This article is incomplete
Some sections are missing or need additional details. Help improve it by contributing.
Gear progression in AION 2 layers several systems on top of a base equipment grade: enhancement, breakthrough, set bonuses and substats, accessory upgrades, and a separate Abyss-only potential track. Because the game is live in Korea and Taiwan and re-tunes these systems with most patches, the specific numbers below are framed as the current live-build state rather than fixed global values.
As of October 2, 2026, NCsoft has not published which of these systems, or which level cap, the global service opened with when Advance Access began on September 30, 2026, so the figures on this page are Korean and Taiwanese service values unless a line says otherwise. NCsoft's global launch event rewards already include Enhancement Stones, Amplify Stone (Unique) (the breakthrough material), Philosopher's Stone: Revelation and Soul Codex Reset items.
Equipment Grades
Equipment climbs through grades, with each higher grade carrying stronger base stats and a longer upgrade track. The official guidebook lists six grades: Common, Rare, Epic, Unique, Hero and Special. The English names are the global client's, which writes the top grade as (Heroic) in item names while NCsoft's English announcements say Hero-grade; earlier versions of this page used the provisional name Fabled for the Epic grade. The two Runes and the wings that carry no owned effect use the separate Special grade. Full details are on Item Grades.
Grade | Korean name | Where it sits |
|---|---|---|
Common | 일반 | Starting gear; enhances to +5 |
Rare | 희귀 | Early gear; enhances to +10; Rare pendants come from Chapter 1 quests |
Epic | 전승 | Mid-tier; enhances to +15; Epic pendants also come from Chapter 1 quests, and the crafted Brooches and Seals are Epic |
Unique | 유일 | Enhances to +15 with five breakthrough stages; a common Expedition and Sanctuary drop grade |
Hero | 영웅 | Enhances to +20 with five breakthrough stages; reached through drops, crafting or Advanced Succession from a Unique piece |
Enhancement and Breakthrough
Two stacking systems push a single piece of gear past its base stats:
System | What It Does |
|---|---|
Enhancement | Raises a piece's stats in stages; the staple per-piece upgrade that most of the grind feeds |
Breakthrough | A separate five-stage track after the enhancement cap; on armor, each stage also adds 1 percent to the HP increase stat on the live build |
On the KR and TW build, each armor breakthrough stage has added 1 percent to the HP increase stat since April 22, 2026, stacking across stages. Treat that figure as a live-build value; the global build may tune it. Both enhancement and breakthrough state can be carried forward when you craft a replacement piece, which is the job of the crafting-transfer system below.
Caps by grade, Hero-grade success rates and breakthrough costs are on the Enhancement and Breakthrough page; the random options layered on top are covered under Soul Inscription and Soul Binding.
Preserving Investment: Succession Crafting
When you move to a new piece of gear, Succession Crafting (rendered as Transfer crafting in some official materials) carries your enhancement stage, breakthrough stage, and Soul Inscription options onto the new craft, so you do not re-grind the upgrade from zero. The Advanced version steps a Unique piece up to Hero grade and keeps the same layers, turning Unique breakthrough tiers into Hero enhancement levels +16 to +20. A Soul Binding option is the one layer that does not transfer.
Daevanion Yustiel
Season 3 (April 8, 2026) added Yustiel as a new Daevanion board. Its points come from converting Fragment: Yustiel's Trace, which the Season 3 Expedition drops alongside Hero and Unique-grade equipment, and NCsoft's English announcement describes the board as increasing Attack and Defense. Yustiel is not an accessory system; accessories have their own page at Accessories.
HP Absorption Overhaul
The April 22, 2026 update reworked HP absorption effects across the classes. Effects that used to heal for a share of damage dealt became HP absorption effects that combine both: a 5 percent absorption, for example, now heals 5 percent of the damage dealt, capped at 10 percent of max HP, plus 5 percent of max HP. The same update split the Damage Boost and Damage Tolerance increases granted by class skills into PvE and PvP versions, turning the old values into the PvE ones and setting the PvP ones at half. Class skill details are on the Combat and Skill Chains page and the class pages.
Abyss Equipment Potential
Gear also carries a separate potential track. Dungeon equipment has had a four-stage PvE potential since March 4, 2026 (weapons +0.6 percent PvE Damage Boost per stage, armor +0.3 percent PvE Damage Tolerance, accessories +0.3 percent PvE Damage Boost), and Abyss equipment gained a PvP potential on April 8, 2026: weapons and Guards +2.5 percent PvP Damage Boost per stage up to 10 percent, armor +0.5 percent PvP Damage Tolerance up to 2 percent and accessories +0.5 percent PvP Damage Boost up to 2 percent. Potential stages are not carried over by succession. See Enhancement and Breakthrough and Abyss Equipment.
New Equipment Slots
The Brooch accessory slot is live on the KR and TW build, added with the Chalice of Muspel Sanctuary on May 27, 2026, and the Seal slot followed on September 9, 2026 with Snowfield of Sorrow. Both sit alongside the existing accessory categories rather than replacing any of them. In the official item database the crafted Brooches and Seals are Epic, the Kaldrix Brooch and the Deltras Seal are Unique and come from their Sanctuary's Gear Change Vouchers, and a crafted Hero Seal tops the Seal line; see Brooches and Seals.
Stat Caps and Wing Enhancement
The same late-May patch that added the Brooch also raised the headroom on character growth. The caps on the six core stats (Might, Dexterity, Precision, Willpower, Intelligence, and Constitution) were lifted to 250, and the maximum obtainable Attack Boost and Defense Boost values were raised to 130 percent, so well-geared characters can push further before hitting a ceiling. A new Soul Binding material, Philosopher's Stone: Power, was added to enable Soul Binding on the new craftable gear and other equipment. Soul Binding adds one extra Soul Inscription option to an item rather than binding it to a character.
The patch also introduced the Wings Enhance System, which lets players strengthen their wings for additional stats on top of the cosmetic and flight role wings already play. Wing enhancement is a separate progression track from weapon and armor enhancement, giving characters another long-term stat sink as they approach the gear ceiling. As with the rest of the live-build numbers on this page, the exact per-level gains are tuned on the KR and TW build and may differ on the global service.
Wings enhance to +10 using Kina, Unique Sync Stones and Enhancement Stones, and the bonus goes to the wing's owned effect; see Wings.
Chapter 1 Growth Systems
The July 1, 2026 Chapter 1. Lands of Sand and Snow update raised the maximum character level to 50 and lifted the Stigma skill enhancement cap to level 25, extending the top of the progression curve. It also added new endgame equipment: a Pendant slot alongside the existing accessory categories, and Hero-grade Amulets and Belts. Three new growth systems, Sealed Dungeons, Strongholds, and Monoliths, were added as additional sources of the materials that feed enhancement and the accessory tracks. Chapter 1 also introduced a Frontal directional stat line, which sits alongside the existing positional modifiers rather than replacing them. As with the rest of this page, treat the specific values as current Korean and Taiwanese live-build state.
August 2026 Accessory Tiers (KR and TW)
The August 12, 2026 patch added two new accessory lines at the top of the Korean and Taiwanese build's accessory ladder. Neither line has an official English name yet, so the names below are the Korean originals:
Crafted Draconic accessories: blueprints for Genesis and Nemesis Dragon Lord accessories (창룡왕/멸룡왕), crafted through succession using the earlier Splendent Eungryong and Giryong Dragon Lord accessories (빛나는 응룡왕/기룡왕; provisional English names) as inheritance material. The bound crafting material comes from Lava Heart accessories, or from Gear Change Vouchers in the new August Expedition's guaranteed rewards, converted through material conversion.
Abyss shop accessories: Guardian and Archon Praetorian Captain accessories (가디언/아칸 친위대장) added to the Abyss shop, with succession recipes that upgrade the existing Legion Commander accessories (가디언/아칸 군단장) into them.
In the official item database both lines sit at base item level 128, the same as the Lava Heart accessories, with the Splendent Genesis and Nemesis versions at 134. The same patch also raised the contribution required to earn Odyle Energy cubes in Expeditions and Transcendence dungeons from 1% to 5%.
What Each Slot Contributes
Each equipment slot leans toward a different part of a build. The table combines the official guidebook's slot descriptions with the option pools in the item data; the skill effect column comes from the global client data, where a Soul Inscription roll can be a skill effect that raises one class skill by a level.
Slot | Base stats lean | Soul Inscription options | Skill effects from options |
|---|---|---|---|
Attack range, plus Accuracy, Critical Hit and Block by weapon type | Offensive pool: Weapon Damage Boost, Damage Boost, Combat Speed, Multi-hit Chance, Attack, Might, Precision and positional Attack | Active skills | |
Attack, Accuracy and Critical Hit | Same offensive pool as the weapon, with smaller values | Active skills | |
Armor (seven slots) | Defense and HP | Defensive pool, plus slot-specific extras such as Double Chance, Perfect Chance and Attack Boost | Passive skills |
Necklace and Earrings | Attack and Defense | Global service: Might, Precision, Intelligence, Accuracy, Critical Hit and similar, plus Combat Speed on Necklaces and Move Speed on Earrings. Korean Hero Necklaces roll Intelligence, Accuracy, Critical Hit and similar, without Combat Speed, Might or Precision | Passive skills |
Rings | Attack and Defense | Global service: Might, Precision, Intelligence, Accuracy, Critical Hit and similar | Active skills |
Bracelet | Attack and Defense | Divine stats only | None |
Attack and Defense | Six base stats plus Accuracy, Evasion, Critical Hit, Critical Resistance, Block and Block Penetration | None | |
Fixed stats that grow with grade and enhancement | None | None |
In practice, active skill levels from gear come only from the weapon, the Guard and the two Rings, so these are the slots players look at first when chasing level 20 on a key active skill; passive skill levels come from armor, Necklaces and Earrings. Arcana and the Daevanion boards add skill levels on top.
Putting It Together
Follow the item ladder. Each Draconic, Sanctuary and Abyss family has a fixed base item level, from 70 for the first Unique Draconic gear to 154 for the top Hero weapons; see Weapons and Armor.
Use Transfer Crafting at each step. Do not dismantle a heavily invested piece; use it as the source so its enhancement, breakthrough and Soul Inscription carry forward.
Treat Abyss potential and Abyss sets as Abyss gear. Abyss sets lower ordinary PvE Damage Boost while raising damage against Abyss monsters and PvP stats.
Extract surplus gear. Item Extraction turns unwanted drops back into Enhancement Stones.
Community Gearing Order
Korean community guides suggest an order rather than a rule. A guide for new and returning players from July 2026 recommends finishing the story, sealed dungeons and regional quests first, then using the free growth support Daeva set (which comes at breakthrough 5 on weapon and Guard and breakthrough 3 on armor and accessories) with Weapon Damage Boost tuned onto its weapon and Guard, enhancing a brooch to +10, raising Amulets and Belts to Hero grade and the Pendant to Unique, using a +5 Rune, and enhancing every Unique wing to +5. It then suggests clearing Sanctuaries, moving Unique gear to Hero through Advanced Succession only when the result can still break through, and adding potential to weapon and Guard before accessories and armor. Another community guide from December 2025 judged weapon breakthrough 3 and Guard breakthrough 2 the cost-effective stopping point on Unique gear, because stages 4 and 5 succeed far less often. These are community practices, not official recommendations.
Kina Costs Across the Gear Systems
Kina is the common currency of every upgrade path. Representative costs on the Korean and Taiwanese service:
System | Kina cost |
|---|---|
Hero-grade breakthrough | 600,000 to 3,000,000 per stage since February 11, 2026 |
Soul Binding | 1,000,000 per item, plus two Philosopher's Stones: Revelation |
Stone-based succession | Free since February 11, 2026 |
Advanced Succession | Capped at 50,000,000 since July 1, 2026 |
Ludra's Bracelet conversion | 20,000,000 plus two Gear Change Voucher: Ludra (April 8, 2026) |
Sanctuary weapon selection chest | 50,000,000 plus four Gear Change Voucher: Ludra (July 1, 2026) |
Daevanion node reset | 500 per node since November 19, 2025 |
Stigma reset | 10,000 per point from January 28, 2026; free since July 1, 2026 |
Crafting and Gathering
Crafted gear feeds the same upgrade tracks. On the Korean and Taiwanese service the crafting proficiency cap was raised to level 70 of the Expert tier on April 8, 2026. Recipes that use a core material always succeed and the crafted item is Bound (February 11, 2026), and since March 18, 2026 a craft with a 100 percent success rate no longer fails when you take damage. Gathering has required level 45 since January 28, 2026. Each gathering spot counts how often a character has harvested it and locks out heavy repeat gathering at that spot for a while (December 24, 2025), and repeatedly cancelling a gather triggers a short lockout (July 15, 2026). Succession Crafting covers the recipes that carry upgrades forward.
Where Equipment Comes From
The official guidebook names four ways to get items: defeating monsters, crafting, buying from NPCs and rewards. Kina and items have a daily acquisition limit; once a character reaches it, field hunting, sealed dungeons, garrisons, Transcendence and Expeditions stop giving them, and a capped character in a party stops the whole party from looting normal monsters. Dungeon guaranteed rewards are often Gear Change Vouchers rather than gear, which Material Conversion turns into selection boxes, and unwanted gear can be broken down through Item Extraction.
Related Pages
Succession Crafting
Daeva System and Daevanion Board
Combat and Skill Chains
PvP and the Abyss
Equipment pages: Item Grades · Enhancement and Breakthrough · Soul Inscription and Soul Binding · Weapons · Armor · Accessories · Abyss Equipment · Manastones and Soulstones · Theostones · Wings · Consumables · Material Conversion · Item Extraction · Pantheon