Soulstones Guide
Last update: 12/01/2021
I] What are Soulstones?
Soulstones (Sometimes called "SS" by players) are socket items used to improve your equipment. They improve your output damage (if equipped on weapons) or resistances (if applied on gears) against enemies that are either infected or not by a specific element.
Please note that soulstones also improve damage output on enemies that are not infected / neutral!
Soulstones are mainly used to increase damage. Using soulstones on gear is applicable only in elemental mazes (Rookie raids, Golden Citadel) or for savage PvP in District 6 (if enemy players use some soulstones on their weapons). Thereby, using soulstones on gears outside those raids or PvP areas is useless as they just don't proc at all.
They can be equipped like other socket items (familiars), and removed the same way (using a Socket Extractor; costs 100 Gruton Coins in the Gruton Shop).
For those who don't know what socket items are, I invite you to read this part of the guide about equipment.
Soulstones, as any socket items, cannot be equipped nor unequipped while running a maze/raid or being in District 6.
Up to 3 soulstones can be equipped on one equipment piece, and only a maximum of 2 soulstones of the same element; the potential 3rd soulstone has then to be a different element from the other 2.
Soulstones with incompatible elements cannot be set at the same time on one equipment piece.
II] Types and Elements
2.1) Soulstones' Types
There are 2 types of soulstones:
- Normal soulstones. They are sometimes called "SS" or "NSS" by players.
- Hidden soulstones. They are sometimes called "HSS" by players (older players may call them "Slumbering soulstones" or "SSS"). These soulstones used to exist on GFSW and don't exist anymore (or yet?) on the global server.
Although normal soulstones don't have this particularity, it is mentioned in their name if they are hidden/slumbering ones (i.e image above).
Hidden soulstones have higher elemental values than normal ones for the same upgrade level. Due to this fact, their damage output and proc chance are higher than for the normal ones.
Normal soulstones can either be crafted through Janice's "Soulstones" tab in her main craftshop (i.e image 1 below; on this image the NPC is named "Jenna" instead of Janice, but it is the same NPC actually), or dropped in Rookie raids and in the Golden Citadel raid ran in elemental mode (elemental rotations for rookie raids are displayed on the image 2 below).
For new players, it is possible to craft a box containing a pack of 2 level 9 soulstones. Don't forget to open the obtained pack! Also note that you will receive 2 soulstones of an identical element*. In addition, you can complete the SoulWorker Beginner sprint in order to obtain a random level 6 soulstone as well.
It is possible to complete the SoulWorker Beginner sprint on every characters. However, you cannot craft the level 9 soulstones pack on more than one character!
*Once crafted, it is not possible to exchange your free level 9 soulstones with other players nor sending them to another character of your account accros HEMS mails or market self purchase, as it automatically binds the piece their are socketed in to your character.
Elemental rotation for rookie raids:
Elements will be permuted every day at the reset time. During Sundays, it is possible to pick the element of your choice.
Golden Citadel doesn't have any elemental rotation. It has 5 fixed elements instead, all except Curative (the blue one with some sort of "+" within its icon). It remains the best place to farm soulfragments for your soulstones.
. Hidden soulstones cannot be obtained in regular mazes nor crafted; More precisely, they cannot be obtained outside event periods. They can only be dropped by enemies in the special maze of the Christmas event (the "Lonely Party" maze), or bought from another player selling them (in the case hidden soulstones are actually scattered throughout the game, which is not the case yet on the global server).
Hidden soulstones are bounded on receipt, thus making trading/selling them hard to handle in regular situations. Players usually use a weapon/gear piece on which these soulstones are socketed in and they trade their HSS this way to bypass the binding restriction.
2.2) Soulstones' Elements
The game contains 6 elements currently:
- "yellow" Luminous(¤).
- "purple" Malicious(ȼ).
- "blue" Apathetic(x).
- "red" Hateful(^).
- "blue and white" Curative(+).
- "green" Tormented(¥).
Note that it is possible for you to meet older players that keep using the old names for elements. If that's the case, here:
- "Virtue" = Luminous(¤).
- "Sin" = Malicious(ȼ).
- "Grace" = Apathetic(x).
- "Hate" = Hateful(^).
- "Solace" = Curative(+).
- "Torment" = Tormented(¥).
These elements are classified by pairs. In each pair, elements are incompatible with each other and cannot be equipped at the same time on one equipment piece:
Don't get confused with the in-game presentation, "compatible" actually stands for the current pair relations, so elements which are linked on the above picture are incompatible with each other; using this fact, Luminous and Malicious are incompatible, Apathetic and Hateful are incompatible, and Curative and Tormented are incompatible.
Each element of a pair is stronger against the other but useless against itself. It is also stronger against all elements out of the pair, but a bit less than the one in it. It works the same for non-contaminated enemies too.
Let's use an example:
Luminous and Malicious are elements in a pair. Luminous is stronger against Malicious, but is useless against Luminous itself. Luminous will also be stronger against the 4 other elements + enemies that aren't contaminated (neutral state), however it will be a bit less effective than against Malicious.
This table is an alternative way to see efficience between soulstones.
2.3) What Soulstones to Pick Nowadays?
In the past, elements had an influence on endgame raids since enemies were infected by a specific element. Curative was considered as the BiS element because all of the enemies of the Golden Citadel (when Golden Citadel used to be the endgame raid) had no Curative resistance; few older players may still recommend this element for soulstones over all others because of this.
Note that now, whichever element you pick to invest in doesn’t matter anymore since all enemies of the new endgame raids are not infected by any element: soulstones will all have the same efficiency on them!
This particular case applies to every characters as well, you can pick the element of your choice no matter the character you play since this doesn't have an impact at all on the way the soulstones work.
III] Strengthening Soulstones
3.1) Upgrading Soulstones
Soulstones can be leveled up to become even stronger, up to a 9th level of strength.
You can level up a soulstone through Janice's "Soulstones" menu, under the "Growth" tab (i.e image below). Note that it isn't necessary to have your soulstones within your inventory in order to upgrade them: you can upgrade your stones even if they are socketed into an equipment piece. You just have to double click on it so that it is automatically selected for growth process.
Be careful not to go under the wrong tab, else you would get a bad surprise!
Each level of soulstone requires a specific amount of Low Class, Mid Class and High Class soulfragments of the same element than the stone you want to upgrade, and some zenny proportionally to the level of the stone. Hidden soulstones require more resources than the normal ones. (Details are listed below)
3.2) Interests of Using Upgraded Soulstones
As aforementioned, Soulstones can be leveled up to level 9, and it is possible to equip up to 3 soulstones on an equipment piece with 2 of the same element on one equipment piece.
The reason why almost all people use soulstones is that soulstones significantly boost your damage output when using 2 level 9 soulstones of the same element on a weapon. We can even say they are essential socket items to have for endgame.
Using upgraded soulstones is one of the best ways to significantly improve your global DPS output.
3.3) Soulstones' Damage Scaling
The damage boost will not be the same on every enemy throughout the game, some enemies have a passive soulstones resistance. (not to be confused with specific elemental resistance through elemental raids, this specific type of resistance reduces damage output from soulstones for every element)
For a high majority of enemies, having 2 normal soulstones at level 9 on the weapon will add an average of ~+47% of your common damage (counting every maze/raid from the beginning of Rocco to the end of Dipluce); Using hidden soulstones will add an average of ~+60%. On certain situations, it could be either lower or greater than these amounts.
When activating the "hit info" in the chat, you can see the elemental damage added by your stones inside parenthesis. The value out of these parenthesis is the total damage dealt after adding the elemental damage brought by the stones*.
To obtain the value mentioned above, simply substract the value inside parenthesis with the one out of them and then divide the value inside parenthesis with the result obtained just before (for example: 1000000(+330000) will give 330000/(1000000-330000), so ~+49% for this example).
There are also players who compare the total damage value with the elemental boost to constitute a percentage of added damage instead of using the aforementioned method (reusing the previous example: 1000000(+330000) = +33% for this example. The calculation method and result are different but the added damage remain the same though).
*Don't get confused. Unlike for XP calculation, which is Base_XP(+Bonus_XP), for soulstones it is well Total_Damage(+Elem._Damage) and not Base_Damage(+Elem._Damage).
Adding a 3rd soulstone on your weapon will not increase the elemental damage boost at all, but instead increases your chance to land hits with elemental damage boost applying. Having 2 normal soulstones provides an average of ~82% probability to successfully add elemental damage, but using a 3rd normal soulstone increases this chance to ~92% (source - taken from RyuA's Discord server). For hidden ones, using 3 soulstones provides to the player an average chance to get extra elemental damage close to 100%*.
When trying to apply a 3rd soulstone, take care about soulstones incompatibilities. (Read above)
*Since proc chance seem to lower as the output damage resistance increases on enemies/bosses in higher level mazes and endgame raids, don't consider this value as universally correct but rather more like an average! This mainly because the proc chance is related to the damage value, and if this one is lowered the proc chance inevitably reduces as well.
Enemies really start begin to have soulstones resistance from Grasscover Camp to the endgame*. This elemental resistance is higher on raids such as the The Primal, Altar of Void, Hidden Hideout, Lunar Fall and Violent Sun, with VS being the one with the highest resistance on the global version. Dipluce Horizon's and West War's mazes are also notable: the higher the maze's level, the higher its soulstones resistance becomes. Note that mazes' difficulty doesn't matter about enemies' soulstones resistance.
For these mazes, it is strongly recommended to have your normal soulstones at level 7~8 at least; level 6~7 is the minimum for hidden ones; it is, of course, way better to have them at level 9 directly.
Enemies from low level districts have no resistance or almost none (so carrying tests about soulstones' global efficience in them will skew the result).
Here are details, about average SS damages at +9:
- Average: -- NEED RECALCULATION --
Hits details for normal soulstones - broken link
*It actually starts in the last districts of Ruin Fortress, but their resistance is quite low to notice.
Values shown above are calculated using this method.
Personal (subjective) Note: for people arguing my values are wrong because it also depends on the equipment's level (because of equipment correction), well, it may be true but a carried test in Hidden Hideout shown only a 1% difference between Primacy and Devourer weapon, in favor of the primacy weapon. To note: Devourer weapon is level 55, primacy one is level 65, and Rapacumba (the boss) is level 68, resulting then in a reduction from 100% to 20% damage output for the Devourer weapon; seeing the damage difference and since output damage from soulstones mainly depend on the attack output (which is random between 80% and 100% damage output), then we can consider this parameter is negligible and the aforementioned average values are relevant (note that the above values are calculated on a base of 100 hits), admitting I didn't just got unlucky while hitting with my Devourer weapon.
IV] Additional Info about Soulstones
4.1) Soulstones' Extraction
Soulstones can be dismantled through Janice's "Soulstones" menu, under the "Extract Fragment" tab. The window looks similar to the Growth tab (i.e image above).
Extraction gives Low Class, Mid Class and High Class fragments proportionally to the dismantled stone's level.
Extraction requires some zenny to be processed. The required amount varies depending on the stone's level. (Access the detailled list)
4.2) Fragments' Swapping
You can swap soulfragments from an element to another under the last tab of Janice's "Soulstones" menu (i.e image below), this if you need specific fragments to upgrade your soulstones. (Access the detailled list)
V] Soulstones Database
For more details about Soulstones' upgrades and extraction, go Here.