Diablo III- Skills Article IX: The Barbarian, Defensive Skill- Ground Stomp

Ground Stomp (Cooldown 12 Seconds): Stun all enemies within 12 yards for 4 seconds.  Generates 15 Fury.

Ground Stomp is an amazingly useful skill for a melee artist like the Barbarian.  Not only does it hold things still so you can beat on them more, it also serves two other major purposes- stopping things from hitting you back, and pinning things in place for any allies you have to smash them.  The stun on it is deliciously long, and it even generates fury!  This makes it immensely useful- sadly, it has a cooldown, restricting how often you can actually use the thing.  Despite that, it’s hard not to love this skill.

Deafening Crash (Cooldown 12 Seconds): Stun all enemies within 12 yards for 4 seconds.  For 3 seconds after they recover, they are slowed by 60%.  Generates 15 Fury.

Deafening Crash is a very strong crowd-control version of Ground Stomp, and is most useful for those who have allies that want things to stay put- whether because those allies are fragile, or because the enermies in question can escape the attacks of said allies.  Perhaps the only character classes that aren’t going to care as much about the slow effect are Monks and Barbarians (and whirlwinding Barbarians are still going to care a lot).  This can also be very useful against enemies with attacks they use while moving.

Wrenching Smash (Cooldown 12 Seconds): Pull to you all enemies withing 24 yards and then stun all enemies within 24 yards for 4 seconds.  Generates 15 Fury.

Wrenching Smash is a positively ludicrous twist on Ground Stomp that makes anyone with small areas of effect (like yourself, for instance) positively gleeful.  For you, it pulls everything into range of your Whirlwind and Rend ranges, not to mention Cleave and Earthquake.  For other classes, it makes Arcane Orb, Disintegrate, Crashing Wave- anything that hits a small area, around the user or otherwise- hugely more effective.  On top of that, the stun effect remains, keeping them there to receive even more punishment.  As though that were not enough, it also pulls in things from almost the entire reach of the screen, making it very easy to overcrowd the area around you in a lot of situations and make things even more ridiculous.  Just don’t try to use this against bosses and other very large enemies.  While it will still stun them, they cannot be pulled by it- or any other pulling attack- which can leave you with a long way to run.

Trembling Stomp (Cooldown 12 Seconds): Stun all enemies within 12 yards for 4 seconds and deal 76% weapon damage to them.  Generates 15 Fury.

Trembling Stomp is an odd permutation of Ground Stomp.  Mostly useful when you just really need to clear out the weakest minions, this skill’s damage is passable, but with the cooldown on it the damage is nothing to scream about.  When you have options like Deafening Crash or Wrenching Smash that open enemies up to much more damage than this, a rune like this is pretty blah.

Foot of the Mountain (Cooldown 12 Seconds): Stun all enemies within 12 yards for 4 seconds.  Generates 30 Fury.

The rune for those who blow through Fury like they’re afraid someone’s going to come take it away, Foot of the Mountain is likely to see some use in builds that abuse Whirlwind.  However, given the cooldown on Ground Stomp, it’s just not as useful as it could be.  The added Fury is nice, don’t get me wrong, but 15 Fury every 12 seconds is a pretty small increase- barely larger than the Fury degeneration that happens out of combat.  Might be useful for maintaining Fury when you’re not mid-fight, if you can’t afford the space for the Passive skill.

Avalanche (Cooldown 12 Seconds): Stun all enemies within 12 yards for 4 seconds and knock them back 9 yards.  When they land, they deal 55% weapon damage to enemies in a small area around them.  Generates 15 Fury.

If, for whatever reason, you regularly find yourself in the middle of huge, spread-out crowds of enemies with still more enemies out near the edges of the screen launching ranged attacks and spells at you, Avalanche is a passable go-to.  Really, though, you’re going to want Weapon Throw, Seismic Slam, Ancient Spear, or best of all, Wrenching Smash for these sorts of situations.  While conceptually it’s cool, there aren’t going to be many situations in which you want Avalanche- so you probably shouldn’t worry about it either way.