World of Warcraft Item Upgrades
Upgrades to an item are a way to increase the stats of an item. Based on the type of upgrade, it may increase an item's Rarity or Mark Level and boost additional stats.
Each item has a track to upgrade it. Each upgrade increases the cost of the next one by a set amount.
Item Level
When an item gets upgraded, its basic stats increase in value. The value is the sum of all of its upgraded perks (attack, magic attack and defense). Upgrades can be costly, depending on who you hire and what you do. This is because of how many perks need to be replaced to allow the item to get upgraded.
It can also be used as a gating requirement while waiting for dungeons, raids and scenarios. It can also be used as a gating requirement when queueing for dungeons, scenarios, and raids, as well as to limit the amount of PvP gear a player can wear (since PvP is limited to the lower levels). The average item level can be found in the character sheet.
Utilizing the level of an item can help players evaluate the power of equipment when choosing to buy or sell. It's an excellent indicator of an item's quality and the amount of damage it is capable of causing. Comparing items in a vendor's stock can be done using the item level.
On PC, you are able to view the item level using ALT, or by using the left stick on XB1 or PS4. This will display the full item description, including its level. It is also accessible by hovering over an item with the mouse cursor and entering /itemlevel into chat.
There are a variety of theories on how the level of an item is calculated. One theory suggests that the level of an item is calculated by a formula that calculates the worth of the stats of an item really are. It takes into consideration the fact that different perks have different worth and that sockets have gems that increase the value of the item overall. This can lead to a calculated item's ilvl that is usually very close to Blizzard's real item level.
However, this isn't the only factor that can affect an item's ilvl as the level of the region the item was dropped in could change the value of its stats, such as by adding a level to its crit rating or haste rating. This means that items that drop at higher levels will have more value than items dropped in lower-level instances.
Item Stats
The stats of an item are a major element in what makes or breaks an item for players. The game makes use of them in a variety of ways to encourage players to not limit themselves to a single weapon and to encourage players to experiment with other weapons. The stats of a base weapon are boosted by the weapon's stat modification which are then enhanced by the player's level.
Upgrades to an item can increase its stats. The rarity of an item determines its upgrade cost. A grey or white item for instance, will only be upgraded one time and items with rare tiers can be upgraded multiple times with higher costs.
Another way to change the stats on an item is to use affixes. These are special stat boosts that can be added to an item by the player, and they come in all sizes and shapes. The affixes can be used to give items extra damage or other special capabilities (such as the ability to revive dead or reduce cooling downs), or to differentiate them by naming them.
All affixes are re-rolled at the moment by selecting them in the upgrade window, pressing the green button. This process will cost the player a specific amount of gold and other items, which can be added to the upgrade gauge in the same manner as other options for rerolling.
In addition to the possibility of rerolling affixes, players may also choose which stats to be kept on an item after it is upgraded. The stat ranges are determined by the item's level. However every item will have at least one stat in the same range, unless it's an item that is unique, or the item is a God Roll from a boss in a raid.
This is another thing that could be altered by adding an option to upgrade the equipment without rerolling the affixes, or selecting which stats to enhance. But, like base equipment, this would need to be done on a per-item level, and the interface for comparing items would not display all the possible stats gained or lost at once.
Item Luck
The Luck stat of a player increases the chance of finding items as well as the properties spawned by loot and the strength of these properties. However, it doesn't directly affect damage or the ability to upgrade item s. It provides players with an opportunity to get better gear earlier in the game. This is especially useful in the early game, because players tend to put weapon scaling and defenses above raw damage gains.
In addition to influencing item discovery, Luck also increases the probability of success when upgrading items with the Blacksmith. This should not be confused with the Blacksmith's overall upgrade probability which increases with each level of the item and can be further enhanced by using an anti-material such as a Scroll of Strength or a Jewel of Blessing.
The shields, armor, and weapons have a default Luck value of 40. These items can then be enhanced by golden ingots, spined leather or oak boards (depending on the type of material used) to grant an additional +40 Luck or to boost the existing Luck of an item, up to 140.
Additionally there are certain items, such as the Hollow weapon that is infused with hollow can be used to boost the damage of any damage-dealing skill by five percent. These items can be purchased from the shop or made using the correct ingredients.
Item Failure
Not all upgrades work. However, there are cash shop items that allow players to increase their success rate or prevent them from losing an item if the upgrade is unsuccessful.
When you upgrade an item, the success rate is shown in the Honing UI. The percentage represents the likelihood of successfully upgrading the item. This can be increased with Additional Materials or Special Materials. There are limitations on how much the success rates can be improved, and the overall chance of an upgrade failing cannot be greater than 100%..
The luck of an item may affect the success of an upgrade. Every item has a success rate of 25 percent and each item that has Luck increases the chance of success by 5percent.
The upgrade overlays of the item are displayed above items in the inventory. This may block enchantment effects as well as other effects. If you wish to disable the upgrade overlays, the config option decoration.renderUpgradeOverlays can be set to False in the Item Upgrader CORE client config.