[Age of Conan] Guardian Gear and Stats Guide for Leveling

Age of Conan, much like any other MMO, has a complex system of character stats. I will not address them all in detail in this post but rather give an overview and point you in the right direction of what you should be looking for when choosing gear for your Guardian.

Base Stats

Your base stats are: Strength, Constitution, Dexterity, Wisdom and Intelligence. Of these five you should be interested only in Strength and Constitution with Dexterity being just a tie-breaker. Anything with Wisdom and Intelligence on it is probably something you should not be using.

Defensive Stats

Your defensive stats can be split into 3 categories: Health, Mitigation and Avoidance. Mitigation means you still get hit by your enemies but you reduce the incoming damage. Avoidance means you avoid the actual hit and thus receive no damage at all. As for Health, you might find it weird that I classify this as a defensive stat, but it actually is and it also includes health regeneration capabilities. The more health you have the longer you are alive and the harder you can get hit.

Your most important defensive stats are:

• Armor (Arm) - affected by Strength (1 STR =  2 Armor) and, depending on your level, gives you a certain percentage of mitigation.
• Evasion (Ev) - affected by Dexterity (1 DEX = 0.5 Evasion)
• Health (HP) - affected by Constitution (1 CON = 8 Health)
• Health Natural Regeneration - affected only by talents and gear.

The armor rating required to mitigate 1% varies with your level, so the higher level you are, the more armor you need. Same with evasion. So far I haven't found a decent formula for determining the mitigation with level but the best guesses at level 80 suggest something like

(Armor - X) / Y = % mitigation

There are other mitigation stats such as Critigation Chance and Amount but there are targeted at a very specific thing and in no way relevant to leveling up. Mostly for PvP and probably for Tanking end-game Bosses.
 
You also have Protection, which cancels out magic damage but I wouldn't focus on it at all. The amount of magic casters you find when leveling can be countered by having a slightly larger health pool and solid DPS to bring them down fast. Of course, if you are comparing 50 Protection against 1 Strength, then the 50 Protection are obviously superior.

One thing to take into account is not to mistake Health Regen with Health Natural Regen, same with Stamina Regen. Make sure it is Natural Regen, which actually affects you during combat. But don't overvalue this stat. It is only a tie-breaker and you should rely more on your talents for this than actual choosing gear for it.

Offensive Stats

Offensive stats are a bit more complex but can be crunched to Damage (DPS), Hit chance and Critical chance. I wouldn't worry too much with critical bonus damage, which increases the damage of your critical hits.

The most important offensive stats are:

• DPS - In turn, this stat is a combination of several other stats:
• Weapon DPS - This is the DPS value shown in the weapon you are currently equiping
• Combat Rating - Affected by Strength (1 STR = 3 CR). You will also find Combat Rating in Gear in 3 different forms: General, specific to a weapon type and in the form of elemental damage. The later is useful to bypass enemy armor and works with any weapon you have.
• Hit rating (HR) - Counters the innate chance of missing a player or monster. I wouldn't focus on this stat too much specially if you go for the Tempest talent tree (Polearm). I'd evaluate it on-par with evasion when quick-judging gear.
• Critical chance rating (CCR) - This increases your chances of scoring a critical hit. I also wouldn't focus on this stat too much.

Stat Priority

By no means is this an accurate way for min-maxing your character but rather a way to cope with constant gear choices which is what you face when leveling up.
 
Main stats to look for are Strength and Constitution independent of the talent choices you've made. Now, depending if you are more focused in DPS or Survivability go for:

• DPS: Combat Rating, Critical Hit Rating and Hit Rating. 
• Survivability: Armor, Evasion, Natural Health Regeneration and Protection as a tie-breaker when choosing gear.

 
If you are aiming at tanking some instances while leveling or just grouping up a lot then some Taunt skill might be useful.

I have chosen the Tempest (read: Polearm) talent tree which gives more DPS but as far as my gear choices, I rather go the middle ground so I can handle groups of 3-4 mobs with little problem. But this is a mater of taste and how you enjoy playing this class.