Patch 4.0.6 PTR: New DPS meta-gems and requirement fixes
by Michael Sacco 
Jan 7th 2011 at 1:47AM
The full text of the announcement is below. Check out the full 4.0.6 PTR patch notes (so far) here.
Jewelcrafting
- Meta gems with the Chaotic and Relentless prefixes now have a requirement of 3 red gems.
- New meta gems have been added: Agile Shadowspirit Diamond (Agility/3% critical damage), Reverberating Shadowspirit Diamond (Strength/3% critical damage), and Burning Shadowspirit Diamond (Intellect/3% critical damage). These new recipes are unbound and can drop from any Cataclysm creature. The new meta gems have a requirement of 3 red gems equipped.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Riley Jan 7th 2011 1:52AM
Oh thank god!
Fletcher Jan 7th 2011 7:36AM
Riley: Fury warriors are chasing hit like fat kids after an ice cream van ... and just like the fat kid after the ice cream van, they can never catch it. In order to avoid offhand misses (and thus make rage generation and enrage procs work properly) they need a whopping 27% hit, which is impossible to get at level 85.
Sleutel Jan 7th 2011 6:48PM
My reaction was more, "Reverberating Shadowspirit Diamond (Strength/3% critical damage)? I'll be in my bunk."
alpha5099 Jan 7th 2011 1:59AM
Hrm. I'm totally on-board for hating the ridiculous More Blue than Red requirement, but I feel like a 3 Red requirement is pretty boring. I mean, for a sizable number (maybe even the majority) of classes, gemming their primary stat straight across the board is generally the best way to go. And given that Int, Str, and Agi are all red gems, it really doesn't require any thought at all to activate these new metas. I'd rather see something like 2 Blues and a Yellow, anything. Something that wasn't difficult to achieve but which did require at least a modicum of effort to activate. I'm glad Blizzard has reverted the previous requirement, but I feel like maybe they've gone too far the other direction.
Hih Jan 7th 2011 2:32AM
This. More blue than red was kinda lame, unless you were gemming almost all blue for hit anyway (which granted, a lot of dps are right now), but 3 red gem requirement? Really? Why even have a requirement at all at that point?
VioletArrows Jan 7th 2011 4:17AM
You say that like people aren't going to still find a way to screw it up. :/
Pyromelter Jan 7th 2011 5:16AM
I feel like what you are asking is akin to "why is my teacher cancelling the final exam and giving everyone an A in the class."
In other words, you're getting a gift, don't question it, just enjoy it. Because the alternative is, well, it's what it is now, and what it is now sucks ass.
Riley Jan 7th 2011 6:12AM
i don't think most dps are gemming that much hit, it's in abundance on gear, i'm gemming pretty much straight agi and agi/haste
Mike Jan 7th 2011 7:35AM
Don't get me wrong; I'm a tank and I still think that the (blue > red) requirement was trash. Still, I agree wholeheartedly. The requirement is now pointless. Half of my mind is convinced that Blizzard is running an experiment to see if the community really does get excited over making things way, way simple as long as it raises their DPS [insert joke about Wrath having been the simplified w/ big number experiment]. The new metas themselves seem to cement that for me. Now there's no choice at all, completely counter to what their "philosophy" has been through Cataclysm's development.
When you read the newspost and sincerely debate whether or not it's a joke, they MAY have gone too far.
Boom Jan 7th 2011 7:43AM
I don't understand all the comments against 'Requires 3 red gems' since all they've done is revert the gems back to what was required before they made the change (as they stated they were going to do).
Grovinofdarkhour Jan 7th 2011 10:25AM
@alpha
The requirement isn't about the color of gems required, but the number. They want to make sure you have accumulated a few gemmable pieces and gemmed them first, and THEN you can have your ubergem. With no requirement at all, everyone would just go after a headpiece first because it's the one you can put an ubergem in. And that would be boring.
Picking red just makes it easier to make sure that once you have three gems, you can activate a meta. But yeah, if they really wanted to make it user-friendly, they could've just said "requires 3 gems of any color".
alpha5099 Jan 7th 2011 10:58AM
@Pyromelter
I would ask that. I want to earn my A.
@Grovin
That's not a bad point, but once you have accumulated gear with gem slots (which is not difficult to do, once you start getting rep or heroic gear, which should be also when you get a meta slot) it won't ever take any thought again to keep your meta gem active. On the other hand, in Wrath the Chaotic Skyflare Diamond required 2 Blue Gems, and the Relentless Earthsiege Diamond need one of each color. These were by no means difficult bonuses to keep active, but they at least required a bit of thought.
Molly Jan 7th 2011 11:22AM
It may take the "thought" out of gemming, but not having to find ways to put blue gems into my hunter's gear when all I want is agility is infinitely preferable, especially when you consider most people just gave up on activating their meta gems with the old change and stacked their main stat anyway.
In general, this is one of those "don't look a gift horse in the mouth" moments. And they may change it again once they test it out on the PTR.
Devin Jan 7th 2011 11:32AM
@pyromelter
A lot of people enjoy the meta game of maximizing their character, myself included. For my dps classes all I have to do now is gem reds straight across the board, even hit isn't worth gemming for most, you just reforge for it if needed. Easy? yes. Boring? Extremely. I would much rather have something like the more blues than reds if the activated meta gem was acutally worth doing so.
Fierna Jan 7th 2011 12:37PM
At least for mages having the more blue than red requirement made gemming a more compelling question. I saw a lot of interesting math floating around that took a look at just what happens when your character dons all purple and green gems to activate the chaotic.
Maybe if by 3 red they meant 3 pure red (not orange or purple) but even then there is now no meta gem any mage will ever take other than the chaotic.
Noyou Jan 7th 2011 3:50PM
G-D- you people are never happy. You bitch at the blue gem requirement now you bitch at the red gem requirement. Meta gems? WTF? Why can't we just put any gem there? Next thing you will want to reforge stats on your gear. Oh wait there already is that. Hey I know, how about getting out a box of crayons and drawing your own gear? Jeebus. Give them credit for hastily making a change to a very broken system. If you don't like it, don't use a meta gem or don't play. No one is forcing you to play? (or are they?)
Zelius Jan 10th 2011 2:21PM
As an Elemental shaman I'm way over the hitcap already, because of the abundance of spirit on caster mail. I find myself reforging spirit and hit into haste/mastery as it is. Gemming for more spirit/hit would be out of the question.
Ametrine Jan 7th 2011 2:02AM
This oughta make DPS gemming MUCH simpler...
MysticalOS Jan 7th 2011 2:21AM
the irony is that fixing the chaos, then giving better metas so no one uses chaos anyways is kind of amusing. But i'm not complaining i like the new metas
gewalt Jan 7th 2011 7:53AM
and this is why I hadnt bought the new chaotic recipe yet...