How Gearing Will Work in SWTOR 8.0: All the Details from the November Let’s Play PTS Livestream

Eric Musco hosted a “Let’s Play” livestream on November 6th, 2026, on SWTOR’s 8.0 PTS #9. One of the main topics of the stream was detailing the upcoming gearing changes, which will be the focus of this article.

The devs are aware of how they reinvent the wheel with gearing process every single expansion. This time, they’re really trying to take the lessons they learned from both the 6.0 and 7.0 gearing systems and iterating on both for 8.0.

Single-Track System

There will only be a single gearing track in 8.0 instead of the separate tracks for each content type like we have right now.

The track will be called “Kalikoran” after the Twi’lek Kalikori heirloom that’s basically their family tree in the form of a totem. The new planet in 8.0 is Ryloth, the Twi’lek homeworld.

You’ll make progress towards upgrading gear regardless of which type of content you’re doing, though more difficult and time-consuming content will reward more.

This vertical side of gearing seems similar to how it was in 6.0 where everyone can get access to the best equipment.

The PvP-exclusive Expertise stat is also returning, but you can only find the stat on dedicated augments that you’ll earn from PvPing, likely an effort to preserve the single-track gearing system.

Upgrade Terminal

Like in 7.0, the focus will continue to be on upgrading the gear that you have, but there will be a new Gear Upgrade Terminal with dedicated UI rather than relying on the clunky vendor system.

All secondary components like augments, color crystals, tunings, and dyes are automatically preserved with upgrades in the new system, so you don’t have to worry about ripping things out or accidentally destroying something precious when upgrading.

This upgrade process will apply both to leveling with the new Classic and Expert Ventures as well as endgame gearing.

Upgrade Currencies

Tech Fragments are sticking around, but the currencies introduced in 7.0 will be going away with the launch of 8.0, including Conquest Commendations, FP-1 Stabilizers, OP-1 Catalysts, and WZ-1 Accelerants.

They’ll be replacing those 7.0 currencies with 2 new ones that you can earn from all content. The new currencies are called Force Imbued Fragment and Force-harnessing Shard, and, again, Tech Fragments will still be a thing.

The idea is that you use both types of Fragments for every upgrade, and then you need Force-harnessing Shards to upgrade rarity/quality (like green to blue or blue to purple).

It’s unclear why we need both Tech Fragments and Force Imbued Fragments. It feels just as redundant as Tech Fragments and Conquest Commendations are right now, but maybe they’ll have them drop from different places.

They haven’t updated any of the weeklies with the new currencies yet, and they don’t even have icons.

Once you reach the item ceiling (380 purple), you can spend more upgrade currencies to customize the tertiary stat on that piece of gear, so DPS and healer gear can be customized to have a Critical, Alacrity, or Accuracy Rating, and tank gear can be customized to have Shield or Absorb Rating on it.

Since the only thing players really change is that tertiary stat, the customization feature will replace moddable gear and Hyde and Zeek. Gone are the days of being able to stick Lethal mods in tank gear. You’ll take your Defense Rating and you’ll like it!

Legendary implants will carry over from 7.0 and upgrading them will require Tech Fragments and credits (and probably Force Imbued Fragments as well).

You’ll use the Upgrade Terminal rather than Lonndar Eadwinn’s droid vendor to upgrade the implants, and, notably, once you hit the max upgrade ceiling, you can customize the tertiary stat on your legendary implants as well!

Gearing Alts

Broadsword is also moving from Bind to Legacy to Bind to Character for endgame gear. They want you to have a set of gear for every toon so that it’s harder to lose a piece of gear or accidentally equip the wrong thing on an alt.

They don’t want you to go through the whole entire upgrade process for every toon, so you will have access to a catch-up vendor that offers gear that may be equal to or lower than whichever toon has the best gear.

Their example is if your best-geared toon has iRating 362, you’ll be able to buy gear from that vendor for your alts that starts at iRating 358 instead of the baseline 352, but then goes on to say that once you get 358 gear, all your alts can get 358 gear.

It’s unclear whether the catch-up vendor sells gear that’s equal or 1-2 upgrade steps lower than your best-geared toon.

Either way, the experience of gearing alts is similar to what you can do with Hyde and Zeek where you upgrade one toon to the max to unlock the same quality gear for your alts.

The only things you might want to transfer are tactical items and implants, though costly augments complicate matters a fair bit.

There will not be a new tier of augments with the launch of 8.0, so we’ll still be using the level 80 augments added with Update 7.7, though there will likely be other ways to obtain the requisite crafting materials, if not the schematics as well.

Eric Musco said on stream that they are aware of how expensive augments are, especially the top-shelf gold 318s, and they are looking into ways to reduce the cost, but they have to balance that with augments being the only real source of money for crafters.

The only way to get armor at the start of 8.0 will be by spending the currencies you get and buy each piece from the vendor. Bosses and missions will only reward currencies, not the pieces themselves.

They plan to add armor drops (or something like it) in 8.1 as a sort of random bonus reward for content that takes longer or is more challenging to do, so I would expect to see these bonus armor drops more frequently in A Traitor Among the Chiss, not Hammer Station.

This gear will be an automatic upgrade for your current worst piece of gear, just like how gear drops work right now.

Broadsword is really trying to avoid incentivizing players to farm the same piece of content over and over again. They don’t want you doing Hammer Station or DF/DP or Nefra NiM a thousand times in a row because it’s just not fun. The game should reward you for doing a variety of content, and this is a game, not your job.

Venture Gearing

Players will also get to upgrade their gear at one of these terminals while participating in the new difficulty-focused Classic and Expert Ventures.

You’ll earn Challenge Tokens for defeating shiny enemies, which you can exchange at new vendor on each planet for fancy purple gear that you can upgrade at said terminals.

One of the Venture rewards is a new gold rarity armor set for each origin story. Once you get a piece of this gold gear, you’ll also unlock it on the vendor to buy and use on other toons.

This legendary armor set is just one of the rewards you’ll get for completing each Venture. Eric Musco is hyping it up a lot, and it seems one of the rewards may be some sort of Black and Gold Enhanced Dye.

First Impressions from PTS

We have absolutely no idea what the final pacing will be, but going from 352 all the way up to 380 in 2-step increments (28 steps) is quite a lot compared to 7.0’s ~14 steps. I suspect they’re shooting for a feel similar to 6.0, which went from 270 to 306 (36 steps) pretty rapidly.

You’ll probably spend more of your time buying implants and tactical items, so you don’t have to trade them around with your alts. Hopefully, Lonndar Eadwinn will cut us a deal on upgrades and initial purchases.

The new upgrade interface conveys upgrade information really well and feels slick to use. It’s a lot better than the clunky vendor upgrade system, and there’s not a boatload of vendors to keep track of nor a bunch of loot to sift through like we had in past expansions.

Once you max out your gear and unlock customization, I’d like to see the iRating progress bar on the right change to depict how close you are to the equipped stat threshold associated with the tertiary stat you’d be switching to, or at least the impact on your Damage/Survivability/Healing.

Regardless, everything feels purposeful and efficient, including the fact that moddable gear is going away. The only real thing players use mods to customize is the tertiary stat on the Enhancement, and the new system enables that functionality without relying on the complexity of mods, including enabling you to customize the tertiary stat on implants!

The biggest hurdle left to address is augments on alt gear, but they can just make all operations (or likely just the new raid on Nul’s ship) drop 8x the crafting mats that you’d get from Relentless Replication.

That will enable players to craft enough augments for a full 8-toon legendary legacy while crafters rake in a similar number of credits compared to now.

Broadsword could adjust that 8x modifier using internal data about the average number of alts endgame players currently use to ensure that supply and demand rise in tandem.

I’m not so sure about the plan for loot dropping from bosses. To me, it seems like reintroducing Renown as a supplementary system instead would make more sense. You’d get RXP for doing everything (with the amount scaling with difficulty and time) and each box could contain an assortment of rewards including armor pieces.

Such a system might be more convoluted than necessary, though, and a chance at armor pieces dropping from bosses is more grounded in the world.

Speaking of being grounded in the world, I’m a little dismayed to see that Broadsword is using a generic terminal for item upgrades. The new one looks nice, but it would feel more immersive if you interacted with an NPC affiliated with your origin story instead.

• Bounty Hunters would speak to a Forgemaster
• Troopers talk to an armory officer
• Smugglers cut a deal on the black market
• Agents would speak to a capital-Q Quartermaster
• Jedi and Sith walk up to saber forge on their own

Each of these situations could be the new function of an alcove in the Combat quadrant on the Fleet, where trainers used to be. Such a solution would probably take a lot more work from the dev team, though.

As a whole, SWTOR’s 8.0 gearing system looks like it will be a solid improvement over the current system we’ve gotten used to in 7.0 that pulls in many of the things players liked from the system we had in 6.0.

The devil is in the details, but this seems like a pretty solid foundation that’s better than what we’ve had to deal with at the beginning of most other expansions.

Below, you can read the full text of Broadsword’s Gearing Breakdown post and leave feedback at forums.swtor.com.

Tips to Prepare for 8.0

Keep in mind that nothing is guaranteed. We’re operating from PTS information that is subject to change, but there are some things you can do to make gearing easier in 8.0.

Augments

Level 80 augments (around iRating 300) will remain BiS in PvE content in 8.0, so it’s safe to stockpile level 80 augments and crafting materials for your alts. I wouldn’t expect to get level 85 augments until mid to late 8.0, similar to what happened with this expansion.

Broadsword is aware that crafting is in need of a revamp and they were planning to do one as part of 7.0, but then it got pushed back into oblivion.

Given how many game systems that crafting touches, I would be shocked if Broadsword managed to do a crafting revamp outside of an expansion release, so we’re talking 9.0 at the earliest.

While higher tier augments must necessarily be cheaper than they are right now, I would still expect to pay at least as much to kit out an entire legacy in gold 318s as you did on your current set of stat jewelry, but we don’t know for sure exactly how Broadsword plans to reconcile non-Legacy gear with costly augments for each toon.

Likewise, OEM-37s, RPM-13s, Legendary Embers, and other crafting materials required to make level 80 augments will continue to be valuable as we head into 8.0, though I expect Broadsword to make them significantly cheaper or more accessible, so it’s a gamble to hold onto them.

Stockpiling other crafting mats required for level 80 augments is a safer bet. The only lever Broadsword has to increase supply is to reduce the number required to craft each augment.

Currencies

All other endgame currencies except for Tech Fragments will be going away:

• Conquest Commendations
• FP-1 Stabilizers
• OP-1 Catalysts
• WZ-1 Accelerants

In past expansions, the devs have converted deprecated currencies into credits, but the exchange rate is typically well below current market value.

You might get to keep your Tech Fragments like you did from 6.0 to get a head start on gearing, and if you want to dedicate the real estate in your cargo hold, you can stockpile Bags of 200 Tech Fragments used for currency conversion at the vendor.

Level 80 gear deconstruction will continue to yield the same currencies it does now, just as level 75 gear does, so you should be fine stockpiling that armor as well.

If you’re an altoholic, you should consider holding onto Personal Conquest Requisitions from Login Rewards so you can get the free Tech Fragments (and likely Force Imbued Fragments) from completing conquest on the toons collecting dust on page 5 of the login screen.

Spoils of War

If you aren’t interested in stockpiling, now is the best time to buy cosmetic items that cost Tech Fragments from the Spoils of War vendors in the Supplies section of the Fleet since the current gear you can buy will only be useful for another month or so.

There are also some decos you can buy from specific vendors on Ossus and the Interpreter’s Retreat on Voss that cost Tech Fragments.