Defense vs VIT

So I'm messing around with a tank (Marauder) in the beta and I just hit level 15. Now I have some armor from dungeon runs I did as a lancer that's i17 and some lv 15 bronze armor from a quest. The bronze armor is a huge boost in DEF (+13) over the i17 but is +2 VIT vs the +3 VIT of the i17 armor. Now obviously I can see VITs effect in my HP easily enough by switching armor and doing the math. What I can't seem to find is exactly what DEF does anywhere, including the wikis. Is it just a straight 1:1 damage mitigator?

There's formulae for how much damage you take and Defense just factors into that.

You should wear the Bronze armor though. The tank armor offers significant and noticeable damage reduction. The only reason the i17 armor has more VIT is simply because it's a higher item level. It is serviceable but you will likely get better performance in parties by gearing for your class.

Tank gear will typically be GLA, PLD, MRD, and WAR only and will have a lot better defense than other armor with the same item level. Also, you will usually find Parry on them but not always.

There isn't going to be any situation where you will have to choose between Defense and Vit if the items in question are the same item level.

Good to know, thanks. As a follow up, I noticed most high DEF gear has low magic defense. Does that not become problematic when tanking magic using enemies or does later gear make that disadvantage not so bad?

Tank gear has equally high amounts p.def and m.def. Pseudo-heavy armor, such as scalemail for lancer, have medium amounts of p.def and low m.def. Caster gear has low p.def and medium m.def. It can be very confusing early on, but if you are tanking, only look for armor wearable by marauder or gladiator only. Any armor usable by lancer will be more skewed towards p.def.

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Originally Posted by Anova

Tank gear has equally high amounts p.def and m.def. Pseudo-heavy armor, such as scalemail for lancer, have medium amounts of p.def and low m.def. Caster gear has low p.def and medium m.def. It can be very confusing early on, but if you are tanking, only look for armor wearable by marauder or gladiator only. Any armor usable by lancer will be more skewed towards p.def.

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Yep, my mistake. I must have been confusing it with lancer armor. Just noticed my bronze armor equally boosted both. That makes a lot more sense.