I have ran as a Defender for long time. Like many here have said, its situational in PVP. The only time in my experience when Weapon of Light is a worthwhile buff is when you are running with a higher impact sniper rifle. The buff kicks the damage into one shot kills regardless of shot placement. The bubble is used from range, and its protective benefits are not of significant interest to the sniper. Armor of Light is the king of Control. You drop your ward on the zone you want to cap or hold and its yours. Period. No one or even two ordinary challengers can uproot a good Defender in conventional battle. The ONLY exception to this is if the people attacking the Ward are organized and capable, and equipped for close range combat. And there has to be three of them. Two is [i]possible[/i], but the odds aren't their friend. Aside from this, the only hope the attackers have of winning is to simply burn a super to destroy the Ward and rebalance the terms of the engagement. Blessing of Light is trickier to use, but when done right, the results are phenomenal. With Blessing, you don't want to be fighting in the Ward at all, not really even next to it either, but nearby. You trade bullets, score a kill and retreat to heal and reload. Then you hop back into the Ward before you run back to the front and enjoy a brief period of space magic body armor that negates the first few bullets that come your way. Its tricky because if the fighting gets to be next to or within the ward, then you would be better off with Armor. But if your team can hold the line, and keep coming back to the Ward to refresh the buff, then not only is the benefit of the Ward spread across more people, but its power footprint is felt across a larger portion of the map as well. Like I said though, its tricky. It takes a team working in the right conditions for it to be really effective. Armor of Light is the most common because its the easiest to use, it is the most versatile overall, and its usefulness in Control (where Defenders are by far at their best) is unparalleled. For Clash, Blessing of Light is the best choice, though it takes good ward placement, and an organized team to take advantage of it. If your playing solo, then run with Weapons if you have a sniper, or Armor.

Striker

I like armour for control, but weapons plus high impact snipers = 1 hit body kills

I love armor. If you can get to a point, drop it and punch everyone to death. I've punched a bladedancer to death in my bubble before too.

This is a situational and opinionated question. There are no right answers. But my preference is Weapons of Light.

Depends on what you want to do, if you're holding a point then armor, if you want to buff your friends then you go weapons or blessing, there really isn't an "in general" best option.

All are situational man