What is the Best Barbarian Subclass in BG3?

Welcome to our Barbarian subclass tier list for Baldur’s Gate 3. On this page, we will review all four Barbarian subclasses in BG3 and try to determine which is the strongest.

The BG3 Barbarian is a melee-focused class built around the Rage mechanic. Barbarians can activate their Rage to become stronger – the exact benefits granted by your Rage depend on the Barbarian subclass you choose, and this is the primary aspect that distinguishes the different types of Barbarian in BG3. Using your Rage does come with some downsides, such as preventing you from using any magical effects, but the benefits outweigh the negatives in most situations. There are also some equipment items that trigger when you activate your Barbarian’s Rage.

Table of Contents:

Berserker Barbarian

Choosing the Berserker subclass transforms your Rage into Frenzy. The main difference is that it allows you to use two special Actions while your Frenzy is active:

• Frenzied Strike – Use your Bonus Action to make an extra melee weapon attack. You can use this every turn, but each use adds a stack of Frenzied Strain, reducing your Attack Rolls by 1 per stack. The stacks decay over time and will all be removed when your Frenzy ends, so it’s not too much of a downside.
• Enraged Throw – Use your Bonus Action to throw a nearby object, weapon or creature. Deals damage on impact, depending on the weight and type of item.

Later on, you get immunity to being Frightened or Charmed when you are Raging, thanks to the Mindless Rage passive. At Level 10 you also unlock Intimidating Presence, allowing you to attempt to Frighten an enemy.

The most important aspect of the Berserker is Frenzied Strike. Being able to make an additional attack every turn while Raging is a huge boost. You usually don’t need to worry much about the Frenzied Strain debuff, either; in my experience it never causes major problems, and it’s always worth using the Frenzied Strike. The Berserker is the only Barbarian subclass that effectively gets an extra attack due to Frenzied Strike, which sets a very high bar for the others to compete with.

Giant Barbarian

With the Path of Giants Barbarian, your Rage will increase the size of your character when active. This enlargement effect will slightly increase your damage output on melee attacks. It can also stack with other enlargement effects, most notably the Enlarge spell. This can have funny results.

As you level up, you’ll unlock Boot of the Giants and Mighty Impel, special bonus attacks that allow you to kick and throw objects enemies. The kick is an alternative to shoving that can shift up to twice as much weight. You also unlock Elemental Cleaver, which infuses damage of a chosen elemental type into your melee attacks. This extra damage is handy, especially since you can actively change the chosen damage type to bypass enemy resistances or activate certain equipment features.

You get an extra 25% Carrying Capacity just for being a Giant Barbarian, which can be useful on long adventures.

The Path of Giants is a very fun subclass to play, thanks to its focus on brute strength. I think it’s slightly weaker than the Berserker Barbarian, but not by much.

Wild Magic Barbarian

Wild Magic Barbarians add a randomly selected Wild Magic effect to their Rage. All of the effects are beneficial for the Barbarian. Some of them allow you to deal extra Force or Radiant damage to enemies, others increase your Armour Class or allow you to teleport.

It’s a little harder to precisely plan your moves due to the random nature of the Wild Magic Barbarian, but this can also make combat more interesting as it’ll keep both you and your foes guessing about what might happen next.

After some levelling up, you can use your Wild Magic powers to buff the Ability Checks of yourself or an ally, or restore an expended Spell Slot to an ally. After teaching Level 10 you have the option of swapping your Wild Magic effect for a new one when you take damage or fail a Saving Throw (consumes a Reaction).

When everything goes right and you get the best possible Wild Magic effect in a given situation, the Wild Magic Barbarian can be stronger than any other Barbarian type. But in general this is not the case. It’s still pretty good though, and it will be especially fun to play until the novelty of the random magical effects wears off somewhat.

Wildheart Barbarian

Lastly, we have the Wildheart Barbarian. These Barbarians have a connection to nature, and can choose a Bestial Heart that modifies their Rage with some characteristics of a chosen animal. You can choose a new one after each level up, if you want to swap.

You can choose from the following Bestial Hearts:

• Bear – You have Resistance to all damage except Psychic, and you can heal yourself.
• Eagle – You can Dash as a Bonus Action. Foes have Disadvantage on Opportunity Attacks against you. You can use Diving Strike to attack from above.
• Elk – You have additional Movement Speed, and you can use Primal Stampede to charge forward and knock enemies Prone.
• Tiger – Your Jump distance is increased and you can use Tiger’s Bloodlust to attack three enemies at once.
• Wolf – Your allies have Advantage when attacking enemies within 2 metres of you. You can use Inciting Howl to boost your allies’ Movement Speed.

The effects above are only active when your Barbarian is Raging. I personally find the Wolf the best, especially when paired with another stong melee heavy-hitter in your party like a Fighter or Paladin. The Bear makes you very tanky and is also a very strong option.

When you reach Level 6 and Level 10, you can also choose an Animal Aspect. These are permanent boosts that aren’t tied to your Rage. You can create some really powerful synergies here, both within your Barbarian’s own build and with other party members. For example, you can combine the Stallion (grants up to 24 THP when you Dash) with the Eagle Heart, which allows you to Dash as a Bonus Action, allowing you to get lots of free THP each turn. The Tiger Aspect doubles your Strength Modifier against targets who are Poisoned or Bleeding, which is great when combined with a party member who is built around applying these debuffs.

At Level 8, you also become immune to the slowing effects of Difficult Terrain.

The Wildheart Barbarian isn’t the “out of the box” beast that the Berserker is – it requires you to plan out your build more carefully to get the most out of it. But this is a subclass that can surpass the Berserker if you choose Bestial Hearts and Animal Aspects that synergise with your build and make sense in your party composition.

The Barbarian Subclass Tier List

Now that we’ve run through and reviewed all of the Barbarian subclasses for BG3, we came up with this ranking. The Barbarian and Wildheart were both very close to making it into S-Tier, but that category is reserved for subclasses that are consistently overpowered. It’s a matter of opinion, but for me they’re not quite there.

Putting Wild Magic in C Tier also felt quite harsh; it is really on the borderline between C and B, in my view. It isn’t weak, but it has some tough competition that makes it look worse than it actually is. The random nature of it can be fun, but it also makes the subclass a bit weaker because there is no way to reliably utilize its best effects at any given time.