WoW Upgrades - The Item Upgrader

Upgrades provide a guaranteed boost to specific stats. Each upgrade boosts the level of an item by 3. Each upgrade also boosts a random substat.

Upgraded gear is generally more useful, unless the item has low requirements by nature (like FB sorc shields) or has a high variance in stats (like Eth Titan weapons). Upgrades are not as important for those with higher variance due to the requirement to roll an exact version.

Recycle Points

The item upgrader allows players to upgrade their gear by offering the currency to an NPC. Upgrades can be applied on any kind of armor or weapons. However, the item upgrader kit that is used to upgrade will be consumed forever and will not be able to be used again. Upgrades can also be used to create enhancements.

You can upgrade your gear at any time by visiting the upgrader in any major city. To keep your gear up-to-date it is recommended you visit the upgrader each couple of weeks.

Upgrades will cost more, based on the level of the item, but they will always be cheaper than purchasing new equipment. Upgrades like upgrading a Benthic chest to ilvl385 will cost you 20 recycle points. Buying a similar item will cost you 105.

Valorstones

Upgrades are items that can be used to upgrade tools, armor, weapon and accessory upgrades. Players can purchase them through NPCs who sell upgrades to item upgrade owners in a variety of currencies. They are also available on random treasure lists. Once purchased, an upgrade can be applied to any tool, weapon, or armor. The button will display the preview of an item's next upgrade level, when there are enough materials.

Upgrade costs differ based on the slot of the item upgrader mod and the current level of the item. For instance weapons cost more than gloves, bracers or bracers. Each step costs 15 Flightstones plus a certain number of crests. Some upgrades offer discounts on Flightstones. After an item upgrader mod has been upgraded to a certain degree it can be re-downgraded and sold to the upgrader for a lower price.

Upgraders for items can be found at many locations including the main island as well as some outposts. The NPCs offer an upgrade coupon and a possibility of obtaining a new recipe. The discount on upgrades increases depending on the amount of items being upgraded, and can be increased by having players complete specific achievements or quests.

Contrary to Cromwell in Baldur's Gate II there is no item upgrader available at the start of Icewind Dale. Instead the NPCs that are available to facilitate upgrades are acquired via several methods which is both an improvement but also a drawback.

In Season 3, many new features were added to the upgrade items system. After a player has upgraded to a certain item level for an armor slot, upgrading other items to the same level, will cost less. This is true regardless of whether the items come from another set of equipment.

The discount applies to all accounts. The amount of Harbinger Crests required for upgrades is also reduced and is not available until players have reached certain achievement milestones.

Crests

When it comes to upgrading equipment in WoW players have a couple of options. They can make use of Flightstones, which are a common upgrade currency that is available to all, or crests, which are more specialized and consumed during upgrades on specific levels of items. Crests are a crucial component of the Dragonflight Gear Progression System, which was introduced in version 10.1. They are available in four ranks.

The first thing to remember is that crests are only available for gear of a certain rank. Each rank has a different upgrade path. The simplest and most straightforward upgrade process costs just 15 crests while the most complicated can require as much as 20 crests depending on the type of gear being upgraded.

Players can earn crests through completing tasks at the appropriate level. This could mean doing outdoor activities or taking on dungeons and raids of any difficulty to earn lower-level gear or Mythic+ raid bosses or dungeons that have a high difficulty for endgame gear. These crests can be exchanged with an upgrader for the item level upgrade like Cuzolth or Vaskarn in Valdrakken to upgrade the item in the proper steps and paths.

Using these new currencies isn't too complicated, but the system does introduce some modifications to the upgrade process. Once a piece of gear attains the highest level of upgrade for any rank (Explorer or Adventurer), it is no longer required to purchase Flightstones. This change lets players upgrade their gear to the highest possible level on all their characters, instead of relying on seasonal loot.

Another significant change is that crests only have one purpose, so it's important to use them properly. For instance, it's a good idea to make use of all your Whelpling-rank crests on the best equipment you have, and then save Drake and Wyrm crests for the next batch of upgrades you plan to create. This is especially true for items like trinkets and rings that occupy multiple slots on the character, that will be able to avail the account-wide discount if all of the slots are filled with high-quality gear.