Making a new Barbarian for a run of Baldur’s Gate 3? Excellent choice! You have a frontline bruiser on your hands with the potential to turn fights to dust with their Rage ability. However, choosing the right race and ability scores will be critical for your early game experience. Even one plus-one modifier out of line can be devastating.
The Barbarian’s ability to hold the frontline with little more than their face is legendary in Baldur’s Gate and Dungeons & Dragons 5E alike. Since BG3 caps at level 12, you don’t even get the late-game fatigue that Barbarian often runs into, either.
Thankfully, Baldur’s Gate 3 has exceptionally flexible races—even more so than the material that it is based on! So, while the ability scores are almost set in stone, you do have a few potential directions to take for your race.
Best Race options for a Barbarian in BG3
There are a handful of races that work well for a barbarian in Baldur’s Gate 3, with our favorites being the Zariel Tiefling, Wood Elves, and Half-Orcs. Barbarian races should give the barbarian the utility to exist outside of combat or ways to enter combat quickly and safely. Barbarians do not require any weapon or armor proficiency, making a lot of races less suited to the task.
Thankfully, since races are disconnected from their ability scores in Baldur’s Gate 3, you can get away with almost any race. The angriest gnome alive can still make a dent in the realm of Faerûn! But let’s talk about a few races that’ll make that dent gigantic.
- Zariel Tieflings boast the Tiefling’s natural resistance to Fire and their Darkvision. They have standard movement, but their Thaumaturgy cantrip can help raise the Barbarian’s poor Charisma checks to an acceptable level.
- Wood Elves and Wood Half-Elves get the Barbarian to the frontline faster with a massive 10.5m move. They do waste a racial skill in weapon proficiencies, sadly, but that’s not a huge problem.
- Half-Orcs provide the Barbarian with the ability to survive one knockout per rest and Savage Attacks, which work well with Reckless Attacks.
And, some honorable mentions…
- Duergar Dwarves give the Barbarian exceptional Darkvision to locate targets. The Gold Dwarf improves its already impressive health by 1. However, their slow movement speed makes them suboptimal for getting your Barbarian in front of your allies.
- Dragonborn offer no significant ability other than resistance to an element of choice and a Breath Attack. Breath Attacks are no joke since otherwise, Barbarians have no real answer to swarms of enemies other than swing for the fences. Having that and potential resistance to Fire is worth considering.
Depending on your want for your Barbarian, the Zariel Tiefling is our choice for tanking and out-of-combat utility, while the Wood Elf is our choice for combat. While Savage Attacks is nice, the Half-Orc is too focused on damage, while the Wood Elf gets the Barbarian to the range where it is dangerous much faster.
Related: Baldur’s Gate 3 Best races and ability scores for the Paladin class
Best Ability Score setup for a Barbarian in BG3
The best ability score setup for your standard Barbarian build is Strength 16, Dexterity 14, Constitution 16, Intelligence 8, Wisdom 10, and Charisma 10. STR is your primary damage-dealing stat, while CON is there to ensure you live through fights. Your mental stats are not important to your standard Barbarian experience, though Intelligence is by far the least necessary.
Unlike races, there isn’t much wiggle room for the Barbarian here. Unlike what the game suggests, there isn’t a reason to put Strength to 17 for the Barb. Theoretically, if there was a Feat that gave plus-one to Strength, you could get to 18 Strength at level 4 and get a cool feat. However, there are no such cool feats for Strength. Athlete is okay, but that’s it! And it’s far too situational to lose a modifier to Dexterity or Constitution! No, stacking 16s is almost always the correct option.
You could theoretically attempt a Dexterity build by swapping Strength and Dexterity… A 16 Dexterity Barbarian replaces the damage of the two-hander Barbarian for shield use and the potential to max out AC with no armor. You aren’t going to run out of armor in Baldur’s Gate 3, though, making this build more of a funny idea than anything else… or a potential route for the multiclass with the Rogue!
