There's always the risk of a bad roll of the dice but generally Seis' pack will barely be able to hit you fast or not if you have a defiance+freeze merc and maxed HS. Even more so if you're sporting a HoZ setup.
If you don't have a Hotspur and/or a decent amulet I continue to recommend Rising Sun as amulet as you'll never need to chug a potion or wait for Redemption against Balrogs.
I have a Hoz, 75% Block, and a HF Merc. Two, maybe three, hits from an Extra Fast de Seis Knight is all it took for my life to drop from 2.8k to around 800 in the blink of an eye. I was Amp'd and on /p7, but that is the norm. No way I am taking chances with him, especially since I'm HC. Extra Fast is what makes De Seis deadly.
I do prefer the "Hook" Infector map because they have to run around a corner to get to you, giving you a bit more time to analyse the mods. With the straight line map, you never kow where thay are going to spawn and sometimes have to bait them out if they spawn at the end of the passage. Though there is not really much of a difference between the maps. Vizier's "T" map is by far superior to the "upside-down L Hook" one.
On HC I would always use Reaper's over Insight on the merc if Doom isn't available.
Agreed, as long as you do not mind chugging Pots. That is one thing I do not like at all - for a build to rely on Mana Potting to function. As soon as I get a SoJ, I will swap over to Reapers, seeing as I am using a 1.07 10FCR/25MPK ring. Mana should not be much of an issue then, hopefully.
When we did the 99 HC Paladin on Battle.net we had a dedicated support Barbarian which put the defense somewhere in the neighbourhood of 20k paired with Reaper's on the merc and a whopping 5k Life there was pretty much no Seis combination I was afraid to jump if I had one or two full rejuvs in belt. Every point of defense matters and I'd always recommend an elite Enigma for that reason.
Bnet is completely different to SP of course. If you can get a Barb to BO you before every run then things obviously change. Most SP'ers can't/wont go through the trouble of self-MP'ing to level. On Bnet, the lack of /p settings means that the closest one can get to "legit" leveling is joining public bot runs where the bot does all the work so things like De Seis and strategy in general of no concern there. Many of my chars on Bnet were naked and in High eighties before I put on any gear...
In SP we have to do all our work ourselves. :yes:
Regarding Enigma, making it in an Elite base (or anything other than Breast Plate) means that one can pretty much forget about base strength builds. On BNet we have Anni/Torch meaning that Mage Plate is the most common base there, with Dusk/Archon Plate the best options for Elite Enigma bases.
While such a base will give you more defence, is the difference really that much? I know that from Bnet trading the mentality is "defence uber alles" (non-superior bases are worthless, HoZ is rubbish unless in the high 190's, non cube-bugged ethereal armours are omglolwot, etc) I
really don't like that mentality since the difference between a few hundred points of defence is miniscule in actually affecting your chance to be hit.
Would you sacrifice the chance to build a base-strength Hammerdin for example by going with an elite base for Enigma?