Blizzards officielle forum-troll Bashiok har for nylig snakket meget om gems og deres funktion i Diablo 3.

For det første er det blevet nævnt, at der i diablo 3 vil være 14 forskellige gem-kvaliteter, mens der i Diablo 2 kun var 5 forskellige; chipped, flawed, flawless, og perfect. Ud af de 14 vil kun 5 af dem kunne falde fra slagne monstre, mens resten skal craftes. Går man ud fra, at der ligesom i Diablo 2 skal 3 gems til for at opgradere, vil det kræve 19.683 level 5 gems at lave en enkelt level 14 gem. Det lyder af mange, så vi må håbe på, at man kun skal bruge to af slagsen, eller at de finder på et andet system.

Yeah, that's about right. I mean keep in mind none of this has been proven through actual testing but the current design is that yeah, it's going to take a lot of lower level gems to reach the very highest high end.

The gem-to-gem upgrade intent is not to have these huge gaps where you feel like you're lame unless you have level 14 gems in every slot, but as a long term goal for the hardcore min/maxers and PvPers who are going to be playing for a long time and be able to work toward those goals. It's something you can put a little time into just by upgrading the gems you pick up during normal play, so you're constantly able to keep working toward the goal of crating a level 14 gem.

Also the trading game and millions of people playing for months is going to make them a lot more attainable than they may seem when throwing out numbers like 19,000. :)

It's possible it may feel crappy or we need to add something to help jump gaps, or, who knows. It's all very unproven at the moment, but we think provides a nice long term goal anyone can work toward just by killing monsters and picking up gems.

Gems do stack. Right now it's 10 but that could go up as we see fit. They have a good chance of being used in other ways aside from simply being socketed, something that would siphon them out of the economy. Maybe crafting. We like them remaining as something you have to visit the Jeweler artisan to combine. We don't want it to be annoying or take a lot of time though. We also don't anticipate someone visiting one with 19,000 gems looking to upgrade all the way to level 14. ;)
They don't have a level requirement so we do intend to see them used as a way to twink new characters, or allow people to buy into gemming up a bit earlier on if they have the gold.
Our current anticipation is that it will take the hardcore players quite a while before they start maxing out their gems, long enough that they won't see level 14 gems in all slots for all of their gear before we throw something new at them.

You will not get anywhere near the amount of crafting reagents back from what it took to craft the item. If you craft something, then salvage it, you'll be losing a significant portion of what it will take to make another one of the same type.

It's important to keep in mind that you can pay an artisan to remove the gems from an item. The last design I had heard of was that it was based on gem value, so as you socket higher level gems it becomes more expensive, but you'll almost certainly want to unsocket gems to level them up, or swap to new gear. This may cause some unique problems for low level (non-twink) characters attempting to buy high level gems and then being unable to remove them from the socket when they get a better piece of armor (because they can't afford it), but that may turn out to be an acceptable roadblock.

Bashiok nævner også at gems ikke vil have noget krav til din figurs level, hvorfor en level 14 gem vil kunne bruges på en level 1 figur. Samtidig kan man bruge en af sine artisans, højst sandsynligt the jeweler, til at fjerne gems fra dine ting uden at de går i stykker som de gjorde i Diablo 2, således at man kan blive ved med at opgradere den samme gem mens man baner sig vej igennem spillet.

Der er ingen konkrete stats til gems, men Lead Designer Jay Wilson har i et intervew udtalt, at der vil være standarder som man så i Diablo 2; f.eks. +strenght, men også mere specifikke ting som hurtigere cast rate eller attack speed.

Det lyder af meget og lyder meget uoverskueligt med 19.000 gems, men som Bashiok nævner, er det et system der er under udvikling, og derfor er det langt fra sikkert, at det bliver sådan i den endelige udgave af Diablo 3.

Tråden på Blizzards Battle.Net-forum, hvor alt dette bliver diskuteret kan findes her.