Life in 1.10f and how the bandit rewards stack up

[Chesspiece_face]

I disagree that ES is the problem.

Let me clarify: I don't think ES is the problem. Although I do think that in the present balance of the game it is vastly overpowered.

Here is the issue with Life based defenses (Armor and Evasion) when compared to ES; ES seems, at it's core, to be designed as a defense choice that can stand on it's own. The ES stats you can find on items provide you with a greater base pool of defense than you can obtain from life. This in turn is magnified by the passive tree which allocates large clusters of ES nodes all within one section of the tree which means if you go for that space in the tree you have a one stop shopping center for all your defensive needs. You don't have that option with Life based defenses. You can't just take Evasion and hope to live. You can't just take Armor and hope to live either. Whether intentional or not when you choose to build a life based character you need to invest heavily, not only, in life but also in Evasion or Armor. Add to this the fact that those nodes are often spread out haphazardly around the tree and this leads to vast opportunity costs associated with that playstyle that ES characters never have to worry about.

Pound for pound Evasion is the greatest damage mitigator in the game. The problem is to survive the possible spike damage in the game you also have to have a viable health pool to support it.

Which brings up the major issue. Specifically for rangers to go with Evasion they need to invest in Evasion, Life, Strength (For larger base pool of life even though they don't need it), Dexterity, and Intelligence and somewhere in there try to find damage nodes. Then they need to try to get gear that will in some way support the absolute cluster &*&% of needs they have just to equal the efficacy that an ES character can get just by grabbing a set of nodes that are conveniently located all around each other.