Diablo® III

Well....i thought about making a barbarian after my monk....but i think i may lean toward Demon Hunter after hearing about this....

why would the barbarian be the toughest class? is it because your have to be in melee range to do damage so you die the easiest of the 5 classes?

it would seem with all the defensive stuff you can take, you would be able to take some hits...esspecially with Overpower healing you for however many enemies you hit

I think by tough he meant...resistant. Not like tough = difficult.

You know, like beef jerky is tough.

If you're quoting the "Which class with you play?" article, Jay actually said "as one of, if not the toughest class in the game", which is quite different to "is the toughest class". Also, if you did read that article, I thought Jay did a pretty good job of explaining in layman's terms, why the class is so tough.

Anyway, the barb will be tough due to strength being the primary attribute, not only increasing damage but armor too. Then you've got skills that reduce damage taken, increase armor and life, provide healing etc. You could argue that the Monk also posses many skills that provide similar effects however since barbs will be pumping strength, they should have higher armor, whereas monks will be on the dex and more likely to evade a hit than the barb.

So I'd imagine a barb should be tougher (more resilient) than the monk due to higher armor but then again, depending upon the build and items equipped, a monk might prove to have superior "survivablity" - a related but distinctly different quality to resilience/toughness.

lulz....just realized this lmao....it just clicked in my mind, lack of sleep right now is messing with me, trying to stay up long enough so i sleep most of the day away tomorrow :D

I don't know about that, the Monk has a lot of defensive options that I think probably put it above the Barbarian average effective health. Seize the Initiative and One With Everything are massive defensive buffs. Resolve provides damage mitigation. Deadly Reach and Fists of Thunder can both be runed to pretty much provide a constant buff to Armor and Dodge respectively. Then they have another 6 skills at least that provide defensive buffs.

The Barbarian is much more bursty when it comes to defense and self heal but they have good life steal potential.

It's a tough call on who is has better survivability.