Defense vs Fortitude

I'm not sure if this belongs in Q&A or General Discussion, but I guess it's sort of related to dbulger's earlier question about the warrior insignia.

I read somewhere (I think it was on a PvX build talk page) a comment stating that defensive (+5 AL) weapon upgrades have more of a positive effect than +30 Fortitude ones. There weren't any statistics provided or anything - iirc, the poster said he had "run the numbers" or somesuch.

So here's what I'm wondering: has anyone actually "run the numbers" and verified this, or was this dude just blowing smoke? According to the GW Damage Calc posted in dbulger's thread, the difference in damage (Axe 6-28, 12 Str/Axe mastery, 20% sundering mod) averages 2.4 points per hit when comparing 60AL to 65AL. Since axes attack every 1.33 seconds, the actual DPS difference would be 1.8. Obviously, that's just one example, and there's no doubt a larger difference when you're dealing with Ele spikes, etc.

So, my original question - possible, likely, or complete bs?

There was a thread addressing this recently. It might not have been hosted on these forums. Let me look for it and get back to you.

Rebel Rising forum thread.

I believe there, they were talking about Survivor Insignias vs. Disciples, but the same argument sorta applies here. I personally see more gain in taking 30 health than 5 AL. If there's a difference in those, it seems like it would be pretty slight. The difference between 15 AL and ~40 health might be more noticeable.

weaponsets, i take both (though i'm on my defense set more often)
armoursets, depends on the profession, or more specifically the insignia available

+5 is 8% damage reduction. So ~400 armor-respecting damage on a spike would become 370ish. A little worse than fortitude on spikes, but pretty close, and it negates pressure in a way that survivor can't. Also if you are going to run armor insignias, you have to worry about crack armor spikes on some builds - this can mean the difference between 60 and 63 armor.

The thing is you can carry both weapons in inventory. If your morale is good and facing a pressure team or on split, go +5 def. Versus a spike team or after building some DP, switch to +30 HP.

Mathematically speaking, as FoxBat said, +5 will do more for you in the long run.
However, a lot of builds run with armor ignoring damage (such as ranger/warriors +x damage attack skills) or use degen. So +30 is often better in a lot of PvP situations where people are running spikes.

Ok, that's sensible.

Now what about HM PvE? I do a lot of solo vanquishing with heroes and hench, and I'm sure there are times when proper equipment can make a huge difference. For the most part, I usually just mindlessly set up my heroes with Survivor and a +30 weapon (with some situational exceptions - Paras with Centurion and Dervs with Windwalker, maybe a few others). Now I'm thinking that my Ranger heroes (for instance) might be better off in Stalwart with a +5AL weapon. 105 AL vs Elemental and 85 AL vs Physical is nothing to sneeze at for a midliner, and it may make more of a difference than the extra health from Survivor/Fortitude.

I'm not sure what to do with casters (I mostly use Necro, Ele, and occasionally Mes heroes if I'm not running a physical/orders setup). Leave em with Survivor/Fortitude, or switch to whatever/+5AL?

Thoughts?

It also depends on the AI targeting mechanism.

AI targets based on: Health, Armor, Regeneration, Range, and Enchants/Stances/Blocks. A boost to defense may be better on a squishy to lower the chance they will be targeted, whereas you may want to let a tank, who already has high armor, have high health instead, in order to have a better chance of drawing aggro.