Note: This guide refers to content from the Shadowlands expansion. Conduits are not active in Dragonflight areas.
Conduits are items that can be used to enhance your player power in WoW Shadowlands. They provide a boost to your abilities and can be upgraded. The process of upgrading a conduit’s item level changed in patch 9.2. So what do you need to do to upgrade a conduit?
In general, you can upgrade conduits by earning higher item-level drops from Shadowlands raid or mythic dungeon bosses, or by achieving a higher PvP ranking. In patch 9.2, you can also purchase items that will upgrade all your conduits at the same time. One is sold by Au’dara near the flight master in Oribos and three others upgrade items are locked behind reputation requirements and achievements in Zereth Mortis.
In this guide, I will walk you through the ways you can obtain and upgrade conduits. I will also provide a few tips on the best way to proceed with upgrades throughout the patch.
Where do you get conduits?
Shadowlands conduits can be obtained by completing covenant callings, world bosses, world quests, the weekly Korthia quest, dungeons, or raids. They can also be purchased by PvP players for conquest.
In patch 9.2, the fastest way to unlock every conduit is with an item like Incense of Infinity or Font of Ephemeral Power.
The Incense of Infinity requires you to reach level 60 and 80 renown. It will unlock every conduit and upgrade them to item level 200. You can buy it from the vendor near the Oribos flight master (Au’dara) for 500 gold.
For a more potent version of the incense, you can buy a Font of Ephemeral Power from Vilo (the Enlightened Quartermaster) in Zereth Mortis. It costs 475 gold and requires a Friendly reputation with the Enlightened faction. It will also unlock all conduits, but will upgrade them to item level 226… but more on that in a moment.
Upgrading Conduits in Zereth Mortis
The introduction of conduit upgrade items in patch 9.1.5 and patch 9.2 completely shook up the conduit upgrade system. Up to that point, you had to upgrade each conduit one at a time through PvE, PvP, or world content. What made it even worse was that you couldn’t choose what to upgrade, it was all random.
In patch 9.2, you can still obtain random drop upgrades, but you can also purchase items that unlock every conduit and upgrade them to the same item levels. We’ve talked about the Incense of Infinity in Oribos, but there are three similar items in Zereth Mortis including:
Let’s look at each one of these and the requirements to buy them.
Font of Ephemeral Power
The first upgrade item you will probably buy is the Font of Ephemeral Power. This little guy can be purchased from the Enlightened Quartermaster in Zereth Mortis (Haven) after reaching friendly. It will unlock every single conduit and upgrade them all to item level 226.
If you have them all unlocked but just need to upgrade them, you can spring for the 475 gold and use the font for that as well!
Decanter of Untapped Potential
Next on your shopping list is likely to be the Decanter of Untapped Potential. This item works in much the same way as the last one, but instead of upgrading all your conduits to 226, it will bump them to 239.
Unfortunately, that extra little power spike also means a higher requirement for purchase. To pick up this bad boy, you’ll need to reach Revered with the Enlightened.
Vessel of Profound Possibilities
The last conduit upgrade item introduced in 9.2 is the Vessel of Profound Possibilities. This monster will raise your conduits to item level 278 but will require you to complete the bulk of the Zereth Mortis storyline and achieve one of the more difficult achievements like Keystone Hero (all +20’s in time) or Mythic Sepulcher.
Upgrading conduits with Korthia items
If you played in patch 9.1, you might still have a few conduit upgrade items left or you could head back and try to pick some up. Overall, there are 2 Korthia items you can use to upgrade your conduits. Let’s take a look at both of these:
Soultwining Crescent
The first is called Soultwining Crescent. This is obtained as a random drop from defeating rare mobs in the Korthia zone.
When used, it will upgrade a random conduit from your collection by 13 levels. This only works on conduits of item level 226 and below. By default, it will upgrade a random conduit based on your current spec.
Once you get one, you can use it at the Forge of Bonds in your covenant sanctum or in Haven.
Death-Bound Shard
The second Korthia item that can be used to upgrade conduits is called Death-Bound Shard. The primary way to get this is to purchase it from Archivist Roh-Suir at Keeper’s Respite.
Purchasing a Death-Bound Shard requires a rep grind to Tier 6 with The Archivists’ Codex. Additionally, it requires 3000 Cataloged Research — one of the new currencies in 9.1. Given these constraints, it will take several weeks of grinding to get the required reputation.
For now, I recommend that you level your conduits through Zereth Mortis and other content where possible.
Upgrading Conduits through M+ and Raids (PvE)
You can obtain conduits for completing dungeon and raids. The item level you receive is based on the difficulty of the content you complete. If you want stronger conduits, you need to complete more challenging content.
If you are a beginner, you can check out my mythic+ guide or dungeons and raids guide.
Upgrading Conduits through PvP
If you are a PvP player, you can obtain conduits by purchasing them in Oribos for conquest. The item level is based on your current ranking. If you want stronger conduits, focus on climbing your way through the ranks!
Getting Conduit Upgrades from Torghast
In addition to PvE and PvP, you can also loot Death-Bound Shard in Torghast. To do this will require unlocking The Adamant Vaults.
To enter The Adamant Vaults, you need to unlock it on your Box of Many Things. Then you need to execute a flawless Torghast run.
Tips for Upgrading Conduits in Patch 9.2
We have talked about a few ways to upgrade your conduits; lets me provide you with a few tips.
1. Prioritize Zereth Mortis upgrades
While old Korthia conduit upgrade items still work in patch 9.2, you will want to prioritize unlocking Font of Ephemeral Power and/or Decanter of Untapped Potential as soon as you can. If you have a few Death-Bound Shard, you can easily buy the Zereth Mortis item that upgrades everything to 239 and then use the shard. That will save you a lot of pain in the long run and you’ll have one or more 252 conduits.
2. Don’t forget upgrades from PvE and PvP
While there are great items you can use to catch up or upgrade conduits, don’t forget that you can also get higher-level conduits from other activities. In addition to the changes we already talked about, patch 9.2 also made it possible to get any conduit from any dungeon.
If you are into pushing m+ keys, you can keep pushing higher and higher to get stronger conduits!
3. Avoid using Death-Bound Shard if you have many conduits at low levels
Since Death-Bound Shard works until conduit level 252, you should save these if you have many conduits at lower levels. The best strategy would be to follow the previous tip and then use Soultwining Crescent when needed.
4. Do Torghast for a chance at extra shards
I get it; there has been a mixed reaction to Torghast. And by mixed, I mean that many players don’t enjoy it.
However, Torghast is a decent way to upgrade conduits. Once you unlock The Adamant Vaults perk and score a flawless run, you’ll have a chance to receive a Death-Bound Shard!
Recap
As a quick recap, the system for upgrading conduits has changed in patch 9.2. Instead of using all upgrade tokens, you can now buy items that upgrade all your conduits at once!
Hopefully, that helps clarify some confusion you had. I will continue to update this article as the patch unfolds so you can use it as a resource.
I wanted to also include some frequently asked questions. Also, let me know if there is anything I missed or if you found another/better way to upgrade conduits! If you have any that you want answered make sure to add them in the comments and I will answer them in the list.
Frequently Asked Questions
If you played in the last patch, you might recall that Ve’nari offered a conduit upgrade item called Unbound Reality Fragment. Unfortunately, this item was removed and replaced with Soultwining Crescent and Death-Bound Shard in 9.1.
You might actually need more than 54 tokens. I believe the wording on the tokens isn’t correctly saying what it actually does. The tokens upgrade your conduits by 1 rank. So let’s say you have ranks of 140, 150, 160, 170, 226.
Instead of upgrading from X to 226 You would go from 140 to 150 for example. So in this instance you would need 5 tokens to get 1 conduit to 226. Combined with the randomization you may need around 500 tokens to get your conduits to 252.
Thanks for your comment. You are correct that the upgrade items only move it 1 rank (about 13 ilvls at a time). In my example I was calculating it for my druid where all my conduits are above 200, but you would definitely need more if you had lower ranks.
My all conduits are 226 can i use Death bound shard to get 252 or i should upgrade conduit to 239 ?
You can use the Death Bound Shard no matter what level your conduits are but it will only add 13 item levels at a time. In other words, you will need to use 2 Shards per conduit to get them from 226 to 252. If all your conduits are 226 you should be good to start using the Death Bound Shards. Just make sure you are in the spec you like to play when you use them because they will prioritize upgrading your 226’s for your spec first and then 226’s for the other specs next.