Diablo – Slain enemies rest in pieces in Diablo III

There are no real "tiers" of equipment. Instead there are rough groups of armor that match visually.

If all of your items are from that given group, they will match. However, this does not determine their stats.

From Blizzard Community Manager Bashiok:

We separate out 'item tiers' for their visual appearance first and foremost. We have a number of "armor sets" (18?) in the game that match visually, and so we call them 'tiers' because there's no real better way to say it. When all of your items are from that 'tier', you'll match. That doesn't directly determine their stats, though.

They're spread out in a logical progression, and items get more awesome looking as you go further in the game. Ipso facto the higher the visual tier the better chance it's a more powerful item, but it doesn't preclude the possibility of it being worse. You can absolutely find an item from a visual tier back in Hell difficulty that's better than an item using a later visual tier in Inferno.

It's best to just expunge the term 'tier' from your minds, because it really has nothing to do with any kind of stair step or item upgrade approach. It's just models and textures.

Protection is a factor of the percent damage reduction that comes from both armor and the chance to dodge in order to show you which item will actually protect you better.

It takes into account

• Armor
• Strength (since armor is based on strength)
• Dodge Chance
• Dexterity (since dodge is based on dexterity)
• Any stats that increases armor or dodge chance from passive skills, such as the Monk's Seize the Initiative passive which adds the Monk's dexterity value to their armor value.

As of patch 1.0.3:

Resist values will now be taken into effect when calculating the Protection comparison stat (the Protection value is an average protection estimate of all your resists)

However, this will not take the Monk's One With Everything Passive into account properly. I found an item that would reportedly increase my Protection due to a difference in resistances, but in reality it decreases both my resistances and armor.