How to manage Corrupted gear for your undergeared alts

Whether you’re just coming back to World of Warcraft for patch 8.3, or you’ve been playing for a while and you just decided to get your alts up to speed with the gear options like Old God Assaults, one thing you may not really be prepared for is just how quickly Corruption can get out of hand. And now that you can buy Corruption to add to your gear, the problem could get even worse.

Now, I like Corrupted gear. And with a little care and attention, it can be quite manageable. But there are ways you can really mess up with Corruption. Just ask my poor Paladin — until I managed to cleanse most of my gear, almost all of the upgrades I was getting were Corrupted items, and I was running around trying to solo and do quests in a 200 Corruption set of pieces that were all upgrades, but which were killing her faster than the mobs were. This was entirely due to two factors — RNG and a complete lack of Corrupted Mementos on her when I started seriously working on getting her gear up.

How does this happen? And how can you fix it? Well, let’s talk about it.

Beware automatically equipping Corrupted upgrades

The first piece of gear I’ve gotten on every single alt I have whenever I do the 8.3 introductory questline are a set of 440 bracers with 15 Corruption and Void Ritual on them. I don’t know if this is an accident or if that’s just what everyone gets, but between that and World Quests, I had six Corrupted pieces, all of them big upgrades, by the time I was half-way through that quest on my Paladin. The problem was, wearing them meant instant death if any of the Corruption effects went off. I would be fighting several mobs in the Uldum Assault and then the big eyeball would spawn over my head and my evil twin would shoot a void laser at me and run up to give me a spiky death hug and if I was lucky I could shield and lay on hands and not immediately die.

Usually I immediately died. I’m a terrible Paladin.

If you’re not paying attention and you get a lot of World Quest upgrades with Corruption, you can easily be rocking a ton of the stuff before you even have the Legendary cloak. The Paladin is an alt — I haven’t run a ton of content yet on her, I haven’t done Horrific Visions, or been making sure to clear every Assault for maximum Vessels yet. I just got her the Cloak and remembered to use the Breath of the Dying Essence that reduces your Corruption on her. I also got lucky and got 100 Corrupted Mementos from the last Assault chest I opened, which meant I could cleanse enough of my Corrupted gear to get it down to a safe 30.

I can handle evading the occasional giant eye of death, but the whole party I was getting at higher Corruption levels was making it impossible to play.

Wait, I have how much Corruption?

It’s easy to forget all of this when you’re either not on the main who has already done all this stuff, or just returning to WoW after a long break and not up on what Corruption is or can do. You’re out doing some World Quests because they offer big upgrades over your patch 8.1 gear, and you get a 2h axe from a quest or Emissary. Your axe winds up Corrupted version, but you put that sucker on because it’s 40 ilevels higher than the one you were using. Of course you do. Why wouldn’t you?

And suddenly you’re blowing up. What happened? The axe has 50 corruption on it. That’s what happened.

On the screenshot above, with the Cloak and Essence in use, I have enough Corruption resistance that my 30 Corruption is reduced to 15, which means that I can keep Void Ritual and the 3% damage and healing from Critical Strikes effect on my new Corrupted ring and not risk anything. If I get another Corrupted piece, as long as it’s not crazy, I can roll with the effects.

But when I first got most of this gear my Corruption was well over 100, and I simply didn’t realize that — I didn’t even know that you can find out your Corruption score. If you’re in the same boat, you can see your current Corruption by:

• Open your character pane
• Mouseover the eye on the right hand-side, by your item level

You’ll see your current Corruption level as well as the negative effects of that Corruption — which can become pretty overwhelming pretty fast. When I first got my nice World Quest axe with 50 Corruption on it? It was a huge upgrade. It was ilevel 415, the hammer I was using was 370 or so. It was a no brainer.

Again, until I started dying.

Keep your Corruption levels in check

So here’s my suggestion to you. First up, get some Corrupted Mementos, pronto. Get them from a Horrific Vision, from an Old God Assault chest — it doesn’t matter, just get them. Now, you’ll be tempted to spend them all on Titan Research to make Horrific Visions easier. But resist that temptation, and hold back 5 Mementos for every piece of Corrupted gear you’ll be needing to cleanse. Make sure to check your current Corruption level on your character window (just mouse over the eyeball) and figure out how much is survivable for you.

Geared below ilevel 420? I suggest getting it below 30 after the Cloak and Essence take some off the top. If you won’t be doing many Horrific Visions on this character — it’s an alt you don’t spend a lot of time on, perhaps — then call it good there.

Geared higher? If you will run Horrific Visions and are increasing the Cloak’s contribution to your Corruption Resistance, and you’re getting gear at or above the 440 mark, you can consider going higher. My main, for example, is rocking 50 Corruption and can usually survive a Thing from Beyond showing up, but she does have to book it away when the gigantic eyeball starts throwing death at her.

Keep your Corruption levels in the right range by visiting MOTHER and cleansing some of your gear. It costs five Corrupted Mementos each, so hang on to some of the Mementos you find to keep your character as sane as possible. And if you have a pile of Corrupted gear but it isn’t the Corrupted gear you want? Spend your Mementos to cleanse gear, then farm up Echos of Ny’alotha to buy the Corruption you do want — preferably without going overboard.

I know it’s pretty when your character is all marbled in red and purple and looks weird as heck. But be careful. Work your way up to that much Corrupted gear, don’t end up there because you got some RNG that threw Corruption at you and now you’re not sure how to handle it. A little caution will serve you well in this transitional period, especially on your alts. Only allow the madness of the Old Gods to infest your mind and soul in moderation, y’all.