Legendary Gem Revision... 2.6.7?

General Discussion
77

Feel like we’re starting to stray a bit from the path. There is very little likelihood that Blizzard will introduce new mechanical systems in the game (letting you socket leg gems into anything other than jewelry, for example), so rather than focus on wishful thinking, it might be better for us to focus on A) how to improve gems that under-perform, and B) how to do it in a way that benefits the most amount of classes.

I suggest the following as a baseline for discussion about gem revisions:

  1. Most likely: Buffs to existing affixes on gems
  2. Likely: Small mechanical alterations or adjustments to existing affixes
  3. Less Likely: New affixes to replace old/outdated affixes on existing gems
  4. Improbable: New legendary gems

Further, as Jako pointed out, every gem has a distinct purpose and role–a unique identity, so to speak. That should be maintained whenever possible.

Using this as a guide post, we can determine productive suggestions from those that aren’t really driving the discussion forward. For example, suggesting entirely new affixes for PE isn’t as beneficial as suggesting ways to buff or slightly alter its existing affixes. By the same token, suggesting that PE drop bleed damage to deal Fire damage (and yes, I realize no one has suggested such a crazy thing) isn’t as productive as keeping PE’s focus on bleeds, physical damage, and attack speed.

Thoughts?

78

Let’s talk about our defensive gem options, since those are both underused, and we have a pretty clear goal line in terms of buffing them (parity with Esoteric).

Let’s start by going with “List 1” principles, and only revise numbers upward, without revising any mechanics.

Molten Wildebeest’s Gizzard – This gem just needs larger numbers to be competitive. Right now it caps out at 160k LPS / 320k HP shield. In order to compete with Esoteric, I think it probably needs to provide a) enough healing to refill your life globe within 2-3 seconds, and b) a shield that approaches 100% of the value of an average life pool (maybe around 800k?)

If we aim for a rank 150 healing number of 300-400k life per second, I think this gem would be in a good place. If the “base” healing amount was increased from 10k to 50k, and the healing amount per level was increased from 1k to 2k, at rank 150 you’d have 350k life per second, and a shield of 700k. I think that’s pretty reasonable.

Mutilation Guard– The secondary for this gem is bad, but if we’re playing by List 1 rules, we have to just leave it as is. The primary ability is quite good. If the melee damage reduction capped out at 80%, as compared to the 60% reduction you get with Esoteric, I think you’d have a pretty good defensive option.

You could make this change by increasing the “base” percentage from 10% to 30%, increasing the max rank of the gem from 100 to 140, or some combination (increase base value to 20%, max rank to 120).

Moratorium– This one is tough, though luckily we have a lot of different numbers we can alter. Just off the top of my head, I think you could increase the “staggered damage taken” amount from 35% to 75%, and also increase the base duration from 3 seconds to 5. The upgrade amount could increase from .1 seconds to .2, and the % chance to clear staggered damage could go up from 20% to 50%.

Collectively, these changes would give you something like 75% mitigation, as long as you’re killing enemies quickly and frequently. In GR pushing circumstances, where you might not be killing quite so often, it would likely be somewhere between 50% and 75% mitigation, depending on the particular build.

Invigorating Gemstone– The secondary for this gem is pretty good, it’s the primary ability that’s terrible. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I think that 400% increased healing at rank 150 is not unreasonable.

To get there, you could increase the base bonus from 1% per stack to 2.5% per stack, and the upgrade bonus from .02% to .25%. While increasing your healing by this amount seems like a lot, you of course have to actually get the healing from other items or skills, which means those item or skill slots aren’t allocated to damage dealing stats/abilities. And keep in mind that Esoteric effectively more than doubles the effectiveness of your healing already.

That’s my two cents on how to change these gems, if mechanical alteration is off the table.

3 Likes
79

SO many great suggestions, but I think we should look even bigger picture here.

Legendary gems are integral in numerous ways, but they are a bit boring once you unlock that level 25 ability.

My proposal along with several of the changes listed above would be to have 4 tiers for each gem, that unlock at 25-50-75-100. My preference would be to have the first two tiers be more utility focused, while the last two years buff the damage of the gem/theme. The initial abilities should stay the same imo or receive buffs to make them compotent.

My biggest but unrealistic dream would be to have the gems affect augments in some form. Maybe once we get that level 100 unlocked, we gain the level 0 base ability on our gear?

80

I’m with you in principle, as getting gems to rank 25 was once a major accomplishment, and is now laughably easy (though, I think one extra ability would be enough). But, my gut tells me that Blizz probably won’t make a change quite that drastic. You never know, though!

1 Like
81

But there are already a few gems that can be socketed into slots that are not jewelry, namely Gem of Ease (weapon) and Red Soulstone Shard (helm), so that isn’t a new mechanic or wishful thinking.

What about nerfs?
In order to achieve balance, nerfs are sometimes necessary.

As I said in one of my earlier posts, Stricken and Trapped are the ones that are the most problematic, that could use some adjustments in one way or another…

They are working on new sets for each class and new legendaries, balance changes, gameplay adjustments etc, so I don’t think it is too much to make suggestions that revolve around reworking affixes on existing legendary gems.

1 Like
82

Today, I’m going to go over some simple numerical changes that would improve our gems that deal a flat amount of damage. Again, these are holding to “List 1” principles, meaning we can’t alter mechanics, just increase some of the numbers.

Gem of Efficacious Toxin, Mirinae, Pain Enhancer, Wreath of Lightning– I’m starting out by discussing these together since they each deal a flat amount of weapon damage. The damage amount should be raised, but how much? Well, consider that a newly minted level 70 Barb can pretty easily come into the possession of a Gavel of Judgement and Bracers of the First Men, which combine to make your HOTA deal 34,560% weapon damage per hit. You also attack 50% faster, meaning your actual dps is still higher, let’s call it 50k% weapon damage per second. Other classes have similarly easy ways to gain large amounts of damage at, or before, hitting level 70.

In comparison, a max rank Toxin deals 9500% damage over 10 seconds, max rank Mirinae 12000% per hit, max rank Pain Enhancer 10000% over 3 seconds, and max rank Wreath of Lightning 5000% per second. All of these numbers are incredibly paltry compared to the damage you can dish out as a fresh 70 with HOTA, with Impale, with Wave of Light, etc.

I don’t think it would be unreasonable for each of these gems to be dealing around 30k% weapon damage, per second, when leveled to max (Mirinae should be considerably higher, since it only hits a single target). This would increase their utility during the brief period between hitting 70 and acquiring a 6 piece set, and after that for those builds which utilize a global damage bonus. So, having said all that, here are individual recommendations for each gem:

Toxin– Increase “base” damage amount from 2000% damage to 60000% damage over 10 seconds. Increase upgrade amount from 50% to 1500% weapon damage per level. This would give you 285,000% weapon damage over 10 seconds at max level, or 28,500% per second.

While this seems like a ludicrously high number, it’s still far less than you can do using your skills and a couple of easy-to-obtain items. It’s also still less valuable than getting a decent multiplicative bonus to said skills from Trapped, Powerful, Zei’s, etc, so even at these hugely inflated numbers, this gem is nowhere near being overpowered.

Also, make the 10% secondary damage bonus multiplicative. It’s not a big deal, and it’s far less confusing to new players that way. Edit: realized this is a mechanical change.

Mirinae– To operate as the nuke that it ought to be, I think this gem should be doing around 300,000% weapon damage per hit at max level. So: increase “base” amount from 3000% to 75,000%. Increase upgrade amount to 1500% per level.

Pain Enhancer– Increase “base” amount from 2500% to 22,500%. Increase upgrade amount to 450% per level. This gives 90,000% over 3 seconds, at max level.

Wreath– Increase “base” amount from 1250% to 7500%. Increase upgrade amount to 150% per level. This gives 30,000% per second, at max level.

Again: while these numbers may seem absurdly high, that’s only because they have stayed constant for so long, while the damage of skills has hugely inflated in the meantime.

6 Likes
83

Only problem with these changes is that it likely makes lazy necro OP as all getup without much effort.

2 Likes
84

I have to laugh at your saying this.

Not because I do not agree, but you posted it right as I was thinking about it.

Yeah, as I said before, you have to increase all the DAMAGE a source of damage would do by 100X. This means you would do 2,850,000% weapon damage with Toxin every second. Mirinae would do 30,000,000% weapon damage when it procs. That would be a boss killer right there.

It would cause some interesting problems for Lazy Necro.

2 Likes
85

As insane as your numbers might be I still like your idea, but wouldn’t it make these gems mandatory in most builds?

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No, like I said, even with a rank 150 Pain Enhancer, for instance, you’d still be doing less damage than a level 70 character with a couple legendaries, and no set bonus.

Even Lazymancer, I think, wouldn’t really be OP, though it would certainly be considerably stronger: a great speed build for sure.

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It already is a good speed build, crunches everything on T16.

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Agreed. With these buffs, it could speed some higher GRs as well, at least in solo.

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I think this is the right approach–a List 1, List 2 approach. And your calculations make easy sense. Very much in favor of it.

I’d suggest adding Bane of Powerful to this as well and simply increasing its numbers to 30% / 20% respectively.

Some other small tweaks to gems:

Taeguk: This gem is in a pretty good place, but I would suggest either a small increase to stacks, or a slight increase to both damage and Armor bonuses.

Iceblink: Increase CHC bonus to 20%.

Simplicity’s Strength: Increase damage to 35% and healing to 4%.

Again, these are just List 1 tweaks–simple numbers increases. Thoughts?

3 Likes
90

Seems reasonable.

Hmm, well, the next sensible stack total would probably be 15, which would be a 50% increase in damage, so that might be excessive. You could change the “base” amount to 2.5% per stack, and the upgrade amount to .05% per stack. This would give you a 100% bonus at rank 150 (up from 80%). Remember that Taeguk is additive, so I don’t think this would be excessive. You could also up the secondary armor amount from 2% to 2.5%.

Reasonable.

Does the upgrade amount stay the same (i.e. 0.5% per level)? You’d have 110% at max rank rather than 100%. That’s… fine. I mean, this gem is quite good as is, for those builds that can use it. I would have said that it didn’t even need an upgrade, but a 10% increase is certainly not going to break the game.

3 Likes
91

I am going to use Lazy Inarius for an idea to work around the problems without causing the Lazy OP situation.

What if they removed the damage limitations on part of a set bonus. I will use our WW set as an example.

When you get the T6, only WW and its DD get boosted by 10000%. What if that one bonus was made so it was all of your damage done like Inarius. Rend would become competitive, and gems would be more important.

I know the damage increase would have to be changed a little so as not to compete with IK, but the idea is there. Oh, and you do not do anything with the rend bonus, hence why it would be competitive.

92

What about nerfing stuff?
Like Bane of the Trapped.

If you don’t want mechanical changes (which I personally find unreasonable, since they are currently working on new sets and legendary powers anyway, but that just as a side note), then what about nerfing it slightly for the sake of balance and so that it becomes less appealing to use it in almost every build.

1 Like
93

Nerfing is the worst logic possible and laziest at the same time, better make the rest gems much stronger, to be more competitive with Bane of the Trapped.

2 Likes
94

depends, I’d dare to say. If something is that much out of whack that boosting everything else will raise more/other/different issues … then putting the nerf-bat to use would be the much better choice. Not saying that it’s due in this case.

1 Like
95

or maybe:

Iceblink

  • Your Cold skills now apply Chill effects and your Chill effects now slow enemy movement speed by an additional 10.0%.
    - Upgrading increases speed reduction by 0.8% per Rank (Maximum Rank is 50).
    - You gain 15% increased chance to critically strike Chilled or Frozen enemies and increase damage against Chilled and Frozen enemies by 50% (Requires Rank 25).
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Those require mechanical changes to the gem. Not bad ideas by any means, it’s just that Free and I are currently kicking back and forth a list of “simple” changes, which just involve increasing numbers (i.e. less coding for the CG team to do).

Eventually we’ll have 2 lists, one with these “simple” changes, one with more complex solutions.