I have been on Sylestia for quite awhile, but my activity has been sporadic, so I have finally started to more heavily progress in Lost Grove and only recently gotten the Blacksmith unlocked in my barracks, getting closer to finally unlocking my last barracks building (tracker hut). I am progress-wise about to take on the Crystal Behemoth, but have held off to get more upgrades for my pets.

Currently I have a Light Tank and 2 Air Attackers, all currently have Vinethorn, but only the armor and relics are at +1. I have gotten 2 books so far from cave bosses to unlock Stoneweave recipes and have figured I'd start on the Air recipes since they cover two of my pets. Spent one book for the bracers since that seemed like the biggest bang for my buck and have considered using the second for the stormcaller relic.

I have crunched numbers and to craft Stoneweave is more expensive in terms of silver ingots, gold ingots, and enchanted powder, but cheaper in terms of Gold, Iron Ingots, and Enigmatic Crystals. I haven't seen much regarding upgrade costs, but would I be better off crafting the Stoneweave since there's more upgrade potential to them or is it better to get the Vinethorn up to +3 while continuing to farm for more supplies?

I feel kind of torn because I feel like the materials I need to craft the Stoneweave will come more quickly then all the iron I'd need for the Vinethorn, plus the Stoneweave would have more upgrade potential (though guessing may get pretty expensive pretty quickly)

lg items guide, relevant posts: 6 (base crafting + upgrade costs), 7 (stat comparison)

I think the general practice is unlocking relics first, since those get you the damage bonus in addition to base stats

also it's probably cheaper to just buy sw gear off of the broker rather than crafting it, (though availability depends, obviously) since that saves you all the ingot cost. Possibly even jumping straight to primordial that way, (though those are always going to be more expensive since those have to be crafted rather than people getting them as boss drops in the Temple)

Yeah, most of the gear I saw listed on the Trade Broker was priced at or below the Gold cost to craft. Was able to pick up most everything except for some bracers, so just crafted what I couldn't buy. Upgrade costs might need me to push on and beat the behemoth