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Gems

Diablo 2 Gems - Diablo 2 Perfect RubyFunctionless on their own, Diablo 2 gems possess great power when utilized with a weapon, shield, or helm, bestowing potent magical enchantments upon the item and its wearer. Socketed armor was added with the release of the Expansion, but all items have identical stats in either armor or helms. Gems, once socketed, add special bonuses to the items.

Diablo 2 Gem Varieties

There are seven different types of gems:

  • Amethysts
  • Diamonds
  • Emeralds
  • Rubies
  • Sapphires
  • Topazes
  • Skulls

All have different effects depending on the item in which they are “socketed”. There are five levels of quality for Diablo 2 gems, from worst to best they are:

  • Chipped
  • Flawed
  • Normal (simply called by the gem type in the game, i.e. “ruby”)
  • Flawless
  • Perfect

Diablo 2 Gems can not be bought, only found from monster drops, chests, and as a reward for some quests. Better quality gems are found as you progress in the game. Gem quality dropped is based on Mlvl. Perfect gems are never dropped, though one may be found as a reward for the Hellforge Quest.

Socketed Items

Only weapons, helms, shields and body armor can have sockets, with body armor being the new addition to the list with the release of the Expansion. No boots, gloves, belts, or jewelry will ever be socketed, and this includes Uniques.

Items can vary in their number of sockets, depending on type and quality. Helms can have from 1-3, Body armor 1-4, weapons 1-6, and shields 1-4. Full details elsewhere in the Items section.

Once a gem is inserted into a socket, it is there forever in Diablo 2 Classic, and can’t be removed or upgraded in quality. In the Diablo 2 expansion, gems can be removed from sockets by destroying them with a Horadric cube recipe. This does not damage the item, but destroys whatever was socketed in it.

Upgrading Gems

Three gems of the same type and quality combine in the Horadric Cube to upgrade one level of quality.

Gem shrines are found only rarely, but they are worth preparing for and using, as they’ll upgrade one gem from your inventory one level. It’s best to carry around a flawless gem of whatever type you want upgraded and be sure it’s the only gem in your inventory when you click the shrine. If you don’t have any gems, or only have perfect gems, one random chipped gem will be dropped.

Gem Effects

Gem effects vary, but are logical: Gems placed into weapons generally add damage, while gems in shields provide resistance, and gems in helms/armor add to hit points or other attributes. Exactly how much benefit a socketed gem provides depends on the quality of the gem.

Gemmed-hat.jpg

You can see how gems look in an item here in this shot. The sockets display down the left side of the image for all socketed items, and if they are filled the gem is visible there, rather than an empty hole. Socketed items in the game appear brightly-coloured, and their appearance is based on the first gem socketed. An item with an Amethyst first, then two Emeralds will be purple, not green.

The bonuses from gems of the same type stack, so if you had two rubies in a sword, the fire damage would be added together. It is arithmetic, never geometric, so if you had say three sapphires, all of them chilling for 3 seconds, you wouldn’t move up to freezing the monster, you’d just chill it for longer. The same goes for other gems. For example rubies add fire damage to your attack. Three perfect rubies would do a lot of fire damage, but they wouldn’t create a small firewall under the monster.

Diablo 2 Gems in shields do nothing for the Paladin’s Smite attack.

Gem Stats

Amethyst

QualityWeaponHelm or ArmorShieldClvl Req
ChippedDiablo 2 Chipped Amethyst+40 to Attack Rating+3 to Strength+8 to Defense1
FlawedDiablo 2 Flawed Amethyst+60 to Attack Rating+4 to Strength+12 to Defense5
NormalDiablo 2 Amethyst+80 to Attack Rating+6 to Strength+18 to Defense12
FlawlessDiablo 2 Flawed Amethyst+100 to Attack Rating+8 to Strength+24 to Defense15
PerfectDiablo 2 Perfect Amethyst+150 to Attack Rating+10 to Strength+30 to Defense18

Diamond

QualityWeaponHelm or ArmorShieldClvl Req
ChippedDiablo 2 Chipped diamond+28% damage vs. the undead+20 to Attack Rating+6% Resistance to All1
FlawedDiablo 2 Flawed Diamond+34% damage vs. the undead+40 to Attack Rating+8% Resistance to All5
NormalDiablo 2 Diamond+44% damage vs. the undead+60 to Attack Rating+11% Resistance to All12
FlawlessDiablo 2 Flawless Diamond+54% damage vs. the undead+80 to Attack Rating+14% Resistance to All15
PerfectDiablo 2 Perfect Diamond+68% damage vs. the undead+100 to Attack Rating+19% Resistance to All18

Emerald

Emeralds are popular weapon sockets for their stacking poison damage.

QualityWeaponHelm or ArmorShieldClvl Req
ChippedDiablo 2 Chipped EmeraldAdds 5 (5.9) poison damage in 1 sec+3 to Dexterity+12% Poison Resistance1
FlawedDiablo 2 Flawed EmeraldAdds 11 (11.7) poison damage in 1 sec+4 to Dexterity+16% Poison Resistance5
NormalDiablo 2 EmeraldAdds 17 (17.6) poison damage in 1 sec+6 to Dexterity+22% Poison Resistance12
FlawlessDiablo 2 Flawless EmeraldAdds 23 (23.4) poison damage in 1 sec+8 to Dexterity+28% Poison Resistance15
PerfectDiablo 2 Perfect EmeraldAdds 29 (29.3) poison damage in 1 sec+10 to Dexterity+40% Poison Resistance18

Ruby

Rubies are popular sockets in armor and helms for the +hit points. Mercs can often benefit from this boost.

QualityWeaponHelm or ArmorShieldClvl Req
ChippedDiablo 2 Chipped Ruby+3-4 Fire Damage+10 to Maximum Life+12% fire resistance1
FlawedDiablo 2 Flawed Ruby+5-8 to Fire Damage+17 to Maximum Life+16% to Fire Resistance5
NormalDiablo 2 Ruby+8-12 to Fire Damage+24 to Maximum Life+22% fire resistance12
FlawlessDiablo 2 Flawless Ruby+10-16 to Fire Damage+31 to Maximum Life+28% fire resistance15
PerfectDiablo 2 Perfect Ruby+15-20 Fire Damage+38 to Maximum Life+40% fire resistance18

Sapphire

Sapphires are little socketed by high level characters, but a sapphire in a weapon is hugely useful for a low level character, for the chilling property of cold damage.

QualityWeaponHelm or ArmorShieldClvl Req
ChippedDiablo 2 Chipped Saphire+1-3 Cold Damage
1 second Cold Time
+10 to Maximum Mana+12% to Cold Resistance1
FlawedDiablo 2 Flawed Saphire+3-5 Cold Damage
1.4 second Cold Time
+17 to Maximum Mana+16% to Cold Resistance5
NormalDiablo 2 Saphire+4-7 Cold Damage
2 second Cold Time
+24 to Maximum Mana+22% to Cold Resistance12
FlawlessDiablo 2 Flawless Saphire+6-10 Cold Damage
2.4 second Cold Time
+31 to Maximum Mana+28% to Cold Resistance15
PerfectDiablo 2 Perfect Saphire+10-14 Cold Damage
3 second Cold Time
+38 to Maximum Mana+40% to Cold Resistance18

Topaz

Topaz are very popular sockets in body armor and helms for the Magic Find bonuses they provide.

QualityWeaponHelm or ArmorShieldClvl Req
ChippedDiablo 2 Chipped Topaz+1-8 Lightning Damage+9% chance to find magical items+12% Lightning Resistance1
FlawedDiablo 2 Flawed Topaz+1-14 Lightning Damage+13% chance to find magical items+16% Lightning Resistance5
NormalDiablo 2 Topaz+1-22 Lightning Damage+16% chance to find magical items+22% Lightning Resistance12
FlawlessDiablo 2 Flawless Topaz+1-30 Lightning Damage+20% chance to find magical items+28% Lightning Resistance15
PerfectDiablo 2 Perfect Topaz+1-40 Lightning Damage+24% chance to find magical items+40% Lightning Resistance18

Skulls

Skulls were popular sockets in weapons in D2C for the dual leech they provided, but with leech available on so many items in the expansion, skulls are seldom used any longer.

QualityWeaponHelm or ArmorShieldClvl Req
ChippedDiablo 2 Chipped SkullSteals 2% life and 1% mana per hitReplenish life +2 and mana regen. 8%Attacker takes damage of 41
FlawedDiablo 2 Flawed SkullSteals 2% life and 2% mana per hitReplenish life +3 and mana regen. 8%Attacker takes damage of 85
NormalDiablo 2 SkullSteals 3% life and 2% mana per hitReplenish life +3 and mana regen. 12%Attacker takes damage of 1212
FlawlessDiablo 2 Flawless SkullSteals 3% life and 3% mana per hitReplenish life +4 and mana regen. 12%Attacker takes damage of 1615
PerfectDiablo 2 Perfect SkullSteals 4% life and 3% mana per hitReplenish life +5 and mana regen 19%Attacker takes damage of 2018

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