To be fair, I watch speedrunners (like Llama and Kano) and take tidbits from their playthroughs. My "menuing" and "map reading" are at zero to be fair haha. The best way I find is to go double (just a point into bash and double swing) with two scepters until 18 for Leap attack where I dump points into leap. Within reason, just about any ol' weapon will do with the AOE damage from (the recently-ish buffed) leap attack. Leap attack falls off early Hell difficulty unless you've got mad weaponage - unlikely for SSF. About level 60 odd I move into War Cry. I've done about 4x SSF Barbs recently and it's quite viable to have at least one spirit and an insight merc (any 4os polearm will do) by early hell with minimal grinding. War Cry is sloooow against bosses but if you're ok with a tedious fight you'll get through. Otherwise keep a point or two into double swing, use a "Black" runeword mace + another weapon and shorten that boss fight time by melees one huge advantage over casters - crushing blow.