Barony

The AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 delivers a performance profile in Barony that is defined by extreme CPU headroom and a GPU that becomes the primary scaling factor at higher resolutions. The measured frame rates show a system capable of pushing well beyond the refresh rate of standard displays at 1080p and 1440p, while still maintaining playable performance at 4K Ultra. This combination ranks in the top third of all tested configurations, and the data reveals a clear division of labor between the processor's multi-threaded muscle and the graphics card's bandwidth-heavy architecture.

FAQ

Q: How does this CPU compare to its closest rivals in average benchmark score?

A: The Ryzen 9 9950X3D has an average benchmark score of 71660. This places it 0.9% ahead of the Intel Xeon Platinum 8270 (71056), 1.8% ahead of the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X (70420), and 2.2% ahead of the Intel Core i7-14700KF (70104). It trails the Intel Xeon 6517P by 1.9%, which scores 73050.

Q: What is the strongest synthetic test result for this processor?

A: The highest single benchmark score recorded is in PassMark Data Compression, where the CPU achieves 908421. In contrast, its lowest score is in PassMark Find Prime Numbers at 613, showing a massive spread between memory-bandwidth-sensitive and integer-heavy workloads.

Q: What is the GPU's standing among all tested graphics cards?

A: The RTX 3080 holds the 80th percentile among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 35787. Its closest rival is the AMD Radeon Pro Duo, which scores 35860, a delta of -0.2% relative to the RTX 3080, making the two statistically equivalent.

Q: What is the highest and lowest measured frame rate in Barony for this combo?

A: The highest average FPS is 452.6, achieved at 1920x1080 with Low settings. The lowest average FPS is 65.8, achieved at 3840x2160 with Ultra settings. This represents a performance swing of 386.8 FPS across resolution and quality presets.

Q: How does the CPU's multi-threaded score compare to its single-threaded score?

A: The processor scores 59712 in Cinebench R23 multi-core and 8430 in single-core. This ratio of approximately 7.1 to 1 indicates strong parallel scaling, which is consistent with its 16-core, 32-thread configuration.

Q: What is the GPU's DirectX 12 performance relative to its other API scores?

A: In PassMark DirectX 12, the GPU scores 100, which is its lowest API-specific result. This is significantly lower than its DirectX 11 score of 207 and DirectX 10 score of 170, suggesting the card's legacy API performance is comparatively stronger in this synthetic test.

How This Combo Ranks

In the context of Barony, this specific combination of the Ryzen 9 9950X3D and RTX 3080 is ranked 526 out of 1702 tested combos. This places it in the 69th percentile of all configurations evaluated, meaning roughly 31% of tested setups deliver higher frame rates in this game. The ranking reflects a balance where the CPU’s exceptional 96th percentile standing among all processors is partially offset by the GPU’s more modest 80th percentile position.

The data suggests that this combo is not limited by the processor in most scenarios. The CPU's average benchmark score of 71660 puts it above the vast majority of rivals, including the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X which it beats by 1.8%. However, the GPU’s average score of 35787 places it in a cluster with the AMD Radeon Pro Duo and the AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE, indicating that the graphics card is the more likely performance bottleneck when pushing higher resolutions and settings.

Barony's roguelike nature likely benefits from the high single-thread performance of the CPU, but the measured FPS data shows that GPU load becomes dominant at 4K. The rank of 526 suggests that while this combo is strong, there are many configurations with faster GPUs that achieve higher frame rates, particularly at Ultra settings. The gap between the combo's CPU performance percentile and its in-game rank highlights this dynamic.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D is a 16-core, 32-thread processor based on the Zen 5 architecture, fabricated on a 4 nm process by TSMC. It operates with a base clock of 4.30 GHz and a boost clock of 5.70 GHz, with a 170 W TDP. The processor features 128 MB of shared L3 cache, which is substantial and likely beneficial for the procedural generation and state tracking common in roguelike games.

Benchmark data shows the CPU excels in multi-threaded workloads, scoring 59712 in Cinebench R23 multi-core and 70255 in PassMark Multi-Thread. Its single-thread performance is also strong, with a Geekbench single-core score of 3401 and a PassMark Single Thread score of 4737. In Barony, the game's logic and AI routines are likely heavily single-threaded, and the high boost clock of 5.70 GHz ensures that this combo can handle those tasks without becoming a limiting factor.

The CPU’s 3DMark scores show scaling from 2549 with 2 threads to 17184 with max threads. This indicates that even if Barony uses only a few cores, the per-core performance is sufficient to feed the GPU. The PassMark Physics score of 5670 further supports the notion that the CPU can handle complex simulation tasks. Given that the lowest measured FPS in this combo is 65.8 at 4K Ultra, the CPU is unlikely to be the cause of any frame rate drops; the data points to the GPU as the primary constraint in those scenarios.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo delivers exceptionally high frame rates across all settings. Low settings produce an average of 452.6 FPS, Medium yields 335.8 FPS, High reaches 286 FPS, and Ultra drops to 205.7 FPS. The difference between Low and Ultra at this resolution is 246.9 FPS, indicating that the GPU has significant headroom and that the CPU is capable of maintaining very high output.

Moving to 2560x1440, the frame rates remain high but show a clear scaling pattern. Low settings average 284.9 FPS, Medium 212.6 FPS, High 180.2 FPS, and Ultra 132.2 FPS. The reduction from 1080p Low to 1440p Low is 167.7 FPS, showing the impact of increased pixel count. At Ultra, the drop from 205.7 FPS at 1080p to 132.2 FPS at 1440p represents a 35.7% decrease, which is consistent with the added pixel load on the GPU.

At 3840x2160, the frame rates become more demanding. Low settings average 149.2 FPS, Medium 111.5 FPS, High 93.7 FPS, and Ultra 65.8 FPS. The jump from 1440p Ultra to 4K Ultra is a reduction of 66.4 FPS, bringing the combo to a level that is still playable but significantly lower than at lower resolutions. The data shows a consistent trend: as resolution increases, the gap between settings narrows in relative terms, but the absolute FPS drop is steep, particularly between High and Ultra at 4K, where the difference is 27.9 FPS.

The scaling from Low to Ultra at each resolution is notable. At 1080p, Ultra is 45.4% of the Low score. At 1440p, Ultra is 46.4% of Low. At 4K, Ultra is 44.1% of Low. This consistency suggests that the GPU is the limiting factor across all resolutions, as the CPU performance does not appear to constrain the frame rate at any point in the measured data.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 is built on the Ampere architecture with a GA102 chip, fabricated on an 8 nm process by Samsung. It has 10 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 320-bit bus, providing a bandwidth of 760.3 GB/s. The GPU operates at a base clock of 1440 MHz and a boost clock of 1710 MHz, with a TDP of 320 W. Its memory clock is listed at 1188 MHz, with 19 Gbps effective speed.

The GPU's benchmark results place it in the 80th percentile, with an average score of 35787. Its PassMark G3D score is 25086, while its compute score is 14397. The DirectX 12 score of 100 is notably low compared to its DirectX 11 score of 207, which may indicate that this card's performance in newer APIs is not its strongest suit in synthetic tests. In Barony, which is a roguelike and may not be optimized for the latest graphics features, the GPU’s raw rasterization power is likely the primary factor.

The 10 GB VRAM capacity is sufficient for the measured resolutions, as the frame rates do not show signs of severe memory throttling. At 4K Ultra, the average FPS of 65.8 suggests the GPU is fully utilized, and the 760.3 GB/s bandwidth helps maintain data flow for high-resolution textures. The GPU's pixel rate of 164.2 GPixel/s and texture rate of 465.1 GTexel/s are consistent with the observed scaling, where 4K Ultra demands approximately 4 times the pixel throughput of 1080p Low.

The RTX 3080's performance relative to its nearest rivals shows it is closely matched with the AMD Radeon Pro Duo, which has an average score of 35860, a 0.2% difference. It also sits near the AMD Radeon 880M (35646) and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti Mobile (35435). This positioning indicates that the GPU is a solid mid-to-high-tier performer, but not at the very top, which is reflected in the combo's 526th rank among 1702 tested configurations. The data supports a conclusion that the GPU is the limiting factor when pushing Barony to its highest visual settings, particularly at 4K.