/quality

Command	Effect
/quality (= /mxt quality)	Shows the quality of your own main-hand item: the tier it resolves to right now, and the chain it belongs to. No permission needed.
/quality get [<target>] (= /mxt quality get …)	The same, for somebody else (needs the gamemaster permission).
/quality set <targets> <quality> (= /mxt quality set …)	Writes the quality override component onto the target's main-hand item (needs the gamemaster permission). It outranks the definition that stack carries and the registry layer, and /quality clear takes it off again; whether that tier may be used is still decided by its own condition and by the chain it belongs to.
/quality clear <targets> (= /mxt quality clear …)	Removes the override component from the main-hand item (the one /quality set, a forge settlement and an inscription all write) so it falls back to the tier the definition it carries declares and then to the tier mxt:default_quality writes (needs the gamemaster permission). A target that had no override reports a failure on its own.
/quality upgrade <targets> (= /mxt quality upgrade …)	Moves the main-hand item one tier up the ladder it belongs to (needs the gamemaster permission): the next tier's upgrade_condition is checked first, and its price is that tier's upgrade_costs (plan then commit, atomic as a whole, so a step that cannot be paid moves nothing and writes no tier). Being already at the top, or resolving to a tier that is not on the ladder, is reported per target.
/quality chain <quality> (= /mxt quality chain …)	Prints the whole quality ladder that tier sits on; no permission needed. The tiers below it are grey, the tier itself is green and the tiers above it are white. A tier sits on exactly one ladder (the one the runtime walks out of next), so a tier with no ladder - or one whose ladder does not walk - reports that no quality ladder contains it, and a tier the current pack does not provide is refused like any other missing definition. The ladder's name is written on the entry tier, so it reads null up front when the entry tier has none.

Which tier is it

A stack's quality is the first of these that answers:

1. A mxt:quality component on the stack (a whole quality object) — what /quality set, a successful upgrade, a Forge Table settlement and a talisman inscription write; when the id on it names no entry in the current pack, this layer answers nothing;
2. the tier the definition the stack itself carries declares, read from whichever component on that item names a definition identity. The nine definitions declaring quality are technique, alchemy_furnace, alchemy_wall_material, spirit_root, physique, pill, formation, secret_realm and contract_type;
3. the default_quality registry: whichever tier the item is given there.

Layer 2 is what answers for "several definitions of a type share one built-in item, so the item cannot say which tier applies": every technique manual, every pill, every furnace specification, the spirit-root stone and the physique stone. neither artifact nor spirit_herb carries an item identity, so nothing on the stack names a definition identity, and a talisman carrier holds a list of bills rather than one definition — those three land in layer 3, and a herb that writes quality_by_age has its tier stamped into layer 1 at harvest first.

The ladder follows the tier the stack resolves: the ladder's name is written on the tier itself (on the entry tier), so neither a binding nor a component has to declare it, see Quality. When none of the three layers answers, the stack has no quality at all and no ladder's entry tier is supplied for it.

set writes that first layer, so it outranks the two below it; clear sends the item back to layer 2, and only when the definition declares no tier either does it reach what the registry writes — the tier a forge run or an inscription wrote is cleared with it (it lives in that same component rather than being stored separately). A successful upgrade writes the new tier into the same override component, so an upgraded item is decided by the override from then on and /quality clear resolves the three layers again.

One tier at a time

upgrade moves exactly one tier and pays the upgrade_costs the next tier declares; climbing two tiers means running it twice and paying twice. A tier that writes next without any cost has that step at an empty price, so it is effectively free; to make a tier the top, leave its next out. The full rules are on Quality.

The top-level /quality alias is controlled by the Command Aliases tab of the server configuration (the entry is named quality, and it defaults to on); switching it off leaves /mxt quality fully usable.