Quote (DeadlySanity @ Dec 17 2010 07:27pm)
Well, if you're focused on skills as I said in the previous post, you'll be using a Lv*** LR armor that's fully upgraded (30-32 def per item) since you have easy access to reg/+/adv Spheres, during the Lv**** quests you do have access to some HR armors, but since you can't yet get hvy or hrd spheres the defense difference will NOT be worth the loss of skills. Once you reach Lv***** quests and DO have access to these spheres, you should be switching to the + form of your armor anyways because of the better skills, OR, if the skills on the LR version are better, you can simply use the special LR upgrade to get it to have HR equivalent def.
Therefore, theres never really a point in which you need to worry about def, if you just focus on skills that are decent you shouldn't ever have much more than 5~15 def difference the armor with skills that help your weapon and ones with skills that don't help but have a high def. With the occasional exception of course.
Although, for players who use items such as the Long Sword which doesn't really have any attribute that is greatly enhanced by skills, and who do get hit fairly often, the fairly small def upgrade might make a bigger difference to them. But if I'm at Lv**** quests and using a Great Sword, I'd MUCH rather have Crit Draw and Evasion +1 then a 5~15 more def, or if I was a counter Lancer (which I am :p) I'd definitely rather have Guard +2 from a LR armor all through the Lv**** quests and get the armor+ with even better skills when I reach Lv***** quests.
tl;dr: Although skills and defense might have difference values to different weapons and play styles, generally you don't need to worry about def since the skills will be available by the time the gap gets too large.
Edit: I do apologize if I'm somewhat biased due to the face that I main Lance and Bowgun, and with Guard +2 on Lance and Evasion +1 on Bowgun, getting hit twice in one match is a bad run for me. 
But I still feel there's hardly a point where you'd have to choose between weapon enhancing skills and defense the way the game and upgrades are set up.
Again, I slightly disagree, but then again, lance is the ONLY weapon I don't use
And, even without an upgrade, the worst HR armor set has about a 50 defense gap over a fully upgraded LR set. Thats the biggest upgrade you can ever expect in this game.
Also, the underlined portion is not true of most weapons sadly. Lance is one of the only 2 weapons that does not rely heavily on defense to survive (the other being bowgun).
By the time you get to the sets with better skills (lagi, rathalos, etc.), you will be dying in 1 hit from just about any attack against a HR monster. Other weapons don't block full damage like the lance, and weapons like hammer, LS, and switch axe are just plain too risky to go up against any tough monster without a good defense. If you are playing one of those weapons, you go into a hunt expecting to get knocked down a few dozen times. For GS and SnS, you CAN block the damage you take, but SnS lacks the ability to block heavier attacks (which will lead to an instant death without high defense), and GS is ineffective at blocking successive attacks, also relying on defense.
Furthermore, even as a bowgunner, I wouldn't risk the LR to HR gap just for evasion. Sure, with evasion, you are much less likely to be hit, but instead of requiring good reflexes to survive, you are now requiring perfection, for without that defense boost, you are looking at an instant death, even against the weaker monsters.
All in all, its just a giant balancing act, but the LR to HR gap is the only point I believe that trashes the whole balance altogether, and the only point I believe that skills should be utterly forsaken for defense.
This post was edited by gateguy on Dec 17 2010 08:59pm