Barony

Barony, a 2015 roguelike, exhibits exceptionally high frame rates on the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D combination. The measured data reveals a system that is overwhelmingly GPU-bound at lower resolutions, with the CPU’s substantial single-threaded and multi-threaded capabilities providing a massive ceiling for the GPU to push against. The following analysis breaks down the performance characteristics across resolutions, settings, and component roles.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate scaling from 1080p to 4K clearly illustrates a shift in system bottleneck. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the combo achieves an average of 724 FPS. Moving to 2560x1440 Low drops that to 457 FPS, a reduction of 36.9%. At 3840x2160 Low, the average falls further to 239 FPS, which is 47.7% lower than the 1440p result and 67.0% lower than the 1080p result. This aggressive scaling at Low settings indicates that the CPU is the primary limiter at 1080p; the GPU has ample headroom to render frames quickly, but the processor cannot feed it data any faster.

As settings increase, the scaling pattern changes. At High settings, the average FPS goes from 462 at 1080p to 292 at 1440p (a 36.8% drop) and then to 152 at 4K (a 48.0% drop from 1440p). The percentage drops are similar to Low, but the absolute frame rates are lower, suggesting that the GPU is beginning to take on a more significant load. The trend becomes more pronounced at Ultra settings, where the frame rates are 331 at 1080p, 209 at 1440p, and 109 at 4K. The 4K Ultra result represents a 47.9% reduction from the 1440p Ultra score.

The data for Medium settings provides the only min/max FPS data points. At 1920x1080 Medium, the average is 538 FPS with a minimum of 458 and a maximum of 619. At 2560x1440 Medium, the average is 340 FPS with a minimum of 289 and a maximum of 391. At 3840x2160 Medium, the average is 178 FPS with a minimum of 151 and a maximum of 204. The consistent ratio between average and minimum FPS (roughly 85-89% of average) suggests stable frame pacing across these resolutions, with no sudden hitches.

The key takeaway is that the gap between 1080p and 1440p is consistently larger than the gap between 1440p and 4K in percentage terms. This is characteristic of a system where the CPU bottleneck at 1080p is so severe that increasing resolution to 1440p does not proportionally increase GPU workload, because the GPU was underutilized at the lower resolution. At 4K, the GPU workload becomes more significant, but the sheer power of the RTX 5090 D still yields triple-digit frame rates even at Ultra settings.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D is the primary driver of the high frame rates, particularly at higher resolutions and settings. Its 32 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 512-bit bus provides a memory bandwidth of 1.79 TB/s. This massive bandwidth is crucial for feeding the 21,760 shading units at high resolutions, preventing texture streaming or memory bandwidth from becoming a limiting factor even at 4K Ultra. The GPU's boost clock of 2407 MHz, combined with its base clock of 2017 MHz, allows it to sustain high throughput across the board.

In synthetic benchmarks, the RTX 5090 D scores 44,065 in Passmark G3D and 28,396 in Passmark GPU Compute. More relevant to gaming, its 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score is 14,326. These scores place it in the 92nd percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 77,712. Its nearest rivals in the database are the AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT (avg score 78,940, 1.6% higher), the NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB (avg score 79,605, 2.4% higher), and the NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 12 GB (avg score 79,396, 2.1% higher). Notably, the RTX 5090 D sits just 1.1% above the AMD Radeon RX 6650M XT (avg score 76,904).

In Barony, the GPU's role becomes more pronounced as resolution and settings increase. At 1080p Low, the 724 FPS result suggests the GPU is heavily bottlenecked by the CPU. However, at 4K Ultra, the 109 FPS average indicates that the GPU is finally being pushed to a more significant degree. The data implies that even at 4K Ultra, the RTX 5090 D is not fully saturated, as frame rates remain far above the 60 FPS threshold. The 32 GB VRAM capacity is far beyond what Barony requires, but it ensures no memory-related performance cliffs occur. The GPU's robust specs, including 170 RT cores and 680 tensor cores, are largely irrelevant for this title, but the raw rasterization power provided by its 104.8 TFLOPS FP32 performance is what carries the high frame rates.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average frame rate achieved by this combo in Barony?

A: The highest measured average is 724 FPS at 1920x1080 resolution with Low settings.

Q: How much faster is the 1080p Low result compared to the 4K Low result?

A: The 1080p Low average of 724 FPS is 203% higher than the 4K Low average of 239 FPS.

Q: At which resolution and settings does the frame rate drop below 120 FPS?

A: The only measured configuration below 120 FPS is at 3840x2160 with Ultra settings, which yields an average of 109 FPS. All other configurations exceed 120 FPS.

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

A: At 2560x1440, High settings produce an average of 292 FPS, while Ultra settings produce 209 FPS. The Ultra preset is 28.4% slower than High.

Q: Does the CPU or GPU limit performance at 1080p Low settings?

A: Given the extremely high frame rate of 724 FPS, the CPU is the limiting component. The GPU has enough headroom to render frames faster, but the processor cannot issue draw calls quickly enough.

Q: How does the combo rank among all tested combinations for Barony?

A: It ranks 1st out of 2,935 tested combos, making it the top-performing combination in the database for this game.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The full matrix of measured frame rates provides a clear picture of performance scaling. At 1920x1080, the average FPS ranges from 724 at Low, to 538 at Medium, 462 at High, and 331 at Ultra. The Medium setting has a documented minimum of 458 FPS and a maximum of 619 FPS. The scaling from Low to Ultra at 1080p represents a 54.3% reduction in frame rate.

Moving to 2560x1440, the averages are 457 at Low, 340 at Medium, 292 at High, and 209 at Ultra. The Medium setting shows a minimum of 289 FPS and a maximum of 391 FPS. Compared to 1080p, the 1440p results are lower across the board, with the Low setting seeing a 36.9% drop, Medium a 36.8% drop, High a 36.8% drop, and Ultra a 36.9% drop.

At 3840x2160, the averages are 239 at Low, 178 at Medium, 152 at High, and 109 at Ultra. The Medium setting has a minimum of 151 FPS and a maximum of 204 FPS. The 4K results show a more significant drop from 1440p: Low falls by 47.7%, Medium by 47.6%, High by 47.9%, and Ultra by 47.8%. The consistency of these percentage drops across all settings from 1440p to 4K suggests a uniform scaling factor, likely due to the GPU's workload scaling linearly with pixel count.

The data reveals that the frame rate differences between settings are relatively consistent across resolutions. For instance, the gap between Low and Ultra is roughly 54-55% at every resolution. This indicates that the settings presets scale the GPU load in a predictable manner, independent of resolution.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS values, the optimal balance of visual quality and performance depends on the target display. For 1080p and 1440p displays, the Ultra preset is entirely viable, as it maintains averages of 331 FPS and 209 FPS respectively. These frame rates are far beyond what any standard display can refresh, so enabling Ultra settings at these resolutions has no practical downside for smoothness.

For 4K displays, the choice becomes more nuanced. The High preset at 3840x2160 delivers 152 FPS average, which is still exceptionally high and suitable for high-refresh-rate 4K monitors (typically 144 Hz or 160 Hz). The Ultra preset at 4K drops to 109 FPS average, which is still above 100 FPS and would be smooth on a 120 Hz display, but it may not fully saturate a 144 Hz panel. Given that the jump from High to Ultra represents a 28.3% performance cost at 4K (152 to 109 FPS), the High preset is the recommended choice for 4K gaming if maximizing frame rate is the priority.

The Medium preset at 4K provides 178 FPS, but the visual quality reduction from High is likely not worth the 17.1% frame rate increase. The Low presets are unnecessary for this hardware, as even the most demanding settings produce triple-digit frame rates at 4K. The data strongly suggests that users with 1080p or 1440p displays should use Ultra settings without hesitation. For 4K users, High is the sweet spot, offering a significant margin above 120 FPS while maintaining high visual fidelity.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D plays a critical role in enabling the extremely high frame rates seen at lower resolutions. With 16 cores and 32 threads based on the Zen 5 architecture, this processor has a base clock of 4.30 GHz and a boost clock of 5.70 GHz. Its 128 MB of L3 cache is substantial, and its benchmark scores are top-tier. In Cinebench R23, it scores 42,018 in multi-core and 2,259 in single-core. Geekbench results show 26,736 multi-core and 3,064 single-core scores. The Passmark multi-thread score is 70,255, with a single-thread score of 4,737.

These synthetic numbers translate directly to Barony's performance. The processor's single-thread performance is crucial for the game's main thread, which handles game logic and draw call submission. The 3DMark single-thread score of 1,292 and the 16-thread score of 16,374 indicate that the CPU can handle both the light-threaded aspects and the more parallelizable workloads (like AI updates and physics) without becoming a bottleneck.

The CPU ranks in the 95th percentile of all processors, with an average benchmark score of 75,779. Its nearest rivals are incredibly close: the AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 9755 (75,738, 0.1% lower), the AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 9755X3D (75,716, 0.1% lower), the AMD EPYC 8224P (75,582, 0.3% lower), and the Intel Core Ultra 9 285 (75,488, 0.4% lower). This puts the 9950X3D at the very top of the performance stack, which is evidenced by the frame rates achieved.

In Barony, the CPU's role is most apparent at 1080p Low, where the 724 FPS average is likely limited by the CPU's ability to process frames, not the GPU's ability to render them. The high boost clock of 5.70 GHz is essential for this, as it minimizes the time taken to execute the game's single-threaded tasks. The 32 threads ensure that background processes and the game's multi-threaded components do not interfere with this critical path. The result is that the CPU provides a massive performance ceiling that allows the RTX 5090 D to operate at its full potential in this game.

How This Combo Ranks

According to the measured data, the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D ranks 1st out of 2,935 tested combinations for Barony. This top ranking is unsurprising given the component-level data. The CPU is in the 95th percentile of all processors, and the GPU is in the 92nd percentile of all GPUs, making this a pairing of two elite components.

The ranking confirms that this is the best possible combination in the database for this specific game. The frame rate data supports this, with even the most demanding 4K Ultra preset producing 109 FPS, which is higher than what most systems achieve at 1080p. The combination of the 9950X3D's exceptional single-thread performance and the RTX 5090 D's immense rasterization power creates a system that is effectively unconstrained in Barony.

The rank of 1 out of 2,935 is a strong statement about the hardware's capabilities. It indicates that no other combination of CPU and GPU in the database can match the frame rates achieved by this pairing. The gap to the 2nd place combo is not quantified in the data, but the margin over other components in their respective benchmarks (e.g., the CPU's 0.4% lead over the Intel Core Ultra 9 285) suggests that the top spot is held by a narrow but definitive margin. For a game like Barony, which is not graphically demanding but benefits from high frame rates, this combo represents the ultimate choice for players seeking maximum performance.