Hey y'all, long time player here with over 4k hours in the game. Coming back to this season to give it another try, I gotta say I am still just disappointed with how casters feel. Let's talk some numbers on why PDR W key melee is broken in this game, and how it can be fixed.
For this example I will be looking at the PDR fighter, level 1, in squire gear, with a regular skeleton race for the added MDR.
Completely naked our resistance stats look like this -35.8% PDR, 11.1% MDR.
We put on ONE "Fine Cuirass" and one of those numbers changes DRASTICALLY. We are now at 22.1% PDR and 9.6% MDR. That's a positive change of 57.9% towards PDR while only incurring a 1.5% reduction in MDR.
Wearing a full set of plate (with rugged boots) you get 45.7% PDR and 5.8% MDR. An original change of 81.5% positive to PDR and an overall drop of 5.3% for MDR. (looking at move speed we go from 300 to 288 which is also only a 4% drop)
In it's current state, casters have no chance to compete. The armor being so light is also a huge problem, Fighters in full plate have a move speed (with swift) of 288 in full plate, fully plate (again minus boots) Clerics have 282 move speed. On most casters you c an not achieve 300 move speed while maintaining all your spells in squire kit, (10 spell wizard is at 299 [while still not having last spell], sorcerer is at 297 [while still missing 2 spells], and caster Warlock is at 299 [mostly being able to use 5 spells, but can be difficult with higher tier spells]).
Most melee weapons have a -60% move speed on attack nowadays while casting still has a -65% during channel.
We need to add a MUCH higher penalty to MDR when using anything other than cloth, and we need to lower the penalty for casting as well if we ever want to be able to have casters actually be playable again. As it stands, melee (which is most of the player base) have a much easier and less thoughtful play style. I am sure I will get hate for this, but the numbers don't lie. Tanky melee classes have been, and continue to be over-tuned.