Ascended gear is the best possible gear a character can have in terms of stats, being that the difference between a Legendary item and an ascended item is that a Legendary allows the change of stats freely. Ascended gear can be changed if it’s armor or weapon. Ascended gear in the slot of accessories, amulets and rings cannot be changed. If you would like to learn how to change the stats, you can follow the guide here.
For each game mode, PvP, WvW and PvE there is a set of ascended gear to be collected, the items and materials will differ depending on how the player decides to acquire them. To get the ascended gear, most players will choose to level up their crafting for the armor and weapons.
Ascended Gear GW2 Crafting Dependencies
Crafting Light Ascended Gear dependencies: Tailor (Lvl 500)
Crafting Medium Ascended Gear dependencies: Leatherworker (Lvl 500)
Crafting Heavy Ascended Gear dependencies: Armorsmith (Lvl 500)
Crafting ascended greatswords, ascended daggers, ascended axes, ascended swords, ascended maces, hammers, ascended spears, and ascended shields dependencies: Weaponsmith (Lvl 500)
Crafting ascended focus, ascended tridents, ascended staves and ascended scepters dependencies: Artificier (Lvl 500)
Crafting ascended Shortbows, ascended pistols, ascended longbows, ascended rifles, ascended harpoon, ascended torches, and ascended warhorns dependencies: Huntsman (Lvl 500)
Grandmaster Marks are cross game modes and only needed to learn in one character
Without crafting, it is possible to get the ascended gear through PVP, but it will take longer without the ability to craft the Grandmaster Marks and just earning the lesser marks.
Guild Wars 2 ascended gear is different from most MMORPGs where the main goal is to continuously improve the gear. In GW2 the main focus is to enjoy the game. When gearing up you can focus any game mode you feel like, either do all in one way or go for a bit of each and in the end your character will be geared equally.
PvE Ascended Gear GW2
To get a PvE set of ascended Weapon and Armor, the first thing to do is to level up the proper crafting for the desired ascended gear. When reaching max level in the crafting, a recipe for the desired ascended gear and attributes needs to be acquired from the crafting seller, in the Ascended Recipes tab. Please make sure you know what attributes you are after before crafting, has changing will require even more materials.
For a list of attributes/stats and links to websites that can help with the decision, please visit our resource page for Guild Wars 2 (Gw2) here.
After learning the recipe, the crafting material for the ascended gear will vary from type of armor, however the following items are usually needed:
Lesser Vision Crystal or Vision Crystal – Both can be crafted, Vision Crystal can be selected at the login bonus as the final reward
Ascended Insignia – The recipe can be bought at the crafting trainer in the Insignia tab
2 pieces that form the gear – These items usually have one component that can be crafted once a day, but can be bought at the Black Lion Trading Company
Bitterfrost Frontier – Living Season 3, A Crack in the Ice
Regarding the Amulet, Accessories, Back and Rings there are several ways to acquire them. The easiest way to obtain them in PvE is to do the berry collection from the Bitterfrost Frontier, and buying the amulet when there is enough laurels, since they are required to craft the rest of the items. Living World Season 3 is not free and requires 200 gems or about 100+ gold to be traded to gems, depending on the market.
Fractals of The Mist Ascended Gear GW2
Another way to farm the gear is to do the daily Fractals of the Mist in Lion’s Arch. See the image below for the entrance. These will allow buying the Rings with Pristine Fractal Relic quickly. The rest of the gear will take more time. Like in PvP/WvW in order to buy the weapons and armor Grandmaster Marks will be needed. These are crafted by professions, additional gold and Fractal Research Pages will be needed to exchange for Ascended armor and weapons at the merchant BLING-9009 inside the Fractals. In the Ascended Vendor Recipes tab, there are several dependencies that are needed to craft the ascended gear. These might look a bit harder to get into when playing solo, but the LFG tool will help to quickly join a party and start gearing up.
Raid Ascended Gear GW2
Raids are a great way to get ascended gear, but even with Emboldement Raid buff, a more organized group is required to carry a lesser geared character. Chances are, when entering raids most of the gear is ascended already, if not all. Still a great way to farm ascended gear for different builds.
Open World Events Ascended Gear in GW2
There are several open world events that reward Ascended gear, Tequatl the Sunless, Dragonstorm, Tripple Trouble, among others. The chance to drop ascended gear is low.
