One of the great new features added in the Diablo III expansion Reaper of Souls is the Enchanting ability. This new feature allows you to take gear that is only OK and turn it into something truly great.  This guide shows you how it all works.

What is Enchanting?

Enchanting in Diablo III works differently than Enchanting does in almost any other game.  Instead of adding abilities or stats to an item as normal in most other systems, it allows you to change a one stat already on an item for a different one not on the item.

Now that you know what Enchanting is in Diablo III, there are several important details to know about how it works. These are broken up into the following sections that cover: what stats can be changed, what they change into, where you go to enchant items, and more.

What items can you Enchant?

The first part of enchanting an item is understanding what can be changed about it.  This is pretty simple, as enchanting will allow you to select and change almost any primary or secondary stat on almost any item.  There are very few limitations, which basically amount to the fact that you cannot select the special legendary abilities, set abilities, or negative abilities on an item to change them.  You also can not enchant some legacy items (meaning items gathered before Reaper of Souls launched).

Once you have enchanted an item you will still be able to further enchant it, but you will only be able to select the stat that you have already changed, to change further.  All other stats are locked in place once you have changed one stat.

How much does it cost to Enchant?

The cost to enchant an item varies on the item itself.  In general to enchant an item will cost several crafting ingredients as well as some gold. 

For low level items you will need the lower level crafting ingredients, while for gear above level 60 you will need the higher level crafting ingredients.  For legendary items you will also need the Legendary crafting ingredients called Forgotten Souls or Brimstone (for low level items).  The amount of each varies with the item you are enchanting.

While the number of crafting ingredients remains the same for each Enchanting attempt on an item, the gold cost does not.  Each time you change an items stat the gold cost will increase.  Therefore if you are trying to get the max increase from a stat it can get expensive depending on how many attempts it takes you to get it.

What are stats changed to with Enchanting

When you choose a stat to re-roll with enchanting, it will be changed to one of the other possible options that could have been generated from the selection pool that the already existing stat came from.  This means that if you select an item in the Primary stat area to be re-rolled you will get another primary stat, if you pick a secondary you will get a secondary.

  • Stats will not duplicate on an item.
  • Stats that are a “Chance to X” will mainly offer other “Chance to X” abilities
  • Stats that are “Increase <skill> by X%” will mainly offer other  <skill> by x% abilities
  • Resistances will offer other resistances, but a single cannot become an All Resistance, nor will an All Resistance become a single.

Why would you Enchant an item?

When you see the cost of enchanting some items, the question of why you would pay to enchant and item can pop into your mind.  The answer is pretty simple, it allows you to take a decent item and make it great.  It also allows you to take an item that would be vendor trash and make it a great usable item. 

A great example for the huge benefit of Enchanting is when a Legendary or Set item drops for you and everything on it is great other than the primary stat.  Using a personal example, I had an amazing legendary sword drop that had an ability on it that caused all lightning damage to have a 25% chance to turn the victim into a lighting rod dealing further damage from them to enemies around them.  WOW!  Getting that on my Crusader that was using hammers that caused lighting to arc to him would be a huge boost!  However, the primary stat on it was Intelligence, what was needed was Strength, and since my Wizard already had a better item, this item would be junk without enchanting.   However, all I had to do was go to the Mystic select Intelligence and re-roll it a few times until I got Strength.  Now I had an awesome new weapon on my Crusader!

How do you Enchant an item

Ok, you now know what Enchanting is all about and why you would want to do it to improve your gear. How do you actually go about enchanting an item though?

All enchanting is done by visiting the Mystic in your town of choice.  However, before you can access the mystic you will need to rescue her from Act V.  This means that you will have to play through most of the new act before you will be able to enchant items.

Once at the Mystic you simply:

  • Chose Enchant and put the item that you would like to change into the enchanting window. 
  • You can then look at which stat you would like to replace and see what you may get as a replacement stat by clicking the question mark next to the stat.  This will open up a new window that shows the potential options.  You can click the other question marks to view options for the other stats.
  • Once you have decided which stat you would like to replace, click on the stat name to highlight it and click “Replace Property”.  You will be charged for the enchant at this point and the item will be bound to you, if it is not already, and the stat will be locked as the only stat that can be further changed.
  • A list will show up with 3 options for a new stat for that slot on the item.  The first will be the previous stat, in case the newly rolled replacements are worse than what you already have, and two new options.
  • Select the stat that you would like to keep on the item and click “Select Property”.
  • You are now done, unless you want to re-roll the stat again, at a higher gold cost.

To read the latest guides, news, and features you can visit our Diablo III Game Page.

Last Updated: Mar 18, 2016

About The Author

Byron has been playing and writing about World of Warcraft for the past ten years. He also plays pretty much ever other Blizzard game, currently focusing on Heroes of the Storm and Hearthstone, while still finding time to jump into Diablo III with his son.

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