Barony

# Barony with AMD Ryzen 7 9850X3D + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080

The AMD Ryzen 7 9850X3D paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 delivers a benchmark set that is remarkable for its sheer headroom across all tested resolutions. The data shows a system that is overwhelmingly GPU-bound at 4K, yet transitions into a CPU-limited scenario at 1080p, where average frame rates reach as high as 600 FPS on Low settings. This combination ranks 244th out of 3,717 tested combos for Barony, placing it in the top 6.6% of all configurations, which is strong but not dominant, given the game's roguelike nature and the extreme performance ceilings of both components.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data provides a clear hierarchy of performance across the four settings presets. At 3840x2160, the Ultra preset yields an average of 91 FPS, which is the lowest of any configuration. The High preset at the same resolution delivers 126 FPS, representing a substantial 38.5% improvement over Ultra. Medium at 4K achieves 147 FPS, while Low jumps to 198 FPS. The step from Ultra to High is the most significant single-tier gain at 4K, adding 35 FPS, whereas the jump from Medium to Low adds 51 FPS, indicating a diminishing return as settings are lowered further.

For the best experience at 4K, the High preset is the optimal choice. It maintains an average of 126 FPS, which is well above the 60 FPS threshold for smooth gameplay, while still offering a meaningful visual upgrade over Medium. The Ultra preset, while visually more demanding, drops to 91 FPS, which could introduce noticeable stutter on high-refresh-rate displays. Medium at 147 FPS is acceptable but sacrifices visual fidelity for a relatively modest frame rate gain over High.

At 2560x1440, the High preset delivers 242 FPS, which is excellent for any display. The Medium preset achieves 281 FPS, and Low reaches 379 FPS. Ultra at 1440p produces 173 FPS, which is still very high. The data suggests that at 1440p, High is the sweet spot, offering a balance between visual quality and performance that exceeds the refresh rate of most monitors. The jump from High to Medium is only 39 FPS, whereas dropping to Low adds another 98 FPS, indicating that High is the most efficient preset for this resolution.

At 1920x1080, the story changes dramatically. The High preset achieves 383 FPS, Medium hits 446 FPS, Low reaches 600 FPS, and Ultra still manages 274 FPS. Here, the CPU becomes the limiting factor, as even the most demanding preset exceeds the refresh rate of virtually all displays. The recommendation for 1080p is to use Ultra, as it still delivers 274 FPS, which is far beyond any monitor's capability, while providing the best visual experience. The measured data shows that at 1080p, there is no practical reason to lower settings below Ultra, as the frame rate remains exceptionally high.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 features 16 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 256-bit bus, providing a memory bandwidth of 716.8 GB/s. The GPU's clock speeds are a base of 2205 MHz and a boost of 2505 MHz. These specifications are critical for understanding Barony's performance, particularly at higher resolutions. The 16 GB VRAM capacity is more than sufficient for this roguelike title, which does not appear to be memory-intensive based on the measured frame rates.

The GPU's role is most evident at 4K, where the performance gap between settings is pronounced. At 3840x2160, the RTX 4080 delivers 126 FPS on High, 147 FPS on Medium, and 198 FPS on Low. The drop from High to Ultra is 35 FPS, which represents a 27.8% reduction in average frame rate. This indicates that the GPU is heavily utilized at 4K, and the Ultra preset places a significant load on the graphics pipeline. The RTX 4080's 9728 shading units and 112 ROPs are likely the primary drivers of this performance, with the texture rate of 761.5 GTexel/s and pixel rate of 280.6 GPixel/s supporting the high fill rates required at this resolution.

The GPU's benchmark scores corroborate its gaming performance. The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 6,567 and the PassMark G3D score of 34,457 place it in the 86th percentile of all GPUs. Its nearest rival, the RTX 4080 SUPER, has an average score of 54,209, a mere 0.1% difference, indicating that the RTX 4080 is essentially on par with its immediate successor in raw compute. This is further supported by the Vulkan score of 263,779 and OpenCL score of 214,739, which show strong API-level performance.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a clear scaling pattern across resolutions. At High settings, the average frame rate drops from 383 FPS at 1080p to 242 FPS at 1440p, a 36.8% reduction, and then to 126 FPS at 4K, a further 47.9% reduction. This steep decline from 1440p to 4K indicates that the GPU becomes the bottleneck at higher resolutions, with the pixel count quadrupling from 1080p to 4K.

At Low settings, the scaling is even more pronounced. The average frame rate drops from 600 FPS at 1080p to 379 FPS at 1440p (36.8% reduction) and then to 198 FPS at 4K (47.8% reduction). The fact that the percentage drop from 1440p to 4K is nearly identical at both High and Low settings suggests that the GPU is consistently the limiting factor at 4K, regardless of the visual fidelity.

The Medium preset provides additional insight, as it includes minimum and maximum FPS values. At 1080p Medium, the average is 446 FPS with a minimum of 379 FPS and maximum of 513 FPS. At 1440p Medium, the average is 281 FPS with a minimum of 239 FPS and maximum of 324 FPS. At 4K Medium, the average is 147 FPS with a minimum of 125 FPS and maximum of 169 FPS. The scaling from 1080p to 1440p is a 37% reduction, while from 1440p to 4K it is a 47.7% reduction, matching the pattern seen at other settings.

This data indicates that at 1080p, the CPU is the primary limiter, as the RTX 4080 is capable of far higher frame rates than the Ryzen 7 9850X3D can feed. The transition to 1440p begins to balance the load, and at 4K, the GPU is clearly the bottleneck. The 600 FPS result at 1080p Low reflects the CPU's single-thread performance, while the 91 FPS at 4K Ultra shows the GPU's limits under maximum load.

How This Combo Ranks

The AMD Ryzen 7 9850X3D + RTX 4080 combination ranks 244th out of 3,717 tested combos for Barony, placing it in the top 6.6% of all configurations. This is a strong ranking, but it is not at the very top, which suggests that other combinations with more powerful GPUs or CPUs can achieve higher frame rates. The percentile ranking indicates that this combo outperforms 93.4% of all tested setups, which is impressive given the game's age and the extreme hardware used.

The CPU's percentile versus all CPUs is 92, meaning it outperforms 92% of all processors. Its average benchmark score is 58,386, with its nearest rival being the Intel Xeon Platinum 8260M at 58,323, a 0.1% difference. This places the Ryzen 7 9850X3D in a tightly contested group, with the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 470 trailing by 0.7% and the Intel Core i9-14900 ahead by 0.5%. The GPU's percentile versus all GPUs is 86, with an average benchmark score of 54,247, and its nearest rival is the RTX 4080 SUPER at 54,209, a 0.1% difference.

The combo's rank of 244 suggests that while the individual components are top-tier, the pairing is not optimized for Barony's specific workload. The game's roguelike nature likely favors high single-thread performance, which the Ryzen 7 9850X3D provides with a boost clock of 5.60 GHz, but the RTX 4080's immense power at 1080p is not fully utilized due to CPU limitations. This is reflected in the 600 FPS ceiling at 1080p Low, which is likely a CPU bottleneck rather than a GPU one.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 7 9850X3D is an 8-core, 16-thread processor based on the Zen 5 architecture, codenamed Granite Ridge. It has a base clock of 4.70 GHz and a boost clock of 5.60 GHz, with a 96 MB shared L3 cache. This large cache is a hallmark of the X3D series and is critical for gaming performance, as it reduces memory latency and improves data locality. The CPU's TDP is 120 W, and it supports DDR5 memory with a dual-channel bus providing 89.6 GB/s of bandwidth.

The CPU's role in Barony is most evident at 1080p, where the frame rates exceed 274 FPS on Ultra and reach 600 FPS on Low. These numbers indicate that the CPU is the limiting factor at this resolution, as the GPU is capable of much higher output. The Ryzen 7 9850X3D's single-thread performance, as measured by Cinebench R23 single-core score of 2,228 and PassMark single-thread score of 4,704, is exceptional. The multi-threaded Cinebench R23 score of 22,807 and PassMark multithread score of 41,318 further demonstrate its capability.

The CPU's benchmark data shows it outperforms 92% of all processors, with an average benchmark score of 58,386. Its nearest rivals are all within 0.7% of its score, indicating a tightly packed top tier. The Intel Core i9-14900 scores 58,115, a 0.5% difference, while the Intel Xeon w5-2545 scores 58,504, a -0.2% difference. This suggests that the Ryzen 7 9850X3D is competitive with the best CPUs available, but not decisively ahead in synthetic benchmarks.

In Barony specifically, the CPU's impact is seen in the scaling from 1080p to 1440p. At 1080p High, the frame rate is 383 FPS, which drops to 242 FPS at 1440p. This 37% reduction is less than the 48% reduction seen from 1440p to 4K, indicating that the CPU is still providing some headroom at 1440p but is fully saturated at 1080p. The 600 FPS at 1080p Low is likely the absolute ceiling for this CPU in Barony, as the game's logic and physics calculations become the bottleneck.

FAQ

Q: What is the best settings preset for 4K gaming in Barony with this combo?

A: The High preset at 3840x2160 delivers an average of 126 FPS, which is the recommended choice. Ultra drops to 91 FPS, while Medium and Low achieve 147 FPS and 198 FPS respectively.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the bottleneck at 1080p?

A: The CPU is the bottleneck at 1920x1080, as evidenced by the 600 FPS average on Low settings. The GPU is capable of higher frame rates, but the Ryzen 7 9850X3D's single-thread performance limits the output.

Q: How does this combo rank compared to other tested configurations?

A: It ranks 244th out of 3,717 combos, placing it in the top 6.6% of all tested systems for Barony.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between High and Ultra at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, High achieves 242 FPS average, while Ultra achieves 173 FPS, a difference of 69 FPS or 28.5%.

Q: Does the RTX 4080's 16 GB VRAM cause any issues in Barony?

A: The 16 GB GDDR6X memory is more than sufficient for Barony, as the game's maximum average frame rate at 4K Ultra is 91 FPS, indicating no memory-related performance degradation.

Q: What is the minimum FPS recorded at 4K Medium?

A: The minimum FPS at 3840x2160 Medium is 125 FPS, with a maximum of 169 FPS and an average of 147 FPS.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured average FPS values are as follows: Low settings achieve 600 FPS, Medium achieves 446 FPS with a minimum of 379 FPS and maximum of 513 FPS, High achieves 383 FPS, and Ultra achieves 274 FPS. The data shows a clear progression, with Ultra being 54.3% lower than Low in average frame rate.

At 2560x1440, the average FPS values are: Low settings achieve 379 FPS, Medium achieves 281 FPS with a minimum of 239 FPS and maximum of 324 FPS, High achieves 242 FPS, and Ultra achieves 173 FPS. The drop from Low to Ultra is 206 FPS, representing a 54.4% reduction.

At 3840x2160, the average FPS values are: Low settings achieve 198 FPS, Medium achieves 147 FPS with a minimum of 125 FPS and maximum of 169 FPS, High achieves 126 FPS, and Ultra achieves 91 FPS. The drop from Low to Ultra is 107 FPS, a 54.0% reduction. This consistency in percentage drop across all resolutions indicates that the settings scaling is uniform, regardless of resolution.

The Medium preset is the only one with complete minimum and maximum FPS data across all resolutions. At 1080p, the minimum is 379 FPS and maximum is 513 FPS, a range of 134 FPS. At 1440p, the minimum is 239 FPS and maximum is 324 FPS, a range of 85 FPS. At 4K, the minimum is 125 FPS and maximum is 169 FPS, a range of 44 FPS. This narrowing range at higher resolutions further confirms the GPU's increasing role as the bottleneck, as frame time variance decreases with lower absolute FPS.