Guide To Item Upgrades: The Intermediate Guide To Item Upgrades

Path of Exile Item Upgrades

Item Upgrade upgrades are a common and essential way to boost the performance of many items in Path of Exile. They can cause additional damage, AD or even affixes.

Rare-grade equipment is usually superior to upgraded Common or Magic equipment due to their high demands.

Armor

Armor upgrades are a kind of upgrade that can be applied to armor and weapon items. They boost the performance of the item upgrader they're attached to. Upgrades to armor are available in the world of the game and can be purchased from Blacksmiths at any bonfire. They can also be salvaged by using a professional or higher salvage kits to salvage upgrade components from items.

The level of an armor's or weapon's upgrade determines the amount of damage it is able to absorb. The ability to absorb damage of a piece armor will increase when it is upgraded to the highest upgrade level. However, it's important note that this will also increase its weight, which will cause it to be heavier than it was before.

There are several kinds of armor upgrades that are available in the game, and they all have distinct effects. Certain upgrades grant armor a greater amount of health points while others make it lighter and more powerful. The name of the upgrade will indicate the type of upgrade that an item upgrade will receive, as shown below.

Certain upgrades require magic or a combination of technology and magic, as shown by the "Magic" and "Hybrids" entries in the table below. Some upgrades also require a charge to use, which is identified by a "Charges" entry in the table below. These charges are constantly updated or never expire depending on the upgrade.

Iron Ore is the cheapest method to improve your armor. You can find it by exploring and looting small loot chests. Titanium is more costly, but is readily available at the smelters of Orgrimmar and Stormwind City. Certain upgrades, like the Reforge or the Hot Potato Books can only be applied on armor pieces that are of high-level. These upgrades can provide significant boost in stats, and are definitely worth the cost.

The player should be aware, however, that upgrading a piece to the maximum upgrade level can increase its defense values. However, it can also decrease the speed and agility of the piece. Therefore, it is typically not recommended to upgrade the majority of armor pieces above +9, since the defensive boost gained is generally not worth the extra weight and power cost of the upgrades needed.

Weapons

Weapon upgrades allow players to improve the effectiveness of certain aspects of a weapon. For example an upgrade could enhance the damage caused by the shells of a shotgun or the accuracy of the rifle sniper. Certain weapons also come with enhancements that enhance their intrinsic characteristics. Frictionless materials (improves stability, minimizes the possibility of overheating) and Kinetic coils (increases the projectile's velocity for greater damage) are two examples.

The majority of upgrades to weapons require a whetblade, one of three Power Dices and a different amount Minerals and Erons. These can be obtained by finishing side quests, killing a certain number of bosses or monsters, or by contacting the Weapon Upgrade NPC in Central Flarine.

To upgrade an equipment set, weapon piece, or Whetblade You must go to the NPC [Armor] Boboko located in Central Flarine, and pay her an upgrade fee that is a certain number of Bars. The more bars you need to complete an upgrade the more advanced the level. If you have multiple upgrade materials, the cost of upgrading will be lower.

In Chapter 2: Season 5 the way you upgrade your weapon and sets has changed a bit. Previously, you could seek out an Upgrade Bench and pay a set number of Bars to upgrade your weapon or equipment to an increased rarity. You could do this until your weapon or equipment reached its maximum upgrade level and at that point, the upgrades would reset.

You can still do this, but the process is based on RNG and low on agency. You're better off buying gear with low upgrade levels, but high base scores and stat distributions. These items have a better chance of giving you the highest tier advantages and benefits.

To improve their skills faster, many players be more inclined to upgrade their weapons. Players should also upgrade the weapons their squadmates use to make them stronger. Shepard for instance, should upgrade the M92F so that he can unlock the Beretta M93R. This will make the weapon more effective when accompanied with biotic specialists such as Grunt and Tali.

Jewels

Jewels are used in the sockets of armor and weapons, increasing the stats of a weapon and providing additional effects. Jewelry crafting is the process of making them, in which you combine a gemstone with a number specific reagents on a jewelry table. The higher the grade of the gemstone, the better the secondary effect. These reagents are available from Treasure Goblins and World Bosses in the world, or by salvaging Legendary Gear. You can also purchase them from The Jeweler in exchange for Scattered Prisms and gold.

The quality of a jewel can be improved at the Jeweler, with stages that vary from Crude to Royal. The stat boosts can vary depending on the tier the jewel is in when it is inserted into weapons, jewelry, or gear.

All levels of jewels are crafted at the Jeweler, with the exception of the rare and legendary jewels which require you to be at a sufficient level to qualify for them. In contrast to other upgrade components, jewels are able to be swapped with a jewel of the same kind without damaging the original one. However, you can only replace one jewel in an equipment piece once.

Using more jewels in a movement will make it more smooth and is typically used for aesthetic reasons. In addition to enhancing performance, the jewels create an area that is stronger than metal, which means that repeated friction from pivots doesn't cause damage as easily.

A Glyphmaster can offer glyphs to improve the look of your weapons and shields. These glyphs give a slight boost in power and can be exchanged, however they're not guaranteed to be available as loot. Glyphs can be upgraded, as jewelry, by visiting the Jeweler for gold, and also Scattered Crystal. Glyphs can also be taken out and returned to the inventory. Other upgrade components, such as aegis or traits cannot be exchanged, and can only be recovered with an Upgrade extractor or salvaging using the Black Lion Salvage Kit or Ascended Salvage tool.

Trinkets

Trinkets are pieces of equipment that offer many small, but beneficial benefits to your hero. They can be acquired starting in the areas of starting as loot or personal story rewards from vendors, and through completing road interactions. They can also be crafted by jewelers, and then found or purchased from the Trading Post.

The first trinket players can unlock is the cloak. It grants a small, but useful bonus in speed of movement and the ability to escape. The player can then acquire rings, amulets and necklaces, in a similar way to how they acquired weapons and armor. Each piece of equipment comes with a slot for an upgrade that can be either universal or jewel. Universal upgrades offer fewer benefits and can be placed in any type of equipment while jewelry cannot be replaced or upgraded, and only works with specific types of trinkets.

These trinkets provide additional buffs and abilities that are active even when the hero isn't fighting. This lets the hero be more effective while inactive and may also help make up for a lack of a solid team or any talent tree slots that would normally be filled with the hero's Best item upgrade statistics.

A good guideline for trinket upgrades is to prioritize BiS (Best-in-Slot) items that you will not replace soon, followed by any items with desirable stats, but less important than the iLevel of the item upgrader mod to be upgraded. This is especially true when an item upgrade has multiple stats that you'd like to upgrade as it's usually more beneficial to upgrade one important stat than two sub-optimal ones.

At the beginning of the game junglers will usually want to upgrade their trinket into a red one, while top and middle players usually choose the pink or green ward (depending on the matchup). These choices can impact the hero's ability to manage the map.

Aside from the things mentioned above, players can find a number of other trinkets in the game in the form of awards and trophies. They can be obtained by completing certain milestones in the story. For example, completing the main quest for a chapter or defeating an opponent. You can check them out by clicking on the achievement in the reward section of the hero's menu.