Item honing in Zarhold: how to upgrade gear to +20 in a card MMORPG

Honing has come to Zarhold, a card MMORPG in your browser: level 60 weapons, armor and jewelry can now be honed from +1 to +20. Every step adds Power, Health and Hardiness to the item, and +10, +15 and +20 unlock special milestone bonuses. A failed attempt never destroys the item and never takes its pluses away. Here is what can be honed, what you hone it with, the chances and the road to +20. All tables with numbers are in the Knowledge Base: Honing +1…+20.

What can be honed

• Weapons — everything in hand and ranged; a shield counts as a weapon too.
• Armor and jewelry — armor pieces, neck, rings, trinkets, cloak.
• Shirts, tabards and bags cannot be honed. Heirloom and account-bound (turquoise) items cannot be honed at all.

Only an item that requires level 60 to wear can be honed (item level does not matter), and only a level 60 hero can hone it. A honed item becomes soulbound.

How to hone an item: item menu → “Hone”

Open the item menu and press “Hone”. The honing window shows everything before you press anything: “was → becomes” for Power, Health and Hardiness, the chance, the guarantee, what the attempt takes and what failure will do. Missing a scroll or a reagent? The window tells you exactly what and where to get it.

An attempt needs three things:

1. The scroll for that step — one scroll per attempt, used up whatever the result.
2. Reagents — Tempering Essence and Nexus Crystal on the low steps, Unstable Runes from +10.
3. A gold fee — from 10g at +1 to 1,500g at +20.

Step by step, from the first attempt to +10 — the guide Your first honing.

Honing scrolls are made by enchanters

Scrolls for each step are made by an enchanter — the Enchanting profession, skill 300, a level 60 hero. Recipes are bought from the enchanting trainer once per hero. Scrolls themselves are not sold for gold: an enchanter makes them from crafting materials, and the high steps need rare reagents from heroics, mythics and keys.

• +1…+9 — Weapon Honing Scroll and Armor Reinforcement Scroll (recipe 500g);
• +10 — Blade Threshold Scroll and Armor Threshold Scroll (1,000g);
• +11…+14 — Greater Weapon Honing Scroll and Greater Armor Reinforcement Scroll (1,500g);
• +15 — Flame Blade Scroll and Flame Armor Scroll (2,000g);
• +16…+19 — Starlit Weapon Honing Scroll and Starlit Armor Reinforcement Scroll (3,000g);
• +20 — Scroll of Ascension: Blade and Scroll of Ascension: Armor (5,000g).

No enchanter of your own? Step scrolls can be bought at the auction or ordered on the Order Board. Where every reagent comes from and how many you need — Honing: reagents and recipes. How to choose and level a profession — Professions in an MMORPG.

+1…+9: honing with a guarantee

The first nine steps are the calmest. At +1…+3 an attempt cannot fail at all, and after that the built-in guarantee works: success by the 2nd attempt at +4 and +5, by the 3rd at +6 and +7, by the 4th at +8 and +9. So getting from +0 to +9 takes no more than 21 scrolls — you know the road in advance.

A failure at +4…+9 breaks the item: repair it at a vendor for gold. The pluses stay — repair it and keep honing. There is no weekly attempt limit on these steps.

+10…+19: risk of overheating or the Seal of Steadfastness

From +10 the risk begins. Every attempt here has two paths:

• with risk — Unstable Runes go into the attempt, and the chance depends on the step (25% for a weapon at +10, 35% for armor and jewelry);
• without risk — a Seal of Steadfastness goes in instead of runes: 100% success, no overheating, no cracks. Details — The Seal of Steadfastness and the Scroll of Transference.

A failed risky attempt overheats the item: for 1 hour at +10, for 5 hours at +11…+19. An overheated item gives nothing until it cools, and cooling only starts when you press “Cool down” and use a Scroll of Restoration. From +16 every failure also leaves a crack: the third crack takes one step away, but the item never drops below +15.

Before a risky attempt the game asks twice: first it shows what failure will do, then it asks you to type “HONE” or hold the button. You cannot take a risk by accident.

+20: the Ascension ritual

The last step is special. Only the Ascension ritual with a Scroll of Ascension leads to +20: a 10% chance for a weapon and 15% for armor and jewelry, no guarantee, the Seal does not work, one attempt per week per hero. A failure burns the scroll and overheats the item for 24 hours.

A success is remembered: the item gets the permanent line “Ascended to +20 by …”, a blood-red frame and glow, and the whole world hears about it in the World chat.

Weekly attempt limits

To keep honing a long-term goal, the high steps are limited per week per hero: +10…+14 — 10 attempts, +15…+19 — 5 attempts, +20 — 1 ritual. There is no limit at +1…+9. An attempt with a Seal counts toward the limit of its step. The reset is on Monday at 03:00 Moscow time, together with the other resets. The honing window shows how many attempts are left right under the fee.

What honing gives

Every step adds Power, Health and Hardiness to the item itself — the stronger the item, the bigger the bonus. Armor and jewelry gain half as much as weapons at the same step, but their chance is higher. Enchantments, overlays and gems add up with honing rather than multiply.

At +10, +15 and +20 weapons and armor unlock milestones: Keen Edge, Flame Strike and Tyrant Breaker for weapons, Fortitude, Bastion and Undying for armor and jewelry. What each one does and how they stack — Honing milestones +10, +15, +20.

Important: honing power and milestones work against creatures — in the lands, dungeons, raids and Mythic+ keys. In PvP (arena, battleground, duels, tournaments) honing is appearance only. How to gear up a level 60 hero — Level 60 gear.

What a honed item looks like

The honing mark shows on the item icon — on the paper doll, in the bag, bank, tooltip and Armory — and in its name. Marks are free: the step itself gives them. Up to +4 — a small grey “+N”, from +5 — a white frame, from +10 — a golden frame and glow, from +15 — a fiery orange frame and sparks with a pattern of their own for each kind of item, at +20 — a blood-red pulsing frame and a crimson glow on the hero.

Item honing FAQ

Can an item be lost when honing fails?

No. An item never disappears and never loses pluses from a failure. There is one exception — cracks at +16…+19: three cracks take one step away, but never below +15.

From what level can I hone items?

From level 60: only a level 60 hero can hone, and only items that require level 60 to wear. Heirloom and turquoise items cannot be honed.

How many scrolls do I need to reach +9?

From 9 to 21: the guarantee works at +1…+9, and success on every step comes by the 2nd–4th attempt at the latest.

Does honing work in PvP?

No. In the arena, battleground, duels and tournaments honing is appearance only. Its power is for the lands, dungeons, raids and keys.

Can I hone without risk after +10?

Yes — with a Seal of Steadfastness at +10…+19 success is 100%. The Seal does not work at +20: only the Ascension ritual leads there.

What if I switch to a new item?

Honing can be moved with a Scroll of Transference onto an item of the same slot — losing two steps. Details — The Seal of Steadfastness and the Scroll of Transference.