If you’ve just hit item level 802 in Lost Ark and are staring at your upgrade menu wondering why every piece of gear requires piles of new materials you’ve never seen before, you’re not alone. A lot of players hit a wall once they leave tier 1 content, because they don’t know where to look for the specific shards, leaps, and stones they need to push to tier 3. Figuring out how to get tier 2 mats in Lost Ark doesn’t have to mean grinding 12 hours a day, either. With a bit of planning and knowledge of the highest-yield sources, you can farm enough materials to hit 1100 item level in a couple of weeks, even if you only play a few hours a day.
How to Get Tier 2 Mats in Lost Ark: Core Weekly and Daily Activities First
The fastest way to stack tier 2 mats is to prioritize low-effort, high-reward daily and weekly activities before you touch any open world farming or extra dungeon runs. These activities give you guaranteed drops, and their bonus loot rates are exponentially higher than any other source in the game right now. You don’t have to complete every single one if you’re a casual player, but even knocking out two or three of them a day will get you enough mats to upgrade consistently.
Chaos Dungeons (Tier 2, 802-1100 ilvl) give you two bonus loot runs per day, and each run drops hundreds of destruction and guardian shards, plus a steady supply of tier 2 leap stones. If you can push your ilvl to 960, run the higher tier 2 chaos dungeons, as they drop honor leap stones that you’ll need for the final pushes to 1100 ilvl. Once you use up your two bonus runs, stop running chaos dungeons for the day, the drop rate drops to almost nothing after that.
Tier 2 Guardian Raids give you two bonus loot runs per day, and they’re your best source of bound leap stones, which you can only use on your current character. If you’re struggling to beat the higher ilvl guardians, join a learning party or matchmake with other players, you don’t need to be a pro to clear them. Just make sure you bring the correct battle items like flare grenades and destruction bombs to speed up runs.
Una’s Tasks are another non-negotiable source of tier 2 mats. Prioritize daily and weekly tasks that give tier 2 leap stone chests as rewards, instead of ones that give gold or rapport items. You can also exchange your weekly Una’s tokens for large tier 2 mat chests at the Una’s Token vendor in any major city, that’s a free stack of mats every week for just completing a few simple tasks.
Hidden Low-Effort Sources of Tier 2 Materials You’re Probably Missing
Most new tier 2 players only stick to chaos dungeons and guardian raids, but there are tons of hidden one-time and recurring sources of tier 2 mats that require almost no effort to claim. I once got enough honor leap stones from three tier 2 island quests to skip three days of guardian raid grinding, so it’s absolutely worth taking a break from dungeons to knock these out when you have extra time.
Island Souls and Adventure Tome Rewards are the biggest hidden source of free tier 2 mats. Tier 2 islands like Azure Wind Island, Panda Island, and Dreamgull Island have short, easy quest lines that take less than an hour to complete, and they reward thousands of shards and dozens of leap stones for finishing them. You can also get large mat chests for collecting 10, 15, or 20 island souls, or for completing 60% or 80% of any tier 2 region’s adventure tome.
Event Shop Rewards are another easy source most players sleep on. Almost every ongoing Lost Ark event has tier 2 mat bundles available for cheap event currency, even if you only log in for daily check-ins you can get enough currency to grab a few bundles a week. Some events even give out free unbound leap stones, which you can either use on your main or sell on the auction house for gold if you don’t need them.
Guild Vendor Rewards are perfect for players in active guilds. You earn guild bloodstones by completing weekly guild missions, and you can exchange them for bound tier 2 mat chests every week. The cost is extremely low, and you can usually get enough bloodstones just by completing three or four simple guild missions a week. If you’re not in a guild right now, join a casual PvE guild, most of them have no requirements other than logging in once a week.
Efficient Open World Farming Routes for Extra Tier 2 Mats
If you’ve already finished your daily and weekly activities and want to grind extra mats for future upgrades, open world farming is a great option. The drop rates are lower than bonus dungeon runs, but you can farm as much as you want without any entry limits, and you can make extra gold from rare drops you find along the way. Stick to these high-density farming spots to get the most mats per hour:
- Yorn’s Cradle of the Sea Fomona: This area has dense packs of low-health mobs that drop tons of tier 2 destruction and guardian shards, plus occasional rare material chests. It’s perfect for solo farming, even for squishy classes like Sorceress or Sharpshooter, and the mobs respawn every 20 seconds so you never have to wait for new spawns.
- Feiton’s Kalthertz Central District: The mob packs here respawn in 30 seconds or less, and you can get extra drops from the random world bosses that spawn every few hours. You’ll also get Feiton adventure tome progress while you farm, which is a nice bonus that can get you even more free mats later.
- Rohendel’s Elzowin’s Shade: This spot has higher health mobs than the other two, but they drop a small chance of unbound tier 2 leap stones, which you can either use or sell on the auction house for gold if you don’t need them. It’s the best spot to farm if you want to make extra gold while you grind for mats.
Important note: Don’t waste your time farming open world if you haven’t finished your daily bonus chaos dungeon and guardian raid runs first. The bonus drop rate on those activities is 10x higher than open world drops, so they’re always a better use of your time. If you do plan on farming for an hour or more, use a green loot scroll to double your drops, it’s well worth the small gold cost.
How to Stretch Your Tier 2 Mats to Avoid Unnecessary Farming
A lot of players waste 20-30% of their tier 2 mats on avoidable mistakes, which means they have to grind way more than they need to. Making a few small changes to how you use your mats can cut your required farming time by almost a third, without slowing down your progression at all.
Don’t upgrade every piece of gear equally. Your weapon and shoulder pieces give the biggest item level boost per upgrade, so prioritize those first to hit the next ilvl threshold for higher tier 2 content faster. You can leave your lower-impact pieces like gloves or boots at +12 until you’re almost ready for tier 3, that will save you thousands of shards and dozens of leap stones. You can still clear all tier 2 content even if your lower pieces are a few levels behind, so don’t waste mats upgrading them early.
Use bound mats first, save unbound mats for alts or selling. A lot of players make the mistake of using unbound mats they get from events or open world farming on their main, when they could save those for an alt character or sell them for gold to buy other materials they need. Bound mats are useless on other characters, so always use those first before you touch any unbound mats in your inventory.
Take advantage of upgrade success rate events. The devs regularly run events that give 10-20% extra success chance for gear upgrades, or reduce the material cost per upgrade by 30%. If you have a stack of mats saved up, wait for one of these events to do your upgrades, you’ll save 20-30% of your materials on average. I waited for a 20% success rate event last month and only wasted 2 upgrade attempts when pushing my main to 1100 ilvl, which saved me almost 50 honor leap stones.
At the end of the day, figuring out how to get tier 2 mats in Lost Ark is all about prioritizing high-reward activities first, and avoiding common mistakes that waste your time and resources. You don’t have to play 8 hours a day to gear up fast, even casual players can hit tier 3 in a month if they stick to the highest-yield sources and don’t waste mats on unnecessary upgrades. If you’re feeling stuck, take an afternoon to run through a few tier 2 islands, clear your weekly Una’s tasks, and you’ll be shocked at how many mats you can get without running a single dungeon. Just remember to have fun along the way, don’t burn yourself out grinding for mats if it stops being enjoyable.