June 29th, 2010
It occurs to me that gemming has become very boring these days. It’s pretty much choose the best stat for your class and stack it.
When jewelcrafting was first released, it seemed much more exciting. There were all these colors of gems, with different colours of sockets, different socket bonuses, and meta-gems with interesting requirements.
Pretty much all of that has been bled from the system. Socket colours are pretty much ignored. The different types of socket bonuses have disappeared, replaced for most classes by a single stat. For example, on plate DPS armor, the socket bonus is always strength. It’s the only stat that can possibly tempt someone away from mono-coloured gems. Meta-gem requirements have been reduced to the bare minimum. And even that is not enough. The meta-gems which require 1 of each color are considered much better than the meta-gems which require 2 blues, because you can use only 1 Nightmare Tear and meet the meta-gem requirements.
As well, I’m not sure being able to focus so much of your item budget on your single-best state is good for the game. It allows for an extremely wide range of that one ability. For example, the health difference between a tank stacking all stamina gems and one matching socket colors is very noticeable.
Is there a way to make gemming interesting once again, and maybe also rein it in a bit?
My suggestion would be to remove single-color gems. If all gems are dual-colors, then it might be easier to hit the socket bonuses. You can’t focus so much in the same way. The choice becomes not so much between best stat and second-best stat, it’s between second-best stat and third-best stat. Oftentimes, that’s enough wiggle room to make decision-making interesting again.
In my opinion, sometimes offering the best possible choice as an option is not the best way to go. Making a decision between two flawed choices can be more interesting.
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