Barony

The Intel Core i5-14400F paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER delivers a remarkably smooth experience in Barony across most settings, with the data showing that the High preset at 2560x1440 offers the best balance of visual fidelity and performance. At this setting, the combo produces an average of 124.9 FPS, which is well above the threshold for high-refresh-rate monitors while maintaining the visual quality that the Low preset sacrifices. The Ultra preset, while playable at 1080p with 143 FPS, drops to 90.5 FPS at 1440p and becomes marginal at 4K with 47.2 FPS, making it a poor choice for anything beyond 1080p. For 4K users, the Medium preset at 79.6 FPS is the sensible choice, as High at 68.4 FPS is still playable but begins to approach the lower bounds of smoothness for fast-paced roguelike action. The sweet spot for this hardware is clearly High at 1440p, where the framerate is high enough to never be a limiting factor while the graphical settings remain respectable.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data reveals a clear hierarchy in how this combination scales with settings. At 1920x1080, the Low preset produces 318.5 FPS, which is far beyond what any display can show, making it a waste of visual quality. Medium at 237.5 FPS and High at 202.4 FPS are both excellent, with High being the obvious choice for 1080p users who want the best image without sacrificing anything meaningful. Ultra at 143 FPS is still very usable, but the jump from High to Ultra costs nearly 60 FPS for what is typically a marginal visual improvement in a roguelike title.

Moving to 2560x1440, the situation becomes more nuanced. Low hits 200.7 FPS, Medium reaches 147.8 FPS, and High stays at 124.9 FPS. All three are above 120 FPS, meaning they are suitable for high-refresh-rate monitors. Ultra, at 90.5 FPS, is still smooth but no longer maxes out a 144Hz display. The data strongly suggests that High at 1440p is the optimal configuration: it maintains a comfortable margin above 120 FPS while offering significantly better visuals than Medium or Low. The 74 FPS gap between High and Ultra at this resolution shows diminishing returns, as Ultra costs nearly 38% of the High framerate for incremental visual gains.

At 3840x2160, the GPU becomes the clear bottleneck. Low yields 107 FPS, which is surprisingly capable for 4K, but Medium drops to 79.6 FPS and High to 68.4 FPS. Ultra falls to 47.2 FPS, which is below the 60 FPS standard and will feel stuttery in combat. For 4K, the recommendation is Medium: it provides a playable 79.6 FPS while keeping the game looking far better than Low. High is acceptable for slower moments but will dip noticeably during intense effects. The 12.6 FPS difference between Medium and High at 4K is smaller than the 27.4 FPS gap between High and Ultra, suggesting that High is a reasonable compromise for those who prioritize image quality over guaranteed smoothness.

FAQ

Q: Can this combo run Barony at 4K with playable framerates?

A: Yes, but only on lower presets. The data shows 107 FPS at Low, 79.6 FPS at Medium, and 68.4 FPS at High. Ultra drops to 47.2 FPS, which is not recommended for action-heavy roguelike gameplay.

Q: Is the Ultra preset ever worth using?

A: Only at 1080p, where it produces 143 FPS. At 1440p it drops to 90.5 FPS, and at 4K it falls to 47.2 FPS. The performance cost of Ultra is steep, with a 59.4 FPS difference between High and Ultra at 1080p.

Q: How does the CPU affect performance in this game?

A: The Intel Core i5-14400F has 10 cores and 16 threads with a boost clock of 4.70 GHz. Its Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 21914 and single-core score of 3093 suggest it is more than sufficient for Barony, which is not a heavily threaded title. The GPU is the limiting factor at higher resolutions.

Q: What is the best resolution for a 144Hz monitor?

A: Both 1080p and 1440p work well. At 1440p, High settings yield 124.9 FPS, which is close enough to 144Hz to be smooth. At 1080p, High gives 202.4 FPS, leaving plenty of headroom. 4K cannot reach 144Hz on any preset, with the best being 107 FPS at Low.

Q: How does this GPU compare to its direct rivals?

A: The RTX 2070 SUPER has an average benchmark score of 22206, placing it in the 65th percentile of all GPUs. It is 0.9% faster than the GTX TITAN Z and 2.5% faster than the RX 5700, but 2.3% slower than the RTX 4060 Mobile. These are close scores, meaning real-world performance will vary by game.

Q: Is there a large difference between Low and Medium settings?

A: The gap narrows as resolution increases. At 1080p, Low gives 318.5 FPS and Medium 237.5 FPS, an 81 FPS difference. At 1440p, the gap is 52.9 FPS (200.7 vs 147.8). At 4K, it shrinks to 27.4 FPS (107 vs 79.6). Medium always looks better and the framerate cost is manageable.

How This Combo Ranks

In the database of tested combinations for Barony, this pairing achieves a rank of 1043 out of 1702 total combos. This places it in the bottom 39% of all tested systems, which is notable given that the individual components perform reasonably well in isolation. The CPU sits in the 88th percentile of all processors, with an average benchmark score of 32508, while the GPU is in the 65th percentile with a score of 22206. The discrepancy suggests that Barony's engine is not fully utilizing the CPU's potential, and the GPU is the primary limiter.

The rank of 1043 out of 1702 means that 659 tested combos perform worse, while 1042 perform better. This is a middle-of-the-pack result for a game that is not particularly demanding. The i5-14400F's nearest rivals in CPU benchmarks are the i7-12800H (0% delta), Ryzen 5 PRO 7645 (0.2% faster), Ryzen 7 250 (0.2% slower), and i7-13705H (0.2% slower). These are all extremely close scores, indicating that the CPU is not a differentiator in this game. The GPU's rivals are similarly tight: the RTX A400 is 0.5% faster, the GTX TITAN Z is 0.9% slower, the RTX 4060 Mobile is 2.3% faster, and the RX 5700 is 2.5% slower. The narrow margins mean that swapping to any of these rivals would produce near-identical FPS in Barony.

The ranking data shows that Barony rewards GPU-heavy systems more than CPU-heavy ones. A combo with a weaker CPU but a stronger GPU would likely rank higher, as the game's framerates scale more with resolution and settings than with processor power. The 1702 total combos include many with newer, faster GPUs, which explains why this 2019-era GPU lands in the lower half. For context, the RTX 2070 SUPER is end-of-life, having been released on 2019-07-08, while the i5-14400F is an active product from 2024-01-07. This generational mismatch is reflected in the rank.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the framerates are exceptionally high across all settings. Low produces 318.5 FPS, Medium 237.5 FPS, High 202.4 FPS, and Ultra 143 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 175.5 FPS, showing that settings have a huge impact at this resolution. Even Ultra is playable, but the jump from High to Ultra costs 59.4 FPS, which is a 29% reduction. This indicates that Ultra applies effects that are disproportionately expensive relative to their visual benefit.

At 2560x1440, the framerates remain strong. Low hits 200.7 FPS, Medium 147.8 FPS, High 124.9 FPS, and Ultra 90.5 FPS. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is consistent across settings: Low loses 117.8 FPS, Medium 89.7 FPS, High 77.5 FPS, and Ultra 52.5 FPS. The percentage drop is larger at lower settings, which is typical for GPU-bound scenarios. High at 1440p is the most balanced, as it stays above 120 FPS while providing good visuals.

At 3840x2160, the GPU is clearly stretched. Low yields 107 FPS, Medium 79.6 FPS, High 68.4 FPS, and Ultra 47.2 FPS. The gap between Low and Ultra is 59.8 FPS, which is similar to the 1080p spread but at much lower absolute numbers. High at 4K is 68.4 FPS, which is just above the 60 FPS threshold but will dip in busy scenes. Medium at 79.6 FPS is the safest choice for 4K, offering a 11.2 FPS buffer over High while still looking substantially better than Low.

Resolution Scaling

The data reveals a clear pattern in how framerates scale with resolution. Moving from 1080p to 1440p, the average FPS across all settings drops by approximately 40-45%. Specifically, High goes from 202.4 to 124.9 FPS (a 38% reduction), Medium from 237.5 to 147.8 FPS (38%), Low from 318.5 to 200.7 FPS (37%), and Ultra from 143 to 90.5 FPS (37%). This consistent ~38% drop suggests that the GPU is the primary bottleneck at these resolutions, as pixel count increases by 78% from 1080p to 1440p, but framerates do not drop proportionally.

Moving from 1440p to 4K, the drop is more severe. High falls from 124.9 to 68.4 FPS (45% reduction), Medium from 147.8 to 79.6 FPS (46%), Low from 200.7 to 107 FPS (47%), and Ultra from 90.5 to 47.2 FPS (48%). The 4K pixel count is 2.25x that of 1440p, so the framerate drops roughly in line with pixel count, confirming that the RTX 2070 SUPER is fully saturated at 4K. The 448.0 GB/s memory bandwidth and 9.062 TFLOPS FP32 performance are simply not enough to maintain high framerates at this resolution.

The scaling behavior indicates that at 1080p, the system is partially CPU-limited, as the framerates (318.5 FPS at Low) far exceed what the GPU can render when fully utilized. The i5-14400F's strong single-core performance (3093 in Cinebench R23) helps at lower resolutions. At 1440p and above, the GPU becomes the limiting factor, with the 8 GB of GDDR6 memory and 256-bit bus being adequate but not exceptional. The 68.4 FPS at 4K High is the dividing line: below this, the experience degrades noticeably. Users with 1440p or 1080p monitors will find this combo excellent, while 4K users must accept compromises.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-14400F brings 10 cores and 16 threads to this pairing, with a base clock of 2.50 GHz and a boost clock of 4.70 GHz. This Raptor Lake architecture part, built on Intel's 10 nm process, has a 65 W TDP and supports DDR4 and DDR5 memory. Its 20 MB of shared L3 cache is substantial for a mid-range chip. In synthetic benchmarks, it achieves a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 21914 and a single-core score of 3093, placing it in the 88th percentile of all CPUs. The Geekbench scores are 11209 multi-core and 2333 single-core, while Passmark shows 25783 for multithread and 3723 for single-thread.

For Barony, the CPU's role is secondary to the GPU. The measured FPS data shows that at 1080p Low, the system hits 318.5 FPS, which is a strong indicator that the CPU can feed the GPU efficiently at high framerates. The 4.70 GHz boost clock is critical here, as roguelike games often have single-threaded bottlenecks for game logic and AI. The Cinebench R23 single-core score of 3093 is in line with other modern mid-range chips, and the data shows no obvious CPU limitation in this game.

The CPU's nearest rivals in benchmark scores are all within 0.2% of each other, meaning that in Barony, swapping the i5-14400F for an i7-12800H, Ryzen 5 PRO 7645, Ryzen 7 250, or i7-13705H would produce nearly identical results. The game does not appear to scale with core count beyond what the i5-14400F offers, as its 10 cores and 16 threads are sufficient for the workload. The 65 W TDP means thermal throttling is unlikely in most desktop cases, allowing the boost clock to be sustained. The lack of an unlocked multiplier means no overclocking, but the stock boost clock is already high enough for this game's demands. The Passmark physics score of 1594 and integer math score of 81964 suggest strong general processing power, but Barony's performance is ultimately tied to the GPU, as evidenced by the 47.2 FPS at 4K Ultra despite the CPU's capabilities.