Sacred 2:Runes

Throughout the course of the game you will find runes that upgrade combat arts or unlock those not learned yet. Runes also add bonuses when they are forged into items. You may memorize a new rune when you find it, exchange it at a runemaster for a different rune, forge it into an equipment slot, or keep it in your stash for later use.

Memorizing Runes

Memorizing a rune will increase the level of its combat art by 1. Memorize a combat art rune by right-clicking it, if it is for your character class. Although you will be able to memorize multiple runes of the same combat art to increase its level, the maximum level of a combat art is limited by your character’s level and the level of the relevant Focus skill.

WARNING: Memorizing or forging too many runes can cause your regeneration times to increase to an unsatisfactory level.

See also: Sacred 2:Highest Combat Art Level Without Penalty

Exchanging Runes

For a fee, a runemaster will let you exchange runes that you don’t need for others. You can give a runemaster up to four runes. The number of runes you have to offer influences the fee for the exchange. The more runes, the cheaper the exchange. If you have plenty of gold, exchange runes on a 1:1 (or 2:1) basis so fewer runes are wasted in the exchange.

Rune Exchange Rates at Runemaster:

• 1 rune for 1 rune: 125,000 gold

• 2 runes for 1 rune: 25,000 gold

• 3 runes for 1 rune: 5,000 gold

• 4 runes for 1 rune: 500 gold

Forging Runes

See also: Sacred 2:Forging

An interesting ability that Runes offer is that they can be forged into equipment slots (sockets). Runes may be forged into three of the four different kinds of equipment slots: Bronze, Silver and Gold slots. Bronze slots do not modify the secondary effects of runes when forged, but Silver and Gold slots do. Runes that are forged into Silver slots will have their secondary effect values increased by 7% and Gold slots by 15%. The primary effect (+ to Combat Art level) will not be affected by Silver and Gold slot bonuses.

Most interesting about runes which is different from Sacred 1 is that rune values increase on a per game difficulty basis, as you can see from the tables below. A rune found in a Bronze difficulty game will be much different from a rune found in a Niobium difficulty game. For example, a way to take advantage of them would be to have a Niobium level character transfer runes to a Silver level player. A Niobium level rune will have the very best values possible and the Silver level player can take advantage of it by forging the rune into his or her equipment. As indicated in each of the tables below, in order to be able to forge a Niobium rune, a player must be at least level 50. For Platinum runes a player must be at least level 35 and for Gold runes level 20. Silver and Bronze runes do not have a level requirement. To see the difficulty that a rune came from, press the ALT key while hovering the cursor over the rune. The difficulty will be displayed within the popup statistics box of the rune.

• Tip: Runes for other character classes may be forged into slots to gain the secondary rune effect, such as life leech or chance to evade. (This will not grant you the combat art for the other class.)
• Tip: Forging a rune into an item or equipping an item which increases a Combat Art will result in half the regeneration penalty of memorizing the rune.

Rune Effects When Forged

The following table lists the runes available to each class, along with their secondary rune effects. Secondary rune effects are particularly useful at lower levels, when gold is at a premium and runes drop more freely. Socketing runes in a creative fashion can significantly increase your damage output, change the type of damage you do, allow you to leech life, etc. The secondary effects of runes stack, so socketing multiple runes with the same secondary effect can greatly benefit a character, especially one that's just starting out. Secondary rune effects increase at higher difficulty levels.

Note: The beneficial values from runes shown in the table below can only be received when the rune is forged into equipment.

Dryad	Primary Effect	Capricious Hunter	Cabalistic Voodoo	Nature Weaver
	Bonus to Combat Art Level	Chance for Poison	Life Leeched per hit	Opponents chance to cause secondary effects
Bronze	+1	+2.0%	+3	-9.0%
Silver	+1	+3.0%	+4	-10.7%
Gold (Req. Lvl 20)	+2	+4.3%	+6	-13.0%
Platinum (Req. Lvl 35)	+4	+5.5%	+8	-14.5%
Niobium (Req. Lvl 50)	+6	+7.0%	+10	-18.3%

High Elf	Primary Effect	Arrant Pyromancer	Mystic Stormite	Delphic Arcania
	Bonus to Combat Art Level	Chance for Burn	Spell Intensity	Block Chance: Combat Arts
Bronze	+1	+2.0%	+0.5%	+4.9%
Silver	+1	+3.0%	+0.7%	+5.3%
Gold (Req. Lvl 20)	+2	+4.3%	+1.6%	+6.0%
Platinum (Req. Lvl 35)	+4	+5.5%	+2.7%	+7.3%
Niobium (Req. Lvl 50)	+6	+7.0%	+4.0%	+8.6%

Inquisitor	Primary Effect	Gruesome Inquisition	Astute Supremacy	Nefarious Underworld
	Bonus to Combat Art Level	Damage of Enraged Players	Chance to Reflect: Close Combat	Life Leeched per hit
Bronze	+1	+10%	+4.9%	+3
Silver	+1	+11%	+5.3%	+4
Gold (Req. Lvl 20)	+2	+12.5%	+6.0%	+6
Platinum (Req. Lvl 35)	+4	+14.3%	+14.3%	+8
Niobium (Req. Lvl 50)	+6	+16.2%	+16.2%	+10

Seraphim	Primary Effect	Exalted Warrior	Celestial Magic	Revered Technology
	Bonus to Combat Art Level	Damage Mitigation: Physical	Chance to Evade	Shield Regeneration Time
Bronze	+1	+2.0%	+11.8%	+10%
Silver	+1	+2.5%	+14.8%	+12.5%
Gold (Req. Lvl 20)	+2	+3.5%	+21.7%	+17.0%
Platinum (Req. Lvl 35)	+4	+4.4%	+30.8%	+21.7%
Niobium (Req. Lvl 50)	+6	+5.5%	+11.2%	+27.5%

Shadow Warrior	Primary Effect	Death Warrior	Malevolent Champion	Astral Lord
	Bonus to Combat Art Level	Armor	Defense Value	Block Chance: Projectiles
Bronze	+1	+6.5%	+5.0%	+4.9%
Silver	+1	+	+6.5%	+5.3%
Gold (Req. Lvl 20)	+2	+12.1%	+12.1%	+6.0%
Platinum (Req. Lvl 35)	+4	+18.7%	+18.7%	+7.3%
Niobium (Req. Lvl 50)	+6	+28.1%	+28.1%	+8.6%

Temple Guardian	Primary Effect	Devout Guardian	Lost Fusion	Source Warden
	Bonus to Combat Art Level	Attack Value	Chance for Critical Hits	Detrimental Magic Effects
Bronze	+1	+5.0%	+1.0%	-3.0%
Silver	+1	+6.5%	+1.5%	-6.9%
Gold (Req. Lvl 20)	+2	+12.1%	+2.2%	-11.2%
Platinum (Req. Lvl 35)	+4	+18.7%	+2.7%	-13.4%
Niobium (Req. Lvl 50)	+6	+28.1%	+3.5%	-16.0%