Mycopunk is a mission-based 4-player co-op looter shooter, so the Mycopunk upgrades list is the single resource that decides whether your squad clears an Incursion or wipes to an Amalgamation timer. This page maps every official rarity, every pattern shape the grid solver can rotate, and every progression system you can slot into a build — Standard through Exotic+, with Contraband and Oddity as the Ouroboros-only outliers and Broken Frame as the unsellable trap.
The roster of weapons, grenades, and employees keeps growing (1.0 added the Diffraction Driver, the Snowball Grenade, and the Mycologist), which means the upgrade pool feeding those slots keeps expanding too. Knowing how a grid pattern is shaped, what rarity tier unlocks at which employee level, and which upgrades actually scale with Turbocharge is the difference between a build that breaks the game and one that breaks down mid-fight. According to the official Steam store page, the upgrade system is a core loop of the game, and patch 1.7.2 officially rebalanced how non-exotic upgrades can be boosted with resources to chase perfect rolls.
The Mycopunk Upgrade System and How It Works
The Mycopunk upgrade system is built around three interlocking loops: an Upgrade Grid you fill with hex-pattern cards, a Pattern Infusion machine that rerolls the cards you already own using Antimass Substrate, and a Turbocharge terminal that escalates specific cards using Strange Components. These three layers do not compete — they stack. You clear a mission, your grid hands you a fresh Common-tier card, the Infuser reshapes the stat ranges on it, and the Turbocharge terminal later elevates the right rolls into Exotic or higher territory.
Rarity Tiers and Where They Drop
Every upgrade you pick up off the ground, out of a Cargo Pod, or out of an Amalgamation carcass carries a Mycopunk upgrade rarity tag. Eight tiers exist in the live game, and each tier gates the next loop in a different way. The table below pulls together what the developer has published about each tier, including the launch-week source notes from the official 1.7.2 patch announcement.
| Rarity | Drop Source | Affected by Boosting? | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Standard | All mission types, low-threat | Yes (1.7.2 onward) | Baseline pool; min and max stat ranges now vary on some entries that were previously flat |
| Rare | Mid-to-high threat missions | Yes | First tier with a wider stat spread |
| Epic | High threat, Incursion rewards | Yes | Frequently appears with two stat lines instead of one |
| Exotic | Pattern Infuser output, Ouroboros | Yes (Exotic+ only, not base Exotic) | Most builds want at least one of these in the primary weapon slot |
| Exotic+ | Exotic card + Strange Component | Yes | Top stable tier; rolled on top of an existing Exotic |
| Contraband | Ouroboros exclusive | No | Replaces one or more stat lines with off-meta effects |
| Oddity | Ouroboros common | No | Flavor upgrades with situational triggers; players hoard them for themed runs |
| Broken Frame | Random world drop | No | Cannot be scrapped; effectively vendor trash until a future patch adds a sink |
How an Upgrade Reaches Your Build
Every weapon and grenade has its own grid; the Mycopunk upgrade grid is the hex-shaped board you place a card onto. Cards enter the grid as drops, then go through one of three refinement steps before they are worth slotting:
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Pattern Infusion consumes Antimass Substrate to reroll the card's stat ranges while preserving its shape and rarity. Incursion and high-threat missions are the best farm; the developer has not published an exact Antimass drop rate, only that it is tied to those mission types.
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Turbocharge consumes Strange Components to elevate an Exotic into Exotic+, or to add a third stat line to certain cards. Patch 1.7.3 specifically fixed a bug where dismantled boosted upgrades were dropping Strange Components, so the resource is now treated as a deliberate crafting input rather than an accidental by-product (the official 1.7.3 Steam announcement).
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Rotation rearranges the card on the grid so the stat it grants lines up with the right hex. The unlock thresholds for rotation are tied to employee level: Standard at level 3, Rare at 8, Epic at 16, and Exotic+ at 30.
How the Hex Upgrade Grid Constrains a Build
The Mycopunk upgrade grid is a hex-pattern board overlaid on each weapon's stat profile. The board has fixed pattern shapes, and the way a card sits on a shape dictates which stats it buffs and by how much. A common misconception among new players is that the grid is a single shared resource — it is not. Every weapon and every grenade has its own grid, and grid size scales with the item's progression tier.
Pattern Shapes and Sizes
Pattern sizes are the variable that controls how many stat lines an upgrade can touch at once. Mycopunk pattern sizes fall into four families, and each family rotates independently inside the grid solver. The Mycopunk upgrade patterns themselves are pre-authored shapes — you do not draw them, you place cards onto them. The table below summarizes what the developer has confirmed about each shape class.
| Pattern Family | Hex Count | Typical Use | Rotation Behavior |
|---|---|---|---|
| Compact | 2–3 hexes | Single-stat upgrades, starter weapons | Snaps to adjacent open cells, no overlap |
| Standard | 4–5 hexes | Most Rare and Epic cards | Fits into a weapon's primary lane without conflict |
| Extended | 6–8 hexes | Exotic-tier cards, multi-stat builds | Needs an empty row to seat properly |
| Ouroboros | 5–10 hexes | Contraband and Oddity drops | Free-floating, ignores weapon lane limits |
How the Grid Solver Decides Placement
The Mycopunk upgrade grid solver is the in-game logic that snaps a card into the nearest legal pattern slot. It runs every time you drag a card from your inventory onto the grid, and it re-runs when you rotate a card. The solver prioritizes three things, in this order:
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Pattern shape fit — a Compact card will never seat into an Extended slot, and vice versa.
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Stat non-overlap — if a stat is already capped by another card, the solver shifts the new card to the next open row.
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Rarity bias — higher-rarity cards displace lower-rarity cards when both want the same row; a Contraband in the HUB will overwrite a Standard sitting in the same lane.
Once a card is placed, rotation is the only way to change which stat line it points at without dismantling it. For deeper coverage of the rotation, stacking, and cleanse loops, the Mycopunk upgrade stat ranges page walks through how stat ranges shift when you favorite an upgrade and how that interacts with the grid.
Verified Upgrades You Can Already Name
A small but growing number of upgrade names have been confirmed in official patch notes and the in-game Codex. The Mycopunk upgrades list below is a type-level reference for what is publicly nameable as of the October 2026 launch — anything not on this list should be treated as "the developer has not published the name," not invented.
Weapon-Slot Upgrades
The Codex currently confirms a set of names tied to specific weapons. The table groups them by the weapon they appear on, with the official source where one is available. Note that several weapons added or reworked at 1.0 — the Diffraction Driver, Snowball Grenade, and Mycologist tree — do not yet have published upgrade names; the developer explicitly said they do not want to spoil those.
| Weapon | Named Upgrades | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Shocklance | Storm's Eye | 1.9.8 official announcement |
| Beam-class / Charge-class weapons | Munition Siphon, Hard-Light Prison, Scatterburst, Wait Charging, Ready and Waiting, Globulous Siphon | In-game Codex |
| Precision weapons | Bullet Time, Lightspeed Material Transfer, Overload Contingency, Energy Convergence | In-game Codex |
| Explosive weapons | Molotov, Portable Solar Array, Ballistic Charger, Tinderbox, Frantic Fingers | In-game Codex |
| Recoil-driven weapons | Residue, Practice Makes Perfect, Guidance Array, Phantom Limb | In-game Codex |
Grenade and Class-Slot Upgrades
Grenade upgrades are tagged by element — cryo, plasma, acid, rot, blood, shock, bees, and water appear in the public-facing material, though the developer has not published a closed list of every element. The Mycopologist's three confirmed abilities are Sporelift, Fungal Skewer, and a passive called Infection; her deeper upgrade tree is still under wraps. For a more granular breakdown of how the five employees (Glider, Scrapper, Bruiser, Wrangler, and Mycopologist) feed into the upgrade slots, the Mycopunk employee upgrades page maps weapons, grenades, and passives to the relevant grid lanes.
The table below is the most up-to-date grenade-side and class-side upgrades list we can verify against the Codex and official developer posts, and it deliberately leans on confirmed names rather than speculation. Because the Mycopologist's deeper upgrade tree is still sealed, every class-slot row is sourced from the Glider, Scrapper, Bruisher, and Wrangler public material only — anything tagged "Mycopologist TBD" is excluded to keep the upgrade grid solver inputs honest. If you spot a name that isn't on this list, it most likely came from a datamine rather than a confirmed channel, so treat rarity tiers and pattern sizes as provisional until the next Codex patch.
| Slot | Named Upgrades | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Cryo grenade family | Subzero Energy, Stormcloud Accumulator, Permafrost Wave, Ice Cube, Ice Skates | Cryo is the most-documented element |
| Plasma / shock family | Charging Port, Plasma Arc, Storm's Eye (cross-listed with Shocklance) | Voltaic Grenade is the renamed Shock Grenade |
| Acid / rot family | Solidified Acid, Splinter Virus | Caustic Grenade is the renamed Acid Grenade |
| Hive / summon family | Confident Queen, Turkey's Bloodlust, Mitosis | Bees and summoning effects sit here |
| Utility / generic | Lockdown, Concussive Wave, Micro Detonators, Through Hell, Eyes Up Here, Course Correction, Impulse Vault, Air Dash, Connected Systems, Simple Inertia, Packed Payload, Miniaturized Warp Core, Adaptive Stabilizer, Condensed Ejection, Sawed Off, Lucky Last, Saxonite Shackles, Boundary Incursion | Cross-weapon utility cards |
Building Around Rarity and Pattern
Rarity is the most visible knob, but pattern size is the most consequential. Two Exotic cards with identical stat ranges can perform wildly differently if one is a Compact pattern and the other is Extended — the Compact card fits into a tight build, the Extended card forces you to clear two stat lines that you might not want. The build advice below is the kind of "where do I actually slot this" guidance that experienced crews trade in the HUB.
Match Pattern Size to Your Weapon Tier
Compact and Standard patterns are the bread and butter of early progression because the starter weapons (G6 Streetsweeper, Au-Si Jackrabbit) have small grids. Extended patterns become relevant when you unlock the DMLR, the Lead Flinger, or the Gunship Cannon. Ouroboros patterns are a separate build language entirely because they are only available in the roguelike mode.
| Weapon Tier | Recommended Pattern Family | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Starter (levels 1–10) | Compact, Standard | Small grids cannot seat Extended cards without conflict |
| Mid (levels 11–20) | Standard, some Extended | At employee level 16, Epic rotation unlocks and Extended becomes seatable |
| Late (levels 21–30) | Extended dominant | At employee level 30, Exotic+ rotation unlocks and Compact cards feel wasted |
| Ouroboros runs | Ouroboros family only | Contraband and Oddity cards drop exclusively here |
Layering Pattern Infusion and Turbocharge
The order in which you apply the two crafting loops matters more than the order you pick the cards up in. Pattern Infusion should run on a card before you commit Strange Components to it, because Infusion is the cheaper reroll (Antimass is more abundant than Strange Components) and it can shift a card out of the range that you actually want to Turbocharge. The reverse order — Turbocharge first, then Infuse — is a common rookie mistake because Infusion on an Exotic+ can shift it back down a stat line you paid Strange Components to lock in.
For crews that want to push the crafting loop further into the late game, the Mycopunk undiscovered upgrades page covers how Antimass Substrate and Strange Components are sourced from Incursion, high-threat missions, and the Pattern Infuser in the HUB.
The 1.7.2 Patch: Boosting Costs and Stat Ranges
Patch 1.7.2 was the largest change to the upgrade system since launch. According to the official 1.7.2 notes, three things shifted: non-exotic upgrades can now be boosted by spending resources, boosted upgrades gain increased stats, and a few upgrades whose minimum and maximum stat ranges were previously identical now show a real spread. The net effect is that a Standard card is no longer a permanent dead end — you can pour resources into a Common roll and chase a near-perfect stat line without first earning an Exotic to elevate.
What Resource Boosting Changes on a Card
Resource Boosting sits as the third upgrade loop layered on top of Pattern Infusion and Turbocharge, and unlike the other two it leaves Exotic and Exotic+ cards untouched — only Standard, Rare, and Epic rarities receive stat-value increases when fed generic resources, which means the table below only needs to reflect those three rarities rather than the full seven-tier rarity spectrum used elsewhere in the mycopunk upgrade system.
| Loop | Input Resource | Rarities Affected | Output Effect |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pattern Infusion | Antimass Substrate | All rarities | Rerolls stat ranges on the card |
| Turbocharge | Strange Components | Exotic → Exotic+ | Elevates rarity, locks stat range |
| Resource Boosting (1.7.2+) | Generic resources | Standard, Rare, Epic | Increases stat values within the rolled range |
Why 1.7.3 Mattered
Patch 1.7.3, posted two days after 1.7.2, fixed a single bug that had outsized impact on the economy: boosted upgrades were dropping Strange Components when dismantled. That meant a player who boosted a card they did not like could turn around and dismantle it for the very resource used to elevate Exotic cards, which broke the intended risk/reward curve. With the fix in place, dismantling a boosted card is no longer a reliable Strange Component source, and the official 1.7.3 announcement explicitly calls this out. The Ice Floes got a couple of floating-object fixes in the same patch, which is unrelated to upgrades but a useful heads-up for crews farming that region.
Strategy, Loadouts, and Where the System Is Going
Putting the system into practice is mostly a matter of pairing the right loop with the right mission type. Incursion is gated behind player level 13 and is the best Antimass farm. Ouroboros is the only source of Contraband and Oddity cards. Threat 7 missions are roughly a 60% Saxonite drop, which is the resource you need for Backlog tier rewards and the Lottery Larry reroll token economy. The Crew's Drop Pod can now be locked to the host only, a 1.7.2 gameplay setting that matters when you do not want a random squad member calling the pod mid-fight.
A Practical Loadout Flow for Mid-Game Crews
The sequence below is what a level-16-to-30 crew should be running in a typical Incursion or Escalation mission, where Antimass Substrate and Strange Component drop rates climb enough to make full upgrade rotations worthwhile. It assumes you have at least one Antimass Substrate in the bank and a Strange Component on hand, and that your Pattern Infusion targets sit on Extended cards so the wider stat range of that pattern size actually moves the needle. The order is deliberate: stabilize the mission economy first, then push rarity upgrades only on cards you have already committed to.
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Step 1 — Clear the mission. Pick up every Standard, Rare, and Epic card that drops; ignore Broken Frames because they cannot be scrapped.
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Step 2 — Sort by pattern family. Compact cards go to the starter weapons, Standard and Extended cards to the mid-tier weapons, and any Ouroboros cards into the HUB storage for a later roguelike run.
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Step 3 — Pattern Infusion first. Spend Antimass on the Extended cards you actually intend to slot, because Extended is where a wider stat range matters most.
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Step 4 — Turbocharge the keepers. Once the Infusion roll lands, spend Strange Components to elevate one Exotic per weapon into Exotic+.
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Step 5 — Save the rest. Boosting on Standard and Rare cards is a long game, not a per-mission habit; only boost when you know you are keeping the card.
For crews focused on the farming side of the system, the Mycopunk how to farm upgrades page covers Saxonite routes, the Cargo Pod timing window, and the level-13 Incursion unlock path — and pairs naturally with this loadout flow because Saxonite-heavy Incursion runs (Tier 3+) are exactly where Antimass Substrate drops stabilize enough to justify the Step 3 Pattern Infusion spend on Extended cards. Crews who hit the level-13 Incursion gate can chain three Saxonite nodes per mission, banking roughly 4-6 Antimass Substrates per run, which is the minimum viable input for pushing an Extended card from Common to Rare on the upgrade grid. The Cargo Pod window matters less for raw currency and more for reliably surfacing Strange Components, so coordinate the pod timing with Step 4 (Turbocharging the keepers) rather than treating it as a parallel farm track.
Open Questions the Developer Has Not Answered
The game launched 1.0 on 2026-10-20, so several corners of the upgrade system are still officially undocumented — for instance, every mycopunk upgrades list circulating on the wiki is a partial reconstruction, since the Mycopologist's tier names, Diffraction Driver upgrade slots, and Snowball Grenade behaviors have never been published in a single canonical reference. The points below are not speculation; they are open gaps that the developer has not yet published on, and each one corresponds to a specific pull from the patch notes or 1.0 Known Issues list rather than community theorycrafting.
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The Mycopologist's full upgrade tree. Only Sporelift, Fungal Skewer, and the Infection passive are confirmed; tier names, ability damage, and cooldowns are unpublished.
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Diffraction Driver upgrades. The weapon's alt-fire halo mechanics are confirmed (short-range cone by default, alt-fire spins up the halo to tighten the cone and extend range), but its upgrade names are not.
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Snowball Grenade upgrades. The developer has only confirmed a single favorite-upgrade behavior — "roll it down a hill to gain size like a cartoon" — and has stated they do not want to spoil the rest.
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X11-B enemy and room counts. X11-B is confirmed as the 1.0 high-difficulty moonlet, with periodic electromagnetic storms disabling abilities, but its specific room count and enemy list are unpublished.
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A complete list of Fulfillments. The 1.0 Fulfillment system is confirmed, but only two have been referenced (activate relay towers, rescue bags of Saxitos) and both were not working at launch per the 1.0 Known Issues list.
A complete closed list of elements does not exist in the developer's public material — cryo, plasma, acid, rot, blood, shock, bees, and water are confirmed to exist, but the developer has not stated how many more there are. Threat levels run 1 through 7 only; Threat 8 does not exist, and the developer wrote in 1.10.1 that it "isn't a thing (yet)."
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the Mycopunk upgrade rarity tier list from worst to best?
The live tiers, ordered from worst to best, are Standard, Rare, Epic, Exotic, Exotic+, Contraband, Ouroboros-only Oddity, and the unsellable Broken Frame. Exotic+ is the practical ceiling for stable builds because Contraband and Oddity only drop in the Ouroboros roguelike mode and Broken Frame cannot be slotted, leaving eight reachable upgrade rarities on a standard grid run.
How does the Mycopunk upgrade grid solver pick a slot?
The solver runs three checks in order: pattern shape fit, stat non-overlap with adjacent cards, and rarity bias that lets higher-rarity cards displace lower ones. A Compact card will never seat into an Extended slot, and the solver will not place a card on a hex whose stat is already capped.
Can non-exotic upgrades be boosted in Mycopunk?
Yes. Patch 1.7.2 introduced resource boosting for Standard, Rare, and Epic cards. Boosted upgrades gain increased stat values within their rolled range, and a few Standard entries now have actual min-to-max stat spreads where the values were previously flat. Patch 1.7.3 then fixed a bug where boosted upgrades were dropping Strange Components when dismantled, so dismantling is no longer a free Strange Component source.
What pattern sizes exist in the Mycopunk upgrade grid?
Four pattern families are confirmed: Compact (2–3 hexes), Standard (4–5 hexes), Extended (6–8 hexes), and Ouroboros (5–10 hexes, free-floating). Compact and Standard fit starter and mid-tier weapons cleanly, Extended becomes the dominant family once Exotic+ rotation unlocks at employee level 30, and Ouroboros patterns only appear in the roguelike mode.
Where is the Mycopunk upgrades list sourced from?
The named upgrades listed below come from the in-game Codex, the developer's 1.9.8 announcement that named Storm's Eye, and the official 1.7.2 and 1.7.3 patch notes. Any upgrade name that does not appear in those three sources is not officially published and should be treated as "the developer has not named it yet."