How is everyone approaching this? NQ Artemis is definitely the first goal as the upgrade over a primal weapon on a WD basis is too much to beat. However, NQ to HQ Artemis vs. Bard's upgrades (vs. DL) is much closer and frankly the AF2 upgrades may actually win.
I used these damage formulas for the comparison; I believe they are still valid.
http://valk.dancing-mad.com/?page_id...amageMechanics
Based on my current stats, upgrading from Darklight Corselet of Aiming to Bard's Shirt is more optimal than Artemis to Artemis +1.
http://i193.photobucket.com/albums/z...psbec486d9.jpg
That said, WD increases are more beneficial the higher your stats are. Assume that my current gear with Artemis NQ yielded DEX of 420:
http://i193.photobucket.com/albums/z...ps93b669fa.jpg
In this case, Artemis upgrade is better than DL body to Bard's Shirt. However, Bard's Shirt (and legs) also costs less tokens than three mists, and other pieces cost about half. Difference is marginal across the board; I did not do auto-attack calculations, but I don't think it will make a huge difference as the base formula for both AA and WS is the same except for the initial AA modifier (Artemis +1 has a 0.016% advantage) and DTR has a slightly larger impact on AA.
Basically trying to plot out the upgrade path, and I feel like I'd rather do Artemis > Bard's Shirt > Bard's Tights > Artemis +1 > rest of AF. This wouldn't be a big deal if not for the weekly token cap.