First of all, thanks for taking the time to reply with all this information. I really appreciate it.
I've definitely noticed the endurance issues, apparantly dark armor is notorious for this, and one of the first things I did was slot performance shifter in stamina and numina's, panacea and miracle in health, my character is also addicted to recovery serums at this point. I noticed my end tanking hard after using the heal, I guess now I fully understand why, heh. Definitely going physical perfection aswell.
Cloak of fear essentially adding more defense also sounds like a good pick, but this is the part where things get murky for me, when it comes down to building defences. You've definitely given me a lot to go on in that regard though.