A Beginner's Guide to Runes
What Constitutes as Good Runes?
What makes a rune good? This question even I don’t fully know the answer to myself. However, I do know some basics about what runes to consider good and what to consider trash. For this section, though, I’m going to focus on what to use to consider good or bad.
Each rune will come with its own substats, along with the main stat. The substats on a rune will have to mesh with the main stat, rune type and what monster to put it on. For example, a Fatal rune would be an instant sell if its main stat were DEF% and had Resistance%, HP, Accuracy% and HP% as its substats, as those are usually best for support runes, such as Energy or Will, when Fatal runes are reserved for monsters who shine as attackers, such as Taor.
However, if you were to get a Despair rune with SPD, ATK%, CRIT DMG% and Accuracy% as its substats, that’s good! However, Despair runes are best used for monsters that have at least one good AoE (Area of Effect) skill, such as Charlotte. You wouldn’t want to put Despair runes on Belladeon.
Substats
I’ll admit that substats are kind of confusing. I’ve given a brief explanation of how substats could make or break a rune, but there’s a lot more about them that not even I know about. I’ll attempt to explain the best I can on two really confusing things about substats:
Quad rolls. Quad rolls are when you get a Legendary rune, and all four substat power up goes into one substat.
Highest substat limit? There’s actually a limit to how high substats can go; forget your hopes about finding a rune with an initial +10 SPD substat. With each substat power up, the highest increase they can get is the amount of that substat it started out as. For example, if you get lucky and get a rune with +8 ATK%, the highest one substat power-up can go into that stat would be another +8.
What are Reappraisal Stones?
Reappraisal stones are a fairly new addition to the game. Basically, one of these babies can turn a bad rune into a good rune! I’ll explain.
Reappraisal stones, when used on a rune, will select four random substats, and you can choose whether you want the new reappraised rune or want to stick with the old one. In other words, it’s like getting a whole other rune, but all the rune power-ups you invested into it will still stay (e.g. flat HP power-up on substat 1 can go into a SPD power-up on reappraised substat 4). For example, this was an old bad rune I had:
DEF – 19
ATK – 5%
HP – 7%
ATK – 19
For the record, this was a slot 5 Legendary Despair rune, six-stars. I kept it around until I could get my hands on a Reappraisal stone. I powered it up to +12, and then reappraised. These are its new substats:
CRIT Rate – 11%
CRIT Damage – 13%
DEF – 13
DEF – 8%
Of course, it’s not nearly as good as it could be, but I still think it’s great when compared to what it used to be. In short, reappraisal stones are a way to fix bad runes and get a chance to get a good rune out of it.
What Are Grindstones?
Grindstones can amplify a rune’s substat, based on what kind of grindstone it is and what rune type it can be used on.
For example, let’s use the picture above as an example and we’ll be focusing on the Legendary Violent grindstone. As you can see, “SPD +4-5” is listed below. This means that the grindstone can amplify a Violent rune’s speed substat by either an extra 4 or 5.
Grindstones are pretty rare at early game. You can get them at the Rift of Worlds, which is late-game content. In other words, don’t get your hopes up, you won’t be able to use any grindstones on good runes for a while.
Instant Sell Runes
Here’s a general rule of thumb for runes to instantly sell:
- Sell all 2/4/6 runes that are flat. Flat runes are runes with a set number as the main stat. For example, a flat HP rune would have around 100 something HP as its main stat, but an HP% rune will have a percentage of HP of the monster that it’s put on as the main stat. The only exception to this is a slot 2 rune with SPD at the main substat, as SPD% runes are not possible as of this writing.
- I don’t even know how it would be possible to get a Magic five/six star rune (when the symbol is green, like in the picture above), but any Magic rune when you can farm GB10 is an instant sell. No exceptions.
- All five star runes that are Hero (the symbol will be blue) and don’t have speed should be sold. When you get late-game, you realize that speed is everything, so it’s best to start early. You’ll also learn, even in early-game, you’ll get a bigger advantage if you outspeed the enemy; this means you get your buffs and continuous damage in before you get attacked, which would help you survive.
- If a rune’s substats don’t mesh well with the rune itself and its main stat, sell it unless it’s a Legendary (the symbol will be orange) six-star rune. Those can be reappraised when you can get reappraisal stones regularly (which are in late-game).
- Runes with Resistance% and Accuracy% are instant sells.
