In addition to thanking the original poster for starting off with a well reasoned post, I just want to address some of the responses in this thread.
First of all, if you aren't playing on the "Hard" difficulty setting, you're feedback is going to be less useful. The problem is the Hard difficulty setting decreases your vitality (and your chance of hitting), which makes Man-at-Arms talents like "Picture of Health" less effective. And, as we all know, Mages can ignore the to-hit penalty Hard difficulty brings where as Warriors can not. Thus, "Hard" mode is actually harder on Warriors than it is Mages, and the balance between the two is quite different on Hard mode versus Normal or Easy (both of which actually receive a Vitality *bonus* rather than a penalty).
Second, if your advice consists of something that can be summarized as "Execute maneuver 38!" - that is, you're advising someone to beat each encounter by approaching it with a specific assortment of skills used in a specific order with specific classes, you're not being helpful. The whole point of this game is to not have everyone forced into one mold.
Third, I see a lot of people making the mistake of trying to define what a Warrior's role is supposed to be. It shouldn't have to be only a tank, nor should it have to be only a damage dealer. Another big point of this game is to have a classes system where you can build the type of Warrior you personally prefer, and they should all be viable within reason.
That also brings us to "the proper party". There is no "proper party" make up, especially when players have the option of using anywhere from two to four characters and expecting a relatively balanced experience either way. If your response insists that every group should have a specific class of character (e.g. Warrior) filling a specific role (e.g. Tank), you're not helping.
Also, I've seen post suggesting several different abilities should be raised to "5" in order to create an effective character. A single ability at 5 is a huge investment, requiring almost one-third of the total ability points you receive on your journey to level 20 (assuming you're not using Lone Wolf). Yes, you are obviously supposed to rely on bonuses from gear to help get you there, but that depends on luck with RNG and can only help you so many ways (that is, there are only so many body parts to cover with equipment, and thus a fixed number of opportunities to modify your ability and attribute scores).
Using the effectiveness of "Legendary" equipment as part of a balance argument is just silly. Again, RNG. Congrats on your toy, not everyone has it.
Finally, one of the big problems (I believe) are the Attributes (STR, DEX, INT, etc). In my opinion none of the attributes should ever have a direct impact on anything beyond a secondary attribute that can not be directly modified by the player (which in turn directly impacts everything). In other word, Warrior gear should not be Strength dependent. Instead it should be "Might" (or whatever) dependent, with "Might" equaling some combination of Strength, Constitution, and Speed - all attributes that are vital to a Warrior, yet no single one of them should define a Warrior.
This would allow for a greater variety of builds while not leaving players feeling like they must pool most of their Attribute points into a single stat in order to keep up with gear requirements. And if something similar is applied to DEX and INT dependent characters, it can help alleviate the concern that Warriors depend on too many stats while Mages depend on too few.
