks per Attack action at 5th level. Standard for martial classes. This is the first level where your damage output becomes consistently scary. Combined with Reckless Attack and Rage damage bonuses, your damage per round at 5th level is already competitive with most full-damage builds.

Feral Instinct ●

Advantage on initiative rolls at 6th level. Combined with the movement from Fast Movement, you're usually acting first and closing the gap before the enemy can kite you. The surprise-breaking clause (act normally if you enter rage before your first action while surprised) is a niche benefit — useful when it comes up, irrelevant otherwise.

Brutal Critical ●

9th, 13th, 17th level. Crits land on a 19 or 20 with melee weapons. You also roll an additional damage die on the crit — scaling to 2 extra dice at 13th and 3 extra at 17th.

Why this matters: with Reckless Attack granting two d20s per attack, your per-attack crit chance on a 19–20 threshold is approximately 19% per attack (before the second d20). At 5th level with two attacks, you're critting meaningful amounts. At 13th–17th with additional dice, those crits scale into significant burst damage spikes.

Pair this with a weapon that has high die size (greataxe 1d12 is king here — reroll 1s and 2s on any crit die) and the math starts looking grotesque in the best way.

Relentless Rage (Persistent Rage) ●

Called Persistent Rage in the progression table. At 14th level, your Rage only ends when the duration expires naturally, you fall unconscious, or you choose to end it — the "no attack/damage" clause disappears. This removes a major tax on your play pattern. You no longer have to engineer situations to take or deal damage every round. A significant quality-of-life upgrade in multi-room dungeon delves.

Unyielding Might ●

18th-level capstone. Two benefits:

1. STR and CON d20 rolls of 9 or lower are treated as 10. This is an effective floor on your most important saves and ability checks. The Barbarian already has proficiency and advantage on STR saves while raging — this just floors out any catastrophic low rolls.
2. Melee attacks deal extra damage equal to your STR score to objects and structures. Situational in most games, but campaigns involving breakable architecture or vehicle combat suddenly make you absurdly effective.

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Heroic Boon

Gained at 10th level. Choose one:

Instant Rage ●

When you roll initiative, you can immediately activate Rage as part of the roll (no bonus action required), provided you also use your Fast Movement feature. This solves one of the classic Barbarian problems: burning your bonus action turn one just to activate Rage. You enter the fight already raging, and you've moved into position. This is nearly universally better than Stubborn Rage unless your specific campaign involves a lot of combat where you expect to be out of Rage for several turns.

Stubborn Rage ●

Rage no longer ends from lack of attacking or taking damage. Wait — this is effectively the same as Persistent Rage at 14th level, except you get it 4 levels earlier. If your table does a lot of split-initiative fights with lull periods, this has value. But Instant Rage solves a problem every fight, while Stubborn Rage solves a problem that only arises in edge cases. Unless your specific table has many non-combat rounds interrupting your combat turns, Instant Rage is better.

Bloody Rage (Player's Guide 2) ●

While raging, your weapon's bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage ignores resistance and immunity. This is not flashy, but it is the answer to the classic "my axe bounces off the boss" problem. If your campaign uses a lot of resistant or immune monsters, Bloody Rage jumps from good to fantastic.

Vengeful Rage (Player's Guide 2) ●

When a hostile creature damages you while you are raging, you have advantage on your first attack against that creature before the end of your next turn. The problem is redundancy: Reckless Attack already gives you advantage when you want it. This is better if you avoid Reckless Attack, fight ranged attackers, or need advantage without handing it back to enemies. Otherwise, it is nice but not essential.

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Heroic Endowments

Book of Blades adds heroic endowments as another optional martial power layer. If your table uses them, the Barbarian-specific pick is worth calling out because it spends the resource Barbarians already have in abundance: hit dice.

Unyielding Rage (Book of Blades) ●

Prerequisite: Barbarian

While raging, you can spend hit dice for two different benefits. As a bonus action, you can expend 1 hit die to regain HP equal to the die roll + CON modifier + Barbarian level. Once per turn when you hit with a melee weapon attack, you can expend 1 hit die to add 1d12 damage of the weapon's damage type.

This is extremely efficient on the class with the best hit die in the game. The healing mode is a real emergency button because it adds Barbarian level on top of the d12 and CON modifier. The damage mode is less important than survival, but it is still meaningful on a critical hit or boss turn. The cost is resource pressure: Combat Conditioning, short rests, Frostborn Raider/Undying Warrior features, and Unyielding Rage all want hit dice. If your campaign has short adventuring days, this is blue. If your GM grinds hit dice through attrition, use it selectively.

Fell Rider (Book of Blades) ●

Fell Rider is not Barbarian-specific, but it matters for mounted Barbarian builds. While mounted, it lets you ride through smaller creatures and potentially knock them prone, splash STR modifier damage around a weapon hit, and move your mount as a bonus action. The full mounted-play breakdown is in the animal allies and summons guide.

For a Barbarian, the problem is bonus action competition. Rage, Berserker Frenzy, Hive Tender bite, Shadow Chewer healing, and some talents already ask for that slot. Fell Rider is best on a non-Berserker mounted raider or a campaign where the mount's positioning matters more than one more bonus action attack.

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Epic Boon

Gained at 20th level.

Primal Champion ●

STR and CON each increase by 4, and the maximum for both is now 24. This is mathematically enormous. A Barbarian with 20 STR and 20 CON before the boon becomes a Barbarian with 24 STR and 24 CON. That's +7 to attack and damage rolls, +7 to CON saves, and AC 20 unarmored with 24 CON. It is still the default pick when you want the cleanest numbers.

Mighty Champion (Player's Guide 2) ●

When you make a STR-based weapon attack with advantage and hit, you automatically deal maximum damage. Barbarians attack with advantage all the time, so this is a real damage ceiling upgrade. It is less broadly useful than Primal Champion's ability score boost, but it makes boss turns ugly in the best way.

Unbreakable Champion (Player's Guide 2) ●

When you enter Rage, you heal HP equal to half your CON score and gain temporary HP equal to your full CON score. This is the attrition pick. It is less glamorous than Mighty Champion and less mathematically clean than Primal Champion, but in long adventuring days it is the boon that keeps the Barbarian walking forward while everyone else starts negotiating with the floor.

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Ability Scores

Priority order: STR > CON > DEX > WIS > INT/CHA

STR drives your attack and damage rolls. CON drives your HP and Unarmored Defense AC. DEX matters only for initiative and DEX saves — don't invest beyond the default unless you've already capped STR and CON.

Recommended Point-Buy (32 points):

Bump STR to 18 at 4th level (Improvement). By 8th level, STR 20 and CON 18 is a realistic target. Final Unarmored Defense before Epic Boon: AC 18 at CON 20. Post-Epic Boon: AC 20 at CON 24.

Standard Array: 16 STR, 14 CON, 13 WIS, 10 DEX, 8 INT, 8 CHA — assign accordingly.

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Lineage & Heritage

Lineage Options

● Orc Heightened Senses gives you advantage on sight- and hearing-based Perception checks. Stalwart lets you save at the start of your turn instead of the end — hugely valuable for ongoing damage effects. Orcish Perseverance delays death from exhaustion and suffocation. The whole package is excellent for a frontline brawler.

● Dwarf Classic Barbarian synergy. Durability, the implied access to Fireforge Heritage's fire resistance, and the general hardiness of the lineage all make dwarves excellent barbarians. No native ability score bonuses in ToV (those come from Heritage), but the package is solid.

● Bearfolk (The Old Margreve) Apex Predator lets you add STR or CON to CHA checks a few times per long rest, which helps cover the Barbarian's usual social weakness and pairs nicely with Intimidation. Wild Heart gives nearby allies advantage against being frightened, and Thick Coat adds cold resistance. Strong thematic and mechanical fit.

● Piney (The Old Margreve) Advantage against exhaustion is useful on a class that sometimes gets pushed through hard travel and brutal adventuring days. Living Wood is the real draw: reaction AC equal to PB against a melee hit, usable PB times per long rest. Photosynthetic hit-die recovery is campaign-dependent but good in outdoor games.

● Human Versatile. No strong synergies, no weaknesses. Pairs well with most Heritage options.

● Alseid (The Old Margreve) 40-foot speed is excellent on a melee class, and advantage against exhaustion and fear overlaps usefully with the Barbarian's frontline role. Heightened Senses and trackless movement are strong exploration perks. The drawback is Quadruped: ladders, trapdoors, stairs, and tight humanoid structures can become real table friction.

● Dragonborn (Labyrinth Worldbook) Medium size, CON-based breath weapon DC, damage resistance, darkvision, and 10-foot keensense are all practical frontline tools. The breath weapon uses your bonus action, so Berserker and Hive Tender feel the competition more than Wild Fury or Forsaken. Void, radiant, poison, cold, and fire ancestries are the most campaign-shaping picks.

● Gearforged (Labyrinth Worldbook) Hybrid Humanoid gives disease immunity, poison resistance, and advantage against paralysis, petrification, and poison. Bulk Up is the Barbarian-facing upgrade: bonus-action Large size, extra weapon damage, and advantage on STR checks and saves for PB rounds. Excellent for grapplers, corridor bullies, and Forsaken tanks, though bonus action timing matters.

● Minotaur (Labyrinth Worldbook) Medium size, horn attack, charge damage, bonus-action shove after a horn hit, and perfect path retracing. The horn is not better than a greataxe, but Charge plus shove gives you a real physical-control identity. Very good for maze campaigns, Vanguard tanks, and Forsaken vengeance bruisers.

● Satyr (Labyrinth Worldbook) Medium Fey with charm and unconscious resistance, advantage against spells and magical effects, and a reaction half-speed move after a melee hit or unarmed strike. The reaction competes with Vanguard and Retaliation later, but early mobility plus magical defense is a strong Barbarian package.

● Beastkin Animal traits are flavorful and can be useful (climbing speed, enhanced senses, etc.), but nothing is broken. Functional, not optimal.

● Erina (The Old Margreve) Burrow speed, darkvision, poison resistance, and advantage against poison are all useful. Small size is the problem: it pushes you away from Heavy weapons, which means no greataxe or Heavy Weapon Mastery plan. Better for a shield, grapple, or Shadow Chewer bite concept than the default damage build.

● Elf No particular mechanical synergy for a STR/CON build. The lineage doesn't push you toward what Barbarians need.

● Derro (Labyrinth Worldbook) Superior darkvision, advantage against charm and fear, psychic resistance, and protection against dread and void taint are all useful. The problem is Small size. If you want a shield Barbarian, Shadow Chewer bite build, or anti-Void Forsaken, this is playable; if you want Heavy Weapon Mastery, it fights your plan.

● Midnight Dwarf (Labyrinth Worldbook) Psychic resistance, better survival on dead worlds or in the Void, and doubled survival time without basic needs are strong campaign defenses. It is less broadly useful than standard Dwarf durability unless the campaign is actually using dead worlds, Void travel, or psychic threats.

● Star Elf (Labyrinth Worldbook) Advantage against blindness and PB/day misty step in bright or dim light are useful, but the teleport uses CHA and does not solve your core STR/CON priorities. Good for a mobile, celestial-themed Barbarian; not a default optimizer pick.

● Syderean Spellborn (Labyrinth Worldbook) Energy Form gives once-per-long-rest resistance to nonmagical physical damage, immunity to restrained, and damage conversion. The physical resistance overlaps with Rage, but restrained immunity is valuable. Mostly a flavor or anti-control pick unless the table uses a lot of restraining monsters.

● Smallfolk Small size means you cannot use Heavy weapons without disadvantage. Greataxes are your best friend. This lineage locks you out of that friendship.

Heritage Options

● Slayer Proficiency in Intimidation (doubles nicely with Berserker's Ruthless Bearing for expertise-equivalent), advantage on Intimidation checks against Beasts. Tracker adds your PB to any tracking or spotting check. Pairs perfectly with Berserker's terror-focused kit.

● Nomadic Advantage on saves against extreme weather, reduce exhaustion on short rest, Survival proficiency. The exhaustion reduction is situational but the Barbarian is often the scout. Solid utility pick.

● Old Ways (The Old Margreve) Nature and Survival proficiency, druidcraft, and advantage on Animal Handling / Insight checks to read Beasts, Plants, and vegetation. The cantrip is not a combat plan, but the skill package is excellent for a wilderness Barbarian and fits Wild Fury, Hive Tender, and Shadow Chewer cleanly.

● Martial Law (Book of Blades) Basic Training gives Athletics and Intimidation, Militia Drill adds light armor and weapon proficiencies, and Small Unit Tactics lets you Help as a bonus action while adjacent to an ally PB times per long rest. Barbarians do not care much about the armor, but Athletics, Intimidation, and bonus-action Help are exactly the warband package a disciplined frontliner wants. Best on commander Barbarians, Vanguard builds, and parties with a Rogue or Paladin who can exploit Help.

● Fallen (Labyrinth Worldbook) Blood Lust lets you use a reaction to make another melee attack after reducing a creature to 0 HP with a melee attack, Fighting Fit gives advantage on death saves, and Wasteland Survivor adds Survival with foraging/shelter expertise. The ally-attack clause is real table risk, but a Barbarian is one of the best classes for turning kill momentum into another hit.

● Maze-Born (Labyrinth Worldbook) Survival proficiency, advantage against getting lost in Labyrinth pathways, portal/secret door detection support, and a social opener. This is not raw DPR, but it is one of the cleanest Labyrinth-campaign heritages for a Barbarian who needs to help the party navigate.

● Stygian (Labyrinth Worldbook) Reduced Luck cost for rerolls and a fear-save floor of 10 are both good on a frontliner. It overlaps somewhat with Berserker fear immunity while raging, but it helps before Rage, outside Rage, and on subclasses that do not cover fear natively.

● Void-Touched (Labyrinth Worldbook) Arcana or Religion proficiency, doubled PB on Void creature/cult lore, a dread-save floor of 10, shortened dread duration, and Void Speech literacy without harm. This is excellent if the campaign's actual enemy is the Void. Otherwise it is mostly story weight.

● Horse Lord (Book of Blades) Expert Trainer improves one horse's HP maximum and DEX saves by PB after long-rest training, while Clansman adds Animal Handling and either Performance or Survival. This is not a default Barbarian pick, but it is a good mounted-raider package if your campaign treats horses as combat assets. Pair with Fell Rider only if heroic endowments and mounted combat are actually on the table.

● Forest Bastion (The Old Margreve) Animal Handling or Nature, trapper's tools, and a reroll on failed CHA checks with urban creatures once per short or long rest. This is a clean "forest edge" heritage for Barbarians who want more exploration coverage without losing combat focus.

● Wildlands (Beastkin-associated) Scaling natural weapon attacks, advantage in natural terrain — fits the Wild Fury subclass thematically and mechanically.

● Moonlit (The Old Margreve) Harness Moonlight makes a carried light count as sunlight for PB rounds, and Shadow Survivor gives advantage against being frightened. Good in shadow, undead, or darkness-heavy campaigns, especially with Shadow Chewer. Otherwise the benefits are narrower than Slayer or Old Ways.

● Hiveheim (The Old Margreve) Strong flavor match for Hive Tender, with Nature or Survival plus herbalist or provisioner tools. Hive Minded can give Stealth and Survival advantage in environments with hive-dwelling creatures. Good in the Margreve; less reliable outside it.

● Boatwright (Labyrinth Worldbook) Swim speed, 10-minute breath-holding, water vehicle proficiency, and advantage on DEX checks and saves to avoid being knocked prone. Strong in River Styx or water campaigns, merely flavorful elsewhere.

● Messenger (Labyrinth Worldbook) Climb speed, advantage against falling, modest fall-damage reduction, and a rumor reroll. Useful on skirmisher Barbarians and Yggdrasil campaigns, but it does not compete with Slayer, Fallen, or Stygian for combat impact.

● Oldwood (Labyrinth Worldbook) Nature, herbalist tools, forest/Yggdrasil difficult-terrain help, and oak-road travel shortcuts. Great for Old Ring and wilderness campaigns; narrower than Old Ways unless the campaign is specifically Labyrinth forest travel.

● Steam-and-Brass (Labyrinth Worldbook) Tinker tools expertise, mending, and temporary makeshift tools. This is useful for gearforged, vehicle, and Smithy campaigns, but it is mostly utility on a Barbarian.

● Delver (The Old Margreve) Burrow speed and Acrobatics or Persuasion proficiency are useful, especially for Erina or underground campaigns. It does not directly boost Barbarian damage or durability, so treat it as a mobility and utility pick.

● Fireforge Fire resistance and Smithing tools. Free fire resistance is better on paper than in practice (not the most common damage type in many campaigns), but it stacks with Rage resistance for effectively taking a fraction of fire damage. Useful in campaigns with fire-heavy encounters.

● Cosmopolitan Urban advantages. Functionally useless in wilderness-heavy campaigns, but solid for city intrigue.

● Privileged (Book of Blades) Passion Project gives any skill plus an instrument or gaming set, and Social Maneuvering gives advantage on contested Deception, Insight, and Persuasion checks in social situations. Mechanically useful, but it is not what most Barbarians are buying. Take it for exiled royalty, noble champions, gladiator celebrities, or an Undying Warrior with a courtly origin. Skip it for standard dungeon damage builds.

● Cloud Magic-focused, uses CHA/INT/WIS for spellcasting. None of that matters to a non-casting Barbarian.

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Skills

The Barbarian class offers two skills from: Animal Handling, Athletics, Intimidation, Nature, Perception, and Survival.

● Athletics — Your STR modifier makes this your best skill. Grappling, climbing, shoving, swimming — Athletics covers the physical verbs. Mandatory.

● Perception — The most rolled skill in the game. Always take it if your WIS isn't terrible.

● Intimidation — Strong thematic pick. Gets significantly better with Berserker's Ruthless Bearing (doubles PB). Your CHA is probably bad, but a secondary CHA skill with proficiency beats nothing.

● Survival — Useful in exploration-heavy campaigns. Nature's complement.

● Animal Handling — Useful for certain party configurations and Wild Fury characters. Otherwise niche.

● Nature — Knowledge skill. You'll roll it sometimes. But it competes with better options.

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Backgrounds

Backgrounds in ToV provide two skill proficiencies, some tool proficiencies, starting equipment, and a single Talent. The Talent is the most mechanically strong part.

● Homesteader Survival + one of Athletics/Animal Handling/Intimidation. That's a potential double-dip on Barbarian class skills (Athletics + Intimidation is a particularly strong combination). The associated Talent choices — Aware, Dungeoneer, or Far Traveler — are all useful utility picks. Aware is the standout: floor your initiative rolls at 10, never be surprised, deny hidden creature advantage. Pair with Feral Instinct for one of the most reliably high-initiative characters in the game.

● Soldier Athletics or Survival proficiency, plus a Talent of Combat Casting, Combat Conditioning, or Field Medic. Combat Conditioning is a Barbarian's best friend: +2 HP per level (a flat ~40 HP bonus by 20th level) and improved hit die rolls. Fits the Barbarian's "more HP" strategy perfectly.

● Wanderer (Labyrinth Worldbook) Choose two from Animal Handling, Athletics, Nature, or Survival; gain a home-world language and herbalist or navigator tools; and choose Athletic, Aware, or Far Traveler. This is almost Homesteader for Labyrinth campaigns. Athletics + Survival plus Aware is the strongest default, especially once Feral Instinct makes you one of the highest-initiative characters at the table.

● Grove Warden (Labyrinth Worldbook) Choose two from Intimidation, Medicine, Nature, or Survival; gain Elvish or Sylvan and herbalist or trapper tools; and choose Aware, Combat Conditioning, or Covert. Combat Conditioning makes this a real Barbarian background, and the Old Ring flavor is excellent for Wild Fury, Forsaken, Hive Tender, or any anti-Void wilderness bruiser.

● Concordan Guard (Labyrinth Worldbook) Choose two from Athletics, Medicine, Persuasion, or Religion; gain air or land vehicle proficiency plus a weapon, instrument, or armor proficiency; and choose Aware, Comrade, or Vanguard. Athletics plus Vanguard is the Barbarian reason to care. Best for a Labyrinth frontliner who served near the Void front lines.

● Rustic Athletics, Acrobatics, Investigation, or Medicine — choose two. The Talent options include Hand to Hand, Physical Fortitude, and Comrade. Physical Fortitude lets you reroll STR/CON saves once per turn and floors your physical save rolls with Luck.

● Forest Dweller (The Old Margreve) Survival plus Animal Handling, Nature, or Stealth; Sylvan; a tool proficiency; and access to Athletic, Forest Denizen, or Relentless Hunter. This is one of the best background fits for an Old Margreve Barbarian if your campaign spends real time tracking, foraging, scouting, or dealing with fey forests.

● Conscript (Book of Blades) Choose two from Acrobatics, Athletics, Insight, or Medicine; choose trapper, provisioner, or smithing tools; learn a language tied to an enemy you fought; and start with a martial weapon plus medium armor. The talent list includes Armor Training, Focus (War), and Ranged Weapon Mastery. The skills are better than the talent list for Barbarians, but Athletics + Insight or Athletics + Medicine is a strong campaign-facing package.

● Grave Keeper (Book of Blades) Choose two from History, Insight, Medicine, or Religion, learn two languages, and choose Combat Conditioning, Field Medic, or Focus (Death). This is the cleanest Book of Blades background for an Undying Warrior: death theme, Medicine or Insight, and direct access to Combat Conditioning.

● Avatar (Book of Blades) Choose two from Acrobatics, History, Intimidation, or Religion; gain Celestial or Abyssal plus another language; and choose Psycanist, Touch of Luck, or Vanguard. This is a strong divine-warrior Barbarian background because Intimidation and Vanguard both matter. It is especially good for Undying Warrior or any Barbarian built around fear and reactions.

● Criminal Situational skills, but access to the Opportunist Talent (advantage on opportunity attacks, opportunity attacks against creatures that stand from prone) has real synergy with a Barbarian that's in enemies' faces constantly.

● Battle Academician (Book of Blades) Choose two from History, Insight, Investigation, or Survival, plus construction or navigator tools and a relevant vehicle. The talent list includes Aware, Comrade, and Vanguard. The skill list is not very Barbarian-shaped, but it enables a serious Tactical Planning commander build because that Book of Blades talent requires History proficiency.

● Cult Escapee (Labyrinth Worldbook) Choose two from Arcana, Deception, History, or Religion; gain a language and tool or instrument; and choose Covert, Mental Fortitude, or Ritualist. The anti-cult story is perfect for Forsaken or Void-Touched Barbarians, but the mechanics are not physical enough for a default build.

● Portal Wright (Labyrinth Worldbook) Choose two from Arcana, History, Investigation, or Perception; gain two tools; and choose Arcanist, Far Traveler, or Locksmith. Perception is good and Far Traveler is serviceable, but this is a utility/map background, not a frontliner package.

● Visionary (Labyrinth Worldbook) Choose from Arcana, Insight, Medicine, or Performance; gain alchemist or herbalist tools plus an instrument; and choose Mental Fortitude, Mystic Visions, or Psycanist. Mystic Visions can pre-roll d20s, which is strong, but the WIS prerequisite and softer skill list keep this from being a normal Barbarian pick.

● Judicial Champion (Book of Blades) Choose two from History, Intimidation, Perception, or Sense Motive; choose any two tool or language proficiencies; and choose Combat Casting, Scrutinous, or Weapon Option Specialist (Book of Blades). The skills are excellent, but the talent list is narrow for Barbarians unless your table uses weapon options often.

● Prodigal (Book of Blades) Choose two from Deception, Insight, Perception, or Sleight of Hand; gain one artistic, gaming, vehicle, or instrument proficiency plus a language; and choose Athletic, Covert, or Mental Fortitude. Good for an untamed plunderer or social Barbarian, but not stronger than Soldier, Homesteader, Grave Keeper, or Avatar.

● Scholar / Artist / Maker Academic and performance-focused backgrounds. None of the skills or Talent lists overlap meaningfully with what a Barbarian wants.

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Talents

Barbarians access Martial Talents through their Improvement feature (one Improvement every few levels, with the option to take a Talent instead of +2/+1+1 to ability scores). Choose carefully — ability scores feed your attack, damage, saves, and AC. A Talent has to compete with that.

● Combat Conditioning +2 HP per character level, and improved hit die rolls (floor of your PB). At 20th level, this is +40 HP. Combined with a d12 hit die and high CON, you become an almost unmovable object. This is the Talent most worth delaying an ability score bump for.

● Heavy Weapon Mastery (4th level or higher) Extra attack on a crit, and a bonus action choice between: ignore resistance to your damage type OR deal −5/+half STR score damage. The free extra attack on crits is pure upside on a crit-heavy Barbarian (especially post-Brutal Critical). Get this when your STR is already capped.

● Critical Training Crits on 19–20 with weapons, plus add your attack stat modifier to crit damage once more. The crit threshold overlaps with Brutal Critical at 9th level — but Critical Training works from level 1. Taking this early extends the crit window before Brutal Critical comes online. After 9th level it becomes partially redundant on the threshold, but the extra damage modifier on crits stacks with the extra dice from Brutal Critical.

● Furious Charge Move 20 feet in a straight line toward a creature and hit it for bonus effects: +PB damage, push, prone, or swap positions. No prerequisites. Fits the Barbarian's charge-first-ask-later playstyle. The prone effect combined with Reckless Attack advantage makes this particularly nasty against big single targets.

● Weapon Discipline +1 to attack and damage rolls with one weapon type, plus an extra damage die on crits with that weapon. On a greataxe-focused build, this is +1 to hit and damage on every swing, plus more dice on an already dice-heavy crit. Solid, if unexciting.

● Vanguard Reaction attack when a creature in your reach attacks someone other than you, plus better opportunity-attack coverage against movement that would normally avoid OAs. Barbarians do not have as many reaction attacks as Fighters, so this fills a real gap. It is best on tank Barbarians, Wild Fury Wolf support builds, and any party that expects the Barbarian to protect the backline rather than only chase damage.

● Cleaver (Player's Guide 2) Heavy two-handed weapon users can splash an extra melee attack into a second nearby target once per turn. This is not a boss-killer talent; it is a "the minion stood in the splash zone" talent.

● Hurler (Player's Guide 2) The best PG2 talent for Four Winds builds. Thrown Barbarian has always needed help staying relevant at range, and Four Winds plus Hurler finally makes the plan look intentional instead of improvised.

● Hard to Kill (Player's Guide 2) More death insurance for a class that already wants to be the last person standing. Best on Undying Warrior, Kraken grapplers, and any campaign where dropping to 0 HP is treated as a scheduling issue.

● Juggernaut (Player's Guide 2) Fits Barbarians who want to ignore battlefield obstruction and keep moving through enemies, doors, furniture, and other suggestions.

● Polearm Mastery (Player's Guide 2) Good reach tech, but it competes with greataxe crit math and Kraken already solves reach in a more subclass-native way.

● Battle Tactician (Book of Blades) Three battle tactics, 4 tactical points, and a short-rest refresh. The save DC uses CHA, which is bad for most Barbarians, but the ally-facing tactics are the point: Convergent Onslaught, Guardian's Glare, Endure Pain, and Masterful Rally let a frontliner shape the party's turn economy. This is green, not blue, because you need table buy-in and probably cannot afford high CHA.

● Tactical Planning (Book of Blades) Requires History proficiency and level 4. After a rest spent planning for a known battle, you give up to ten allies Ambush, Defensive Action, or Rush the Line for that fight. This is excellent in raids, sieges, monster hunts, and any campaign where you can see the fight coming. In random-room dungeon crawls, it turns off too often.

● Weapon Option Specialist (Book of Blades) Choose a weapon option and improve its DC or attack roll, then add PB damage when you hit while using it. Barbarians already have high STR, Reckless Attack, and strong positioning pressure, so weapon options that shove, trip, disarm, or otherwise control enemies can be very good. The rating depends entirely on whether your table actually uses weapon options.

● Lacerating Slash (Labyrinth Worldbook) When you damage with a melee piercing or slashing weapon, you can apply a bleed equal to twice your PB at the start of each of the target's turns until magical healing or an action stops it. On a crit, you add your attack ability modifier to the bleed. This is very real on greataxe, horn, bite, and Forsaken pressure builds, especially because Reckless Attack and Brutal Critical make crits happen.

● Rallying Call (Labyrinth Worldbook) Once per short or long rest, bonus action battle cry: you and friendly creatures within 30 feet get advantage on the next ranged or melee weapon attack and advantage against frightened for 1 minute. The bonus action cost is real, but this is a strong commander Barbarian button and stacks naturally with a party that starts fights on your engage.

● Void Strike (Labyrinth Worldbook) Requires 4th level. When you hit with a weapon attack, you can change your weapon damage to necrotic until your next turn, and you can roll one hit die for extra necrotic damage. This spends the same resource Barbarians already value, but a d12 hit die makes the damage rider better for you than for most classes. Best in Void campaigns or on Forsaken.

● Unarmed Maneuvers (Book of Blades) Requires Martial Arts or Hand to Hand. You trade unarmed strike damage for control maneuvers: blocking speech, deafening, blinding, knocking prone, or pushing. This is a real pick for Frostborn Raider, Hand to Hand Barbarians, and grapplers. It is not for greataxe Berserkers, because giving up weapon damage is exactly what that build does not want.

● Athletic Doubles PB on Athletics, improved carrying/lifting capacity, bonus jump distance, cheap prone recovery. Great utility, mediocre combat impact unless your campaign involves a lot of environmental hazards.

● Forest Denizen (The Old Margreve) Advantage on climbing and swimming checks, resistance to the poisoned condition, plant safety sense, and advantage against many natural grapples/restraints. This is solid in the Old Margreve specifically, where hostile vegetation, beasts, and monstrosities matter. In a standard dungeon campaign, it is too narrow to beat Combat Conditioning.

● Relentless Hunter (The Old Margreve) Adds PB to tracking checks, gives one tracking check advantage per long rest, improves stealth and detection against a tracked creature, extends travel before forced march saves, and adds PB damage to your first hit against a chosen quarry when combat starts. Good campaign talent, modest combat talent.

● Physical Fortitude Reroll one STR/CON save per turn, advantage on knockdown/push/pull resistance, Luck generation. Defensive Talent — good for campaigns where you're fighting giants, grapple specialists, or effects that punish failed CON saves.

● Hand to Hand Unarmed strikes become 1d6 + STR, improvised weapons scale up. There's a grapple-focused Barbarian build here, but it competes with using a greataxe, which is almost always better damage. If you want to grapple-then-damage as a Berserker, this has legs.

● Poisoner (Book of Blades) Poison immunity and bonus-action poison application. The defensive half is excellent in poison-heavy campaigns, but Barbarians already have strong durability and often have better bonus-action uses. Hive Tender also covers poison resilience more directly. Take it only if your table supports poison crafting, harvesting, or frequent poisoned enemies.

● War Dancer (Book of Blades) Requires DEX 13. Move more than 10 feet for +1 AC until your next turn, avoid OAs from creatures you hit in melee, and react for +2 AC against one visible melee attack. Most STR/CON Barbarians do not want to spend build resources on DEX 13, but Alseid, Beastkin, or skirmisher Wild Fury builds can use this as a mobile-defense package.

● Armor Training / Armor Expert The Barbarian's Unarmored Defense beats most armor at good CON scores. Spending a Talent to enable armor proficiency for worse AC is a trap. The only exception is if you have a terrible CON and won't invest in it — a corner case not worth building around.

● Magic Talents (any) No spellcasting class feature. These don't function.

● Teleporting Harrier / Stunning Sniper / Friend of the Fey / Friend of the Forest (The Old Margreve) Teleporting Harrier needs teleportation you probably do not have. Stunning Sniper is ranged-weapon focused. Friend of the Fey and Friend of the Forest are technical utility talents with poor combat return for this class. They are flavorful, not optimized Barbarian picks.

Barbarian Talent Shortlist with Expansion Books

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Subclasses

Subclasses are chosen at 3rd level and grant features at 3rd, 7th, 11th, and 15th.

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Berserker ●

The Berserker is the direct, damage-oriented path. It doubles down on the Barbarian's core: hit things harder and more often, and scare everything that survives.

Frenzy (3rd) ● Activate as part of the same bonus action you use to enter Rage. For the rage's duration, make a single melee weapon attack as a bonus action each turn. That's an additional attack on every turn for free, as long as you're raging. This is straightforwardly excellent. Three attacks per round at 5th level (two from Multiattack, one from Frenzy) is your baseline before crits.

Ruthless Bearing (3rd) ● Proficiency in Intimidation, doubled PB if already proficient. Free skill expertise, effectively. Pairs excellently with Slayer Heritage for a fully-stacked Intimidation modifier.

Mindless Rage (7th) ● While raging: ignore exhaustion levels, can't be charmed or frightened, and during Frenzy — if you crit or reduce a creature to 0 HP — gain temporary HP equal to PB + CON modifier. All of this is great. Immunity to charm and fear while raging removes two of the most common CC effects. The temporary HP generation from crits feeds into your durability in a meaningful way and has great synergy with the Frenzy attack's crit frequency.

Intimidating Presence (11th) ● Your attacks deal additional damage equal to PB against frightened targets. You can use a bonus action to frighten up to PB creatures within 30 feet (WIS save DC 8 + PB + CHA + current temp HP from Mindless Rage). The save DC scaling with temporary HP is a unique pressure mechanic — the more HP you've absorbed from kills, the harder this becomes to resist. The CHA dependency is real (most Barbarians dump CHA), but the base DC is still functional and the bonus damage on frightened targets is free.

Retaliation (15th) ● When a creature hits or misses you with an attack, use your reaction to move up to half your speed toward it and make a single melee attack. If the creature is Large or larger, you have advantage on the roll. This is triggered off enemy misses too — which given how often enemies will be attacking you, activates constantly. Free attacks every round via reaction, at a level where your attacks already hit hard. Against Large+ creatures (basically every boss you'll ever fight), you have advantage on top of it.

Berserker Summary: Every feature is useful. Frenzy is free extra attacks, Mindless Rage provides defensive CC immunity and self-sustaining temp HP, and Retaliation generates reaction attacks late. This is the default optimal subclass for most Barbarian builds.

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Wild Fury ●

Wild Fury trades raw damage upside for versatility and utility through its animal-based feature system. It's a more involved subclass with more decision points — you're choosing animal tokens that define your rage benefits, and you stack a second animal at 15th. The ceiling is lower than Berserker in pure damage, but the options are flavorful and some combinations are powerful.

Animal Focus (3rd) ● Choose an animal (with a marking/token/symbol), gain benefits while raging:

• ● Toad — Full damage resistance to all types except psychic while raging. Combined with existing slashing/piercing/bludgeoning resistance from Rage, you are extremely difficult to kill. Nearly immune to physical damage, and resistant to fire, cold, etc. The best survivability option.
• ● Bear — Bonus action for temp HP equal to barbarian level + CON modifier, and advantage on melee attack rolls while you have those temp HP. Combines well with Berserker builds conceptually, but this is the Wild Fury version. Good damage + survivability hybrid.
• ● Alligator — Grappled creatures are also restrained, you can drag without speed penalty, bonus action force damage to grappled targets. Strong grapple-specialist build enabler.
• ● Tiger — Dash action + bonus action melee attack, with a +5 attack/damage bonus if you moved 20+ feet straight. On crits, roll damage dice three times. Excellent mobility + burst damage.
• ● Wolf — Allies have advantage on attacks against creatures within 5 feet of you. Strong party support, but your own damage contribution doesn't increase.
• ● Hawk — Advantage on Perception, +5 passive Perception, and a bonus action grapple if you hit a creature twice. Utility-focused.
• ● Lizard — +10 speed, climbing speed equal to walking speed, Dash + Disengage in one action. Excellent mobility, modest damage.
• ● Turtle — +1 AC unarmored (making Unarmored Defense 14 + CON), or DEX save bonus while armored. Fine at low levels, falls behind.

Nature's Cunning (3rd) ● Proficiency in Animal Handling, doubled PB if already proficient. Weaker in combat relevance than Ruthless Bearing, but still free skill expertise.

Primal Aspect (7th) ● A second animal effect from a different list (Hawk, Lizard, Turtle, or Wolf). This is additive — you keep your Animal Focus and add one of these. The combinations matter:

• Toad + Wolf: You're a tank that also enables your whole party's offense.
• Tiger + Hawk: Mobility + perception + bonus grapple on double hits.
• Alligator + Lizard: Grapple + climb speed + mobility for terrain-control specialists.

Ferocious Howl (11th) ● When you enter Rage, use your reaction to give all allies within 60 feet advantage on all d20 rolls until the start of your next turn. Attack rolls, saves, ability checks — everything. This is a massive party buff. One reaction at the start of each Rage is extraordinarily efficient. Timing matters — enter Rage right before the party needs their advantage the most.

Empowered Rage (15th) ● A third animal effect from a final list (Crane, Ram, Shark, Snake). More additive stacking:

• ● Shark — Each hit on a creature below max HP deals an extra 1d12 of your weapon's damage type. Basically: every hit after the first in a fight deals +1d12. In sustained combat, this is enormous damage.
• ● Ram — Move 20+ feet, knock targets prone and deal 2d6 bonus damage. Combines well with Lizard mobility to get those 20-foot charges reliably.
• ● Snake — Advantage on opportunity attacks, move to stay in reach after an OA hit. Control the battlefield.
• ● Crane — +20 foot jump, no damage from falls of 100 feet, +5 foot melee reach. Niche but fun.

Wild Fury Summary: More complex than Berserker, but the Toad + any damage aspect combination can produce a remarkably durable and offensive character. Ferocious Howl at 11th is arguably the best team-support feature in the Barbarian kit. Weaker single-target damage ceiling than Berserker, but broader utility and one of the best mid-combat party support tools in the game.

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Chaos (Player's Guide 2) ●

Chaos is the Barbarian for players who want Rage to come with a dice pool and a mild paperwork goblet. You get Chaos Dice equal to PB + 1, spend them for extra force damage, and attach banes that disrupt enemy turns. It is more complicated than Berserker, but the payoff is real control stapled to Barbarian attacks.

Chaos Conduit (3rd, Player's Guide 2) ● While raging, when you hit with a weapon attack you can spend a Chaos Die to add force damage and choose a Chaos Bane. Enervate can impose disadvantage on the target's next attack, Impede can shut off reactions, Martyr adds more force damage at a painful self-cost, and Shunt can teleport the target to an unoccupied space you can see within 30 feet.

The important part is that this is not just damage. Impede turns off opportunity attacks. Shunt breaks positioning. Enervate protects the party. Martyr is the "fine, I will eat glass for damage" option, which is very Barbarian but should not be your default nutritional plan.

Random Polymath (3rd, Player's Guide 2) ● After each long rest, you gain a random skill proficiency, or doubled PB if you already have it. It is chaotic, but it patches the Barbarian's out-of-combat weakness. Sometimes you wake up as the party's best Arcana consultant. Nobody is more surprised than you.

Invoke Entropy (7th, Player's Guide 2) ● As a reaction, force a reroll when you or a visible creature within 30 feet succeeds or fails an ability check, attack roll, or save. PB uses per long rest. This is the kind of feature Barbarians almost never get: reactive probability control. Use it to protect allies from lethal saves, force boss misses, or make a clutch grapple stick.

Mayhem Shield (11th, Player's Guide 2) ● Spend Chaos Dice as a reaction to reduce damage to you. If any die rolls a 1, you regain PB Chaos Dice. If any die rolls a 10, the attacker takes force damage equal to the combined dice. It is swingy, but it turns your dice pool into survival tech instead of pure offense.

Cry Havoc (15th, Player's Guide 2) ● If you start your turn with no Chaos Dice, regain one and gain advantage on your first attack before the end of that turn. The subclass no longer fully bricks itself when the dice run dry. Hot take: this is less a capstone and more the table saying, "please stop hoarding your dice."

Chaos Summary (Player's Guide 2): Good, flexible, and much more tactical than it looks. Berserker wins on simple sustained damage. Chaos wins when rerolls, reaction denial, forced movement, and damage reduction matter.

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Four Winds (Player's Guide 2) ●

Four Winds is the storm Barbarian that actually cares about movement. It gives you Acrobatics support, anti-prone tech, ranged weapon help for thrown STR weapons, mobility bursts, and damage reduction. If you want a Barbarian who can leap, throw, charge, and turn the map into weather, this is the one.

Implacable Presence (3rd, Player's Guide 2) ● Acrobatics proficiency, or doubled PB if you already have it. Useful on a class that normally leans Athletics, especially when terrain, balance, falls, and forced movement show up.

Winds of Wrath (3rd, Player's Guide 2) ● While raging, you cannot be knocked prone and you land on your feet. When you Rage, you also choose a wind benefit: ranged attacks against you can suffer disadvantage while you are obscured by dust, you can convert a long leap into thunder damage and a prone rider, or you can use Reckless Attack with thrown STR weapons while doubling range and adding double Rage damage.

That third mode is the headline. ToV Barbarians often have bad ranged turns. Four Winds says, "what if throwing weapons counted as weather?" Good answer.

Cyclonic Ward (7th, Player's Guide 2) ● Reduce fall damage, and while raging use a reaction to reduce damage to you or an ally within 30 feet by your Barbarian level. You can also move a willing ally 10 feet. Damage reduction plus repositioning is rare Barbarian support and gives this subclass a real defender angle.

Howling Charge (11th, Player's Guide 2) ● Bonus action Dash, then ignore difficult terrain and avoid paralysis or restraint until the start of your next turn. This is the "no, I am absolutely reaching the caster" feature. If the battlefield has mud, ice, webs, roots, or smug enemies, it earns its keep.

Raging Storm (15th, Player's Guide 2) ● While raging, melee and unarmed hits splash thunder damage to nearby hostile creatures, Cyclonic Ward can retaliate with thunder and deafening pressure, and your first thrown STR weapon hit splashes lightning. The numbers are not a nova spell, but they make every turn feel like the storm is now an employee.

Four Winds Summary (Player's Guide 2): The best PG2 pick for mobility, thrown-weapon play, and party-protection Barbarians. If your table uses terrain and enemy spacing, Four Winds gets better every session.

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Kraken (Player's Guide 2) ●

Kraken is the grappling Barbarian with spectral tentacles, underwater competence, and reach that keeps scaling. It is not subtle. It is, however, extremely clear about what it wants: grab things, restrain things, throw things, and make the enemy regret occupying physical space.

Deep Vision (3rd, Player's Guide 2) ● Swim speed equal to your walking speed, the ability to breathe water, and better underwater darkvision. Campaign-dependent, but when the map has water this stops being flavor and starts being a lawsuit against aquatic monsters.

Kraken's Grasp (3rd, Player's Guide 2) ● When you Rage, spectral tentacles appear. As a bonus action, including the bonus action used to Rage, you can make up to two tentacle attacks. They use your STR, have 10-foot reach, deal force damage, and can grapple Large or smaller targets. The damage die scales from d4 to d10 across the subclass.

This is the subclass. Bonus-action reach grapples are a big deal because they let you keep your Attack action for weapons while still controlling enemy movement. Also, yes, your Barbarian now has a tentacle action economy. Everyone be normal for one minute.

Ink Cloud and Titan Grip (7th, Player's Guide 2) ● Ink Cloud adds defensive obscuring, while Titan Grip upgrades tentacle grapples into restrained targets and lets you use tentacles for any number of attacks in your Attack action. Restrained is the payoff condition: attacks against the target improve, and the target's own options get worse.

Tentacle Fling (11th, Player's Guide 2) ● Use attacks to hurl tentacle-grappled creatures up to 30 feet, knocking them prone and potentially causing collision damage. This is battlefield control with a slapstick soundtrack. It is strongest when the map has hazards, ledges, spell zones, or enemies who thought standing together was a plan.

Leviathan Wakes (15th, Player's Guide 2) ● Tentacle reach increases by 10 feet, and when you make your bonus-action tentacle attacks you make one additional tentacle attack. More reach, more grabs, more problems for everyone who did not bring teleportation.

Kraken Summary (Player's Guide 2): The cleanest grappler Barbarian in the current ToV lineup. It needs maps where forced movement, reach, and grapples matter, but when they do, Kraken makes the battlefield feel smaller for everyone except you.

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Forsaken (Labyrinth Worldbook) ●

Forsaken is the Labyrinth Worldbook's spirit-haunted Barbarian. It is built around the lost dead: worlds erased by Void calamity, murdered innocents, forgotten souls, and vengeance against the servitors responsible. Mechanically, it is a durable control-adjacent subclass with passive aura damage, flexible proficiency, condition cleansing, a fear burst, and late resurrection-style insurance.

Hungering Swarm (3rd) (Labyrinth Worldbook) ● While raging, chosen creatures that enter within 5 feet of you for the first time on a turn or start their turn there take radiant or necrotic damage. It begins at 1d6 and scales to 2d6 at 7th, 3d6 at 11th, and 4d6 at 15th.

This is not nova damage, but it is automatic pressure in exactly the space Barbarians occupy. You want enemies adjacent to you. Vanguard, grapples, chokepoints, forced movement, and melee-heavy encounters all make this better. Radiant or necrotic choice is also useful when undead, fiends, or Void creatures care about damage type.

Whispered Knowledge (3rd) (Labyrinth Worldbook) ● At the end of a short or long rest, gain proficiency in one skill, vehicle, or tool until you use this feature again. Barbarians usually do not get flexible noncombat competence, so this matters. Pick thieves' tools when the Rogue is absent, vehicles in travel arcs, Perception in dangerous dungeons, or a lore skill before investigating a Labyrinth faction. It is not combat power, but it keeps the Barbarian relevant between fights.

Consume Suffering (7th) (Labyrinth Worldbook) ● As a bonus action, end one condition affecting you and gain temporary HP equal to half your Barbarian level until your next short or long rest.

This is the feature that makes Forsaken more than an aura subclass. Conditions are how monsters actually beat Barbarians. Damage bounces off Rage; paralysis, poison, restraint, fear, blindness, and action denial are the problem. A bonus-action self-cleanse with temp HP is exactly what a frontliner wants. The bonus action cost is worth it whenever the condition would cost you attacks, movement, or your turn.

Wave of Wrath (11th) (Labyrinth Worldbook) ● While raging, use an action to manifest your bound spirits. Chosen creatures within 30 feet make a WIS save against DC 10 + PB, taking 4d8 radiant or necrotic damage and becoming frightened for 1 minute on a failure, or half damage with no fear on success. Recharges on a short or long rest.

The DC is fixed and not amazing, but the area, short-rest recharge, damage type choice, and frightened rider make it useful. Do not use this when two greataxe attacks would already end the problem. Use it when you are surrounded, when minions need to scatter, when enemies have poor WIS, or when frightened control will protect the backline.

Spirit Sacrifice (15th) (Labyrinth Worldbook) ● If you die and your body is destroyed, a bound spirit preserves your soul. After 24 hours, your soul inhabits another Humanoid corpse on the same plane, returning you to life with full HP. You keep your capabilities, but you exchange your lineage for the new body's lineage if it is different.

This is campaign insurance, not a combat turn. It will never increase DPR, but it changes how disintegration, body destruction, Void annihilation, dragonfire, and lethal high-level plots feel. The lineage-change clause is wild and story-heavy, so this depends heavily on table tone. Mechanically orange; narratively memorable.

Forsaken Summary (Labyrinth Worldbook): Forsaken is good because it attacks the Barbarian's real weaknesses: conditions, utility gaps, and enemies who try to ignore the frontliner. It does not beat Berserker at damage, Wild Fury at flexible animal packages, or Frostborn Raider at raw raging AC. It does, however, become one of the best Barbarian subclasses for Void campaigns, haunted Labyrinth stories, undead-heavy arcs, and players who want the dead fighting through them.

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Frostborn Raider (Book of Blades) ●

Frostborn Raider is the Book of Blades cold-storm Barbarian. It turns Rage into ice armor, gives you built-in ice gauntlets, and eventually lets you fight inside your own blizzard. It is not the highest-damage Barbarian, but it has one of the best defensive level-3 starts and the cleanest support for unarmed Barbarian builds.

Bitter Animus (3rd) (Book of Blades) ● While raging and not wearing armor, your AC becomes 15 + CON modifier. DEX does not apply. That is two points higher than the base Barbarian Unarmored Defense formula, and it arrives at level 3. With CON 16, you are AC 18 while raging; with CON 20, you are AC 20 while raging before magic items.

The ice-covered fists matter too. They function as spiked gauntlets for 1d8 + STR piercing damage, count as Light weapons, allow the Bash weapon option, cannot be disarmed, and melt when Rage ends. This is the subclass that makes an unarmed or two-weapon Barbarian concept mechanically credible without pretending it outdamages a greataxe Berserker.

Home in the Wild (3rd) (Book of Blades) ● Survival proficiency, or doubled PB on Survival if you already have it. Simple, useful, and perfectly aligned with a frozen-wastes raider. It is not combat power, but it saves a class skill slot.

One with the Storm (7th) (Book of Blades) ● Cold resistance, plus your speed is not halved by magical or nonmagical difficult terrain caused by ice or snow. Cold resistance is campaign-dependent, but moving freely through ice and snow matters a lot once your own 11th-level feature starts creating storm terrain.

Summon the Rampant Snowstorm (11th) (Book of Blades) ● While raging, you gain two important tools. First, you can fling icicles from your Bitter Animus gauntlets as ranged weapon attacks for 1d6 + STR piercing damage. This gives the Barbarian an in-rage ranged option that still uses STR.

Second, once each time you Rage, you can cast sleet storm as an action without material components, using CON as the spellcasting ability. You do not need to concentrate, and you cannot end it early before the 1-minute duration. That is powerful and dangerous. The no-concentration clause is great because Rage normally blocks concentration, but the inability to dismiss the storm means your own party has to play around it.

Raging Blizzard (15th) (Book of Blades) ● Your ice gauntlet melee and ranged attacks deal an extra 1d8 cold damage. After taking the Attack action with the gauntlets, you can use a bonus action to make two additional gauntlet attacks instead of the one attack normally granted by two-weapon fighting.

This is the payoff for staying with the gauntlet plan. It gives the subclass a real multi-attack identity, but it still asks you to commit to ice gauntlets instead of the greataxe talent package. If your goal is maximum spike damage, Berserker still wins. If your goal is a durable, mobile, storm-controlling brawler, Frostborn Raider is excellent.

Frostborn Raider Summary (Book of Blades): The AC feature is the headline. A level-3 Barbarian with 15 + CON AC while raging is immediately hard to kill. The subclass becomes more tactical at 11th with no-concentration sleet storm, then becomes a real gauntlet attacker at 15th. Best for cold campaigns, unarmed Barbarians, and players who want battlefield disruption instead of pure greataxe math.

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Undying Warrior (Book of Blades) ●

Undying Warrior is the death-refusal Barbarian. It spends hit dice to heal when badly hurt, frightens enemies while raging, converts conditions into temporary HP, and eventually makes death much harder to stick. It is less clean than Berserker, but it has a strong identity and excellent staying power.

Defy Death (3rd) (Book of Blades) ● When you begin your turn with HP lower than your Barbarian level, you can expend one hit die to recover HP equal to the roll + CON modifier. You can use it while unconscious, but not if you are dead.

This is the subclass's survival engine. It does not prevent a one-shot kill, but it makes the "I am at 3 HP and still raging" Barbarian fantasy much more reliable. The drawback is hit-dice pressure, especially if you also take Combat Conditioning or Unyielding Rage.

Soul of Wrath (3rd) (Book of Blades) ● While raging, once during each of your turns when you hit a creature with an attack roll, you can force a WIS save against DC 10 + PB. On a failure, the target is frightened of you until the end of your next turn. You also deal +1d6 psychic damage when you hit a frightened creature with a weapon attack.

The fear save DC does not use CHA, which is great for Barbarians. The problem is that DC 10 + PB is not high enough to dominate boss monsters forever. Treat this as pressure, not guaranteed control. When it lands, the psychic damage rider rewards you immediately.

Feast of Suffering (7th) (Book of Blades) ● As a bonus action, end one condition affecting you and gain temporary HP equal to half your Barbarian level for 1 minute.

This is one of the best Book of Blades Barbarian features. Conditions are how enemies beat Barbarians once raw damage stops working. Turning a condition into temporary HP while raging is exactly the kind of self-correcting durability a frontliner wants. The bonus action cost matters, but removing the condition is usually worth more than another attack.

Vengeance Snare (11th) (Book of Blades) ● While raging, use a bonus action to force chosen creatures within 30 feet to make a WIS save against DC 10 + PB. On a failure, they are frightened for 1 minute or until they move more than 60 feet away. If a creature was already frightened and fails, it is paralyzed until the end of your next turn. Once per long rest.

The paralyze upgrade is the ceiling. Fear first, then snare, then paralyze. The issue is still the fixed DC. Against low-WIS brutes this is brutal; against high-WIS elites it is unreliable. Good feature, not automatic.

Rejected by Death (15th) (Book of Blades) ● Death no longer fully claims you. If you die and your body is destroyed, your soul remains, and after 24 hours it can begin the process that brings you back if the feature's conditions are met.

This is campaign insurance more than combat math. It will not improve your damage per round, but it changes the stakes of high-level play. In a lethal campaign with disintegration, dragonfire, annihilation effects, or enemies who destroy bodies, this is a real capstone-style safety net.

Undying Warrior Summary (Book of Blades): The subclass is durable, flavorful, and much better against condition-heavy encounters than most Barbarians. It is not as simple as Berserker and not as broadly flexible as Wild Fury, but Feast of Suffering and the fear engine make it a strong pick for death-touched champions, grave guardians, revenants, and terrifying warlords.

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Hive Tender (The Old Margreve) ●

Hive Tender is a bearfolk-flavored bee-spirit Barbarian that plays like a durable skirmishing striker. It gets a bonus action bite while raging, poison defense, short burst flight, and a late debuff rider. The problem is action economy: the bite competes with Berserker's Frenzy-style role but does not scale as explosively with weapon talents.

Honey of the Bear Maiden (3rd) (The Old Margreve) ● Once per long rest, forage blessed honey in an environment where bees are naturally found. Golden light, extra exhaustion recovery, a tiny sting rider, or Animal Handling advantage with low-INT Beasts are all useful, but they are mostly exploration and utility effects. Hearty is the best adventuring-day option because extra exhaustion recovery can matter in harsh wilderness campaigns.

Raging Swarm (3rd) (The Old Margreve) ● While raging, you can make a bonus action bite against a creature within 5 feet. It is an unarmed strike that deals 1d6 + your modifier instead of normal unarmed damage. This gives you a reliable third attack at 5th level, but it uses a smaller die than your greataxe and does not benefit from Heavy Weapon Mastery. Strong early, less impressive once your weapon crit package comes online.

Thousand-Sting Hide (7th) (The Old Margreve) ● Poison resistance, advantage against being poisoned, and suspended poison while raging. Poison is common enough that this matters, and the "suspend while raging" clause is practical: you can keep fighting through effects that would otherwise grind down a frontliner.

On Buzzing Wings (11th) (The Old Margreve) ● Bonus action 30-foot fly speed until the end of your turn while raging, then you fall if still airborne. This is not sustained flight, but it solves the Barbarian's most annoying problem: enemies who think height makes them safe. It competes with the Raging Swarm bite on the turns you use it, but reaching the target is worth more than a missed bonus action attack.

Clinging Swarm (15th) (The Old Margreve) ● Your Raging Swarm bite range becomes 15 feet, and a hit leaves bee spirits clinging to the target until your next turn. The target has disadvantage on weapon attacks, and somatic spellcasting can fail on a CON save against 8 + PB + CON. That save DC uses CON, which you already maximize. This is excellent against weapon bosses and a real tax on casters, though it still asks you to spend your bonus action on the bite.

Hive Tender Summary (The Old Margreve): Good, not dominant. It gives you practical answers to poison, flying enemies, and weapon attackers, while adding a bonus action attack from level 3. Berserker remains the better pure damage subclass. Hive Tender is better when the campaign is wilderness-heavy, poison-heavy, or full of vertical fights.

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Shadow Chewer (The Old Margreve) ●

Shadow Chewer is the radiant anti-darkness Barbarian. It is less optimized for greataxe crit-fishing because its central damage feature is a bite, but it brings tools Barbarians rarely get: magical darkness counterplay, radiant damage, limited healing, and party-wide fear protection.

Chew Shadows (3rd) (The Old Margreve) ● While raging, you shed bright light in a 10-foot radius and dim light for another 10 feet. The bright light cannot be covered, dispelled, or suppressed by magical darkness. This is campaign-dependent but extremely strong when it matters. If your GM uses shadow fey, undead, magical darkness, or light-sensitive enemies, this feature earns its rating.

Teeth of the Sun (3rd) (The Old Margreve) ● When you rage, you gain a bite unarmed strike for 1d8 + STR piercing or radiant damage, scaling to d10 at 7th and d12 at 11th. Radiant damage on a Barbarian is unusual and valuable, but using the bite means giving up the greataxe's Heavy weapon synergy on that attack. Best for a bite-focused concept, a shield build, or campaigns where radiant damage solves real enemy defenses.

Divine Sustenance (7th) (The Old Margreve) ● While raging, bonus action healing for creatures of your choice in your Chew Shadows bright light, equal to half your Barbarian level and capped at half the target's HP maximum. Uses equal PB per long rest. The numbers are not huge, but Barbarians normally do not get repeatable in-rage healing for themselves and nearby allies. Good emergency sustain.

Emboldening Light (11th) (The Old Margreve) ● You and friendly creatures in your bright light are immune to frightened while you rage. At 18th level this extends to the dim light too. Fear is one of the best ways to shut down melee characters; this makes a small anti-fear zone around the party's frontliner. Excellent defensive support.

Rage of the Roaring Sun (15th) (The Old Margreve) ● While raging, use a bonus action to deal radiant damage equal to half your Barbarian level to each creature of your choice in your Chew Shadows light, PB times per long rest. At 15th level this is only 7 radiant damage per target, so do not read it as nova damage. Read it as selective, no-friendly-fire area pressure against swarms, invisible enemies revealed by positioning, or creatures vulnerable to radiant.

Shadow Chewer Summary (The Old Margreve): The best Old Margreve pick for undead, shadow, fear, and darkness campaigns. It is not the top DPR subclass, but it gives the Barbarian rare team utility while still attacking with STR and Rage. If your campaign is not using darkness, fear, undead, or radiant vulnerabilities, Berserker and Wild Fury will usually outperform it.

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Weapons

The Barbarian wants a weapon with the largest damage die available, since Rage adds a flat damage bonus and Brutal Critical rolls extra dice.

● Greataxe (1d12, Heavy, Two-Handed) The optimal weapon. Largest damage die in the game. Every extra die from Brutal Critical is a d12. Pairs with Heavy Weapon Mastery. The Furious Charge Talent works with any melee weapon you're proficient with that isn't Light. Straightforward and devastating.

● Maul (2d6, Heavy, Two-Handed) Higher average damage than the greataxe (7 vs 6.5), but lower maximum and lower Brutal Critical ceiling (each extra die is a d6 vs d12). Slightly better average damage on normal hits; notably worse on crits. Fine if you want the 2d6 roll feel.

● Greatsword (2d6, Heavy, Two-Handed) Functionally identical to the maul in stat terms. Crit behavior is identical. Style choice.

● Handaxe + Any One-Handed Weapon The Barbarian can throw handaxes. Sometimes useful when you're getting kited. But you want to be in melee, so ranged capability is a backup, not a strategy.

● Thrown STR Weapons (Four Winds, Player's Guide 2) Four Winds can use Reckless Attack with thrown STR weapons, double their range, and add double Rage damage while raging. Add Hurler and the "I have no ranged turn" complaint finally leaves the room.

● Ice Gauntlets (Frostborn Raider, Book of Blades) While raging as a Frostborn Raider, your Bitter Animus gauntlets deal 1d8 + STR piercing damage, count as Light weapons, allow the Bash weapon option, and cannot be disarmed. At 11th level you can throw icicles for 1d6 + STR, and at 15th your gauntlet attacks gain +1d8 cold damage plus better two-weapon-style bonus action attacks. This is the one unarmed-ish Barbarian weapon plan that can stand on its own, but it is subclass-locked and still gives up the greataxe Brutal Critical ceiling.

● Versatile weapons (used one-handed) Never use a versatile weapon one-handed on a Barbarian. You want the die size. Use both hands.

Weapon Options (Chapter 5 features): Barbarians don't have Fighter-style Martial Actions, but they do benefit from standard weapon option rules. Read what options your weapons have — some two-handed weapons have cleave effects or similar. The GM's weapon options section is worth reviewing per the ToV rules.

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Armor

● Unarmored (Unarmored Defense) Your default. With 18–20 CON, you're at AC 17–18 naked. That's competitive with scale mail and doesn't cost you a bonus action or a gold investment. Leave the armor to the Fighters.

● Shield (while unarmored) You can use a shield and still benefit from Unarmored Defense. A +2 AC shield is free AC. The tradeoff: you can't wield a greataxe with a shield. If you're using a one-handed weapon, a shield makes sense. If you're committed to the greataxe (you should be), skip it.

● Heavy Armor You lose all Rage benefits while wearing heavy armor. This isn't a trap you need to think about — just never do it.

● Medium Armor At CON 16+, Unarmored Defense gives you higher AC than any medium armor without a shield. Not worth it.

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Magic Items

These are the Labyrinth Worldbook, The Old Margreve, and Book of Blades items that most directly matter to a Barbarian. Most caster-only items from the books are intentionally omitted.

Labyrinth Worldbook Barbarian Gear

● Frostfallow Blade (Labyrinth Worldbook) Fabled greatsword that cannot be disarmed, then grows into water traversal, underwater breathing, hit-die healing, death-save protection, nonmagical damage reduction, and eventually a paralysis rider. It is not a greataxe, so the Brutal Critical ceiling is slightly lower, but the survivability package is absurdly Barbarian-friendly.

● Sunfire Weapon (Labyrinth Worldbook) +1 weapon that adds a major fire/radiant rider against Aberrations, Fiends, and Undead. If your Barbarian is fighting Void corruption, undead, or infernal enemies, this is the cleanest offensive weapon upgrade in the book.

● Voidbane Weapon (Labyrinth Worldbook) Rare weapon for anti-Outsider and anti-Undead work. It spends charges to reduce necrotic damage from those creatures and to add force damage on hits against them. Excellent in the right campaign; merely magical after its charge pool is gone.

● Void Aegis (Labyrinth Worldbook) Absorbs part of incoming necrotic damage, then lets you spend that stored power as healing. Barbarians already make HP go farther through Rage, so any item that changes incoming necrotic damage into later healing is worth noticing.

● Voidskin Cloak (Labyrinth Worldbook) Necrotic resistance plus a hood-based fear effect. The action to raise or lower the hood is clunky, but Barbarians care about reliable resistance and intimidation pressure. Stronger on Undying Warrior or Forsaken than on pure Berserker.

● Belt of Natural Weaponry (Labyrinth Worldbook) Gives small STR/DEX boosts and lets you manifest natural weapons. This is good for Minotaur, Satyr, Dragonborn, bite, horn, claw, and unarmed concept builds, but a standard Heavy Weapon Mastery Barbarian should not abandon a great weapon for it.

● Breath of the Void (Labyrinth Worldbook) Lets you survive without air, ignore Void terrain for a limited duration, and unleash a necrotic line attack by spending stored hours. Very campaign-specific, but a frontliner who has to cross hostile Void terrain will be glad someone packed it.

● Voidwalker (Labyrinth Worldbook) Legendary, sentient, and dangerous. Free action, cold resistance, at-will teleportation, necrotic absorption, and huge lore skill coverage are wildly powerful, but the item is actively malevolent and wants to pull its wearer toward the Void. Treat this as a campaign-defining cursed prize, not normal gear optimization.

● Margreve Fur (The Old Margreve) Advantage on initiative and smell-based Perception checks, plus once-per-dawn invisibility for 1 minute in terrain with ample plant life. Feral Instinct gives initiative advantage at 6th level, so the initiative benefit eventually overlaps, but pre-6 this is excellent and the stealth button remains useful all campaign.

● Scorn Pouch (The Old Margreve) You cannot be surprised by a hostile creature within 30 feet. This overlaps with Aware and later Barbarian surprise protection, but it is still a strong defensive item for parties that get ambushed often.

● Charm of Restoration (The Old Margreve) Common, cheap, and simple: whenever a spell or magical effect restores your HP, you regain 1 extra HP. That is not exciting, but Barbarians get healed constantly because they stand in front. Low cost makes it easy value.

● Moon Through the Trees (The Old Margreve) Within 20 feet of a living tree, become invisible for 1 minute as a bonus action. You can later reveal yourself and force nearby chosen creatures to save or be blinded. Strong ambush and repositioning tool in forest campaigns, but nearly dead weight in castles, deserts, ships, and stone dungeons.

● Half-Sword of the Margreve Knights (The Old Margreve) A +1 longsword with Finesse that crits on 19 or 20. The crit range is attractive before Brutal Critical, but it is still a longsword, not a Heavy two-handed weapon. Good for shield builds and Small Barbarians; worse than a greataxe plan for standard damage optimization.

● Goblin Shield (The Old Margreve) Rare shield with 3 charges that can bite as a bonus action for 2d4 piercing. Fine for sword-and-board Barbarians, but it competes with subclass bonus actions and cannot coexist with a two-handed weapon plan.

● Sickle of Thorns (The Old Margreve) +1 sickle that clears vegetation at range and deals +1d6 slashing to plant creatures. Great Margreve utility, poor baseline Barbarian weapon. Carry it as a tool or plant-hunter sidearm, not as your primary weapon.

● Living Stake (The Old Margreve) Excellent if vampires are on the menu: hit a vampire, attach the stake, stop Regeneration and mist transformation, and enable classic staking when reduced to 0 HP. Completely useless against anything else.

Book of Blades Mounted Support

Book of Blades adds a lot of mount support, but Barbarians should only care if mounted combat is a real campaign mode. The full breakdown is in the animal allies and summons guide.

● Armor of the Paired Heart (Book of Blades) Matching rider armor and barding. The rider can split damage taken by the mount, and rider weight does not count against the mount's carrying capacity. This is one of the best ways to keep a Barbarian's mount from becoming collateral damage.

● Saddle of Flying (Book of Blades) Gives a ridden mount a flying speed equal to its walking speed for limited daily use. This solves the classic Barbarian problem of flying enemies without forcing a spellcaster to spend concentration on you.

● Blanket of the War Steed / Bridle of Handling / Bridle of Calling (Book of Blades) These are practical recurring-mount items: better mount handling, easier retrieval, better saves, fear protection, and initiative temp HP. Not flashy, but exactly what a mounted Barbarian needs if the mount is part of the build.

● Right-Sizing Saddle (Book of Blades) Shrinks a mount by one size category without reducing speed or carrying capacity. This matters for dungeon play, where a Large mount can otherwise make the Barbarian's entire plan collapse at the first five-foot hallway.

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Multiclassing

Requirements: STR 13.

● Fighter (1–2 levels) Gains Fighting Style (Great Weapon Fighting is relevant), Second Wind (free healing), and possibly Action Surge (two attack actions in one turn). A 2-level Fighter dip gives you Action Surge, which means on your best turns you're making four melee attacks with Frenzy active. The cost: delayed Barbarian feature progression.

● Rogue (1 level) Expertise in Athletics for essentially unbreakable grapple checks. Cunning Action for bonus action Dash/Disengage. One level for meaningful grapple build utility. The cost: no feature synergy beyond those two things.

● Paladin (2 levels) Divine Smite adds burst damage on crits. With a 19–20 crit window and Frenzy attacks, this can generate enormous crit-smite spikes. The massive problem: you can't cast spells while raging, and Smite requires a spell slot. You must end your Rage, Smite, and re-enter Rage — or accept that Smite is exclusively for out-of-Rage moments. Awkward. Worth it only for concept builds.

● Monk (1–2 levels) Unarmored Defense overlap (only keep the first class's version). Bonus action unarmed strike with no weapon requirement. The overlap restriction makes this clunky.

● Any Full Caster Concentration spells and Rage don't coexist. Spellcasting levels delay your Barbarian features substantially. The Barbarian doesn't have the spell slot foundation to justify this. Hard pass.

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Hot Takes

Hot Take: Frostborn Raider earns its place for AC, not cold damage. Its 15 + CON Unarmored Defense while raging changes the Barbarian's defensive math; the ice gauntlets and storm features matter after you decide that tradeoff is worth leaving the standard greataxe plan.

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Example Build: The Raging Apex

Concept: Maximum sustained damage and unkillable durability. Berserker subclass, Greataxe with Heavy Weapon Mastery.

Lineage: Orc (Heightened Senses, Stalwart, Orcish Perseverance) Heritage: Slayer (Intimidation proficiency + tracker utility) Background: Soldier (Combat Conditioning Talent at character creation)

Core Tactics:

• Roll initiative → Instant Rage + half-speed move to close distance.
• Turn 1: Reckless Attack + two Multiattack swings + Frenzy bonus action attack = 3 attacks with advantage.
• On any crit: Mindless Rage triggers temp HP. With Brutal Critical, those crits roll 2–4 extra d12s.
• When hit or missed: Retaliation reaction attack.
• Against frightened targets: Intimidating Presence adds PB to every hit.

Damage at level 10 (representative): Three attacks per turn (Reckless, so advantage on each): greataxe 1d12 + 5 (STR) + 2 (rage) = ~15.5 per hit, roughly 46.5 per full turn. On a crit turn (frequent with 19–20 threshold + two d20s per attack): that number spikes by 1d12 + STR modifier per crit die, easily 20–30 additional damage.

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Final Notes

The ToV Barbarian is a trimmed, confident rage chassis: Rage, Reckless Attack, d12 hit die, high CON, and Brutal Critical on 19-20. Player's Guide 2 expands that chassis in the right direction by adding tactical subclasses and real high-level boon alternatives instead of just another way to say "I hit it."

The subclass lineup now serves ten different masters. Berserker is the aggressive damage specialist — pure offense, reaction attacks, fear effects. Wild Fury is the versatile frontliner who can shift roles mid-campaign based on animal tokens. Chaos (Player's Guide 2) is the dice-driven control bruiser. Four Winds (Player's Guide 2) is the mobile storm thrower and defender. Kraken (Player's Guide 2) is the grappler with reach, restraint, and forced movement. Forsaken (Labyrinth Worldbook) is the spirit-haunted anti-control bruiser. Frostborn Raider (Book of Blades) is the cold-storm brawler with excellent raging AC. Undying Warrior (Book of Blades) is the death-refusal and fear-pressure pick. Hive Tender (The Old Margreve) is a poison-resistant skirmisher. Shadow Chewer (The Old Margreve) is the radiant anti-darkness pick.

If you're new to the Barbarian: Berserker. If you want options: Wild Fury. If Player's Guide 2 is allowed and you want weird dice control, storm mobility, or grappling tentacles: Chaos, Four Winds, and Kraken are all real. If Labyrinth Worldbook is allowed and your campaign is about the Void, lost worlds, spirits, fear, or condition-heavy enemies: Forsaken. If Book of Blades is allowed and you want a tougher unarmed storm bruiser: Frostborn Raider. If you want the revenant who refuses to die: Undying Warrior. If your campaign lives in The Old Margreve's poison, heights, shadows, and undead threats: Hive Tender and Shadow Chewer are worth serious consideration.

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Related Guides

Talent Guides

• Best Martial Talents in Tales of the Valiant
• Best Technical Talents in Tales of the Valiant
• Tales of the Valiant Animal Allies and Summons Guide

Lineage Guides

• Tales of the Valiant Orc Lineage Guide

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