Barony

The pairing of AMD’s Ryzen 5 4600G with NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 5080 produces a striking performance profile in Barony, a roguelike title from 2015. The data reveals a system where the GPU is massively overqualified for the task, leaving the Zen 2 processor as the primary bottleneck across most settings. This analysis breaks down the measured frames per second, the combo’s standing among thousands of tested configurations, and the practical implications for players.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate scaling from 1080p to 4K illustrates a classic shift in system balance. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the combo hits 493.8 FPS, but High settings at the same resolution only reach 407.8 FPS, indicating that even at 1080p, the CPU is already constraining output before the GPU can fully stretch its legs. Moving to 2560x1440, the numbers remain exceptionally high—Low settings produce 403.9 FPS, while High settings yield 254.9 FPS. The transition to 3840x2160 is where the RTX 5080 begins to assert its dominance: Low settings still deliver 210.5 FPS, but the gap between Low and High narrows considerably compared to lower resolutions, suggesting the GPU workload is finally becoming relevant.

The most telling data point is the Ultra preset. At 1080p, Ultra runs at 291.1 FPS; at 1440p, it drops to 185.2 FPS; and at 4K, it falls to 96.3 FPS. This scaling pattern—a roughly 36% drop from 1080p to 1440p, and another 48% drop from 1440p to 4K—shows that the game becomes progressively more GPU-bound as resolution increases. However, even at 4K Ultra, the system never dips below 96 FPS, which is far beyond what a 2015 roguelike demands. The limiting component at lower resolutions is clearly the Ryzen 5 4600G, which holds the frame rate hostage below what the RTX 5080 could theoretically produce.

How This Combo Ranks

In the grand scheme of tested hardware combinations for Barony, this pairing sits at rank 114 out of 1702 combos. That places it in the top 7% of all configurations evaluated, which is impressive on its face but requires nuance. The combo rank is determined by the actual measured FPS, and since the Ryzen 5 4600G is a 4000-series CPU with a 75th percentile standing against all CPUs, it drags the overall result down relative to what the RTX 5080 alone could achieve.

The CPU’s average benchmark score of 17489 places it nearly identical to the AMD Ryzen 3 PRO 5355GE (17482, 0% delta) and the Intel Core i5-12450H (17475, 0.1% delta). It is slightly behind the Intel Core i3-14100T (17636, -0.8% delta) and the Intel Core i3-13100F (17665, -1% delta). This means the processor is squarely in the mid-range tier, which is a mismatch for a GPU that sits at the 89th percentile among all GPUs. The RTX 5080’s average benchmark score of 59188 puts it 1.6% ahead of the Intel Arc A570M (58239) and 2.5% ahead of the Intel Arc A580 (57756), but those comparisons are irrelevant in gaming—the GPU is not the limiting factor here. The data shows that this combo’s rank is artificially suppressed by the CPU, which cannot feed frames fast enough to exploit the GPU’s full potential, especially at 1080p and 1440p.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080 brings substantial hardware to the table, but its role in Barony is largely underutilized. It features 16 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 256-bit bus, providing 960.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The base clock runs at 2295 MHz with a boost clock of 2617 MHz, and the memory operates at 1875 MHz (30 Gbps effective). These specifications are overkill for a game with the graphical simplicity of a roguelike, and the measured FPS confirms that the GPU rarely breaks a sweat.

The memory capacity and bandwidth are particularly irrelevant at 1080p and 1440p, where the CPU bottleneck prevents the GPU from even approaching its limits. Even at 4K Ultra, where the GPU is most stressed, the 16 GB frame buffer is nowhere near full, and the 960.0 GB/s bandwidth is more than sufficient to handle Barony’s texture and geometry loads. The GPU’s 10752 shading units and 112 ROPs are capable of far more than this title demands, and the fact that 4K Low runs at 210.5 FPS while 4K Ultra runs at 96.3 FPS shows the GPU is still scaling with settings, just not being pushed to its thermal or power limits. The RTX 5080’s 360 W TDP is a non-issue here, as the game’s modest workload will likely keep power draw well below that figure.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the results are as follows: Low settings produce 493.8 FPS, Medium settings 443.2 FPS, High settings 407.8 FPS, and Ultra settings 291.1 FPS. The delta between Low and Medium is 50.6 FPS, while the delta between High and Ultra is 116.7 FPS, indicating that Ultra is disproportionately taxing relative to the visual gain. The 1080p numbers are so high that they are beyond the refresh rate of virtually any consumer monitor, making them academic rather than practical.

At 2560x1440, the frame rates remain elevated: Low settings deliver 403.9 FPS, Medium 298.5 FPS, High 254.9 FPS, and Ultra 185.2 FPS. The drop from Low to Ultra is 218.7 FPS, which is a 54% reduction. This resolution is still CPU-limited, as evidenced by the fact that Low settings at 1440p (403.9 FPS) nearly match 1080p High (407.8 FPS), suggesting the CPU is the ceiling.

At 3840x2160, the results show the GPU finally taking over: Low settings run at 210.5 FPS, Medium at 157.3 FPS, High at 132.2 FPS, and Ultra at 96.3 FPS. The 4K Ultra figure is the only one that dips below 100 FPS, and it is still perfectly playable. The scaling from 1080p to 4K at Low settings is a 57% reduction (493.8 to 210.5), which is a clear sign of GPU involvement, whereas the same scaling at Ultra is a 67% reduction (291.1 to 96.3), showing that the GPU is the primary driver at this preset.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured rows, the optimal experience depends on the display resolution. For 1080p and 1440p, the Ultra preset is the only one that provides a meaningful increase in visual fidelity without sacrificing smoothness—at 291.1 FPS and 185.2 FPS respectively, there is ample headroom. However, the data shows that High settings at 1440p (254.9 FPS) are still far beyond what any display can show, so players with 144Hz monitors could choose High and never notice a difference while reducing GPU load.

For 4K displays, the recommendation is more nuanced. Ultra at 96.3 FPS is playable, but it sits close to the 90 FPS threshold where some users perceive stutter. High settings at 132.2 FPS offer a safer margin, and the visual difference between High and Ultra in a game like Barony is likely minimal given its simple art style. Medium at 157.3 FPS is also viable, but it sacrifices too much for a game that is not graphically demanding. The best balance for 4K is High, as it delivers 132.2 FPS while keeping the GPU load moderate and avoiding the steep performance penalty of Ultra. For 1080p and 1440p, the Ultra preset is the clear choice, as the CPU bottleneck means there is no reason to lower settings—the frame rate is already so high that any reduction in quality would be wasted.