Socketing

Socketing seems to be considered a bit of a black art, something that you shouldn't do except with your best items, using your best runes. I'm going to show that it should not be viewed that way, and show how you can use it to your benefit

There are two key issues to consider when socketing, what is the cost to me now, and what is the cost in future flexibility.

I'm going to try to illustrate the cost by considering the cost to obtain N slots in an item of a given rarity

Rarity	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13
Nota	-	0.0M	0.5M	1.0M
Rare	-	-	0.0M	0.5M	1.0M	1.5M
Uni	-	-	-	0.1M	0.6M	1.1M	1.6M	2.1M
Leg	-	-	-	-	0.7M	1.3M	1.9M	2.5M	3.2M	4.7M
Myth	-	-	-	-	-	3.5M	5.0M	6.5M	8.0M	9.6M	12.1M	23.6M

This table includes the cost for creating the socket, buying the nilla base object, buying the correct number of unc runes to socket into the object, and socketing all the runes.

One way to interpret this is: If you currently planing on wearing an unsocketed nilla myth (3.5M), then instead sell it for scrap and use that scrap to buy a uni (0.1M), socket it twice (1.0M) and pocket the 2.4M you've saved - as you've got the same number of slots.

The downside is loss of future expandability. However in this case the loss is not total, as you still have two spare sockets to use, and even when they're all filled you're ahead of the 2 socketed myth in cost.

Does this mean its just a way of making cheap low-end myth items? Quite the opposite in my opinion.

Lets say you'd love a myth T3% POW neck. Depending on how heavily you're planning on socketing it you'd probably be better off buying a T3% uni and socketing that. In fact that way you can probably get a T6% or T9% without really breaking your budget. Again though you're trading future expandability against getting those stats now.

However there's an additional upside - Our T9% myth equiv neck is equippable at 40, rather than 70 - which may make it more attractive for some uses.

Where I think this really shines is on those strange enchants that you cant get except on slots 3 and beyond. A T6% Life with HPR myth would cost an exorbitant amount, but with a HPR rare and two T3% Life uncs you can have the equivalent for under 8M.

Note: You may have noted the massive jump in cost between 5 and 6 socketed myths. It turns out that this jump is so expensive you're better off socketing a nota earlier than every creating that 6th socket, if you're only socketing with uncs. If you're socketing with something more expensive then you're better of creating the socket than upgrading the rarity of one of the runes.