Does the difficulty matter for gear drops?

The drop rates for items and gold increase with difficulty, along with the experience you gain from monsters, bounties, rifts and quests.

But, so long as you're playing on a difficulty below Torment, you can expect the same types of loot from the monsters you hunt, when you switch to Torment, you can find new Legenderies and Set Items that aren't available on non-Torment difficulties.

So essentialy, if you're comfortable getting gear quickly on normal, you should keep doing that, until you gain more gear that allows you to feel more comfortable on higher difficulties. When you start playing on Torment, that is when you have a chance at really good loot.

BTW, I myself prefer to play at a more difficulty that is a bit harder and more challenging for my character, because it allows me to level up faster and improve the stats of my character, but in the end it's up to you.

Happy hunting!

The loot tables are the same for all non-Torment difficulties. What difficulty you should grind on at this time is an opinionated answer that can't be factually proven in any one way though. Most people seem to choose speed over drop rate, to an extent, but honestly you're either playing Torment or you're not so it shouldn't matter too much one way or the other.

The drop rates are greatly increased with the difficulty, here are the applied mmodifiers : (note that each mob has a n base % to drop a legendary, if the proc is for example 10%, playing T6 will raise the probability to 23% instead, it's not guaranteed drop in any way, just better probability to have one. )

Torment I: 819% Health, 396% Damage, 300% extra gold bonus, 300% extra XP bonus,[1] 15% increased legendary drop rate

Torment II: 1311% Health, 575% Damage, 400% extra gold bonus, 400% extra XP bonus, 32% increased legendary drop rate

Torment III: 2097% Health, 833% Damage, 550% extra gold bonus, 550% extra XP bonus, 52% increased legendary drop rate

Torment IV: 3355% Health, 1208% Damage, 800% extra gold bonus, 800% extra XP bonus, 74% increased legendary drop rate

Torment V: 5369% Health, 1752% Damage, 1150% extra gold bonus, 1150% extra XP bonus, 101% increased legendary drop rate

Torment VI: 8590% Health, 2540% Damage, 1600% extra gold bonus, 1600% extra XP bonus, 131% increased legendary drop rate

You will get better chances at legendaries the higher the difficulty you play. That said... you can still get drops at Master or lower. Do what you are comfortable with. If you have friends.. join them. I'd be happy to help you gear up if we could find each other in game :)