Lost Ark guide: How Engravings work and where to unlock them

Engravings are one of the endgame sources of power for your Lost Ark characters. Each class gets two unique Engravings. Plus, there are 43 Combat Engravings that can be used by any class. The whole system appears complex at first glance. However, it’s simple to understand and plan your build once you learn the basics of Engravings.

The first thing you will need to do is collect Engraving Recipes to unlock specific Engravings. You can get chests or bags that will allow you to choose specific Engravings, as well as ones that will give you a random Engraving. You need to use 20 Uncommon recipes of a specific Engraving to unlock it. Then you can upgrade it by using 20 Rare recipes, followed by 20 Epic recipes, and finally 20 Legendary recipes. This will give you the maximum level of one Engraving.

There isn’t much more to unlocking Engravings. It’s straightforward but time-consuming. And it can be expensive when you’re trying to track down the final few recipes of a specific Engraving on the market. So, I highly recommend you plan a build before using specific recipes. Engraving Recipes can be earned as rewards for endgame dungeons, raids, the Tower, Island Adventures, side quests, secret dungeons, and by spending Perception Shards. You can see all of the Engravings in Lost Ark, as well as how far you have unlocked each one by pressing Alt+I. So, why do you want to upgrade your Engravings?

How to equip Engravings and empower your Lost Ark character

The image above shows the main window you need to look at to see how much benefit you are receiving from your Engravings. As you can see, each Engraving you have equipped has three tiers. Each tier gives you a more powerful version of the Engraving. For example, Robust Spirit, one of the Soulfist Engravings, causes you to go straight into your strongest power-up. At level one, the Engraving increases your damage by 10% while in this more powerful form. At level two, it increases your damage by 20%. And at level three, it increases your power-up damage by 30%.

To reach higher levels of an Engraving, you need to access more nodes. These are the diamond-shaped markers in the image above. Each Engraving has its own nodes. You need to completely fill a level to access the Engravings power. So, five nodes give you level one, 10 nodes give you level two, and 15 nodes give you level three. As you can see for Robust Spirit in the image above, six nodes give you no more benefit than five. Remember when we talked about unlocking higher tiers for Engravings with recipes? The Uncommon tier will give you three nodes. Each tier beyond that adds another three to a maximum of 12 at the Legendary tier.

Now, let’s talk about different ways to add nodes to your equipped Engravings. If you look at the image above, you can see two slots on the lower left of your character’s image where you equip Engravings. You can use two of the same Engraving in those two slots if you need more nodes to reach a higher level of an Engraving.

Other ways to get Engraving nodes

Unlocking higher tiers of your Engravings to equip in your two Engraving slots will give you the most nodes. However, you can also gain them from Ability Stones, earrings, rings, and your necklace. Later in the game, Engraving nodes will start being included on your jewelry. It’s a matter of finding items that possess the ones you want. You may need to resort to the market to find the perfect ones. Thankfully, you will be able to sell ones that you don’t need.

Here you can see the Engraving nodes an Ability Stone is contributing to my character.

Ability Stones are an item that drops from numerous monsters, bosses, and endgame content. You need to take these to an NPC to facet them before they can be used. So, when an Ability Stone drops that has the Engravings you want on it, you can attempt to facet it. This is a random system that can be partially controlled. You can see how the Ability Stone faceting process works in the video below. Notice how the chance of the next node succeeding goes down when you gain a node, but goes up when you fail a node.

One thing to keep in mind when equipping jewelry and Ability Stones is that they will also add negative Engravings to your character. As with the Class and Combat Engravings, these need to reach level one (five nodes) before they will have any effect. So, try to ensure your different pieces of jewelry and Ability Stone have different negative Engravings to prevent this.

If you’d like more help with your adventures and characters, you can check out our Lost Ark guides and features hub.