MapleStory M - Should You Rank Up Or Fuse Your Equipment?

In MapleStory M, there are only a few ways to get a higher rank weapon or armor.

One way is to rank it up using rank up stones, the other is to fuse two max level equipment.

Other ways would include buying rare treasure boxes with real money or buying a high rank equipment from the Trade Station.

For free-to-play players, the most common ways are fusing or ranking up. Which one should you do?

Should you fuse your equipment or use rank up stones to get higher rank equipment in MapleStory M? Here’s a very brief comparison.

Ranking up your equipment

The most straight forward way to rank up your equipment is by using the “Rank Up” section under Forge.

What you need is a maximum level equipment, 10 rank up stones that are appropriate for your item rank and a whole lot of mesos.

Pros

1. One of the advantages of ranking up is that it preserves your item’s stats. If you have a perfect base attack (PBA) weapon, ranking up ensures your weapon is still a PBA.

2. It also preserves your enhancements on the weapon, i.e. the amount of star force on it.

Cons

1. For higher ranks (unique and above), you need a lot of rank up stones to rank just one item. For e.g. you need 80,000 gold leaves to buy 10 unique rank up stones for your item to go from unique into legendary. That’s a whole lot of gold leaves.

2. You also have to pay a big cost for ranking the item up. For unique to legendary, it costs 50 million mesos per item.

3. You have to get your item to max level, which requires a load of refining powder.

Fusing your equipment

Fusing your equipment in this game requires two max level equipment. Furthermore, it has to be the same category (weapon with weapon / armor with armor).

The rank has to be the same (e.g epic with epic) as well. You also need to spend quite a lot of mesos to fuse.

Pros

1. Fusing does not require any rank up stones. Sure, you have to get two max level equipment instead of one, but it’s doable if you farm refining powder with your alts. You can even buy max level equipment from the Trade Station.

2. You have a small chance of getting emblem stats. Read here to understand what emblem is.

3. It costs slightly less mesos compared to ranking it up.

4. You can fuse different classes of weapons (e.g. claw with spear), but you have to choose the base correctly. If you want the fused item to be a claw, use a claw as the base.

Cons

1. It has a big disadvantage however. Your fused item will be a totally random one but of the same class and category. For e.g. if you fuse a Jaihin claw (as the base) with a spear (as material), you will get a ranked up claw for sure. However, the stats are random (can be both good or bad) and the type of claw is random. You may end up with a Briser claw.

2. You can’t retain the stats of the item. This means it’s a bad idea to use your PBA weapon to fuse, because you can end up with a shitty damage weapon. Most people fuse because they want the chance to get an emblem anyway.

3. Your base item will lose one star (enhancement) after fusing. Always, always remember to put the correct item as the base. If you want the fused item to be a claw, use a claw as the base. If you have two claws, choose one with the most enhancements as the base.