Insider Trader: Jewelcrafting nerf incoming
by Amanda Miller 
May 22nd 2009 at 4:00PM
Insider Trader is your inside line on making, selling, buying and using player-made products.Bornakk just announced on the forums that Jewelcrafters are about to see a new nerf, and as a result, people are already beginning to weigh the benefits of switching to a different profession for min-maxing, or working out how they are going to re-itemize their gear.
Bornakk:
In the next major content patch we will be removing the prismatic quality of the jewelcrafter-only Dragon's Eye gems. Like other gems, they will have to match the socket color to receive a socket bonus. When this change occurs, players with qualifying jewelcrafting skill will be provided a yet to be determined amount of Dalaran Jewelecrafter Tokens as compensation.
This probably won't be enough to entice players to drop the profession, but it is a bit of a blow. Stratfu points out that because Mage T8 is equipped primarily with yellow and blue sockets, the only way to actually meet socket bonus requirements will be to use sub-par gems.
The JC-only Runed Dragon's Eye offers +32 spell power, and currently fits into any socket, conforming to meet the necessary color requirements. This is compared to the +19 spell power that the rest of us folks get from Runed Scarlet Rubies. While Jewelcrafters will still be able to use these gems, they won't be able to stick them just anywhere.
Breaking it down
Jewelcrafters can equip three of these soon-to-be-not-prismatic gems, and the fact is that for many classes, red gems offer the best stats in many cases. That is the main reason that Scarlet Rubies sell for often double the price of any other comparable gem on the market. For some classes, their gear simply will not include three red sockets.
Another example would be tier 8 and tier 8.5 sets for protection Paladins. While they benefit most from blue gems, their sets have only one blue socket!
While it may seem to some to be an easy compromise to forgo a socket bonus or use a different gem, it does mean that some classes simply won't benefit from being Jewelcrafters as much as other classes. Not being able to take advantage of your own profession's rewards for leveling it seems counter-intuitive, and unfair to the affected classes.
Would this mean that min-maxing guilds would suddenly prefer, for example, a Jewelcrafting prot Warrior over a JC prot Paladin, simply because the Warrior can squeeze more out of his/her stats? After all, tanks are becoming increasingly homogenized. Many fights no longer require a specific class. Unfortunately, many high-end guilds do block people from raid slots for not having the right profession, for example.
Compensation
The Jewelcrafting Token compensation is also a curious mechanic. Will the Dragons Eyes disappear entirely, or will your equipped and/or cut gems disappear? Unlikely. Most likely, you will log in to find your once prismatic gems converted into their corresponding colors. The tokens will be handed out as a means of compensation for the fact that many players will have to replace them.
But why JC?
Presumably this nerf comes as a response to the popularity of the profession. Not only is it one of, if not the, best gold making professions in the game, it is also considered a must for min-maxing your raiding gear. In fact, many high-end guilds require that their raiders become Jewelcrafters and either Enchanters or Blacksmiths in addition.
When Blizzard finally decides to add epic gems into the game, this nerf will hit the JC community even harder if the gems aren't buffed significantly, as Stratfu mentions. After all, each profession has its profession-only perks, and if they don't scale, and new ones are not introduced in their place, we'd all feel like Engineers carrying around old Arcanite Dragonlings and the like.
Of course, there is no need for panic. Patch 3.2 may not be the epic gem patch, meaning that we may yet see buffs to the Dragon's Eye gems that have not yet been announced.
Discussion
What do you think about this change? How are you going to have to re-work your gear? Is this actually going to affect your decision to take up, or keep, the Jewelcrafting profession?
We want to know your take on the matter. Hop on Twitter, leave a comment here, or blog about it with your new WoW.com profile feature! Don't forget to add the #wowcom tag to the end of your tweet!
Each week, Insider Trader takes you behind the scenes of the bustling sub-culture of professional craftsmen, examining the profitable, the tragically lacking, and the methods behind the madness. Check out our analysis of patch 3.1 profession changes, or read through our in-depth analysis of the changes to flasks in 3.1. Filed under: Mage, Enchants, Raiding, Features, Jewelcrafting, Economy, Analysis / Opinion, Items, Enchanting, Paladin, Insider Trader (Professions)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 6)
SaintStryfe May 22nd 2009 4:05PM
way to shoot the only good profession out there in the foot, Devs.
Magma May 22nd 2009 4:10PM
I didn't realize enchanting was crap.
Ahnz May 22nd 2009 4:11PM
That's the reason they're nerfin' it. it's the only profession that has profession only Items you'd actually want to keep and use once you've got the tier 8 or 8.5 gear.
theRaptor May 22nd 2009 4:26PM
Exactly. No profession should be required because it is so good. The devs have repeatedly reduced the costs of raiding, yet if professions have such large self-buffs they become required gold sinks if you want to seriously raid. This is no different to when people were required to be potted, elixired, and flasked six ways to sunday.
I think the perks were a stupid idea. They should have been utility not pure PVE buffs. They need to remove them or balance them out. If a huge proportion of raiders are picking one profession it is obviously not balanced.
Reihert May 22nd 2009 6:26PM
If epic gems comes and Dragon's Eye doesn't get buffed (and I believe they won't), I will simply drop JC and go enchanting. hands down.
The fact that I can use those 32 SP gem counting as any collor is very good. Now, with this nerf and the soon to come epic gem its benefits doesn't outscale enchanting. With the extra of d/eing my old gear.
tython25 May 22nd 2009 4:12PM
A terrible change that basically destroys the profession. Blizzard fails again...
Mung May 23rd 2009 7:32AM
OMG you're so right, it's destroying the profession! No-one who plays any type of content will need gems of any kind for any purpose any more!
pushmonk May 22nd 2009 4:13PM
So, instead of making the other professions as good as JC is for min/maxing, they just decide to break JC a bit. Way to go, Blizz.
Loftus May 23rd 2009 5:35AM
exactly what i was thinking, i think all proffesions should be improved rather than the 'best one' being nerfed, no-one likes a nerf.
I swapped from skinning to Jewelcrafting a while ago as my leather wasnt selling... Cost me around 2k+ to level it, and then a week or two of dailies and alot more gold on getting my meta gems... Im not hardcore raiding, just simply trying to improve my character as and when i can. Now im going to have to watch my stats go backwards, which is pretty dissapointing.
People should have a positive insentive (sp? lol) for moving to another profession, but they should never be given a negative insentive to leave one.
Wyred May 26th 2009 7:05AM
@Loftus *incentive. Close enough that everyone got what you meant.
On topic, this nerf doesn't seem profession destroying. As a healing priest, I'm still seriously considering swapping tailoring for JC, as the cloak enchant just really isn't good enough to justify the entire profession. There's been some debate on these pages about whether they should've nerfed JC or buffed other profs. I've gotta say, some professions really do feel sub-par, whatever blizz's philosophy behind buff/nerfs.
fredkreuger May 22nd 2009 4:13PM
Wait wait wait. So you mean I'm going to have to start putting blue gems in my blue slots for the bonus??? INCONCEIVABLE!
Jason May 22nd 2009 4:20PM
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
Kidding aside, it makes me glad my JC just hit 80 and I haven't cut a single Dragon's Eye. It won't hurt as much as it would have if I'd socketed three of them.
lockanon May 23rd 2009 11:38PM
UNEMPLOYED...IN GREENLAND!!!
It's kinda silly to QQ about a profession being nerfed again isn't it?
I mean, realistically, if you are spending your time min/ maxing on professions instead of min/ maxing by skills/ specs/ gear/ other enchantments and such you are probably not going to be pulling THAT much more out of your character.... You know 32-19=13 spell power... losing 13 sp on something as minor as having to switch to another gem or something.... I understand the loss of the perk; I get why that sucks, but JC are still the only ones using the things, and nothing is saying that this isn't just a clearing of brush for the newer gems coming out y'know.
Phoenix Dawn May 24th 2009 7:06PM
I have decided that blue sockets officially suck.
As a holy paladin, I don't benefit from SPI boosts...blue sucks.
As a healer, I don't need any more stam...blue sucks.
I have leveled JC since level 5, I didn't chose it because of the buffs, they didn't even exist when I chose this profession...so now, thousands of gold and 80 levels later I'm reduced to filling sockets with ___ & MP5...alas...blue STILL sucks.
Myf May 22nd 2009 4:14PM
Oh great.
I just spent 2000g yesterday leveling JC so I could use these gems.
Now I have another useless profession to go along with Engineering
p3ng May 22nd 2009 4:46PM
I just did the same fucking thing today. This kinda blows. I understand the need for it, it's just really bad timing.
Roboticus May 22nd 2009 6:18PM
I don't understand all these "JCing is useless now" posts. Two points:
1.) JCing was not just slightly better than the others, but massively so. At least for rogues, every non-gathering profession had almost exactly the same value, set at 64 attack power. With JC's ability to socket-hop with better stats, EJ.com was estimating it at around 110 attack power equivalent.
2.) JCing, even after this, will still have at minimum 66 attack power equivalent for a rogue, and possibly more, if you need to work on a certain stat like expertise, for instance.
Conclusion: JCing will be either best or tied for best raiding profession (with blacksmithing) even after this nerf.
Thebum May 23rd 2009 7:29PM
Unfortunately not Roboticus. For those of us with one red socket slot on our items jewelcrafting now becomes worse than any of the other professions for the perks. LW gives me 37 spell power from the bracer enchant, JC will now give me 13 spellpower since I have one red socket and there are no "hybrid" dragonseye gems. So instead I can get spirit from the blue sockets and haste/crit/int for the yellow ones. How nice. But I don't want those stats.
Fuseitana May 22nd 2009 4:15PM
So, instead of figuring out how to make the other professions less craptastic, they're just gonna crapify JC.
Good one Blizz.
uncaringbear May 22nd 2009 7:33PM
Gee, it doesn't seem to take many voters to vote down a comment to the point of grayness. I may be biased, but I happen to agree with most of the grayed post. Rather than nerf the one profession that genuinely felt useful, why not improve the other professions. There's an argument to be made that the other professions have generally felt sub par since the launch of Wrath.