Does a high Def Enigma matter?

So I've been grinding and saving in my spare time from the beginning of D2R to build enough Wealth to make an Enigma for my Pally. I was 3/4 there yesterday, but got both a

Ber and

Jah in my last 4 cow runs! Weird luck. If I was a Youtuber, everyone would be crying foul!

Anyway, is it worth it to buy a high def (close to 600)

Archon Plate to pop it into, or would something 500 or less do? I have a 3os 465

Dusk Shroud ready. Since Enigma isn't +% Def, I'm not sure spending for an extra 100ish Def is worth it, when I could start buying some good Combat Skillers instead.

Defence is actually worthless in practice - mainly bc you're runnin, not walkin durin your gameplay. My advice for Enigma is: choose the type of armor that suits your personal tastes the best. You'll be wearin this armor - and seein your char all the time. I'll create mine in elite one (bc Enigma deserves elite, no less) base - it may be even

Kraken Shell in case of java. I'd personally even sacrificed some stat pts into strength for the cause - imo, when it comes to show-gear, some min-maxing can be surrendered

aquabilliam wrote: 3 years ago

So I've been grinding and saving in my spare time from the beginning of D2R to build enough Wealth to make an Enigma for my Pally. I was 3/4 there yesterday, but got both a

Ber and

Jah in my last 4 cow runs! Weird luck. If I was a Youtuber, everyone would be crying foul!

Anyway, is it worth it to buy a high def (close to 600)

Archon Plate to pop it into, or would something 500 or less do? I have a 3os 465

Dusk Shroud ready. Since Enigma isn't +% Def, I'm not sure spending for an extra 100ish Def is worth it, when I could start buying some good Combat Skillers instead.

I’m in the same boat. Found a

Jah in cows on my Hammerdin other day, got lucky and traded for a

Dusk Shroud Enigma.

I’ve been debating selling it and trading for the runes to put in an

Archon Plate. But decided it’s not a priority since I’d be looking at maybe a 100-150 def upgrade.

I’m already @ 15k defense, so it wouldn’t really be a game changer. But I am keeping an eye out for a good AP base. No rush though, as any upgrade would be purely cosmetic and not so much for the defense.

Good luck!

Every Enigma I build is on a mageplate. The defense added from Enigma is FLAT defense, meaning that in the end the difference between the 600 def achron plate and the 298 def

Mage Plate is 300 defense.

However, the amount of strength required goes up to almost 2x: 103 achron vs 55

Mage Plate.

With an Enigma mageplate, you may be fine to use it without ANY points into str (as long as you get +str from gear), letting you grow your life even more.

And with Enigma, the str boost is high enough to equip most of the rest of your gear.

Also, with the

Mage Plate, even when superior, the repair costs are still reasonable.

Thanks all. I went ahead and stuck it in the good

Dusk Shroud I had already collected. Now to relearn (since the original D2 release) incorporating

Teleport into my runs (and use the runes I had already collected into some buffs).

Enigma adds a TON of strength, so if you make it in something with highish str requirement, you're likely to overshoot on your final strength after all bonuses are applied, and effectively just waste your attribute points.

Anything with low strength requirement + "light" armor type is good. Beyond that, it's all about how the armor looks on your class. For example,

Dusk Shroud looks great on Amazon IMO, but terrible on Necromancer.

As others have mentioned, since Enigma adds flat defense, the base defense never even gets multiplied, so it becomes almost completely irrelevant except for uber-optimized PvP builds.

Personally I would never build Enigma in

Archon Plate for this reason -- if

Monarch (Spirit shield) is your target strength requirement,

Archon Plate is terrible because you will overshoot your needs once you're high level and the +str bonus gets high.

Similar story for Chains of Honor -- it has quite low +% Enhanced Defense (base defense low relevancy), and adds +20 strength, so usually

Dusk Shroud is the best base for CoH, especially if you ever decide to sell it later.

How are you guys using

Dusk Shroud? It is literally the ugliest armor in the game.

sonnytai331 wrote: 3 years ago

How are you guys using

Dusk Shroud? It is literally the ugliest armor in the game.

I think it looks great on Amazon personally. I don't like a bunch of heavy-looking intense armor on her with massive shoulder plates etc...she's supposed to look fast and light, and even her unarmored character model looks good with the quite normal-looking brown leather outfit she comes with.

sonnytai331 wrote: 3 years ago

How are you guys using

Dusk Shroud? It is literally the ugliest armor in the game.

Heh, I'm function over form. Plus the green legs on a Pally goes with the

Shako.

Dusk Shroud is definitely more functional than

Archon Plate for Enigma and for CoH.

Mage Plate is aight tho for function (not for Zon style).

Here's

Dusk Shroud vs

Archon Plate on zon for reference! Found on this site actually.

moonlit wrote: 3 years ago

Dusk Shroud is definitely more functional than

Archon Plate for Enigma and for CoH.

Mage Plate is aight tho for function (not for Zon style).

Here's

Dusk Shroud vs

Archon Plate on zon for reference! Found on this site actually.

Haha fair!

People will argue for days over what base to put your Engima in. I say just put it in whatever base you think is best. Whether that is a

Breast Plate or

Sacred Armor.

Just don't build it on a superior base because the cost of repairs isn't worth the extra durability and enhanced defense.

Haro wrote: 3 years ago

Just don't build it on a superior base because the cost of repairs isn't worth the extra durability and enhanced defense.

I totally forgot about repair costs. Very relevant for hammerdins and melee chars, but not so much for casters and ranged attackers. Getting hit with misc elemental damage does not impact durability IIRC.

Haro wrote: 3 years ago

Just don't build it on a superior base because the cost of repairs isn't worth the extra durability and enhanced defense.

If gold is an issue, Rals are easy to find to cube repairs.

Wouldn’t the 100-150 extra defense from an AP vs. DS be relevant to a Hammerdin, since

Holy Shield will multiply it?

Lvl. 25

Holy Shield (easily obtainable with gear) is almost +400% defense.

moonlit wrote: 3 years ago

Haro wrote: 3 years ago

Just don't build it on a superior base because the cost of repairs isn't worth the extra durability and enhanced defense.

I totally forgot about repair costs. Very relevant for hammerdins and melee chars, but not so much for casters and ranged attackers. Getting hit with misc elemental damage does not impact durability IIRC.

As a Hammerdin with an Enigma in sup

Mage Plate, I can honestly say I've never had a problem with repairing. By the time enemies get to you to swing at you they're already dead. A single point of durability costs around 7k and I've never had to repair more than 5 durability at once. If you don't repair your armor on the verge of breaking down completely, you won't even feel the gold leaving your pocket.

RevBadger wrote: 3 years ago

If gold is an issue, Rals are easy to find to cube repairs.

Wouldn’t the 100-150 extra defense from an AP vs. DS be relevant to a Hammerdin, since

Holy Shield will multiply it?

Lvl. 25

Holy Shield (easily obtainable with gear) is almost +400% defense.

The defense would give you a couple extra %, yes. In my case I prefer

Mage Plate because with base 25 STR you can get the extra 30 needed to equip it with (non-perfect)

Annihilus +

Hellfire Torch. Didn't need to spend a single point in strength this way.

Just don't be this guy

forums/i-farmed-2-fucking-week-for-this ... 20154.html

aquabilliam wrote: 3 years ago

So I've been grinding and saving in my spare time from the beginning of D2R to build enough Wealth to make an Enigma for my Pally. I was 3/4 there yesterday, but got both a

Ber and

Jah in my last 4 cow runs! Weird luck. If I was a Youtuber, everyone would be crying foul!

Anyway, is it worth it to buy a high def (close to 600)

Archon Plate to pop it into, or would something 500 or less do? I have a 3os 465

Dusk Shroud ready. Since Enigma isn't +% Def, I'm not sure spending for an extra 100ish Def is worth it, when I could start buying some good Combat Skillers instead.

What type of pally? if you are melee din then it might make a difference. If you are a hammerdin I would go with what you can get/ afford to buy or have on hand as long as you don't plan on reselling it. I personally wouldnt use a

Dusk Shroud due to the way it looks. I would use

Mage Plate for the lower str requirement.

On my melee paladin I purposely looked for a 3s

Boneweave because I like the look of it. resale value is low due to str requirement but I dont plan on getting rid of it.

Just remember your total defense drops to 0 any time you move while running. Hope you're walking instead of running if you care that much about your defense.

Imo since most Enigma users won't be standing still tankig hits plus it adding flat def and not % doesn't make it that important, the extra life you can get is more worth.

Mage Plate allows for it to be used with 0 or almost 0 points in str in endgame plus and this is a big plus for me allows any alt char to equip it really soon and it makes leveling them a breeze.

The low str requeriments are more important than the extra def in this case i think.