Barony

Barony pairs the Intel Core i3-12100F with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER, a combination that lands at rank 2153 out of 3717 tested combos. The measured frame rates show a setup that is heavily GPU-limited at higher resolutions yet capable of very high refresh rates at 1080p, with the CPU’s 4 cores and 8 threads proving sufficient for this roguelike’s demands. The data set includes 12 measured FPS rows across three resolutions and four settings presets, providing a clear picture of how this hardware behaves in practice.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data shows that the Medium preset offers the best balance of visual quality and performance across all three resolutions. At 3840x2160, Medium delivers an average of 78 FPS with a minimum of 66 FPS and a maximum of 89 FPS, which is comfortably playable. The High preset at 4K drops to 67 FPS average, while Ultra falls to 48 FPS, making Medium the clear sweet spot for maintaining smooth gameplay without sacrificing too much visual fidelity. At 2560x1440, Medium produces 148 FPS average with minimum 126 FPS and maximum 171 FPS, while High reaches 127 FPS and Ultra drops to 91 FPS. The 1440p Medium result keeps frame times consistent enough for high-refresh monitors, though the 126 FPS minimum is worth noting for competitive play. At 1920x1080, Medium achieves 235 FPS average with a minimum of 200 FPS and maximum of 270 FPS, which is excellent for any display, while High sits at 202 FPS and Ultra at 145 FPS.

The Low preset is the only other option that exceeds 100 FPS at 4K, hitting 104 FPS average, but the visual downgrade is substantial compared to Medium’s 78 FPS. For users prioritizing maximum frame rates, Low at 1080p reaches 316 FPS average, which would suit esports-style play, but Barony’s roguelike nature benefits more from consistent mid-range performance than extreme framerates. The data suggests that Medium is the recommended preset for general play, as it maintains playable FPS at 4K and high refresh rates at lower resolutions. The Ultra preset, while offering the highest visual quality, produces 48 FPS at 4K, which approaches the edge of playability, and even at 1440p it drops to 91 FPS, making it a poor choice for anything but the least demanding scenarios. High settings are viable for 1080p and 1440p but fall short at 4K, where Medium’s 78 FPS versus High’s 67 FPS difference is modest yet meaningful for maintaining a stable frame pacing. Overall, the measured rows indicate that Medium provides the most consistent experience, with the smallest gap between average and minimum FPS across all resolutions.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER operates with a base clock of 1605 MHz and a boost clock of 1770 MHz, paired with 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus delivering 448.0 GB/s bandwidth. These specifications translate into a GPU that ranks at the 65th percentile among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 20282. Its nearest rivals include the NVIDIA Quadro M4000M at 20480 (1% higher), the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Mobile at 20534 (1.2% higher), the Intel Arc B570 at 20556 (1.3% higher), and the Intel Arc A750 at 20582 (1.5% higher), showing that the RTX 2070 SUPER sits just below a cluster of modern mid-range competitors.

The 8 GB VRAM capacity is sufficient for Barony at all tested settings, as evidenced by the measured FPS values, but the GPU’s compute capabilities are the primary constraint at higher resolutions. The GPU’s 2560 shading units, 160 texture mapping units, and 64 render output units produce a pixel rate of 113.3 GPixel/s and a texture rate of 283.2 GTexel/s, with FP32 performance of 9.062 TFLOPS. These figures directly influence how the card handles the increasing pixel counts from 1080p to 4K. At 3840x2160, the GPU’s workload quadruples compared to 1080p, and the measured FPS at High settings drops from 202 to 67, a 67% reduction, which is consistent with a GPU-bound scenario. The 12 nm process node and 13,600 million transistors on a 545 mm² die size explain the card’s power characteristics, with a 215 W TDP requiring a 550 W suggested PSU, but these physical attributes are secondary to the observed performance. The RTX 2070 SUPER’s 40 RT cores and 320 tensor cores are present for ray tracing and AI workloads, but Barony likely does not utilize these features heavily, based on the FPS patterns. The memory clock of 1750 MHz (14 Gbps effective) combined with the 256-bit bus provides ample bandwidth for 8 GB of GDDR6, which the game appears to use without bottlenecking, given that the FPS scales predictably with resolution rather than stalling due to VRAM exhaustion.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS drop from 1920x1080 to 3840x2160 reveals a clear GPU-limited behavior. At Medium settings, the average FPS falls from 235 at 1080p to 148 at 1440p (a 37% reduction) and then to 78 at 4K (a 47% reduction from 1440p). This pattern indicates that the RTX 2070 SUPER is the limiting component, as the CPU’s performance would not degrade so dramatically with resolution changes. At High settings, the drop is from 202 at 1080p to 127 at 1440p (37% reduction) and then to 67 at 4K (47% reduction), showing consistent scaling. The Low preset shows the same trend: 316 FPS at 1080p, 199 at 1440p (37% reduction), and 104 at 4K (48% reduction). The near-identical percentage drops across all settings presets confirm that resolution scaling is purely GPU-bound, with the CPU maintaining sufficient headroom even at 1080p where the i3-12100F’s 4 cores and 8 threads are not the bottleneck.

The Ultra preset scales slightly differently, dropping from 145 FPS at 1080p to 91 at 1440p (37% reduction) and then to 48 at 4K (47% reduction), but the overall pattern remains consistent. This uniform scaling suggests that the game’s rendering workload increases proportionally with pixel count, and the RTX 2070 SUPER’s 9.062 TFLOPS FP32 performance is the deciding factor. At 4K, even the Low preset only reaches 104 FPS, while the Medium preset at 78 FPS is the highest playable option, indicating that the GPU’s fill rate and shader throughput are stretched at this resolution. The 448.0 GB/s memory bandwidth also plays a role, as higher resolutions require more data to be fetched from VRAM, but the consistent FPS scaling implies that bandwidth is not a separate bottleneck. The absence of min FPS data for most rows, except Medium settings, limits analysis of frame time consistency, but the Medium preset’s min FPS at 4K (66) versus average (78) shows only a 15% drop, indicating stable performance. The data strongly suggests that users seeking higher FPS at 4K would need a more powerful GPU, while the CPU can handle any resolution without issue.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution for this combo to maintain 60+ FPS?

A: All three tested resolutions achieve 60+ FPS at Medium settings or higher, with 4K at Medium averaging 78 FPS, 1440p at Medium averaging 148 FPS, and 1080p at Medium averaging 235 FPS. The Ultra preset at 4K is the only exception, dropping to 48 FPS.

Q: How does the CPU compare to its nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The Intel Core i3-12100F has an average benchmark score of 13494, placing it at the 68th percentile among all CPUs. Its nearest rival, the Intel Core 3 N355, scores 13492 with a 0% delta, while the Intel Core i5-9500 scores 13452 (0.3% higher), the Intel Core 5 120UL scores 13594 (0.7% lower), and the Intel Core i7-1250U scores 13351 (1.1% higher).

Q: Is the 8 GB VRAM sufficient for Barony at 4K?

A: Yes, the measured FPS at 3840x2160 shows playable results across Medium (78 FPS), Low (104 FPS), and High (67 FPS), indicating that 8 GB of GDDR6 memory is not a limiting factor for this game. The GPU’s compute performance, not VRAM capacity, determines the 4K results.

Q: What settings preset should I use for 1440p gaming?

A: Medium settings at 2560x1440 provide 148 FPS average with 126 FPS minimum and 171 FPS maximum, which is the most balanced option. High settings at 127 FPS are also viable, but Ultra drops to 91 FPS, making Medium the recommended choice for consistent high refresh rates.

Q: How does the RTX 2070 SUPER rank against comparable GPUs?

A: The GPU scores 20282 on average, placing it at the 65th percentile. It trails the NVIDIA Quadro M4000M (20480, 1% higher), the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Mobile (20534, 1.2% higher), the Intel Arc B570 (20556, 1.3% higher), and the Intel Arc A750 (20582, 1.5% higher).

Q: Can this combo achieve 200+ FPS at 1080p?

A: Yes, at 1920x1080, the Low preset averages 316 FPS, Medium averages 235 FPS, and High averages 202 FPS. Only the Ultra preset falls below 200 FPS, averaging 145 FPS.

How This Combo Ranks

This specific combination of Intel Core i3-12100F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER ranks 2153 out of 3717 tested combos in Barony, placing it in the lower-middle portion of the overall distribution. Given that the combo percentile is not directly provided, the rank of 2153 out of 3717 indicates that approximately 58% of tested combos perform better in this game. This positioning reflects the GPU’s 65th percentile ranking and the CPU’s 68th percentile ranking, suggesting that neither component is particularly weak, but the combination does not reach the top tiers due to the GPU’s age and the CPU’s limited core count.

The rank is influenced by both components, but the resolution-dependent FPS data indicates that the GPU is the primary differentiator. At 1080p, the combo delivers excellent results (202 FPS at High), which would likely outperform many lower-end combos, but at 4K, the 67 FPS at High settings places it behind setups with more powerful GPUs. The CPU’s 4 cores and 8 threads are sufficient for Barony, as evidenced by the strong 1080p performance, but the overall rank suggests that combos with higher-end GPUs, even if paired with weaker CPUs, might achieve better 4K results. The nearest rival GPUs, such as the Intel Arc A750 with a 1.5% higher average score, would likely produce slightly better frame rates, but the difference is small. The combo’s position at rank 2153 is consistent with a mid-range pairing that excels at 1080p and 1440p but struggles to maintain high FPS at 4K Ultra, making it a balanced but not top-tier option for Barony.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i3-12100F features 4 cores and 8 threads with a base clock of 3.30 GHz and a boost clock of 4.30 GHz, built on the Alder Lake architecture using a 10 nm process. Its cache hierarchy includes 80 KB of L1 per core, 1.25 MB of L2 per core, and 12 MB of shared L3 cache, with a 58 W TDP. The CPU supports DDR4 and DDR5 memory in dual-channel configuration and connects via PCIe Gen 5 with 16 lanes. Its synthetic benchmarks show a single-thread score of 893 in 3dmark, a multi-thread score of 4023 in 3dmark_max_threads, and a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 11860, along with a single-core score of 1674. These results place the CPU at the 68th percentile among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 13494.

In the context of Barony, the CPU’s role appears minimal, as the FPS scaling with resolution is almost entirely GPU-bound. At 1080p with Low settings, the combo achieves 316 FPS, which would require significant CPU throughput to feed the GPU, yet the 4-core/8-thread configuration handles it without issue. The Cinebench R15 single-core score of 168 and R20 single-core score of 703 indicate strong per-thread performance, which is beneficial for games that rely on a few heavily loaded threads. The 3dmark 2-thread score of 1659 and 4-thread score of 2859 suggest that the CPU can leverage its 4 physical cores effectively, but the 8-thread score of 4026 shows diminishing returns from hyper-threading, which is typical for gaming workloads. The Passmark single-thread score of 3444 and multi-thread score of 14015 further confirm that the CPU is not a bottleneck, even at the highest frame rates measured. The i3-12100F’s nearest rivals, including the Intel Core 3 N355 (13492, 0% delta) and Intel Core i5-9500 (13452, 0.3% higher), show that it performs comparably to older 6-core parts, but Barony does not appear to require more than 4 cores. The CPU’s 12 MB of L3 cache is shared across all cores, which helps with data reuse in game logic, but the low resolution FPS numbers (316 FPS at 1080p Low) indicate that the CPU can produce frames faster than the GPU can render them, making the GPU the definitive limiting factor.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured average FPS values are as follows: Low settings produce 316 FPS, Medium settings produce 235 FPS with a minimum of 200 FPS and maximum of 270 FPS, High settings produce 202 FPS, and Ultra settings produce 145 FPS. These numbers show a clear progression where each settings tier reduces performance by roughly 15-30%, with the gap from Medium to High (235 to 202, a 14% drop) being smaller than the jump from High to Ultra (202 to 145, a 28% drop). This suggests that Ultra settings introduce a significant additional GPU workload compared to High, likely due to advanced shading or post-processing effects.

At 2560x1440, the average FPS values are: Low at 199 FPS, Medium at 148 FPS with a minimum of 126 FPS and maximum of 171 FPS, High at 127 FPS, and Ultra at 91 FPS. The scaling from Low to Medium (199 to 148, a 26% drop) is similar to the 1080p pattern, but the High to Ultra transition (127 to 91, a 28% drop) remains consistent. The Medium preset’s minimum FPS of 126 indicates that frame times are stable, with only a 15% variance from the average, which is reassuring for gameplay smoothness. At 3840x2160, the average FPS values are: Low at 104 FPS, Medium at 78 FPS with a minimum of 66 FPS and maximum of 89 FPS, High at 67 FPS, and Ultra at 48 FPS. The 4K results show a steeper drop from Low to Medium (104 to 78, a 25% reduction) and from Medium to High (78 to 67, a 14% reduction), but the High to Ultra drop (67 to 48, a 28% reduction) mirrors the lower resolutions. The 4K Medium preset shows a minimum FPS of 66, which is 15% below the average, indicating that even at this demanding resolution, frame pacing remains acceptable.

The data reveals that the relative performance gap between settings presets is consistent across resolutions, with Ultra always being roughly 40-50% slower than Low at each resolution. Specifically, at 1080p, Ultra (145) is 54% slower than Low (316); at 1440p, Ultra (91) is 54% slower than Low (199); and at 4K, Ultra (48) is 54% slower than Low (104). This uniform ratio strongly suggests that the settings presets scale the same rendering features regardless of resolution, and the GPU’s compute resources are the sole determinant of performance. The Medium preset, which includes min/max FPS data, shows that the range between minimum and maximum FPS narrows as resolution increases: at 1080p, the range is 70 FPS (200 to 270); at 1440p, the range is 45 FPS (126 to 171); and at 4K, the range is 23 FPS (66 to 89). This narrowing indicates that higher resolutions reduce the CPU’s ability to cause frame rate spikes, as the GPU becomes more dominant in determining frame times. Overall, the measured FPS breakdown shows a well-behaved system where the RTX 2070 SUPER delivers predictable performance across all settings, with the i3-12100F providing enough headroom to never become the limiting factor.