People actually trade for gems? Interesting, since I can’t tell you the number of them I either never pick up or just sell outright, and I know I’m way, waaaay lower on the “finding stuff” ladder than most of you guys. Is it just because people need specific gems, or do some folks find them that hard to come across?
think, people used to give out decent uniques for chipped gems before 1.10, because they were used to cube 3 socketed swords with random mods (hoping for a 3 socket cruel something of quickness). Now, 3 flawless gems and any weapon will result in a socketed (random number) weapon with random mods.
Gems are used for rune upgrades and crafting recipes among other things. Prubies seem to be the most wanted for crafting. You can still get some lower items with chips, but not like you used to be able to get.
Priorities.
Right now I am not in the hunt for The Sword. Back when I was, I was saving anything that even LOOKED like a gem.
But now that I am not really in the hunt for anything in particular (except RUNES), I save perfects on occasion and any rune I find (with few exceptions), and go on my merry way.
If one were looking to make a Cruel Colossus Blade of Quickness or Evisceration, then gems would be crucial. For those people they have value, and if you can get 24 (or whatever) flawless for a dinky pair of CK boots you had on a crust mule anyway, why not?
Three chipped gems and a magic weapon does the same thing.
Ah. Just looked at Arreat Summit. Looks like they dropped the number of sockets possible to 1-2, and the ilvl has really dropped. Looks like gems are not worthless, eh?
Re: Cow Kings boots: They are much more rare now on ladder due to the fact that nobody does cows anymore. I want them for the MF and massive dex bonus, to help blocking.
Re: Gems: Perfect gems are very useful. With three perfect gems you can re-roll the stats on ANY blue magic item. The best things to use these on are charms and jewels found from high level monsters. If Hell Baal just dropped you a really crappy charm, KEEP IT! Stick any 3 Pgems in the cube with it and re-roll it. A charm from Hell Baal or other similarly high-lvl monsters has the possibility of having ALL possible affixes and suffixes. If you re-roll it and it still ain’t great, just leave the charm in your stash until you find three more Pgems, then re-roll it again and again, until you get something useful or tradeable. You’d be surprised what a good charm will trade for.
This is a good way of getting those +skill GCs that are so elusive.
So all this talk about 1.10 got me to finally reinstall DII and fire up some of my old single player characters.
I then discovered that the hard drive which held my old characters is completely borked. I can hear the head swinging back and forth but I can’t hear the platter spin up.
Sigh.
Rest in peace, Meatball McGee, Dipstick McGee, Francis McGee (the mule of the family), and the rest of the McGee clan.
So I’ve decided to start fresh with some new guys on Battle.net. Right now I have a Druid (Puddles McGee) on US West. He’s currently level 9. I’m playing him different from my SP characters, in that I have a plan to really focus on his summoning and elemental skills and ignore everything else. To that end, he’s sitting on 3 skill points waiting for the next branch of skills to open up, since I don’t want to waste them on what are basically just prerequsites.
The only times I played online in the past it was with people I knew in private games on battle.net, so I’m not very familiar with etiquitte for public games. I’ve been creating my own games and leaving them open hoping people will join in, but usually what happens is people pop in for a second, and before I even get a chance to do anything they leave. Or they’ll enter and sit there, not respond, then leave. Or one guy entered, ran out, grabbed a bunch of stuff (bolts, low quality gloves, couple of potions, nothing nice) off the ground from monsters that I’d killed, then left. Are these people looking for something in particular?
I’m a little hesitant to hop into other people’s open games before I really know the ropes.
'Rpund these here parts we play in games called SDMB with the standard password of cecil.
I think that most of us play on the USEast server, though Yeticus Rex and a couple of others do play on USWest I think.
Good luck!
On the very rare occasions I play online, I play on the Europe server. I don’t know how the lag would be if I tried using USEast - any idea without me wasting time trying it?
(I’d also be playing very late at night by my lights, being four hours ahead of you.)
ED, I play fairly late, though that will change drastically in a few days when school starts up again.
Er, um, Chronos? Are you still on hiatus, or what? The West is kinda lonely out here…
[stupid rookie move]
Found this really cool Cruel Pike with 290%ED and thought, “Wow, I’m gonna go get a few flawless gems and put them all in the cube and get some sockets into it to make a REALLY cool Pike with extra frills for my mercenary”…
Nothing like wiping out a 290ED mod and replacing it with a Septic (slightly septic that is…6 damage over 3 seconds) mod and only getting 2 sockets added to it. Homer would have been proud to hear me say “D’OH!!!”
[/stupid rookie move]
On a better note, I traded one dol rune (and found another one 5 minutes later) for Lycanders Flank Pike for my amazon just for a third weapon option. My merc is now using that Hone Sundin with 3 amns and he’s sticking around alot longer in hell now, saving me the task of fundraising…so all is not bad here.
I can help you out on West…I’m on sdmb or sdmb1 with the same password…if I’m on Hell and you can’t join, whisper me “yeticusrex2”, (or Chronos - “sonorhC”), and well come to your game and get you up to speed…we need some an extra killer in our group…
Are Dols that valued in West, or are Lyc. Flanks that undervalued? Dols are not exactly looked for around here; monster flee is annoying for melee chars and shields more often need res than replen life (which can be had, along with mana regen, in armor, where it’s harder to make res).
Fairly late for you or fairly late for me? Your midnight is my 4am, I think.
ED, I just stopped playing for the moment, and that only because I need to mule and I am not so fond of muling. Also, since nobody else is on East right now (on my F list, anyhow), I do not want to chance a computer hiccup.
Shit, shit, shit.
I finally found a decent elite paladin shield (a Kurast shield) with competent mods (+12 to all resists).
I toss it in the Cube with the necessary ingredients to socket it. I’ve got a 3 in 4 chance of getting something useful, right? 2 sockets? RHYME. (I’ve even got the runes) 3 sockets? ANCIENT’S PLEDGE. Not quite as nice (I really like "cannot be frozen), but the resists are damn good, so it woulda been cool. If I’d hit the jackpot and gotten a 4 sockets…EXILE (assuming that Pun had the runes for me to mooch off him 
(Vex + Ohm + Ist + Dol ?) ). No resists, but I’ve got a 3 socket armor I could put runes into for the resists and the other mods are nice.
Anyway, I put the items in the cube, press the button and…one socket. Th’ damn thing is ruined. I mean…one socket? Pfffbt. :rolleyes:
Do you know how long it took me to find that damned shield?
Aaargh.
Fenris
PS #1–I’m coming to the conclusion that when you have a weapon that freezes a target and then you shatter the target leaving a puddle, you’re f*cking up your chances for drops. I played for like an hour straight with a freezing weapon and if the monster was turned to ice and shattered, I never once saw them drop an item and only very rarely dropped money (maybe…the two times it happened there were other monsters around.) Anyone else notice this?
PS2–Fluid, didn’t you have a unique sword for a necromancer that gives a ton of + skill bonuses to poison skills? If you still don’t want it, I’m building up a poisonmancer who could really use it.
PS3–Have drops been crappy recently? Last 3 days or so? I haven’t found anything decent.
Well it took some wheeling and dealing, but I am now the proud new owner of TAL RASHA’S Gaurdianship Lacquered Plate and my sorc now has the BLING BLING GLOW!!! WOO HOOOOO!!!
It took me IK armor + SS + Verdungos + Arach Mesh + Silkweaves + something else I can’t remember, but believe it or not it was a good deal seeing as how other people were asking for an arm a leg and a kidney.
Seems that my build has now worked out perfectly, since before I thought I had put too much into energy and Warmth, but now without WizSpike and Shako, I see that I needed the natural boost to mana. The only thing I really need now is Cow Kings boots and maybe another Rhyme Shield and she’ll be all done. (except for maybe more MF and/or +skill charms)
I also need to socket my Tal armor and helm and throw in the requisite Ptopaz’es, so I’ll need to rush somebody to get Hellforge and the socket quests.
Oh Fen, I believe BlackBogs Sharp is what you seek, and I think I have one for you, somewhere.
Well now we’ll just have to get all that stuff again to re-build the collection.
That looks like an arm, a leg and a kidney, but then I was offered Shaeled U Truncheon, 2 Strings, Cat’s Eye and about four other items for my Highlord’s (as if, dude. My one and only good char is not trading a Highlord’s. Maybe if I had 3…).
Blackbog’s Sharp is the U Cinquedeas and in 1.09 looked exactly like the Jade Tan Do, which is sort of its well-meaning but seriously underpowered kid brother. Thing does 90 poison damage, which is good up through parts of A3, but is totally inappropriate in NM or Hell.