With Diablo 4 officially in early access, players are calling attention to one specific issue they'd like Blizzard to address soon. The issue revolves around Diablo 4's revamped inventory and the space that gems take up. Gems are treated as similar in size to equipment pieces, meaning they take up a full slot of inventory space. Picking up even a handful of different gems can take away a healthy chunk of inventory better used for equipment, and Diablo 4 players are asking Blizzard to help give them this space back.
To be fair, gems of a similar type and quality stack in a player's inventory. If, for example, a Diablo 4 player on a Dungeon run picked up several Chipped Skulls, they would all stack with each other and only take a single slot of inventory space. However, different qualities of the same gem do not stack. If a player picks up a Chipped Skull, a Crude Skull, and a standard Skull, they all take up a slot. The same goes for Amethysts, Diamonds, Rubies, Sapphires, and Topaz, along with their Crude, Chipped, standard, Flawless, and Royal variants.
The ever-active Diablo 4 community on Reddit brought up the subject in a recent post from user AndrewWOz. The post is titled "Please give us a gem pouch" and criticizes how gems can take up so much inventory space. They mention that they're otherwise enjoying playing Diablo 4, noting that changing how gems take up inventory space is "the only thing I'd change right now."
Their recommendation for fixing the problem is by removing gems from Diablo 4 players' inventory and giving them their own separate tab. Diablo 4 players already have separate tabs for elixirs and quest items, so it's theoretically possible for gems to be split off into their own tab system. Gems could be treated like resources, rather than individual items. Diablo 4 payers could focus on filling their inventory with equipment and weapons instead of games.
It's easy to understand why Blizzard would choose to keep gems in players' inventories. Blizzard wants gems to be front and center alongside armor and equipment so that players have quick and obvious access to slotting gems. Hiding gems in a separate tab might prevent some players from knowing how gems work. There are potential workarounds for this, of course. Clicking on a piece of equipment with a slot could pull up a gem submenu, for example.
While Diablo 4 players may agree this is something Blizzard should change, it's likely not going to be a priority for the game developer. Inventory management frustrations have a long history in the Diablo franchise, after all. Still, perhaps Blizzard will at least take note of it now and consider making changes to gems in a future Diablo 4 update or expansion.
Diablo 4 releases June 6 on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
