Barony

# CPU Role — cores, clocks, and how they relate to this game's results

The AMD Ryzen 5 3600 is a 6-core, 12-thread processor based on the Zen 2 architecture (Matisse), manufactured on TSMC's 7 nm process. It operates with a base clock of 3.60 GHz and a boost clock of 4.20 GHz, drawing a 65 W TDP. The CPU's cache hierarchy includes 64 KB of L1 per core, 512 KB of L2 per core, and a shared 32 MB L3 cache. Memory support is dual-channel DDR4 with a bandwidth of 51.2 GB/s. The processor's 3DMark scores show a single-thread result of 696 and a 2-thread result of 1361, while the 4-thread score reaches 2579, the 8-thread score 3844, and the max-thread score 4603 — the latter being nearly identical to the 16-thread score of 4605, indicating that the 12-thread workload scales cleanly to the CPU's full logical core count.

In Barony, a roguelike title that is not traditionally considered a multi-threaded stress test, the Ryzen 5 3600's single-core performance becomes the primary determinant of frame pacing. The Cinebench R23 single-core score of 2124 and Geekbench single-core score of 1536 place this CPU in a range where it can feed a modern GPU adequately at lower resolutions, but the data reveals that at 1080p, frame rates are high enough that CPU overhead starts to matter. The PassMark single-thread score of 2562 and the 3DMark single-thread score of 696 both point to a processor that, while not a top-tier single-core champion, is more than sufficient for a game like Barony, which relies on discrete game logic updates rather than massive physics simulations.

The CPU's multi-threaded capabilities, while not heavily taxed by this game, are still relevant. The Cinebench R20 multi-core score of 6318 and R15 multi-core score of 1516 show a capable 12-thread part. The PassMark multi-thread score of 17700 and the 3DMark 16-thread score of 4605 confirm that background tasks or concurrent streaming workloads won't bottleneck the game's frame delivery. The processor's percentile rank against all CPUs is 71, meaning it outperforms roughly 71% of all tested processors in aggregate benchmark scores. Its nearest rivals in average benchmark score include the Intel Core i7-1260P (0.2% higher), the Intel Core i5-11400 (0.2% lower), and the AMD EPYC 7742 (0.2% higher) — all essentially tied, which suggests the Ryzen 5 3600 sits at a performance plateau where minor architectural differences don't translate into meaningful gaming deltas.

FAQ

Q: What is the average FPS at 1080p with High settings for this combo?

A: The measured average FPS at 1920x1080 with High settings is 201, with no minimum or maximum values recorded.

Q: How does the CPU's single-thread performance compare to its multi-thread performance in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The 3DMark single-thread score is 696, while the max-thread score is 4603, giving a ratio of roughly 6.6:1. The Cinebench R23 single-core score is 2124 versus 15045 multi-core, a ratio of about 7.1:1. This shows the processor scales well with thread count, though Barony's workload primarily leverages the single-thread strength.

Q: What is the combo's rank among all tested combinations in Barony?

A: The combo ranks 1704 out of 2935 tested combinations, placing it in the lower-middle portion of the overall distribution.

Q: What is the difference in average FPS between Low and Ultra settings at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, the Low preset delivers 199 FPS on average, while Ultra drops to 91 FPS. This is a difference of 108 FPS, or approximately a 54% reduction from Low to Ultra.

Q: Does the GPU or CPU act as the limiting factor at 4K?

A: At 3840x2160, the average FPS drops from 104 at Low to 48 at Ultra. The scaling pattern (104 → 77 → 66 → 48 across Low, Medium, High, Ultra) indicates a GPU-bound scenario, as the CPU's 12 threads are rarely saturated by this roguelike's logic at such high resolution.

Q: What is the launch MSRP of the CPU in this combo?

A: The AMD Ryzen 5 3600 had a launch MSRP of $199.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data for Barony with the AMD Ryzen 5 3600 and AMD Radeon RX 9060 shows a clear hierarchy across presets and resolutions. At 1920x1080, the Low preset achieves 315 FPS average, Medium reaches 235 FPS, High produces 201 FPS, and Ultra drops to 144 FPS. The minimum FPS recorded at 1080p Medium is 199, which is still comfortably above common 144 Hz display refresh rates. At 2560x1440, the same pattern holds: Low yields 199 FPS, Medium 148 FPS, High 127 FPS, and Ultra 91 FPS. The 1080p Medium preset shows a minimum of 199 FPS and a maximum of 270 FPS, indicating very stable frame delivery.

The most balanced experience appears to be the Medium preset at 1080p or 1440p. At 1080p Medium, the average of 235 FPS with a minimum of 199 FPS ensures that even in the most demanding scenes, frame rates stay well above what most high-refresh monitors can display. At 1440p Medium, the 148 FPS average with a 126 FPS minimum remains smooth, though the average falls below the 144 Hz threshold only marginally. For users with 4K displays, the High preset at 3840x2160 yields 66 FPS average, which is playable but not ideal for fast-paced roguelike gameplay that benefits from high frame rates. The Ultra preset at 4K drops to 48 FPS, which is likely too low for comfortable play, while Low at 4K produces 104 FPS, making it the better choice if visual fidelity can be sacrificed.

The data suggests that the Medium preset provides the best overall experience across resolutions, as it balances visual quality with frame rate headroom. The measured minimum FPS values for Medium at both 1080p (199) and 1440p (126) indicate that the preset avoids severe frame dips, whereas the High and Ultra presets show no recorded minimums, suggesting potential instability that the benchmark does not capture. Given that the game is a roguelike with procedural generation and potentially dense on-screen elements, the extra headroom from Medium over High is a safer choice.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the AMD Ryzen 5 3600 and AMD Radeon RX 9060 achieves a rank of 1704 out of 2935 tested combos in Barony. This places the system in the 58th percentile of all tested configurations, meaning it outperforms 58% of the field. However, the absolute position in the middle of the distribution suggests that while this combo is competent, it does not represent a top-tier configuration for this particular game.

The rank is likely influenced by the GPU's position in the overall hierarchy. The Radeon RX 9060 has a percentile rank of 59 against all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 16014. Its nearest rivals include the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (0.7% higher score), the AMD Radeon R9 370X (1% lower), the AMD Radeon RX 7700 (1% lower), and the AMD Radeon Pro W5500 (2.1% lower). This clustering means the GPU is competitive with mid-range options from previous generations, which aligns with the combo's middle-of-the-pack ranking.

The CPU's percentile rank of 71 is higher than the GPU's 59, indicating that the processor is relatively stronger in the broader benchmark landscape than the graphics card is. In Barony, where the game's roguelike nature may not heavily tax either component, the combo's rank of 1704 suggests that the limiting factor is likely the GPU, especially at higher resolutions. The fact that the combo sits below the median (1704 is below the midpoint of 1467.5) means that many other tested configurations — likely those with more powerful GPUs — achieve higher frame rates at the same settings. However, the rank is not a condemnation of the combo's playability; rather, it reflects the competitive field of tested hardware.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a predictable scaling pattern as resolution increases from 1080p to 4K. At Low settings, the average FPS drops from 315 at 1920x1080 to 199 at 2560x1440 (a 37% reduction), and further to 104 at 3840x2160 (a 67% reduction from 1080p). The Medium preset shows a similar trend: 235 FPS at 1080p, 148 FPS at 1440p (37% lower), and 77 FPS at 4K (67% lower). High settings yield 201 FPS at 1080p, 127 FPS at 1440p (37% lower), and 66 FPS at 4K (67% lower). Ultra settings produce 144 FPS at 1080p, 91 FPS at 1440p (37% lower), and 48 FPS at 4K (67% lower).

This consistent percentage drop across all presets — roughly 37% from 1080p to 1440p and another 47% from 1440p to 4K — is a classic indicator of GPU-bound performance. The pixel count increases by 78% from 1080p to 1440p and by 125% from 1440p to 4K, but the FPS drop is not proportional to the pixel increase, suggesting that the GPU's memory bandwidth and pixel throughput are the limiting factors. The Radeon RX 9060 has a 128-bit memory bus with 8 GB of GDDR6 memory and a bandwidth of 288.0 GB/s. At 4K, this bandwidth becomes a bottleneck, as the frame rate drops to as low as 48 FPS at Ultra.

The CPU's role in this scaling is minimal. The Ryzen 5 3600's 12 threads and 32 MB L3 cache are sufficient to maintain frame delivery at all resolutions, as evidenced by the fact that the FPS drop from 1080p to 4K is almost perfectly uniform across all settings. If the CPU were the limiting factor, we would expect to see a smaller FPS drop at lower resolutions (where CPU overhead is more dominant) and a larger drop at higher resolutions. Instead, the uniform scaling confirms that the GPU is the primary constraint, particularly at 4K where the card's 191.4 GPixel/s pixel rate and 334.9 GTexel/s texture rate are taxed heavily.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the data shows a full range of results across all four settings. Low delivers 315 FPS average, Medium 235 FPS with a minimum of 199 and maximum of 270, High 201 FPS, and Ultra 144 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 171 FPS, or a 54% reduction in performance when moving to the highest preset. The minimum FPS at Medium (199) is higher than the average FPS at High (201) is close, indicating that the Medium preset offers more consistent frame delivery than High.

At 2560x1440, the results scale down proportionally. Low produces 199 FPS, Medium 148 FPS with a minimum of 126 and maximum of 170, High 127 FPS, and Ultra 91 FPS. The gap between Low and Ultra is 108 FPS. Notably, the Medium preset's maximum of 170 FPS exceeds the High preset's average of 127 FPS by a significant margin, reinforcing that Medium is the more stable choice. The minimum FPS at Medium (126) is still above the Ultra average (91), meaning that even the worst-case frame times at Medium are better than the average at Ultra.

At 3840x2160, the performance drops considerably. Low achieves 104 FPS, Medium 77 FPS with a minimum of 66 and maximum of 89, High 66 FPS, and Ultra 48 FPS. The Medium preset's minimum of 66 FPS is identical to the High preset's average, indicating that Medium at 4K provides frame rates comparable to what High delivers on average, but with more consistent pacing. The Ultra preset's 48 FPS average is below the 60 FPS threshold that many players consider the minimum for smooth gameplay, making it unsuitable for serious play.

The complete dataset shows that the combo is capable of exceeding 300 FPS only at the lowest settings and resolution, while the highest settings at 4K fall below 50 FPS. The sweet spot for high-refresh gaming is 1080p Medium, which maintains an average above 200 FPS with a minimum above 190 FPS.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 9060 is built on the RDNA 4.0 architecture with the Navi 44 chip, manufactured on TSMC's 4 nm process. It features 1792 shading units, 112 texture mapping units, and 64 render output units, along with 28 ray tracing cores. The GPU operates at a base clock of 1700 MHz, a game clock of 2400 MHz, and a boost clock of 2990 MHz. Its memory subsystem consists of 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus, delivering a bandwidth of 288.0 GB/s. The card's compute capabilities include 21.43 TFLOPS of FP32 performance and the same 21.43 TFLOPS of FP16 (1:1 ratio), with a pixel rate of 191.4 GPixel/s and a texture rate of 334.9 GTexel/s.

In Barony, the GPU's role is significant at higher resolutions and settings. The measured FPS data shows that at 4K Ultra, the card produces only 48 FPS, which is a clear indication that the GPU's raw compute and memory bandwidth are insufficient for the highest preset at this resolution. The 128-bit memory bus and 288.0 GB/s bandwidth are the likely culprits, as the 8 GB VRAM capacity is adequate for a roguelike with modest texture requirements, but the bandwidth constraints become apparent when the pixel workload increases.

The GPU's benchmark scores provide context for its performance. The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 3322 and the Geekbench OpenCL score of 88183 indicate a mid-range card. The PassMark G3D score of 17631 and the PassMark GPU Compute score of 9919 place it in the 59th percentile of all GPUs. Its nearest rival, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti, has an average score only 0.7% higher, while the AMD Radeon RX 7700 is 1% lower. This tight clustering suggests that the RX 9060 is competitive with other mid-range options from the same era, but it is not a high-end part.

The GPU's DirectX 12 Ultimate support (12_2) and Vulkan 1.4 compatibility are relevant for Barony's rendering pipeline, though the game's age (released in 2015) means it likely does not leverage the latest graphics features. The card's 132 W TDP and dual-slot design are modest, but the data shows that the GPU becomes the bottleneck at 4K, where the FPS drops to nearly half of the 1080p values. The uniform scaling across presets at each resolution confirms that the GPU's performance envelope is the defining factor for this combo's Barony results, with the CPU providing sufficient headroom to avoid being a limiting component.