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I've found that as I've progressed in the game, the weapons found in chests and on enemies are getting better. Better types, but also better stats. Even the enemies in the starting area are now getting better weapons. (The enemies are stronger too.)

What part of my progression exactly causes the weapons to get better? Is it playtime? How many Divine Beasts you've taken care of? The number of shrines completed, perhaps?

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    I don't have a source, but I believe it's how many monsters you've slain.
    – Nolonar
    Jun 27, 2017 at 14:07
  • @Nolonar I feel like that's only the case for certain weapons types. I feel like some weapons types you see more after discovering specific locations/getting to certain points in the game, i.e. the Royal gear.
    – BlueBarren
    Jun 27, 2017 at 14:10
  • @BlueBarren No, it's definitely the number of monsters slain. I beat a single Divine Beast (Nabooru), then spent the next 50 hours exploring and finishing side quests and shrines. I went through probably 10 blood moons, and I was finding royal gear pretty regularly by the time I decided to tackle the rest of the Beasts.
    – Mage Xy
    Jun 27, 2017 at 14:14
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    @MageXy That leaves some variables to account for still. It could be related to just the number of shrines for example (which would still indirectly tie into your strength due to the hearts/stamina).
    – JMac
    Jun 27, 2017 at 14:46
  • I haven't noticed this at all. Despite having beaten all four Divine Beasts and around 60 shrines, the fights get much easier when I go back to the starting areas. It could be because I know better strategies for fighting enemies now, but it seems that a swing of the master sword takes out a monster that took several hits with a weaker sword, even in starting areas.
    – Kadima
    Jul 7, 2017 at 19:35

4 Answers 4

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The more enemies that have died, the better the weapons. This includes bosses, shrine enemies and enemies that die even if you don't kill them e.g. enemies that die by falling from high heights or into water.

As more enemies die, the types of weapons improve, they are more likely to receive modifiers, and the modifiers are more likely to be stronger (for example the attacker modifier will give more attack). This affects weapons dropped by enemies, some but not all treasure chests and amiibos.

Modifiers for attack, durability, long throw, quick shot and shield strength are normally based on a min and max range that increase with more enemy deaths. Amiibos are usually more likely to have stronger modifiers as they only use the max range value. Exceptions are quick shot which uses min value only for amiibo items, shield durability which uses one parameter shared for both amiibo and non-amiibo items, the multi-shot burst modifier for multi-shot burst bows which is always an upgrade from 3-shot to 5-shot burst, and the critical hit modifier which remains unchanged with scaling. Interestingly, if the enemy death count is high enough, the critical hit modifier can no longer be obtained.

Weapons that were purchased from a shop, and weapons from some specific chests, don't improve and cannot receive modifiers.

Source is Zelda mods wiki. It's complex but comprehensive.

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The weapons that drop are directly related to the strength of the enemy that dropped/was protecting them. Stronger enemies such as silver moblins will drop better quality weapons than their red counterparts. (You can see this yourself by killing a red level enemy, the drops will always be weak).

Now as for why you are seeing better weapons even in the starting area is that the strength of the enemies is starting to scale up. According to the strategy guide, the game keeps a hidden counter of the number of each type of enemy you've killed. The more moblins you kill for example, the stronger the moblins that will replace them after blood moons will be. If you choose to avoid a certain type of enemy completely such as Lynels, you will notice that you will almost never run into a silver Lynel.

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    Completely disagree with this answer. Late game when I was seeing silver enemies everywhere, red and blue bokoblins all had dragonbone weapons. Also, I had never killed a single lynel in my save file until late game, but when I wanted to, all I could find were silver ones (minus the two that are fixed to always be red and blue)
    – Pyritie
    Aug 23, 2017 at 10:04
  • @Pyritie: I agree with your objections in regards to enemy unit types, but the underlying idea of the answer does seem correct. Weapon quality seems to increase as the enemies' strength increases. That's not just a matter of different enemy units, but also that the same enemy units get stronger (therefore wielding better weapons). And this enemy strength increases based on how many things Link has killed.
    – Flater
    Aug 23, 2017 at 11:19
  • The answer to the question should also account for Master Mode. There are weaker Lynels present in MM, but there is a Silver Lynel on the Great Plateau during the tutorial in MM. By that point you've killed only a handful of enemies.
    – Cody
    Aug 23, 2017 at 18:12
  • Master Mode affects the enemies, but not the weapons they have
    – BGamer
    Mar 4, 2020 at 8:20
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I read somewhere that it has to do with how many divine beasts you've beaten. For each divine beast, you unlock the next level of enemies. I haven't gotten to master mode yet but from what I understand it's the same case, just starts you off at 1 or 2 levels higher.

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  • According to the fancy guide that game with my copy of the game, the enemy species color levels you run into are increased by killing enemies of that species. I do not know though whether beating divine beasts also increases this value.
    – Lunin
    Sep 9, 2017 at 0:04
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I'm not 100% sure but from my own experience, I could tell a few times when the game upgraded better weapons and stronger enemies. They mostly happened to me at the completion of Main Quests, for example:

  • Escaping the great plateau

  • Receiving the master sword (thats a big one)

  • Freeing divine beasts & more.

You can view quests and main quests by pressing: + L Button

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  • Getting the master sword and escaping the great plateau doesn't upgrade the monsters
    – StruckZeus
    Mar 17, 2021 at 15:36

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