As a barbarian we get the highest attack speed (because we can get the highest amount of stamina) but the cap doesn't allow us to fully utilize our benefit. I went whips/flails first and recently found out whips are useless to me due to there low attack dmg. So I've been using flails for more dmg and same delay (due to atk speed cap) and still not fully utilizing my damage output. So, I tried picking up a battle axe (some day... I'll actually level up my axe skill :( ) and my attack speed was 1.97 but if I put on my legendary ring of dexterity (best jewelry item I got so far) it goes back down to 1.6 for a 15 dmg weapon (just about twice that of a flail and that's not counting the huge % reduction for whips/flails.... so now I really wished I leveled up axes lol). 

 

In short, the cap is too high for barbarians to fully utilize there class. Even the slowest axe hits the cap with the right jewelry and the +dmg jewelry pales in comparison. The jewelry I'm using is +5sta/faith necklace and -400 atk speed interval ring. Just did some more calculations, 10 axe skill and I actually do more dps with the battle axe than a flail that I have 200 skill with.

While you may have hit the attack speed cap remember that you had to spend your ring slot to do it which is a penalty in itself... Attack speed is far to broken at very low speeds as you would suggest. When Fantasy Realm Online first was being tested, one of our players had 100 stamina and wore leather swinging at about 0.9 seconds. that is 700 milliseconds faster than you are swinging now. We had a difficult time even making creatures that were anywhere near challenging enough....

So we increased armor/weapon speed penalties, after thischange he could still swing at 1.2 seconds which was still too fast. So eventually we had to increase speeds and then cap it (originally cap was 1.7) which was recently scaled back to 1.6 seconds. We our considering maybe allowing a reduction to 1.5

While the barbarian cannot wear heavy armor, swing speed does matter as you pointed out, you had to wear a ring to accomplish the max, this is what we were shooting for. Your point on comparing whips to axes is valid without also considering the fact that swing speed isnt a huge factor with whips, range however is. You must consider as a player is the range worth the damage sacrifice, and the ring slot for speed....? There are better rings than just speed such as magic/melee damage bonus's and reductions and only two bonuses can exist on a single ring. 

I don't have to use a ring, to go past max attack speed on most weapons, just the slowest weapon in the game I do. On top of that, its a ring from a lv 20 mob, just imagine what the lv 30+ mobs can drop. It makes whips/flails so under powered if you decide to level it up with no warning, I just feel like I got screwed. The +dmg ring helps out especially with a sharpen weapon you get but sharpne only lasts for 10min or so (100 hits or so) and even then it is still too little to help imo, the +dmg on the rings would have to double to be able to start to compair to the slower weapons (unless I actually haven't found a realistic damage ring yet).

 

Even with a damage ring though, 10 points into axe skill will be better damage wise than 200 in flail. It some what does sound fair considering flails have double the attack range but you rarely get to use the bonus and that doesn't count all the other supperior range skills like spells, roots, bows, throwing. If your trading half the dmg to gain double the range someone is just going to one up you and trade a bit more dmg for 6x your range. Whips/flails are still good from lv 1-25ish but they just get soo far behind after that, how about making a triple headed flail with 600ish penalty and slightly more dmg. To me whips/flails arn't far behind since there range does count for a lot it just seems bad at lv 50+. Despite getting more stats and skills at lv 55 or so blood orcs still kick my ass unless I kite them which gets nearly impossible when all the other orcs surround them. The only real bonus atm with the range are minotaurs truthfully or the lv 20ish orcs.

There are very good rings out there, that will give +4 melee damage, which is significant ontop of magic/sharpened weapons. Additionally one thing I think I need point out with damage on melee weapons is that your skill level does not increase the damage you do, only improves your accuracy. If you are looking to improve damage on most melee weapons I recommend increasing your strength.

It is also not a fair comparison between whips/flails and axes, of course whips/flails is going to do significantly less damage than some of the axes. Axes is a fairly exclusive combat skill given to barbarians because it does the most damage in comparison to other weapon skills since the barbaian is primarily intended to be the ultimate melee character. No other character class can come close to 200 skill in axes. A few of the classes can get close to or equal to 200 in whips/flails.

Its up to you to weigh the value of what the extra range of a whip or flail worth over the damage that axes give you. As you pointed out it is good as run/fight tactic against opponents, which is maybe worth its point value to you. Although I will say that it may be better in other character classes since barbarian does have the ultimate melee skill. You can always drop whips/flails for a 5 point penalty and choose a new skill for an additional 5 point penalty or move those points to an existing skill for no penalty. Its fairly nominal, no permanant loss...  

You likely will see additional whips/flail weapons in the future along with one final decrease on the attack interval to 1.5.

I hope this is fairly informative.Let me know if you have more questons.

Oh wow, did not know you could move existing points around without penalty, this is going to allow me to try sooo many new things :). *Oh you ment if you loose 5 points then you can spend the rest of those points around freely :(*

Since there are +4dmg rings maybe I'm thinking too much into axes. +2 dmg doesn't seem that great in compairson to axes but +4 may actually get them close and extended range. Only reason why I really complained because whips/flails bonus gets rarely used. Any casters you were just hurting your self due to low damage since they can hit you for 30+ dmg from 10x your range. Blood orcs and other fast creatures still hit you every now and then due to there speed. When theres multiple mobs it gets very hard to kite when the one your fighting gets stuck behind a mob and start moving random direction forcing you to take dmg to get to it, but it still saves your life every now and then since even fighting 2 strong non range/caster mobs with a melee weapon you'll still get crushed.