Originally Posted by
Takiwaki
Just to clear up the misconception of gear stats not mattering, it does and it does alot, the difference is that max stats are easily attainable by anyone, and you will not have that grind to find an extra +1 or +2 stat rare armor piece, it does not exist in gw2. So at level 80 if I have a piece that gives +50% crit, every one can get that also, but someone can have a rare skin with the exact same stats I have which just looks way cooler.
There are videos out of some pvp matches where people have shown how much runes and gear affects dmg, hp, defense, timers on skills etc.