The War Within Season 3 launches on 12th / 13th of August. With this you will also have a load of new ways to gear up. Whether you are a returning player or just looking to get a head start in the new season, we have you covered, as we break down the best ways to gear up your main character, a new character or an alt.
How to Catch up with Gearing in Season 3 of The War Within
Gearing a main or new alt ready for season 3 is important so you can dive into new content and start earning all those new rewards.
One of the easiest ways to start gearing is to have friends help you with either Mythic 0s or low keys once they are available. Most keys are doable with one undergeared player between a +2 and +6. However, if you do not have the luxury of having friends help you through dungeons, we have a few recommendations to get you started.
Renown Rewards
While the Renown Rewards do not offer any gear, they do offer some Weathered Ethereal Crests, Carved Ethereal Crests and Valorstones that will be important in upgrading gear in later steps. If you have played a previous season and already collected these rewards, you will not have access to them.
Below is a list of the Renown Vendors and their locations:
- Council of Dornogal
/way Dornogal 39.17 24.04
- The Assembly of the Deeps
/way the ringing Deeps 43.14 32.86
- Hallowfall Arathi
/way Hallowfall 42.37 55.01
- The Severed Threads
/way Azj-Kahet 55.26 41.21
Weekly Activities
Before heading off to do any content on K'aresh, we recommend doing at least 2 of the weekly activities available on the main Khaz Algar area. The first two you do will reward a Veteran piece of gear that can be upgraded to 691. You can also continue to do these to obtain more Valorstones, Coffer Keys and Crests.
Seasonal Start Quests
At the start of each season, there are a few quests available in Dornogal which explain the upgrade system. These will reward you with some Valorstones and crests.
DISC belt
The DISC belt was everyone’s best in slot belt in season 2. It starts at item level 691 and can be further upgraded to 701 through quests. To get the belt, if you don’t have it, pick up the quest from the Titan Console in Dornogal. Once you have the quest, just run any delve on any difficulty.
K'aresh Content
K'aresh is the brand new zone released in Patch 11.2, and brings some great gearing opportunities.
By completing the campaign, you will be rewarded with an almost full set of 642 Explorer track gear and some valorstones. If this is your first character you will need to complete the campaign, if it’s an alt and you don’t need the gear, there is a skip. We recommend skipping the K'aresh Campaign unless your character needs valorstones or the gear.
During the campaign, or if you skipped it, you will obtain the Reshii Wraps. The cloak starts at item level 694 and will eventually be upgraded to 727. This is great for new characters as an instant item level boost similar to the DISC belt.
The K’aresh Trust renown track has some rewards which can help you upgrade your gear, including Valorstones and crest rewards. At Renown 7 you will be able to purchase a 668 veteran track chest piece.
The new world boss Reshanor, The Untethered, will drop warbound Champion track gear so if you are trying to gear new alts he is always worth finding a group for.
If you complete all of the above you should be close to 660 average item level and ready to start trying some more difficult content.
How to Gear Fast with PvE in The War Within Season 3
Once you are around item level 660, you can start thinking about doing some more difficult content.
Delves
Delves are great to start gaining gear. Your main goal in delves will be to push towards being able to complete +8s. Once you feel confident enough to complete a +8 delve, you should do one of the 4 active bountiful delves, which rewards you with a Champion track 2/8 item level 684 piece. Keep doing Bountiful delves as long as you have the bountiful coffer keys available (if you have a lot of keys, you will have to do this over several days, as only 4 bountiful delves are available per day).
If you are lucky enough to obtain a Delver’s Bounty map in your delve you can activate it before you enter a delve to make that delve contain a hidden trove, which will contain a Hero Track piece of gear.
To gain more Coffer Keys, complete the weekly events across Khaz Algar.
Dungeons
Dungeons are always a great source of gear at the start of a season, and this season is no different. Mythic 0s are available from Week 1 of the patch, a week before the season starts. These rewards Champion Track 1/8 gear at item level 681. You can only do M0s once per week but if you’re lucky they can lead to some potentially great trinkets and gear early on.
Once season 3 starts you will be able to move on to do Mythic+. There are 3 breakpoints where keys become more valuable:
Keystone Level 6: Starting from keystone level 6, you will be rewarded with 1/6 hero track gear at 691 item level. You also get 18 Runed Crests from this difficulty. This difficulty rewards a 3/6 Hero Track Item in the vault.
Keystone level 7: At Keystone level 7, you will still receive the same Hero Track Gear as level 6 However, you will now receive 10 Gilded Crests instead of runed. For Keystone 8&9 you will increase the Hero Track one step to 2/6, and increase the amount of gilded crests you receive. The Great Vault Reward will be a 4/6 Hero track Item.
Keystone Level 10: At Keystone level 10, the Hero track item will increase to 3/6 and the amount of gilded crests will be increased to 16. However, the big bonus is the Great Vault item will be a Myth Track 1/6 item. However, doing a +10 on the first week of the season may be very difficult.
We recommend attempting to do as many keys as you can at the highest difficulty level, using the rewards to push more difficult keys. Although 10s will be extra difficult, try to do at least one for the great vault reward, and it does not need to be timed for that.
Raid
The new raid, Manaforge Omega, will be available on 3 difficulties once season 3 starts. We recommend doing as much of the raid as possible as it's the only way to access tier without the Matrix Catalyst or the Great Vault.
Once the LFR wings are open, we recommend running LFR if the potential drops are upgrades.
Crafted Gear and The Matrix Catalyst
Your final options for gear upgrades are to craft gear or using the matrix to convert pieces into tier.
Matrix Catalyst
You will earn one charge for the Matrix Catalyst every 2 weeks, and an additional charge when you complete one of the season 3 challenges. We recommend saving your first charge until you receive your first Great Vault after Season 3 launches. This will allow you to make a good decision on what to catalyze into tier and not accidentally catalyze an item you then receive in the Great Vault only days later.
There are exceptions to this. For example if you received 3 pieces of tier while running the raid, it is likely worth catalysing to obtain a 4 set, to be able to progress further in keys or raid.
Crafted Gear
During the first week you will only have access to a single spark, which limits the options that you have. That being said, you should try to craft your embellished items as early as possible. We recommend reading our Class Guides, and following their recommendations for crafted items.
Once you have sorted your embellished items you can then use future sparks for filling in slots which you have been unlucky with drops for. To help with crafting, you get an Enchanted Runed Ethereal Crest for reaching renown 20 with The K’aresh Trust, as well as the quest Manaforge Omega: Dimensius Looms.
The better gear you have the easier you will find doing more difficult content. If you are looking for more guides on the new content, then make sure to check out our Season 3 & Patch 11.2 Guides.
