Hot off Caydiem's desk!

Now, Dodge, Parry, and all that are tied to the Defense skill -- if the Defense of your opponent is high, you will see these more. These messages are being seen more often for two reasons:

1) There was a change made that makes ranged attacks subject to Defense (which you know), and

2) There was a change made in the reporting, just as there was for melee attacks a few patches ago. What used to be reported as a "miss" or "deflect" that was in fact a dodge or parry is now being properly reported.

Defense ratings are still being looked into, but the feeling is that they're too strong on the Test Realm last I heard. They're still investigating it.

and

1) The miss rate on the test realms for ranged attacks was too high. It's being brought down somewhat. That change is not yet on the test realm yet, but it should be in the patch when it reaches live realms. To cut through all the wording: you're not hitting often enough on Test and that will be fixed. What you're seeing on Test now is too much. It will be better. There's no stealth DPS nerf involved here.

2) There was a messaging change on ranged attacks -- some misses or deflects were in fact supposed to be dodges, parries, etc. and were not reporting as such on live realms. This was changed, thus compounding the belief that the Defense change was more significant than it is.

3) Even with that, the developers are investigating Defense items to see if the relationship change between Defense and Ranged Attacks made those too powerful.