How much will it cost to fully upgrade all of your Radiant Echoes gear?

With the Warbound gear finally starting to flow in World of Warcraft thanks to major buffs to the Radiant Echoes event, the next thing on many players’ minds will be upgrading that gear. After all, 480 is good, but it’s not the best, and with WoW players often being conditioned to seek out the best, sometimes it can be a good idea to have a little reality check to see exactly how much extra currency you’d need to grind out outside of the event to fully upgrade those drops.

The exact numbers are nearly impossible to find for Flightstones because prices vary by slot and upgrade track, but part of the issue is that for the most part you will be doing these upgrades on alts who haven’t been grinding the required materials — while the gear itself is Warbound, the upgrade material are not, and upgrading an item will soulbind it to that character (so no workaround of using those resources you’ve been accumulating on your Season 4 main, sorry).

Also keep in mind that while these numbers are shockingly high, if you already have an item of a higher item level on another character, you’ll halve the Flightstone cost. As you’ll see, that takes it from “wildly unrealistic” to just “very unrealistic.”

Veteran track gear (upgrading from 480 to 502) — the items you get as random drops or by buying them from a vendor

• Helmet: 940 Flightstones, 45 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 60 Drake’s Awakened Crests
• Neck: 495 Flightstones, 45 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 60 Drake’s Awakened Crests
• Shoulders: 780 Flightstones, 45 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 60 Drake’s Awakened Crests
• Back: 495 Flightstones, 45 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 60 Drake’s Awakened Crests
• Chest: 940 Flightstones, 45 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 60 Drake’s Awakened Crests
• Wrists: 495 Flightstones, 45 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 60 Drake’s Awakened Crests
• Hands: 780 Flightstones, 45 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 60 Drake’s Awakened Crests
• Waist: 780 Flightstones, 45 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 60 Drake’s Awakened Crests
• Legs: 940 Flightstones, 45 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 60 Drake’s Awakened Crests
• Feet: 780 Flightstones, 45 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 60 Drake’s Awakened Crests
• Rings: 495 Flightstones, 45 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 60 Drake’s Awakened Crests (each)
• Trinkets: 780 Flightstones, 45 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 60 Drake’s Awakened Crests (each)
• 1H Weapon: 1275 Flightstones, 45 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 60 Drake’s Awakened Crests
• Offhand or Shield: 495 Flightstones, 45 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 60 Drake’s Awakened Crests
• 2H Weapon: 1950 Flightstones, 45 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 60 Drake’s Awakened Crests
  • Grand total: 675 Whelpling’s Awakened Crests, 900 Drake’s Awakened Crests, and anywhere from 11745 to 11925 Flightstones, depending on what combination of main hand and offhand you wield. If you had the upgrade discount in every slot, you’re instead looking at 5873-5963 Flightstones.

Champion track gear (upgrading from 493 to 515) — the items you get once per week by using a Token of the Remembrancers

• Helmet: 1115 Flightstones, 45 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 60 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests
• Neck: 585 Flightstones, 45 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 60 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests
• Shoulders: 920 Flightstones, 45 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 60 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests
• Back: 585 Flightstones, 45 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 60 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests
• Chest: 1115 Flightstones, 45 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 60 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests
• Wrists: 585 Flightstones, 45 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 60 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests
• Hands: 920 Flightstones, 45 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 60 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests
• Waist: 920 Flightstones, 45 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 60 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests
• Legs: 1115 Flightstones, 45 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 60 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests
• Feet: 920 Flightstones, 45 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 60 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests
• Rings: 585 Flightstones, 45 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 60 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests (each)
• Trinkets: 920 Flightstones, 45 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 60 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests (each)
• 1H Weapon: 1775 Flightstones, 45 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 60 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests
• Offhand or Shield: 585 Flightstones, 45 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 60 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests
• 2H Weapon: 2300 Flightstones, 45 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 60 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests
  • Grand total: 675 Drake’s Awakened Crests, 900 Wyrm’s Awakened Crests, and anywhere from 14150 to 14675 Flightstones, depending on what combination of main hand and offhand you wield. If you had the upgrade discount in every slot, you’re instead looking at 7075 to 7338 Flightstones.

This is, frankly, ridiculous. Even with full discounts, the Flightstone cost alone is 2.5 to 3.5 the Flightstone currency cap. Not to mention the fact that, yes, the Radiant Echoes events are dropping some crests and Flightstones now; to the best of my knowledge, they don’t drop Wyrm’s Crests, which means if you really wanted to upgrade this gear, you would be required to either run Mythic+ or Heroic Raids.

There are two conclusions you can draw here:

1. This is intentional, characters are not intended to bother upgrading this gear too much as it will be replaced shortly into The War Within‘s questing experience, and no one should bother upgrading further than what the events drop — so a piece here and there to 3/8 or 4/8 and call it good.
2. Or, Blizzard didn’t do the math on their own upgrade system for gear intended to be primary funneled to alts to realize how absurd these costs are, and this is a mistake that should be corrected.

The ideal solution would be that sometime in the next week or so, these items are updated to be able to be upgraded with Residual Memories. This currency is already Warband-transferable — so it can be funneled to where it would be most useful — and with drop rates of both gear and currency increasing, the currency is rapidly going to become useless for many people. Being able to use it to upgrade this gear ensures both that it finds a use, and that your potential new mains spring into early access as powerful as they can be.

But frankly, unless that change comes along? Don’t bother. Enjoy the event, get some sweet new looks, and don’t even think about the absurd grind that this would require.