How to complete Primal Storms events in Dragonflight Season 1 for ilevel 359 and ilevel 385 gear

The Primal Storms events featured in Dragonflight Season 1 are slightly different from the pre-launch event, including a bump in the gear ilevel to 359, and then again to 385 ilevel — but it’ll cost you.

Many of us ran the Primal Storms event constantly during the two week pre-launch period, but the changes to the events for Season 1 make that gear acquisition a more time-consuming affair. It will take much longer to collect the Elemental Overflow currency to get a full set of ilevel 359 gear from these Storms, and once you have that full set of gear, you’re going to need to spend even more time farming up a different currency — Storm Sigils — to buy the upgraded, just shy of Normal Vault of the Incarnates ilevel 385 gear. There are also the usual additional shiny treats to collect using this currency, like pets and mounts.

So how do you run the Primal Storm events? And — maybe more importantly — how do you get your gear?

How to start the Primal Storms events

• The first time you log in after Season 1 of Dragonflight goes live, you should see a quest named Storm Surge pop up. If you don’t, go to see Rethelshi in Valdrakken and they’ll give you the quest directly.
• Open your World Map and check around the various Dragon Isles zones to see where the Primal Storms events are currently active. The tooltip will read “Elemental Storm.” You’ll likely find a few candidates to check out, with a timer for how long the Storm will be taking place. When you go there, there will be an obvious elemental sigil floating in the air and the top of your screen will tell you you’re in an Elemental Storm area.
• Kill things. Many normal mobs will now be elites and hit much harder than usual. You’d definitely want a group if possible, although if you’re at or around ilevel 350, depending on class and spec, you should be able to solo most if not all of the elites you run into. Mobs that were already elites before you entered the zone might be a tough nut to crack alone.
• Hoover up all of that Elemental Overflow that will be dropping. You’ll need it for the Storm Surge quest Rethelshi gave you, and also as currency for the ilevel 359 gear.
• Eventually a mob will drop a quest item, giving one of four Elemental Cores. Rethelshi wants it and you can turn it in to Rethelshi for 2 Storm Sigils, a currency we’ll be talking about later. There are four such quests each week.
  • Dissipating the Air Primalists
  • Extinguishing the Fire Primalists
  • Shattering the Earth Primalists
  • Vaporizing the Water Primalists
• After you finish Storm Surge and do all four of the Elemental Cores, you’ll end up with 9 Storm Sigils for the week, and 8 Storm Sigils for following weeks because the initial Storm Surge quest does not appear to repeat.

What can you use Elemental Overflow currency to buy?

Both Rethelshi and their assistant Mythressa are vendors. Mythressa sells the various ilevel 359 items available through the event.

• 200 Elemental Overflow for Bracers, Belts and various Cloaks.
• 350 Elemental Overflow for Shoulders, Boots and Gloves.
• 500 Elemental Overflow for Helmet, Breastplate and Legs
• 300 Elemental Overflow for Shields and Off-Hand Items
• 400 Elemental Overflow for 1h weapons like Warglaives, Axes, Maces, Daggers and so on — there are Int and Agi Weapons, so don’t panic, Shaman and Agi folks.
• 800 Elemental Overflow for 2h Weapons, including a gun for Hunters, caster staves, and a 2h sword with Int for you Holy Paladins out there.
• 1000 Elemental Overflow for Ghostflame and Stormie, the two Battle Pets Mythressa sells. Ghostflame is a cute, if terrifying, spiritual entity, while Stormie is an adorable baby Proto-Drake.
• 2000 Elemental Overflow for the Stormhide Salamanther mount. The mount changes according to your riding skill and location, but it cannot fly on the Dragon Isles, just as a heads up.

What can I use Storm Sigils to buy? Where is the ilevel 385 gear?

Not to be outdone, Rethelshi has ilevel 385 versions of each of the items listed above. You will have to trade in the original ilevel 359 item to them, as well as the following cost in Storm Sigils

• 5 Storm Sigils to upgrade Bracers, Belt and Cloak items
• 7 Storm Sigils to upgrade Shoulders, Boots and Gloves
• 10 Storm Sigils for Helmet, Breastplate and legs
• 5 Storm Sigils for Shields and Off-Hand items
• 7 Storm Sigils for 1h weapons
• 14 Storm Sigils for 2h weapons (yes, even that sweet caster sword for you Holy Pallies, and maybe Windwalker Monks)

It’ll cost you roughly 3150 Elemental Overflow to get an item for each available slot — there do not appear to be rings, necklaces or trinkets available at this time — and between 700 more for a 1h weapon and shield or offhand, 800 more for using a single 2h weapons — and a whopping 1600 more for Fury Warriors, who once again pay the coolness tax — that’s between 3850 and 4750 Elemental Overflow to get to a full set of 359 gear.

If you intend to go all the way to ilevel 385, you’ll need between 78 for a Weapon/Shield or Off-Hand, 80 if you use a 2h, and 94 if you’re a Fury Warrior. With eight Storm Sigils available to be earned each week, assuming you collect them all, it’ll be between 9 and 12 weeks to upgrade all your pieces. Even if you’re a grinding machine and gather all the Elemental Overflow you need in a week or two, you’re still going to be waiting three months to complete your new set.

So yes, you can get gear on par with Normal Raiding or Mythic+ to a degree — Heroic and Mythic raiding and higher keystones will still be better — but it’s not going to be as short a grind as it was in the pre-patch. Just be aware of it while trying to farm up that Elemental Overflow. Still, it’s available and you can run it on your own schedule, plus you can select your pieces, meaning that you’ll be able to fill any gear gaps that you’re not getting from the Great Vault or from the raids or Mythics you run.