balance isnt one of the game's strengths. another thing that weakens melee classes imo is that they arent particularly tougher than the ranged (including magic) classes but they have to get in the thick of things where they WILL get damaged. sure you can use points to up your life but then your damage would suffer. ranged characters by contrast dont have to have big hp pools to survive and can just put everything into damage.
that said however, the game is hardly difficult enough to required careful character planning and its very easy (maybe even inevitable if you dont purposely try to sabotage yourself) to eventually overpower enemies whichever path you take.
Well, the thing is, there's more to melee than "walk up and hit it until it dies before you." Melee requires as much planning, strategy, and maneuvering as ranger or mage characters. You need to know when to dodge, when to attack, when to jump, and most importantly, when to run. You should have a decent bow with you to draw away single enemies, or finish off weakened ones after fleeing.
1 level of Whirlwind and Rush Attack are absolutely mandatory for melee. Whirlwind, even at 1, does your normal (combined, if dual-wielding) weapon damage to all nearby enemies. Rush Attack immediately takes you to the nearest enemy, reducing the time the archers and mages have to pelt you with projectiles.
Thousand Strikes is an excellent boss-killer, but is too expensive to use otherwise. And the worst part is that Mana Leech can't restore its Mana cost during , because the Mana isn't deducated until the attack is finished. You need at least enough Mana to use it twice to "leech" off Mana Leech like that.
For melee weapons, I ended up using the full Defenders of Aleroth set, plus the Annihilator Axe and Bracers, dual-wielding the weapons, giving me a ton of damage output. At level 16, I tore through the goblins and black ring early on in the Orobas Fjords (goblins fell in about 5 seconds of attacks each).
If anything, I'd say melee is MORE complex than ranger or mage, since those classes (for what little "classes" are worth here) are pretty simple: Rangers shoot with a bow from a distance, and Mages cast spells, which they choose one or two of (usually Magic Missile and Fireball early, maybe Firewall later).
