Alternate Everquest

This is only really an issue because applying a Recommended Level 55 Augment to an item without Recommended Level will apply the Recommended Level tag to the item and thus reduce the stats we receive as level 51 characters.

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I would prefer not to make underwater areas attractive as exp or farm zones. Once in a while it's cool to swim around and do something but for routine Everquest stuff I prefer to stick to land.

Is AC meant to increase damage avoidance (miss/dodge/parry/riposte rate)? If not I don't see how the avoided swings factors into a discussion about the value of AC.

Mask of Superiority is far inferior to the standard mask for all characters, Guise of the Forest Elf, and not much better than the other popular option, Aviakian Mask.

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Tier X armor that doesn’t feel unique anymore, just fills in your gear “requirement” for that stage of the game.

When item quality is uneven then certain items become the "required" item. Think about how many casters are wearing Aviakian Helmet and Belt, or how many characters use IGS or any other item on my list.

those same stats feel weak on my sk.. it is all about class roles. The gear in Delvea is not specialized to roles, sadly.

Yes this is certainly part of the problem. The delvea gear is mostly all/all and at least somewhat useful on most classes (tank classes seem to be the exception here). This means that many items are the best or close to the best items available for their respective slots for at least one class, which is inappropriate for items so easy to obtain in my opinion. Making better options available in more difficult content is possible but might not be the best approach for reasons I have suggested above.

All we can do is the best we can with the best possible information available.

I agree with this and I think you brought up a good reason why we should not use the same formula for items regardless of class restrictions on the item. I also think that we can improve results by being systematic about how powerful to make items. I that sense I think that developing some quantitative guidelines can be part of a strategy for "doing our best". If you are at all open to the idea I could work on this and show at least an example of what I am talking about. If you don't like the idea whatsoever I'll just drop it and give feedback on items individually. In the absence of rules or guideline for items in general I don't see a way to approach item balance more efficiently than that.

Reducing availability of tank stats to non-tank classes is another aspect of item design that I think is important to address and is pretty closely related to the issue of balancing items relative to one another with factors like class role held constant. Having gear for distinct purposes available to distinct classes naturally requires that more gear overall must be added to the game. I think this makes it even more important to develop tools that help item designers create items within acceptable stat ranges: if more gear is created by feel rather than by formula there are more opportunities to mistakenly create something unacceptably over- or under-powered.

Since the original post, the recast time of Blood Pact has been increased from 10 minutes to 15 minutes.

Now it does something but the wrong thing. Instead of dealing damage it buffs the "victim" with an effect that adds a 100 damage proc. I can easily reproduce this in a duel.