Looking for the best Suikoden 2 runes? This Suikoden 2 runes guide will walk you through how to get all the most covetered runes in Suikoden 2.
If you’re playing Suikoden 2, you might already be aware that you can break the game by combining the best most OP runes on characters that get 3 open rune slots. But where do you get all these amazing runes, and what are they? This guide has you covered. I’m not going to give you the location of every rune. Just the best runes, that you absolutely want to find.
First off, the best runes that you’re looking for are these: Double Beat, Fury, Double-Strike, Thunder and Rage. There are a few other runes that are mildly useful, namely the Spark rune for Nanami, but you get that automatically from a boss fight early in the game.
Why are these the best runes?
Double Beat makes you character attack twice. Fury makes your character deal double damage. Double-Strike makes your character do 1.5x damage, and Rage and Thunder, aside from being the strongest magic runes, can be equipped to weapons to increase damage by 1.5x, and they all stack, allowing you to hit for thousands of damage in a game where a few hundred damage is considered a lot.
Locations – Best Suikoden 2 Runes
It’s important to read a guide like this before you get too far in the game, because most of these runes are only freely available during limited windows and you’ll want to take advantage of those windows and farm them there, or else you’ll have a lot more difficulty trying to acquire them later on.
Double Beat Rune – Best Suikoden 2 Runes
Double Beat is dropped rarely by the Cut Rabbits at North Sparrow Pass, which you can only access one time, right at the start of the game. So make sure to farm a bunch of Double Beat runes while you’re there. Get 6 if you can. It’s time-consuming and a bit of a chore, but you’ll be glad you did it later on. The only other place to get these is by farming Tigers in the Muse area toward the very end of the game, and the drop % is exactly the same, so might as well do it at the start.
Fury Rune – Best Suikoden 2 Runes
You have to do this in the early part of the game when you’re first at Muse. Fury runes are a Rare Find in the Muse Rune Shop and it’s the only place to get them outside of a one-time event at the castle called the Guardian Deity event, which you should really not waste on a Fury rune. Again, you’ll want 6.
This, like the Double Beat rune, is a pretty big chore unless you game the Rare Finds system, so here’s how you do that: the way Rare Finds work in Suikoden 2 is they refresh every 30 minutes, but they don’t determine the new list until you talk to the Runemaster. So, wait 30 minutes, save your game, then go talk to the Runemaster. If she doesn’t have a Fury rune, reset and talk to her again. If she does, buy it, then wait 30 minutes and repeat. Still a chore, but if you don’t do it this way, you have to wait 30 minutes each time you talk to her. Yikes.
Double-Strike Rune – Best Suikoden 2 Runes
This is another farming chore, but at least the area is readily accessible from the moment it’s available. You have to kill Eagle-Men in the Kobold Forest. They drop these 2% of the time. You can also find one for free in a chest in the Tinto Mine. I’d recommend you just collect as many of these as you currently need, because you can always go back.
Thunder Rune – Best Suikoden 2 Runes
You can get one of these for free from a Blue Knight hanging around Matilda after all the events involving the Matilda Liberation have played out. If you want more, you’ll need to farm Cockatrices in Matilda Castle at a 0.8% drop rate.
Rage Rune – Best Suikoden 2 Runes
You get a free Rage rune by talking to the Greenhill Runemaster after the liberation of Greenhill, and you can get more by farming Copper Suns in the Muse area at a 0.8% drop rate. It’s basically the same situation as the Thunder Rune
The only other rune you may want to take a look at is the Spark Rune, which drops from the boss at the Sindar Ruins early in the game. It grants the user’s speed stat to all characters on the field, so it’s great to have on Nanami whose speed stat is insane and who you’re required to use throughout the game.
That about does it for the locations of the best Suikoden 2 runes. Be sure to check out the Games Section for more guides like this, and be sure to check out the Suikoden section for more articles about Suikoden 2 and other games from the series.
