What are fair expectations on progression raiders with regards to epic gemming?

[Khargol]

In my guild the policy is that BiS items such as cloaks or normal items after ultraxion if they are the precursor to BIS. In all honesty it just comes down to not dumping epic gems into items that you don't plan to hold on to for any length of time.

[Glok]

We didnt go full epic gems until Heroic Spine.

Was kinda funny for those still sporting 391 and LFR 384 gear but a worthwhile investment imo.

[mittacc]

i'm not the guy who would throw out 10k jsut to get 10more int....

[Pasture]

I'm not using epic gems unless it's a BiS heroic piece. If I used epic gems on items that weren't BiS then I wouldn't have enough gems to gem the items that were.

[Jacob6875]

If you are in a top end guild (aka something like blood legion / paragon) then you would expect your raid to acquire full epic gems in their gear as soon as possible. For a guild such as yours (or mine in fact) that is 2/8 or 3/8 heroic it simply isnt practicle. To use myself as an example.

I play a resto / ele shaman which means I have almost two full sets of gear. Which means that to just regem my current gear I need around 25 red epic gems (and a couple orange). With red gems still costing 6k each on my server it really isn't possible to upgrade without having hundreds of thousands of gold per raider.

[klaps_05]

as the content will be getting some heavy nerfs both the "power of the aspects" and "fine" tuning, id suggest that there is no need to make fuss around whether u gem epic or not.

demanding epic gems and absolute min/maxing is required when you go for ranks, else you can do away fine until u get little more upgrades.

[Myrlae]

in our guild one must gem BiS items and can gem non BiS items however one wants

[wtfPanzerkin]

I'm split down the middle on this one because I've raided with both ends of the progression spectrum. I've raided with DV's alt group and I've raided with multiple casual, easy going "idc" style guilds.

The Deus Vox part of me says always gem and enchant to maximum efficiency. Even if it's only a 200 dps/hps or 400hp increase, it's an increase. And gold is there to be spent.

The casual, easy going guy of me says the opposite. That small of an increase will rarely matter. There have been times where yes, we've wiped on a boss where boss had less than 1k hp left. It would matter in a case like that. But out of 5 years of raiding, I think that's happened...twice?

If you're a progression guild and don't consider yourself casual, I'd go with my first example. I'd definitely say "Hey it's only like 1-2k gold to fully gem and enchant your toon, and even if it'll effect your performance minimally, if everyone does it it'll be like adding a few thousand dps/hps to the raid". If you don't care too much about progression but just want to progress as far as you can while having fun, let em do what they please as long as it's not gimping the raid completely. By that I mean, gearing way off (agility weapon for warrior or something like that), or something.

[Autofollow]

Our expectation is that people gem / enchant / reforge every piece of gear they get. Whatever their profession, they use the best modifiers they have on any of them, regardless of if there is an upgrade or not. As for epic gems, only if it's the true BIS item for your class. And fyi, not all BIS items come from the DS heroic content. Your players should know the lists, and the officers enforcing this should as well. If there is a dispute, then go to the lists to check it out is all. It shouldn't be an unfair expectation.

*EDIT*

Sorry, last minute thought here. I'm pretty sure that the wold first guilds didn't have full epic gems or full BIS gear when they took down MoD heroic. IDK, just came to mind.

[wtfPanzerkin]

If you are in a top end guild (aka something like blood legion / paragon) then you would expect your raid to acquire full epic gems in their gear as soon as possible. For a guild such as yours (or mine in fact) that is 2/8 or 3/8 heroic it simply isnt practicle. To use myself as an example.

I play a resto / ele shaman which means I have almost two full sets of gear. Which means that to just regem my current gear I need around 25 red epic gems (and a couple orange). With red gems still costing 6k each on my server it really isn't possible to upgrade without having hundreds of thousands of gold per raider.

When I was raiding with Deus Vox's alt group end wrath and early Cata, they had everyone use the best gems and enchants on anything purple. Regular Cho'gall kill item? You're throwing the best enchants possible (forgot names, haven't played in months) on it, even if there's a better weapon off a heroic boss we have on farm elsewhere.

[Deleted]

How much do red epic gems sell for on your server? For a 25 man raid that's gotta be anywhere from 10-20 red gems per player with the exception of tanks, that would cost our guild in the region of 200k+ for red gems alone. That's assuming so many gems would be available on the AH to begin with.

The guildbank bought a bunch up and subsidised the price for guildies, the prices on AH are less than 2k.

[Deleted]

Epic gems won't make such a big difference. We are a 6/8 guild and we only expect epic gems on DS heroic gear.

[Tiberria]

I don't think that it's unreasonable to expect people to use epic gems in gear that is BiS - i.e anything ilevel 410, as well as the VP 397 cloaks and relics (since there is no upgrade for these available). I have also been putting epic orange and purple gems in non-BiS items that have yellow or blue sockets (and that I want to go for the socket bonus in), because I have so many of those gems from alts, etc that it was either use them, leave them in my bank or sell them. Besides, they are only like 500g at this point.

[Sadinar]

Part of it depends on the prices on your server, part of it depends on the level of dedication you expect from your raiders. For example, red gems on my server fluctuate from 3-5k; if you need to gem your whole gear in a short time period, expect to pay ~4k per gem. For most raiders with a decent amount of t13, you're looking at 20-25 gems for their gear; thats asking people to throw down 100k for the sake of progression. Thats a harsh price to ask them to pay.

On the other hand, they could be using epic purple/orange gems in red sockets. However, you need to question whether or not thats actually an upgrade for many classes.

[Darkfriend]

Hardcore progression = fully gemmed, casual or a guild that doesnt take raiding as serious = whatever members decide id say.

That assumes there are enough epic gems on the AH to do so, TBH.

[Divisible]

I go hard in the paint and put epic gems in all of my gear. Including my PVP gear.

[coldfiredragon]

Not at all, If you guys consider yourself progression then you put in time and money into your toons to make them best they can to deafeat bosses. Epic gems for every piece of gear until you get a new piece and epic gem that. it is cost of being a solid raider and being a solid raiding guild.

I agree with what you say if you replace solid with heroic. There are lots of solid raiding guilds that don't do much heroic or none, and they don't bother with the epic gems. In heroic raids where ever tinny little bit can make the difference between a win and a wipe yes they are important. Though with the incmming nerf I don't think it is quite so needed since you can wait a week and they are nerfed an extra 5% each week.

[Jacob6875]

When I was raiding with Deus Vox's alt group end wrath and early Cata, they had everyone use the best gems and enchants on anything purple. Regular Cho'gall kill item? You're throwing the best enchants possible (forgot names, haven't played in months) on it, even if there's a better weapon off a heroic boss we have on farm elsewhere.

I was talking about epic gems. Of course people should fully enchant there gear. The cost difference is my problem with epic gems currently. I could fully enchant all my gear with the best enchants in the game for the cost of 1 red epic gem on my server (6k).

[rijn dael]

We have had so many 1% wipes that our Gbank paid for the cheap people to have full gems -

While I appreciate the benefit to the raid, it annoys me that people were putting blues in 410 items, when I bought epics for all slots - remaining 391/397 included -_-

At this point, our raid is about half-half 397/410, and stuck on the third tendon of spine due to dps issues.

[Beace]

The general guild rule has been to epic gem everything from which there isn't an upgrade from a farming boss. In our case if you cannot upgrade an item from 1/8 heroic it should be epic gemmed. Is this an unreasonable demand given the progression position we're in? What are other guilds stance on the use of epic gems?

That's very reasonable. Though depends on AH costs also. I wouldn't expect someone to put down 5k to gem a 397 item.