It may not have the large number of abilities or high damage output that fort has. But there is absolutely nothing bad about it.
The only thing that you do not use in it is the +2 assassin skills.
The only other merc armor I ever use is duress. COH is ok but yeah.

Nice...except why don't you use a faith mat bow...? Wouldn't that be a very powerful weapon to use.

I have a couple comments -

1.) Why not max block? Especially if you are telestomping monster packs I feel like maxblock/86fhr BP is of vital importance?
2.) Why max CE? If you are planning on using Iron Golem, it makes sense to max Golem Mastery instead for greater survivability

Everything else - solid.

1, Why bother? when you have a merc, golem, 17 skeletons, 17 mages, and xx revives, you're almost never going to have problems. you can't keep fcr 75 with that set up and get max block without using spirit to do it. and that takes about 2.5k life away. I would rather have 4.x life for elemental attacks that will hit me, rather than melee attacks that might. There's no reason to. You get so much from the set up like lvl 20 bo, +11 skills, +a lot to res, +a lot to mana, etc. so switching it takes away. If i was going to play on ahrdcore I might consider switching the set up for homunculus + max block, but you're so slow at the 40 fcr break point.

2, again, why not. I've never had a problem with the golem dying for any reason. i've done countless baal/chaos runs and never had any problems with it. yes - it will take damage. but at skill point 1 you only get a 17 skill level for corpse explosion. which is like 1/3 of a screen. You can easily run ubers and chaos without worries when it's maxed.

You can still hit 75 FCR and get max block:

Helm: 2/20 or 3/20
Armor: Enigma
Weapon#1: Beast
Shield#1: Homu
Belt: Arachnids
Gloves: Magefists (+1 fire helps CE also)
Boots: Eth SSTreks
Ammy: Maras
Rings: 2x 10FCR/mods

80FCR easy. Vita for necs only 2 pts of life and it takes about ~215 dex at lvl 90 to get max block and leaves you with still over 200+ vit.

The only thing you're losing is MF on the Shako (life/mana but this can be made up depending on how good the rares are) and two +1s on the BK. This being a cheaper build, if you can get your hands on a 2/20 ammy then you can get your BKs back then you gotta worry about using charms / that sock on the Homu to max resists

This post was edited by creature_ss on Apr 18 2010 03:27am

Still no reason.
You loose skill levels. That takes away from your damage out put.
It's as simple as that.

Well it's two +1 skills you lose on the BKs.

But if you get a 2/20 you actually end up having the exact same + skills with less FHR (the 55 missing fhr from spirit has to be made up on your skillers)

It's not possible to replace the skills. You have the absolute max in skill levels with that set up without going to class specific. Like +3 summon or +2 Necro.
And using those takes away from CE and curse potency and from battle orders

^^

Great guide. I am following it on my first summoning necro. the summoner was my first d2 character way back when, but I was on 56k and it was too laggy for me.

I have one question though.. would it be good to put one point into bone shield? I know you don't take any damage, but it would be worth investing one point, (~17ish with all gear) to have a high lvl shield...

anyway thanks again.