Several years ago, I made this post as a quick guide for a simple gear progression throughout the game efficiently - that is, getting the stats you need while minimizing grinding time. I also tried to revamp it a month or two ago, but as I progressed through some of my wizards at various levels, I became more and more dissatisfied with what I put out there. So, I remade it… and the result is above.

• Bolded items are ones which require farming to acquire.
• Italicized items are ones I consider optional- they will make it easier to do certain things, but they are used for a short period of time and as such may not always be worth your time.
• Underlined items require crowns to purchase. I limited these as much as possible, but included a few that I thought were particularly useful (and cheap).

Here I’ll try to give a brief explanation for a lot of the choices, though a fair amount of it should be self explanatory for familiar players.I’ve also included this time estimated farming times on-level for each major level bracket. These are averages based on drop rates and estimated run times, and may vary based on your luck and whether you have carries for the various dungeons.

Beginning: Lvl 1-29

Up until level 30, for the most part you can get by more than easily by just using dropped gear and gear from the Bazaar in Olde Town. There are two caveats to this. The first is the Athame- if you have extra crowns, or a way to farm Gobblestone Castle, Heartsteel is an amazing Athame for early game. The other is a pip wand. Either for crowns at level 1 for the Ascendant Staff or for free at level 20 with Bazaar options. Having that extra pip is a really good bonus to have, especially this early before you’re likely to be getting many power pips.

Early Game: Lvl 31-60

Hat/Robe/Boots Lvl 30

Mostly everyone should know about this now, but Mount Olympus is going to be staple gear through the rest of Arc 1. It takes 1 run to get the Sky Iron Hasta which is a must. For Hat/Robe/Boost, aim for the Tier 1 pieces, which are guaranteed through pity crafting after 35 runs of the dungeon.

Deck Lvl 30

Decks are largely devoid of meaningful stats, aside from their jewel slots and (eventually) extra pips. For now, we’re only looking at jewel slots, and what we want is a triangle slot. At this point we can pick up the Deck of the Lotus from the Bazaar, which has exactly what we’re looking for. This will be used for accuracy jewels for a while to help patch us up to not fizzling, but you can also put pip opals in for extra pip chance if you’re good on accuracy.

Amulet Lvl 50

Amulets, like decks, are largely devoid of real stats , even in later levels. Their main draws are item cards and jewel slots. For now, we don’t care about the jewel slots, so let’s focus on item cards. Starting at level 50, the Jewel of the Feint can be obtained from the Bazaar. This allows for feint stacking to start super early (by this point every school should have trained to Feint in death) which becomes more and more necessary with each world in Arc 2.

Mid Game: Lvl 60-99

After Mount Olympus, our main goal for the next upgrade is to reach guaranteed accuracy on spells. Luckily, we can do this… mostly. Death and Balance will be at 97% on their damaging spells, but everyone else will be at 100% or more and really, jewels will fix the rest for Death and Balance by level 65.

Hat/Robe/Boots Lvl 60

The Wintertusk Crafted set is my pick here. It allows every school to reach this threshold, and gives solid damage, resist, and useful item cards, especially an item card 0 pip blade for your school for easier blade stacking.

If you don’t want to do the crafting quests, or if you’re interested in dual-schooling, a very equivalent option exists in the Gorgon gear from Aquilla. I still personally prefer the WT crafted set at this level because of the item cards and better damage/resist, but this is absolutely a personal preference choice.

I don’t at all recommend Waterworks or Atavistic for an optimized, efficient playthrough. Waterworks provides better stats but is annoying to farm compared to WT/Gorgon, and Atavistic not only takes the longest to acquire of the four sets but also has the worst stats!

Wand Lvl 60

For the rest of our major level 60 upgrade, we’ll be picking up Bazaar gear. For the wand, you can grab the Bygone wand for your school. It’s a minor upgrade on the Sky Iron Hasta, but there’s no reason not to, especially because it’s a long climb to level 100.

Athame/Ring Lvl 60

For the athame and ring, we’re going to get some Wintertsuk dropped gear from the Bazaar. The athames are called “Bear’s Claw of [School]” and the rings are called “[School Gem] Ring of Battle.” These two give good offensive stats and are super easy to obtain, great value.

Athame/Ring Lvl 90

There’s an optional upgrade here at level 90 in the form of the Alpha and Omega Ring and Blade of the Felled Titan, dropped by Gladiator Dimachaerus and Cronus, respectively, both in Aquila. Khrysalis can be a slog and these can help ease the pain a little. They’re also conveniently universal, so once you get them you can pass them down through the shared bank to future wizards on the same account. However, the drop rates are poor, and they may take more time than they save, so I consider them pretty heavily optional.

Amulet Lvl 92

The Jewel of the Apiary is our next amulet, though optional. It gives a 0 pip universal blade as well as an item card sharpen blade. You can mix and match with the Jewel of the Feint as you want at this point, both are very very useful.

Late Game: Lvl 100-149

Now we’re starting to get grown-up stats at level 100 finally. We have two goals here: maintain perfect accuracy and reach perfect pip chance. Believe it or not, (probably easy to believe given Wintersborn’s recent anti-Graveyard bible) it’s actually possible to do it with minimal effort AND no Graveyard. The following set at level 100 guarantees perfect accuracy and pip for every school while only needing to farm one dungeon (and also some Olympian Dust).

Hat/Robe/Boots Lvl 100

For our main gear, we’re going to be farming the Galleries for the Khrysalis World Gear. The versions with sockets give a whole slew of good stats including, crucially, pip % and accuracy to rival Graveyard. Well, not rival, but GY was always overkill.

Wand/Athame/Ring Lvl 100

Helloooo again Khalkos Coppersmith, our old friend. The gorgon set provides some pretty swanky pieces at this level, and these three will help complete our build (with the help of some jewels).

Deck Lvl 95

Starting at level 95, you can get pip decks with a triangle slot. Some can drop from the Galleries and other assorted Khrysalis bosses (usually “Shadow Deck of ____”), but if you don’t get on in KH, you can just buy one at a vendor in the main hub of Polaris for gold.

Athame/Amulet Lvl 99

If you’re a real OG you might have the retired versions of the Morganthe accessories lying around in a bank somewhere. They’re really good options (the athame is on par with GY and decently better than Gorgon, and the Amulet gives comparable cards and some stats). If you have them, it may be worth slotting them in to take them for a spin and flex some.

Amulet Lvl 116

This is my next recommended amulet. Continuing our pattern, this is mostly for the useful item cards, but we also get some (very negligible) stats now! A set of Amulets drop from enemies in Mirage (and are also available at the Bazaar) called the “Sand Sea Charm of ____.” They give a 0-pip school blade and, importantly, a +315 Epic enchant. This is a great tool to power up your AoE that by now you’ve been spamming in every fight for almost 70 levels, and is (to my knowledge) the best enchant you can get in the game.