Barony

The Intel Core Ultra 5 225 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 combination delivers a striking performance profile in Barony, a roguelike that proves far more demanding on frame rates than its genre might suggest. The measured data reveals a system that excels at high refresh rates but shows clear scaling constraints as resolution increases.

Resolution Scaling

The transition from 1080p to 4K demonstrates a classic shift in system bottleneck. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the combo produces an extraordinary 469 FPS average. Moving to 2560x1440 Low drops that to 296 FPS, a 36.9% reduction. The jump to 3840x2160 Low yields 155 FPS, which is a 47.6% decline from the 1440p figure. This steep drop-off indicates that while the CPU and GPU are both highly capable at lower resolutions, the render load at 4K begins to saturate the graphics pipeline.

The scaling pattern is consistent across all settings presets. With High settings, the frame rate falls from 299 FPS at 1080p to 189 FPS at 1440p (a 36.8% decrease), then to 99 FPS at 4K (a 47.6% drop). Medium settings show a similar trajectory: 349 FPS at 1080p, 220 FPS at 1440p, and 115 FPS at 4K. Ultra settings produce 215 FPS at 1080p, 135 FPS at 1440p, and 71 FPS at 4K.

The percentage losses between 1440p and 4K are remarkably consistent across all four presets, hovering near 47-48%. This uniformity suggests that the RTX 4070's memory bandwidth and pixel throughput become the limiting factors at 4K, regardless of the graphical complexity. The GPU's 504.2 GB/s bandwidth and 158.4 GPixel/s pixel rate handle 1080p and 1440p with ample headroom, but the 4K workload exposes the physical limits of the AD104 chip.

Interestingly, the gap between Low and Ultra settings widens as resolution increases. At 1080p, the difference between Low (469 FPS) and Ultra (215 FPS) is 254 FPS. At 1440p, that gap narrows to 161 FPS (296 vs 135). At 4K, the spread compresses to 84 FPS (155 vs 71). This compression indicates that at 4K, the resolution itself — not the settings complexity — is the dominant frame rate driver.

How This Combo Ranks

Within the benchmark database, this pairing holds the 663rd position out of 2,935 tested combinations. That places it in the top 22.6% of all CPU-GPU pairings tested in Barony. The ranking reflects a system that is decidedly above average but not elite, consistent with its component tier.

The CPU's percentile ranking against all processors is 85, meaning it outperforms 85% of tested CPUs in general benchmarks. The GPU sits at the 81st percentile among all graphics cards. When combined in this specific game, the pairing achieves a composite rank that is slightly lower than either component's individual percentile might suggest. This indicates that Barony does not scale perfectly with the raw compute power of this duo, likely due to the game's engine characteristics.

The combo's rank of 663 out of 2,935 implies that roughly 2,272 other configurations deliver higher average frame rates in this title. That places this system in the upper quartile of tested hardware, a respectable position for a mid-range-to-upper-mid-range pairing. The data suggests that users seeking top-tier performance in Barony would need to step up to higher-end GPUs or CPUs, but this combination already delivers frame rates well beyond what most displays can reproduce.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 is built on the AD104 chip using TSMC's 5 nm process, containing 35,800 million transistors on a 294 mm² die. Its 12 GB of GDDR6X memory operates across a 192-bit bus, delivering 504.2 GB/s of bandwidth. The memory clock runs at 1313 MHz with 21 Gbps effective transfer rate.

The GPU's core configuration includes 5,888 shading units, 184 texture mapping units, and 64 raster output units. It also features 46 ray tracing cores and 184 tensor cores, though Barony likely does not leverage ray tracing given its genre and release date. The boost clock of 2475 MHz and base clock of 1920 MHz provide the computational muscle, with FP32 performance rated at 29.15 TFLOPS.

In Barony, the GPU's VRAM capacity is more than sufficient; 12 GB is ample for a roguelike at any tested resolution. The limiting factor appears to be raw fill rate and memory bandwidth at 4K. The pixel rate of 158.4 GPixel/s and texture rate of 455.4 GTexel/s dictate how quickly the GPU can process screen-space effects and texture sampling. At 4K with Ultra settings, the 71 FPS average suggests the GPU is working near its maximum throughput.

The GPU's benchmark scores corroborate its mid-range positioning. It achieves 26,927 in Passmark G3D and 14,720 in Passmark GPU Compute. Its percentile ranking of 81 against all GPUs places it slightly below the RTX 4080 Mobile in nearest rival comparisons, with a -1.3% deltaPct against that mobile part. The RTX 4070 sits just 0.1% above the Tesla P4 and 0.4% above the Radeon RX Vega 56 in average benchmark scores, indicating tight competition in its performance tier.

Measured FPS Breakdown

Starting at 1920x1080, the system produces exceptional frame rates across all presets. Low settings yield 469 FPS average, Medium delivers 349 FPS with a minimum of 296 and maximum of 401, High reaches 299 FPS, and Ultra still manages 215 FPS. These numbers far exceed the refresh rate capabilities of virtually all consumer monitors, making 1080p a non-issue for this hardware.

At 2560x1440, performance remains extremely high. Low settings produce 296 FPS, Medium averages 220 FPS (min 187, max 253), High delivers 189 FPS, and Ultra maintains 135 FPS. Even the most demanding preset at 1440p clears the 120 FPS threshold that high-refresh-rate gamers target. The minimum frame rates recorded for Medium settings — 187 FPS at 1440p and 296 FPS at 1080p — suggest stable frame pacing with no noticeable stuttering.

The 3840x2160 results reveal where this combination begins to strain. Low settings still deliver a playable 155 FPS, and Medium averages 115 FPS with a minimum of 98 and maximum of 132. High settings drop to 99 FPS, while Ultra falls to 71 FPS. The 4K Ultra result dips below the 75 FPS mark that many gamers consider the baseline for smooth play, though it remains playable. The Medium preset at 4K offers the best balance, with its 98 FPS minimum ensuring no drops below 60 FPS.

The data shows a clear hierarchy: 1080p delivers 215-469 FPS, 1440p delivers 135-296 FPS, and 4K delivers 71-155 FPS. Each resolution tier roughly halves the previous tier's frame rate at equivalent settings, which is expected given the pixel count increases.

Settings Recommendations

For 1080p displays, the Ultra preset is the obvious choice. The 215 FPS average is far beyond what any monitor can display, so users should maximize visual quality without any performance concern. Even the most demanding settings leave massive headroom for future driver optimizations or background tasks.

At 1440p, Ultra settings remain viable at 135 FPS. This exceeds the 120 Hz refresh rate that many 1440p gaming monitors offer. For users with 144 Hz or 165 Hz panels, the High preset at 189 FPS provides additional headroom, but the visual quality difference between High and Ultra may not justify the 54 FPS loss for most players. The Medium preset at 220 FPS is only relevant for competitive players with 240 Hz displays, though the visual compromise is significant.

For 4K, the recommendation shifts. Ultra at 71 FPS is playable but leaves little margin for demanding scenes. High at 99 FPS offers a better experience, but Medium at 115 FPS with a 98 FPS minimum provides the safest combination of visual fidelity and frame rate stability. Given that the Medium preset's minimum frame rate stays above 60 FPS, it is the recommended choice for 4K gaming. The Low preset at 155 FPS sacrifices too much visual quality for a marginal frame rate gain over Medium.

The measured data shows that this system can comfortably drive 4K at Medium settings, 1440p at Ultra settings, and 1080p at any settings. The optimal configuration depends entirely on the display's refresh rate and resolution.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 5 225 is a 10-core, 10-thread processor based on the Arrow Lake architecture, manufactured on TSMC's 3 nm process. It has a base clock of 3.30 GHz and a boost clock of 4.90 GHz, with a 65 W TDP. The CPU supports DDR5 memory on a dual-channel interface with 102.4 GB/s of bandwidth.

Cache configuration includes 192 KB of L1 cache per core, 3 MB of L2 cache per core, and 20 MB of shared L3 cache. The processor's 17,800 million transistors on a 243 mm² die represent a dense, power-efficient design. It uses the Intel Socket 1851 and integrates Arc Xe-LPG Graphics with 16 execution units, though the discrete RTX 4070 handles all rendering duties in this configuration.

The CPU's benchmark results show strong multi-threaded and single-threaded performance. It scores 25,891 in Cinebench R23 multi-core and 3,655 in single-core. Passmark tests show 30,459 in multi-thread and 4,412 in single-thread. The processor ranks at the 85th percentile among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 36,938.

In Barony, the CPU's role is less critical than the GPU at higher resolutions, but it becomes more significant at 1080p. The 469 FPS result at 1080p Low demonstrates that the CPU can feed frames at an extremely high rate without becoming a bottleneck. The 10-core configuration with 10 threads provides adequate parallelism for game logic and physics, though Barony is unlikely to utilize all cores heavily given its roguelike nature.

The CPU's nearest rivals include the AMD Ryzen 5 5600F with a 0% deltaPct difference, the Ryzen 5 5500X3D at -0.2%, and the Ryzen AI 7 PRO 450 at -0.4%. The Intel Core i9-12900T sits at -0.5% deltaPct. These close margins indicate that the Core Ultra 5 225 performs essentially identically to its direct competitors in general benchmarks, though its architectural efficiency and power characteristics may differ.

The 3 nm process node and 65 W TDP suggest this CPU is designed for efficiency rather than raw power. The 4.90 GHz boost clock provides snappy single-threaded performance, which is beneficial for games that rely on a primary simulation thread. The combination of high single-thread performance and adequate multi-thread capabilities makes this CPU well-suited for Barony's workload, though the data indicates the GPU becomes the limiting factor at 4K resolution.