I’m a barb BVA and I’m really thinking about making a swap for my COA ber ber 30@ 15dr for another one, COA ber 40ed/9str or even 2* 9str/40ed. In both cases I reach 46dr and 38dr. Is it a stupid move or is usable vs other barbs or mele chars?

Double ber CoA has more applications. Imo, don't swap and if you want the CoA with the 40/9str in it, trade other items/fg instead and have both CoA for different setups. But again, double ber is just better in general vs most melee related stuff and easy to get DR in that slot.

If it’s usable I’ll buy another for the swap, no problem. But if it’s not usable in any set up I won’t make it… i don’t know if a 46dr set up vs mele is just stupid… or i can change those 4% dr points for 400 more dmg…

Not stupid, closer you are to 50% DR the better vs any melee unless specific gm rules say otherwise. The 40ed/9str CoA has much less use cases but you should wait for others input. I'll tag someone to help.

This post was edited by Emiliaaa on Apr 30 2026 07:19am

Maybe can help or or even or

Thank you very much

I’d keep the BerBer 30/15 imo

Ty for response !

If we are talking pure melee vs melee you gotta run 50% DR

You're vs all - so it kinda comes down to whether or not you're getting slapped by phys dmg and want to correct that or not

In zeal vs zeal it's tempting to run coa + dungo for a lot of builds.. but consider the implication

That means every hit is dealing 0.54 damage compared to 0.5 damage.

You might think that's just 4% more damage because its 4% less DR, so the difference between 4000 life and 4160 life

But actually it's 8% more damage (0.54/0.5) .. thats 4000 life vs 4320 life


For pure melee vs melee it's almost never better to run anything less than 50%. I don't want to say never but it's pretty safe to say a better option likely exists with 50%

BUT that's not your use case..

Imo it's typically better to have more options so just get another coa

Didn't read but I agree