Will the 4 TBL evolve items age out in next expansion?

I 100% expect them to age out. Unless they introduce some type 18/19 augs that are in the 100-200 ac range with 1500-2500 ish hp range..

Back in TBL expansion threads I believe the devs openly stated they were intended to have a life of a couple expansions (which TBL) was a part of. And they also iirc.. openly stated that they were unsure at the time they posted if they would be doing any more of those none raid bis items after the next expansion (which was ToV at the time)

So those of us who paid attention to the devs posts in the TBL thread days.. pretty much believe they will age out next expansion and that there is no guarantee of any new type 18/19 augs nor new bis none raid items for next expansion.

Remember that on expacs with no level increase we normally get a huge bump in gear strength.

There is no Luck stat on visibles.

Defender augs are already questionable. The focus will increase in value, but the value is just a touch higher AC. They're not special in that way; they're just AC/HP augs, which can be beaten (kinda easily) by higher AC/HP on actual items. They're already "exposed" to juxtaposition with the more plain Fortification/Stealth/Assault variety of 18/19. Since those others have so much higher base stats, Defender types have to climb out of a bit of a hole to even start talking about the tradeoff between AC & HP.

Napkin math: currently, the 4 defender focuses (just the focus, not the augs) are 25 27 32 35 AC respectively. This is tested empirically, simply swap one of your Defenders with a junk Protecting Magic or whatever you have handy. As the player's skill in Defense increases, the focus can reasonably be expected to go (all the way!) up to ... 26 28 33 36? *maybe* 27 29 34 37? Those focuses are pinned to low-stat focus augs, though, 20/21ac 180/205hp. The base AC is subject to softcaps, which vary, but the best case is warriors with half return: Defender augs total out to 36-46ac. That's more than half of a Fort/Stealth/Assault aug's 78/57/53ac, but only by a little bit and at a substantial cost to HP and to Heroics. Someone going hardcore on AC is certainly going to use them, there's a cadre of tanks that Do Not Care about any other stat, but they're not some special use of 18/19 slots. They're not doing anything like some other examples.

Defenders can be statsed into obsolescence. Ditto Enhancements, Fortifications, Assaults, Stealths, and Strategies.

The issue, the ones hard to upgrade, are those that Do Things. Attacker augs for melee accuracy, Casting Proc augs, Ventral Defense, Soothing, and to much less extent the melee procs (pretty sure everyone can walk away from the melee proc augs).

Do attacker augs help you land melee procs?

melee procs are independent of hits & misses, afaik

Casters, and casting DPS classes such as rangers, are able to use melee and casting DD procs. I believe you can have 8 of them as of now- four from each expansion.

As long as I can use all 8 procs and replace the TBL evolve items, then I will do so. But as of now, for sure casters have to keep at least one of them along with the earring to maximize DPS. Furthermore depending on the enhancement augs, we may choose to keep two of the four.

Again, not knowing how many evolve items (if any) are offered next expansion.

So I disagree with Whulfgar with the respect that all four will be replaced. That may not be true for your casters and DPS casting melee classes.

or DPS meleeing melee classes. Leaving -- some tanks may ditch the 4, holding on to just Ventral, Soothing, and a ham sandwich in their ToV ear. I won't. Unless the stats difference is enormous, I'll be retaining the four Attacker augs as well as equipping any new ones.

I *suspect* I'll be retaining more than that for stats. Boots are 992ac with Forts/Dires in, current raid boot is 742+type8(67ac is the highest I'm not already equipping)=810ac. A 150+ac jump on an armor piece is unlikely. That hp difference is less outlandish, it would only need to go up about 600, that part's believable - but that would only put it in the realm of discussing a HP vs. AC trade off. ... and the 90hDex, 20hSta, et al, difference.

Empirically, I did choose eventually (last upgrade out of 22 slots) to take a Velium ear for 1200hp and some other stuff including 5 luck, over Fleet TBL ear that had 48 higher AC. No evolvers there, just using as a stats comparison. With that choice as a guide, boots would need to jump by (over?) 2k hp instead of 600 for me to start thinking about them. I presume monks still wouldn't at that point since boot AC effects Kick damage for both our classes only they care more.