Skill Rune System Guide

In addition to the different Tripod options available to power up skills, you can also attach Skill Runes to them. A Skill Rune can be freely slotted in and out of skills for different minor bonuses and effects. Although not as powerful as Tripods, Skill Runes are necessary to fully optimize your character.

Check the Skill Rune Collection Guide for details on how to obtain them.

• Every skill except for your Awakening can be augmented with Skill Runes. This includes transformation skills for classes like Shadowhunter or Artillerist.
• Skill Runes have different rarities. Multiple copies can be obtained for some of them.
• You can equip a total of 8 different skills with a Rune at the same time. The same type of Rune can be socketed into multiple skills as long as you have extra copies.

Once you've obtained a Skill Rune, it appears on the right side of your Combat Skill Window (default hotkey "K"). To apply them to your skills:

1. Select the skill you want to augment with a Rune.
2. Choose the Rune you wish to socket from the right side.
3. Press Apply.
4. Press the yellow Save button and you're done!

You can also Drag & Drop the Rune on the desired skill before you click on the Save button. Removing or replacing a Rune works the same way, except you will see Replace or Remove instead of Apply.

Below are the Runes and their recommended usage. For the best skill and Rune combinations specific to your class and build, check out our Class Build Guides.

Offensive

• Galewind is useful on skills with lengthy casting animations. It helps you obtain more seamless damage rotations.
• Vision rune is a mix of Galewind and Overwhelm, great for skills that do high Stagger Damage and are slow.
• Bleed is best used on your skill with the highest uptime. The Bleed effect is refreshed on successful hit.
• Poison functions identical to Bleed and does the same damage.
• Rage is best used on a skill with a low Cooldown for more frequent proc chances.
• Quick Recharge is best used on the final skill of a rotation, so it can reduce the cooldown of as many skills as possible.

Defensive

• Iron Wall, Protection and Mountain's Face are useful on skills with long cast times or animations.
• Purify is best used on a skill with low cooldown for more frequent proc chances when you are facing an encounter with nasty debuffs.

Utility

• Overwhelm is useful on skills with high Stagger Damage to improve the stagger they provide.
• Wealth is useful on skills that generate a high amount of Identity Meter.
• Focus is useful on skills with extremely high mana cost.

Special Interaction

• Conviction and Judgment need to be used together for any benefit. They are best used on skills that hit multiple times for a higher chance of activation. The buff provides 15% Cooldown Reduction and doubles your Combat Resource Recovery. Attempt to activate this buff before using your main damage skills for smoother rotations.

• Equip up to 8 different skills with Runes to enhance their power with various effects.
• Check the Skill Rune Collection Guide for details on how to obtain them.
• For the best skill and Rune combinations specific to your class and build, check out the Class Build Guides.

Credits

Written by Choilicious
Reviewed by Lexyu