I never understood what so big deal about the armor sets...
well i'm a warrior and i tried to use the viper set and its relly bad compared to using individual unique items, like dragon curiass, helm of arben, rhode's legging, and lord lavos gloves (well the gloves i agree that not that good but all the others much better than the viper set together)...
about the other sets i dont know - never tried archer and mage...