I'll pull my statement from the other thread concerning Guardian nerf feedback:
Again, proportionally speaking, saying 5% is close to 12% is like saying 50 is close to 120. We're talking about 12% on a scale of values that can only go as high as 100%, so from Guardian equips alone you could be over 1/10 of the way to being completely invulnerable to physical damage. Just because the numbers are relatively small doesn't mean it can't have a big impact on gameplay.
Also, I can't speak for WP or the developers regarding why other items were not nerfed, but I can say this -- at the player-GM meeting I attended, *ALL* PDD/MDD items were discussed as potentially damaging to game balance. We mentioned everything, including Guardian sets, angel/devil sets, Heirloom Bone Dragon Invoker sets, Heirloom Priest Chaotic Hera sets, PDD/MDD on shields and accessories, the Mana Shield skill... We literally broke it down piece by piece to show the GMs (and by association, the developers) how PDD could easily become a game-breaking element by approaching values near 100% (in fact, with the Option Expansion system in place, sorcerers could obtain over 100% PDD and invokers very close to or over 100% PDD). We did this because we did not want this to be abused.
In the player-GM meeting mentioned above, there were several veteran players in attendance, and a handful of newer players who were there just to listen to the discussion. Basically, what it comes down to is this: We made it clear that PDD/MDD (but PDD, especially) needed to be nerfed at some point soon or it could break the game by allowing mages to acquire 100% (or nearly 100%) Physical Damage Drop. That would mean complete invulnerability to physical damage, which is obviously a major issue concerning game balance.
IIRC, we didn't make any specific recommendations that Guardian equips should be nerfed in this way. This wasn't our decision to make -- and, according to Warp Portal staff, it was not their decision either. It was the developers that made that call, noting that they considered it a bug. All we did was provide feedback concerning potentially game-breaking balance issues, and PDD happened to be one of the ones that was discussed in greater detail.
Furthermore, before this change came about, a Game Balances section was created on the forums to give the rest of the community (those not invited to speak at the meeting) the chance to provide feedback on issues like the Guardian sets.
Yes, there was a lot of feedback in that thread suggesting ways to enhance balance with respect to the Guardian sets, far different from the balance that was applied. But ultimately, *in this case*, it seems the developer had its own concerns and addressed the issue in its own way. Unfortunately, the method that was chosen means that many players will suffer a loss of investment -- that's a fact, most definitely. But please, try to understand that it isn't Warp Portal's fault -- all they can do is provide the developer with our feedback, and it's up to the developer to interpret that and address issues.
It is because this change will cause a loss of investment for many players that Warp Portal chose to offer compensation. And again, after players expressed concerns that they felt the original compensation wasn't enough, WP went even further and increased the compensation considerably.
Believe me, I understand completely how you feel about the suddenness with which the change was made, and the method the developers chose to address this issue. I have quite a few Guardian pieces, myself, and many of them are highly enchanted/soulcrafted. But the decision has been made, and I think that if the developers considered the issue to be caused by a bug in the game, there's probably very little we can do to change their minds about that.
I've already discussed with Aramis the need to better-inform the community when formal player-GM discussions are held, and I think there there are ways we can address that concern. In the meantime, we have a Game Balances section on the forums for a reason -- if you would like to express your opinion about future game balance issues, then I encourage you to start or reply to a thread there. We can't control what the developers do, but we can certainly provide them as much feedback as possible -- and the more feedback we provide, the better the developers will understand our concerns, which may impact the decisions they make in the future.