Rune

Runes are small objects that, like gems and jewels, have no function until they are socketed into an item. See a full runes listing. Runes can be upgraded; 2 or 3 of one type, plus a particular gem type/quality, can be combined in the Horadric Cube to upgrade to the next higher level rune. Runes add different properties to shields or armor vs. weapons, and sometimes shields and armor differ as well. Runes are most powerful when combined into special runewords, so be sure you check the recipes for those.

Rune Scarcity

Runes are not like gems, they are not dropped in equal amounts. They are more like items, there are common runes, and there are runes that you'll find once in your character's life, if that often. Runes drop pretty regularly, you'll often find several a game, but only the common ones. The less common runes are very hard to find, and the rarest of them all are virtually imaginary.

So how do Runes generate? A quick overview of how the game decides which items to drop when is needed.

• When you kill a monster, the game picks a treasure class based on the monster's level.
• A random roll takes place, and the game either drops an item from that treasure class, drops nothing, or goes down to a lower treasure class.
• Once in the next lower treasure class it can again drop an item from that treasure class, drop nothing, or move to the next lower treasure class.
• It will continue calculating what to drop until selected an item, or selecting to drop nothing at all.

Here's a quick list of comparative Rune scarcity. These figures change with balances in each patch, and they've grown much longer since these numbers, which were accurate for v1.07, when D2X was first released. In v1.11 the curve is much longer; you'll find far, far more of each level rune than you will the next higher level.

El = 144,238 Eld = 96,159 Tir = 69,209 Nef = 46,139 Eth = 43,530 Ith = 29,020 Tal = 32,998 Ral = 21,999 Ort = 21,133 Thul = 14,088 Amn = 11,822

Sol = 7881 Shael = 6028 Dol = 4019 Hel = 2899 Io/Po = 1933 Lum = 1343 Ko = 895 Fal = 606 Lem = 404 Pul = 267 Um = 178

Mal = 115 Ist = 77 Gul = 48 Vex = 32 Ohm = 19 Lo = 13 Sur = 7.2 Ber = 4.8 Jo = 2.4 Cham = 1.6 Zod = 1

Runewords

Runewords Nav
All Runewords Armor Runewords Headgear Runewords Shields Runewords Weapons Runewords

This is where Runes really become awesome. A "RuneWord" is the term for an item that has been socketed with special Runes in the correct order. Runewords can only be fashioned in regular (gray name) socketed items, with the precise number of sockets required for that recipe. No more and no less.

The most powerful weapons and armor in the game are runewords, though they can be difficult to obtain, since the powerful ones require very scarce, high level runes. In addition to the runes, a suitable item must be found to create the runeword in. It makes no sense to create a high damage runeword in a weapon with a low base damage, so expert players search long and hard for just the right item with just the right number of sockets, while working to store up the runes they'll need to fill them.

Further Information

You can find out more of the essential information about rune in one of these articles:

• Rune FAQ - All your questions about runes are answered here.
• Rune list - All the runes in the game, and how you can create a Zod rune from a few trillion Els.