Hero gear, enhancing, and mastery
Hero gear slots, rarity tiers, how enhancing and Mastery Forging work, Widget skills, and priority upgrade order for F2P and Spenders.
Hero gear equips directly onto heroes and provides permanent stat bonuses to every troop in that hero’s march. There are two distinct upgrade systems — Enhancing (levels gear up within its rarity tier) and Mastery Forging (a separate multiplicative layer unlocked only on Mythic gear). Gear applies to your own marches — solo attacks, arena, and rallies you lead all benefit. Joiners receive zero bonus from their own gear when joining someone else’s rally.
TL;DR
- Hero gear is powerful for solo attack events and Arena — don’t neglect it even if you mostly join rallies
- Save rare materials (Forgehammers especially) for when you lead more frequently — don’t push Mastery Forging heavily until leading is a regular part of your game
- Arena Custom Mythic Gear Chests (12,000 tokens each) are your primary Mythic gear source — a steady, free investment worth maintaining
- Get all 4 gear slots to Mythic before pushing Mastery Forging levels
- Forgehammers for Mastery Forging come primarily from Bear Hunt — join every rally to accumulate them passively
Priority order
- Obtain Mythic gear in all 4 slots via Arena token shop
- Enhance each piece steadily — every level helps solo and arena performance
- Begin Mastery Forging as you lead more; don’t rush Forgehammer spend early
- Widget skills after gear is established
TL;DR
- Arena Custom Mythic Gear Chests first — spend tokens here until all 3 of your main heroes have full Mythic gear across all 4 slots; this is the highest-priority arena token spend
- Mastery Forging is multiplicative — it compounds on top of all your research, hero skills, and base gear stats; push it as high as possible on your primary rally leader
- Widget skills stack multiplicatively with Mastery Forging — the two systems compound together for disproportionate rally power
- Forgehammer farming: Bear Hunt + Swordland Showdown are your primary sources; supplement with event purchases
- Push Mastery to Level 5 per hero first across all 3, then push one hero toward Level 10
Priority order
- Full Mythic gear on all 3 main heroes (Arena tokens)
- Mastery Forging to Level 5 on all 3 heroes
- Widget skills to Level 5 on all 3 heroes
- Push Mastery and Widgets higher on your primary rally lead hero
Gear slots
Each hero has 4 gear slots — Helmet, Chest, Gloves, and Boots — shared across all troop types. Helmets and Boots lean toward Lethality (damage); Chests and Gloves lean toward Health (survivability).
Rarity tiers and max levels
| Rarity | Color | Max enhance level |
|---|---|---|
| Common | Grey | 20 |
| Uncommon | Green | 40 |
| Rare | Blue | 60 |
| Epic | Purple | 80 |
| Mythic | Gold | 100 |
| Endgame | Red | 200 |
Mythic gear starts at +15% stat bonuses at Level 0 and reaches +50% at Level 100. Red gear (Levels 101–200) requires TC30, Mastery Forging at Level 10, and additional Mythic gear pieces to unlock via Imbuement — out of scope for TC25–29 play.
Enhancing
Unlocks at Town Center 15. Enhancing levels up a gear piece within its rarity cap, increasing its stat bonuses incrementally.
How to enhance:
- Use Enhancement XP Parts (drops from content)
- Merge lower-rarity gear pieces directly into the piece you’re upgrading (each rarity contributes different XP: Grey=10, Green=30, Blue=60, Purple=150)
Enhance each piece to its rarity’s max level before upgrading the piece to the next rarity. Don’t skip rarity tiers — the XP cost to enhance scales with rarity, so merging grey and green pieces into blue gear is efficient.
Mastery Forging
Unlocks at Town Center 20 on Mythic gear only. This is a separate system from enhancing — it adds a multiplicative stat multiplier that compounds on top of all your other bonuses.
Resource: Forgehammers
Each Mastery level costs Forgehammers, with higher levels also requiring Mythic gear pieces. Costs scale up significantly toward the higher levels.
Forgehammer sources:
- Bear Hunt rallies (primary F2P source — join every rally)
- Swordland Showdown
- Terror rallies
- Event milestones
The multiplicative nature of Mastery Forging means every level compounds significantly at high investment levels. Prioritize your primary rally lead hero for deeper Mastery investment.
Stat priorities by troop type
| Troop type | Primary stat | Secondary stat |
|---|---|---|
| Infantry | Health | Defense |
| Archer | Lethality | Health |
| Cavalry | Lethality | Health |
Upgrade priority across slots:
- Infantry Gloves + Chest (Health — keeps your frontline alive)
- Archer Helmet + Boots (Lethality — primary damage output)
- Cavalry Helmet + Boots (Lethality)
Widget skills
Widgets are exclusive gear skills available only to Mythic heroes (TC15+). They provide multiplicative bonuses and activate exclusively when the hero is leading a rally or garrison — they do nothing in solo attacks or when joining someone else’s rally.
Unlocking Widgets:
- 5 Widgets to unlock Level 1
- 275 total Widgets to reach Level 10 (across Levels 1–10)
- Best value: get all 3 main heroes to Widget Level 5 before pushing any single hero to Level 10
Widget source:
- Buccaneer Bounty event — primary source
- Mystery Shop (only buy at 70%+ discount for F2P)
- Hall of Heroes (later server ages)
Widget bonuses stack multiplicatively with Mastery Forging — together they produce the largest power gaps between well-equipped rally leaders and everyone else.
Getting Mythic gear
| Source | Notes |
|---|---|
| Arena Custom Mythic Gear Chest | 12,000 tokens; lets you choose exact piece — best value |
| Bear Hunt | Drops gear pieces as event rewards |
| Swordland Showdown | Gear pieces in reward track |
| Event milestones | Periodic; varies by event |
Resetting and transferring gear
Gear can be unequipped and re-equipped freely at no cost. What costs materials is resetting enhancement or mastery levels.
There are two ways to move investment off a gear piece:
Enhancement Transfer — 200 gems Strips all enhancement levels and Mastery Forging from the old piece and transfers them to a new piece of the same slot. The old piece is returned at Level 1, reusable. 100% of Enhancement XP and 100% of Forgehammers are recovered. This is the correct method whenever you have Forgehammers invested in a piece.
Mastery Reforge — free Strips all enhancement and mastery levels. Returns 100% of Enhancement XP but only 50% of Forgehammers — the other 50% are permanently destroyed. The old gear piece is also destroyed entirely. The only valid use case is gear with zero Mastery Forging on it, or truly obsolete pieces with no transfer target.
| Enhancement Transfer | Mastery Reforge | |
|---|---|---|
| Cost | 200 gems | Free |
| Enhancement XP recovered | 100% | 100% |
| Forgehammers recovered | 100% | 50% (50% destroyed) |
| Old gear piece | Returned at Level 1 | Destroyed |
The Forgehammer destruction from Mastery Reforge represents several weeks of active farming at any meaningful mastery level. The 200-gem Enhancement Transfer is almost always cheaper than that loss.
Tip: If you need to do an Enhancement Transfer, time it during a Hall of Governors event — the gem spend earns event points, so you extract value from gems you’d spend anyway.
Critical mistakes to avoid
Never consume an enhanced gear piece for XP. The game UI lets you sacrifice a gear piece to gain Enhancement XP for another. If that piece has enhancement levels or Mastery Forging on it, everything is gone with zero recovery — no XP returned, no Forgehammers returned. Always use Enhancement Transfer or Mastery Reforge instead.
Never use Mastery Reforge when Enhancement Transfer is available. The 200-gem cost is always cheaper than the Forgehammer destruction at any meaningful mastery level.
Gear above Mastery Level 10 cannot be used as crafting material. Don’t plan to sacrifice high-mastery pieces into other gear — they’re locked out of that system.