ArcheAge: Unchained – Upgrading Gear
There’s a significant difference with regrading “old” vs. “new” gear.
Old gear still uses regrade scrolls (mag, epherium, delphinad, Serpentis, etc.). Craftable gear WILL NOT BREAK anymore, but old dungeon items, like Serpentis, WILL break. There are anchoring charms for pushing past divine, but they’re very expensive to make.
ALL gear MIGHT crystallize when you fail to regrade past celestial or awaken it (synthesis will not crystallize). If it crystallizes, you buy a scroll for 10,000 honor to fix it so you can make more attempts. You can still equip/sell the item if it’s crystallized.
New gear will progress without breaking through the infusion system (Hiram, Library, Erenor). World boss gear is safely upgradable somehow (there are awakening scrolls to craft for them)
Hiram levels up through infusions from mob drops and dalies (Halcyona instance, Fall of Hiram instance, quests in Diamond Shores, Exeloch, Sungold, Reedwind, East/West Hiram Mountains). Awakening scrolls come from the above Auroria dalies. Low gold cost, but very high labor cost.
Library levels up through Abyssal Library drops and uses a lot of gold.
Erenor levels up through feeding either celesial or divine (not sure which) Ayanad into the Erenor gear.
Tempering is different. It’s like regrading, where you have a chance to fail and lose temper at high levels. It’s 200 labor per attempt. I think +17/+18 is safe from downgrading. Is Max apparently +30? You gain solar/lunar tempers through opening crates from mob drops.
New end-game lunagems don’t have a chance to break but are very expensive. Still, the difference between the new and old gems is pretty huge, so eventually, you want the max tier of new gems. You buy the precursors for these new gems through the honor shop.
The old ones still do have a chance to break, though there are more expensive no-break gems that still have a chance to fail to socket. They just won’t blow up everything in your gear if those fail. You can upgrade the old gems up to a point, but they will become quickly obsolete once you can afford the new lunagems. I recommend NOT investing into the old system.