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→Skill Rune Effects
==[[Rune|Skill Rune]] Effects==
[[File:Hydra1.jpg|thumb|300px450px|Un-runed Hydra, October 2010.]]* None known.
Jay Wilson provided a whole new insight into the changes made to [[Runestones]] with a short quote from Gamescom, in August 2010. [http://diablo.incgamers.com/blog/comments/jay-wilson-interview-g4tv/]
::'''Jay Wilson: '''One of my favorites is on the [[Wizard]]. She has a skill called [[Hydra]], which is largely the same as it was in Diablo 2. Fiery (dragon) heads that shoot fireballs. Depending on which rune the Wizard sockets in that skill, the dragon heads change elements, and it’s a major change. Their entire appearance is altered. They can become poison heads, which shoot bolts of poison that leave pools of acid on the ground. There are lightning heads that shoot [[Chain Lightning]]. Cold heads that shoot [[Frost Bolts]] that slow enemies. Another rune makes for a bigger fire attack, where the head just breaths a cone of flame.
Jay did not list what all five runes did in Hydra, and his explanation left fans confused. Where were the three elemental damage types coming from? Nothing like that seemed to fit with the previous rune functions.
This mystery was cleared up a few days later with new info [[Bashiok]] provided to [[Flux]], webmaster of fansite [[Diii.net]]. [http://diablo.incgamers.com/blog/comments/more-changes-to-runestones/]
He explained that the Hydra runes provide:
* Extra damage in the form of firewalls.
* Multistrike (rapid fire)
* And the 3 elemental properties.
Extra damage and multishot are consistent with previously known rune functions. One of the elementals comes from the wildcard rune, and the other comes from what used to be the Energy rune. That rune now functions as a second wildcard in most skills, since changes to the [[resources]] made the mana-saving property obsolete. (Plus it just wasn't cool enough, in most instances.)
So Hydra isn't a total outlier; it's just got one rune, (formerly known as Lethality) that usually affects critical bonuses, that's doing something very different (providing an elemental damage change, in Hydra).
==Development==