Neve's Gemstones too frustrating to use.

[Gangrene]

I really want to use these relics. But having 7 of the same arcana in a run is damn near impossible unless you have godly RNG in the shops/boss drops. Which sucks, because I really like the idea of making a mono-element mage.

I also discovered a "neat" little thing while trying these out. If you purchase gold before the trials, and exit the game, you lose all your gold. This seems unecessary, why take the gold away in the hub area?

[ZexxCrine]

near impossible you say?

well its literally impossible to have 7 water spells so...

[TheExtropian]

You want to take all the gold away so you can't buy infinite gold. I would guess the MPCs reset as you enter the hub, which means you can buy gold from the lady one time but only once.

[Aeternalis the Abyssal Alchemist]

Originally posted by ZexxCrine:

near impossible you say?

well its literally impossible to have 7 water spells so...

Ice counts as Water, but Water does not count as Ice...
(example: the Water Bottle affects both Water and Ice, but the Stanza of Frost only affects Ice)

I've done a Neve's Sapphire run and its probably the easiest of the Neve's Gemstones to use.

[Gangrene]

In the off chance you do actually get to use the effects, I'd rank them like this:
Ruby (fire)
Quartz (wind)
Citrine (elec)
Sapphire (water)
Emerald (earth)

the first 3 can outright win you the run. The last 2 need good support from other relics to be any use. (my opinion.)

[Aeternalis the Abyssal Alchemist]

Originally posted by Gangrene:

In the off chance you do actually get to use the effects, I'd rank them like this:
Ruby (fire)
Quartz (wind)
Citrine (elec)
Sapphire (water)
Emerald (earth)

the first 3 can outright win you the run. The last 2 need good support from other relics to be any use. (my opinion.)

So far my only successful Neve runs have been Sapphire and Quartz. I've been having really bad luck with Citrine runs for some reason. I tried Emerald and got to the final boss once, but I overestimated my defenses and paid for it dearly. Haven't really tried Ruby too much.

[Magikabula]

A little late to the party, but I wanted to talk about Neve's gemstones, and figured it was better to necro an old thread than start a new one.

So far, I've completed a run with each of them except for Ruby, which was ironically one of the easiest for some. Fire Arcana and I have never gotten along, perhaps because I learned early on that they are the worst element on paper. They are weak against both ice and fire, and only perform moderately well against earth.

Still, damage is damage, and I guess my playstyle is a little more defensive.

The thing about Neve's Gemstones is that they appear to me to be vanity items for those who want to be users of one element. They grant no significant boost until later in the game, after they've simply been distracting you from playing the game to win.

My success with this game skyrocketed as soon as I convinced myself to prioritize buying relics over Arcana. Arcana shops will only sell one upgraded version on most runs, and if you're spending money on the unupped version, you may just have to pay full price to upgrade it again later. You can have a moderately successful run without paying for a single arcana if you get good relics.

Neve's Gemstones are useless if you follow this strategy. Assuming that you even get access to three more arcana of the same element that aren't replacements or enhansements for the ones you started with, you will be wasting money on the arcanas and not relics. If you started out with one of these gemstones, and then pretended you didn't have any starting relic at all, you would likely have a more successful run than if you tried to build around your gemstone.

Lets say you want to build as a obligate pyromancer. You pick Hope for the red color, Flamestrike basic, Searing Rush for Dash, Twin Dragon Standard, and Exploding Fireball Signature. Which relic should you pick? Agni's sparkler? Matchstick? Royal flush? All will give you decend damage right off the bat. Still, you could also go defensive with Vampire's Eyeglasses or Cushioned Flip Flops. After that, you have a choice: You could play your run as a PyroPurist, and only pick up fire Arcana when you see one you really like, and play normally, saving money for good relics and holding off on the shops.
Alternatively, if the spirit moves you, you can abandon your plan to go Full Fire and pick up the dropped Arcanas whatever they are because why waste them? They may not synergize with your first relic, but your other arcana will still get decent use from them, and probably won't lose anything by your picking up the mismatched arcana.

If you decide to pick Neve's Ruby instead of other relics, you've resigned yourself to having no relic for the first round, and perhaps a completely useless starting relic for the whole run if you get completely unlucky. In order to prevent this possibility, you are encouraged to pick up fire arcana every opportunity you get. If you see no good ones in the first round, you might consider buying a relic, but that might lower your funds and prevent you from being able to afford the fire arcana in the next round. If you must choose between an enhanced version of an arcana you already have, and a basic version of one you don't, you may still want to buy the basic one, since it will activate Neve's Ruby faster.
What if the Matchstick or Royal flush appear in the relic shop? What if they're on sale? If they show up early in the game, they will doubtlessly give you more use for a greater percentage of your run than the Ruby, which may or may not eventually do anything for you. They will do so for a lower cost too, since they don't come with the hidden cost of three extra fire arcana.

And don't even think about buying that health potion! Who cares if you're at 100 HP? You only have one more fire arcana left to buy! You won't ever use that arcana, but it needs to be in your stash if you want the Ruby to work. You might die immediately after activating the infernal thing, but you were never playing this run to win anyway.

That's the problem with these gemstones, that they don't actually help you win, at least not 99.9% of the time. They are a peculiarity that you want to try out like you would with a new arcana, or even a new relic you just unlocked. Sadly, the loopholes one must hop through to make use of them are so restrictive, one must play a kind of Hard mode just to see them in action.

Yet this could all be forgiven if the activated gemstones were significantly more powerful than your average relic. Thus far, I have yet to see convincing evidence of this. I've never activated one before the final stage, and thus have little experience with their power. By the time you get them to work, you're almost done with your run, and you've sabotaged yourself in order to see them work. Now you finally get to see them work, and what a surprise! They're lackluster compared to what you could have had if you forgot you had them in round one.

Suggestions to fix them:
1. Increase the rate at which gem-matching Arcana drop randomly, are sold in shops, and/or go on sale. This would accelerate the activation of the Gem.
2. Reduce the number of necessary arcana to activate the gem from seven to six. It's dumb that you need to have a useless arcana in your pocket to get the thing to work.
3. Significantly buff the activated gemstones. It's an achievement to activate any of Neve's stones, and you had to pass up on so much, you deserve to feel the power from the infini- I mean Neve's stones.
4. Cause all Arcana matching your Stone to become Enhanced, or at least enable more enhancements, maybe one per stage, just passively. This discourages you to waste money on any arcana besides the ones you don't already have, and encourages you to pick up non-enhanced versions.
5. Any combination of the above suggestions, but also impose some curses upon the holders of the gemstones. This will make the items much more useful, but that power will come at a price, like any spell.

TLDR: OP is right. This Neve guy is a con artist.