D&D 5E Building a Better Berserker

[Weathercock]

At 5e's launch, Berserker was already a pretty underwhelming archetype compared to its Totem Warrior counterpart. Now that Battlerager has been released and Totem Warrior got buffed, the poor Berserker doesn't have much of anything, especially with the new features that both archetypes now introduce that would make some of what Berserker offers redundant to boot.
As someone who's strongly considering playing a Barbarian that isn't a flower child or a dwarf, I'm kind of at a loss here, and I'm wondering what could be done about it.

As it stands, looking at the numbers, it's not unreasonable for a Totem Warrior who makes good use of polearm mastery and its easy access to reaction attacks to outdo the damage of a Berserker until late game, the one thing that the Berserker is supposed to be good at, all while doing far more with no associated side effects.

Barbarian raging, reckless attack DPR with great weapon mastery (Halberd), polearm mastery, reaction included
Level 5 v AC 13: 57.4 (Str +3) <-- 159.3 per 3 rounds, 388.9 per 7 rounds (1 turn setup)
Level 11 v AC 15: 64.9 (Str +4) <-- 180.2 per 3 rounds, 439.8 per 7 rounds (1 turn setup)
Level 20 v AC 19: 80.4 (Str +7) <-- 219.3 per 3 rounds, 540.9 per 7 rounds (1 turn setup)

Barbarian (Berserker) raging, frenzy, reckless attack DPR with great weapon mastery
Level 5 v AC 13: 52.8 (Str +4) <-- 140.7 per 3 rounds, 351.7 per 7 rounds (1 turn setup) (Greatsword)
Level 11 v AC 15: 61.8 (Str +5) <-- 164.4 per 3 rounds, 411.4 per 7 rounds (1 turn setup) (Greataxe)
Level 14 v AC 18: 70.3 (Str +5) <-- 193.3 per 3 rounds, 474.5 per 7 rounds (1 turn setup) (Retaliation) (Greataxe)
Level 20 v AC 19: 69.4 (Str +7) <-- 185.1 per 3 rounds, 462.6 per 7 rounds (1 turn setup) (Greataxe)
Level 20 v AC 19: 92.6 (Str +7) <-- 254.6 per 3 rounds, 625.0 per 7 rounds (1 turn setup) (Retaliation) (Greataxe)

(Berserker could try to compensate early game by investing in polearm mastery as well, but doing so ends up causing a later game drop in damage, as you'd eventually want to switch to a greataxe to keep up in damage anyway).
The more I look at the numbers, the easier it becomes to see that Frenzy itself only provides a heaping dose of raw power at levels 3 and 4. Past that, its value drops at a rock, going from a powerful ability with a prohibitive after effect to prevent abuse, to an overall weak ability with a prohibitive after effect to discourage its use almost entirely. With that in mind, Frenzy, and the Berserker in general, would be a lot better if the ability were rebalanced to be acquired after the big extra attack threshold, switching its position with Mindless Rage. At that point, you could restructure Frenzy and its heavy cost entirely (hell, you could even consider just getting rid of the exhaustion entirely). It still wouldn't be quite as good as a Totem Barbarian, especially out of battle, but it could move beyond its current party role of being a trap.

And the more I look into Berserker, the more colossally flawed it appears to be. Short of just reflavouring Totem Warrior to simply be a better Berserker, has anyone ever done anything to create a properly berserk Berserker?

 

[S'mon]

"At level 5 the Berserker may recover 1 level of Exhaustion on a Short Rest, up to 3 times per day".

I find this house rule sorts the Berserker out fine. Of course he may end up weaker than Totem Warrior with the right feats, but 5e is not a tightly balanced game like that; you see the same with several classes. This is enough to make them viable.

 

[Weathercock]

Removing exhaustion on a short rest also ends up trivializing survival elements for Barbarians in a campaign.
The problem is that even if you removed the cost from Frenzy completely, Totem Warrior still has all the tools to be a much better Berserker than Berserker past level 4. That is not something I'd consider viable, especially in an archetype made to be so single minded in its role.

Essentially, to what extent would Berserker have to be redesigned to not only be playable, but actually worth even actually considering beyond the effort of reflavouring the flower child out of Totem Warrior?

 

[S'mon]

Removing exhaustion on a short rest also ends up trivializing survival elements for Barbarians in a campaign.
The problem is that even if you removed the cost from Frenzy completely, Totem Warrior still has all the tools to be a much better Berserker than Berserker past level 4. That is not something I'd consider viable, especially in an archetype made to be so single minded in its role.

Essentially, to what extent would Berserker have to be redesigned to not only be playable, but actually worth even actually considering beyond the effort of reflavouring the flower child out of Totem Warrior?

Make it "Berserk-induced Exhaustion" if you don't want to give Berserkers a survival advantage (I do).
Your analysis seems to depend on Polearm Mastery or other Feats given use of the Bonus Action. Well the Berserker can always take a different Feat. Also Feats are an optional rule and they inevitably tend to imbalance play, this is far from the only example. FWIW nobody IMC (level 7-9) has taken a Feat yet, and I'm not sure they ever will. The Berserker Barbarian wants to max out STR, CON and (as far as possible) DEX so he may never take a Feat before 20th level. His dream is STR 24 CON 24 at 20th - with a ridculous Unarmoured AC.

 

[Weathercock]

I certainly wouldn't be surprised at all if Berserker was designed without the slightest idea of feats in mind (and if every other part of the entire game was designed without Halberd Mastery in mind, seriously, that feat is ridiculous and it should die in a fire. Or at least the part that functions simultaneously with GWM). But in my experience, and from what I've seen online, while feats are optional, they're vastly preferred and used pretty much as the standard. And that's where it seems that balancing archetypes focused solely on DPR becomes difficult, since the offensive game changes entirely.

And it's that very common context where Berserker goes from being bad, having a moderately powerful ability with a ridiculously high cost, to being just plain awful on every level, giving up that same ridiculous amount for something that its counterpart can do almost effortlessly.

 

[S'mon]

I agree Polearm Master is a very stupid feat, particularly the visuals on the 'opposite end' attack (ugh)
.
I haven't seen feats used yet though in any campaign I've GM'd or played. I'd expect they may
start to appear around 12th level when PCs have maxed out prime attributes.

 

[Azurewraith]

Remove the exhaustion it is way to restrictive and make the berserker actually go berserk for every 5hit points he loses while raging he gains +2damage or when he kills something etc as right now he don't feel any more berserk than a lvl 1 barbarian or some guy going im a wolf im a wolf no im a barbarian not a druid(sorry i hate totem barbs)

 

[Weathercock]

As things are now, the main problem with the Berserker and the idea of rebalancing it is that its key class mechanic, Frenzy, is just not something meant to be attainable at the level at which every class unlocks their key class mechanic. At levels 4 and 5, where every other class starts to unlock feats and their extra attacks (or 3rd level spells), things quickly start to overtake Frenzy, but before then, it's just too much. So much that WotC had to add a cost so high that it is focused on discouraging players from using it entirely, because even they knew that it just doesn't work at that level.

If it were to be obtained at level 6 without a cost, instead of 3, it would actually be a fairly reasonable ability, comparable to a Fighter's action surge, but spread over a longer period of time, with a 1-turn activation period (bonus action required on turn 1 invalidates the ability for that turn) and higher overall damage after 3-5 turns, which would have been perfectly fine, but the problem then comes of an archetype that fails to acquire its 'defining feature' at entry level. To that end, it might just be that the entire Berserker concept needs some heavy reworking. Everything Berserker has (so not a whole lot) just feels like it completely fails to fit within the standard level progression of every other class in the game.

If Frenzy were to become something worthwhile, it would have to be something that could start out useful but reasonable enough to not need a hard wall discouraging its use, while having scalability to continue being useful and define the Berserker's play style and value to a party for the rest of its continued existence.

 

[TwoSix]

I don't have the books right here, and Berzerker has never particularly interested me, but just to spitball:

If the ability is roughly balanced at 3-5 with an activation cost, and would be balanced at 6 with no activation cost, why not just houserule that it loses the activation cost at level 6?

 

[Warmaster Horus]

The main reason I stay away from Berserker Barbarians is because I don't like the idea of my PC gaining Exhaustion from using a core ability. No thanks.