The 10 Best Keepsakes In Hades II

While they're only a part of your overall progression in Hades II, keepsakes play a crucial role in making you stronger, and can have a huge impact on your builds, minimizing the need of lucky draws or helping fill holes that you might have in your current run.

With that in mind, we've compiled our list of the 10 best keepsakes in Hades II. We'll go over how you can unlock them, and how they work. Keep in mind that, in order to avoid spoilers, we intentionally do not include keepsakes unlocked post-credits.

Note: All listed Keepsakes are earned by gifting a Nectar to a character for the first time. The character's name is in the headings, after the keepsake name. All keepsakes level up after 25 and then 50 encounters. They cannot be swapped after a run is started, unless you complete the Kindred Keepsakes incantation, which will then allow you to swap Keepsakes between regions.

10- Ghost Onion- Dora

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The Ghost Onion is a simple keepsake, but one which pays dividends in the early game. While you have it equipped, this keepsake will heal you to your max HP, but it is capped at a certain value. At its first rank, that is 50.

Taking into account that Melinoë's base HP is 30, this can heal you entirely 1.5x times, which can be a life-saver in your first runs through Erebus. When leveled up, it restores a maximum of 75/100 HP respectively.

9- Silver Wheel- Hecate

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Much like the Ghost Onion, Silver Wheel is an extremely basic keepsake. It is a simple stat boost which improves your Magick by 50/75/100 depending on the keepsake's level. While this might not seem like much, at first, it is actually quite powerful.

Melinoë starts the game off with 50 Magick, so even the first rank of Silver Wheel will double her resources. While you lack access to boons that help you recover Magick, having such a boost to your base pool allows you to pull off a lot more Omega casts, which in turn can get you quicker access to the all-powerful Hexes from Selene.

8- Luckier Tooth- Schelemeus

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Our great skeleton friend gives us one of his teeth as access to our first Death Defiance. While you have the Luckier Tooth Keepsake equipped, you will be revived after you first fall during a night. Keep in mind that after you use this, it won't come back.

Leveling Luckier Tooth only boosts the amount of health with which you return: 51/76/101HP. Having a second life at the earlier stages of Hades II, especially when you haven't had a chance to unlock the normal Death Defiances via the Arcana, is huge, especially one which essentially full heals you.

7- Evil Eye- Nemesis

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Evil Eye is one of the strongest progression Keepsakes in the game. The only reason why we don't place it higher than this is because it is, unfortunately, very situational, and unless outside of that specific situation. This Keepsake, kindly gifted by the lovely Nemesis, automatically tracks whichever enemy last defeated you (even if you didn't have it equipped at the time), and boosts all damage you deal to it for the entire night.

That boost is 20/25/30% depending on the Keepsake's rank. So if you perished to a specifically difficult boss on our most recent attempt, simply equip the Evil Eye and enjoy a raw 20% boost to all damage you deal on your next attempt. Just keep in mind that this Keepsake does not do anything else, so if the boss isn't in the first region and you have Kindred Keepsakes unlocked, only equip Evil Eye when you're getting into the boss's region.

6- Gold Purse- Charon

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Our old friend Charon brings us back to the basics with his Gold Purse, a simple Keepsake which does nothing other than start us off on a run with a hefty boost to our gold. Using this will give us an extra 100/125/150 gold for the night, which is a lot when you take into account the prices Charon practices.

100 gold buys you an upgrade, 125 gold buys you a random God Boon or a Centaur Heart, 150 gold gets you a God Boon. Paired with the aforementioned Kindred Keepsakes incantation, you can take the Gold Purse through Erebus, spend all your money on the shop, and switch to a more combat-focused Keepsake for your second region, and you can get an entire bonus boon out of it for free.

5- Discordant Bell- Eris

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While she is impossibly annoying, Eris isn't entirely useless in Hades II, for she gives us the powerful, yet dangerous, Discordant Bell. Using this Keepsake will boost all damage you give and take after each successful encounter, stacking infinitely.

Consequently, leveling this Keepsake makes it simultaneously stronger and more dangerous. You will be boosting all damage dealt and taken by 0.5/0.75/1% after each encounter. Do keep in mind that this Keepsake has effect for the entire night, so if you use it through Erebus and then unequip it, you will still be retain the damage increase and keep stacking it after each encounter.

4- Knuckle Bones- Odysseus

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The great tactician knows which targets are most dangerous, which is why he gifts us the Knuckle Bones, a more defensive alternative to Nemesis' Evil Eye. While having this Keepsake equipped, the next Guardian (main boss) you face will automatically lose 5/10/25% of its HP. In addition to this, all Guardians will deal 10% less damage to you.

We rank this higher than Evil Eye for two reasons: it is useful against multiple targets, and you can choose which target to pick. As long as you have access to the Kindred Keepsakes, you can just equip this at the start of the region whose boss you want to damage, and it will lose a chunk of its HP. Obviously extra-strong against the final boss, but you can also use it to get an easier path through Hecate.

3- Moon Beam- Selene

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While this is technically one of the many God boon-focused Keepsakes available in the game, it is much stronger than all others because Selene doesn't give us normal boons. Using the Moon Beam not only gives us early access to one of the many powerful Hexes, it also gives us 3/4/5 extra points to upgrade it when we get the chance.

There are two ways in which you can use the Moon Beam: you can either start off your night with it so you can ensure an Hex early in your run, or you can wait to see if you can get your hands on a good Hex, and you later equip the Moon Beam so you can have a massive upgrade, which can reach 9 points in one go if you choose a Full Moon Hex.

2- Crystal Figurine- Circe

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Given by the lovely Circe up on the surface, this Crystal Figurine of a pig is a unique Keepsake. While it does nothing to benefit your time through the first region of each night, it allows you to bypass the limits of your Arcana. While wearing the Crystal Figurine, you will activate two random inactive Arcana Cards after you take down a Guardian.

Leveling this Keepsake up will raise the level of the Arcana, so even if you draw one which you haven't upgraded at all, they will come in their Rare or Epic forms, depending on your Crystal Figurine's level. Not only is this extremely powerful during the early game in which you are so limited by your Grasp, it also synergizes extremely well with Judgement, a powerful Arcana Card.

1- Silken Sash- Arachne

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Our cursed spider takes the uncontested throne of best gift giver since her Silken Sash is so powerful. This Keepsake gives you 30 armor, which effectively doubles your base HP, but it also stacks even more armor on top of it every time you leave a location. This means that, as long as you have 1 armor left, you will get +2/3/4 armor after each location, depending on the Silken Sash's level.

Not only is this Keepsake an excellent defensive tool just by itself, it stacks with all other forms of armor, so if you meet Arachne during your time in Erebus, you can easily get upwards of 60 armor early in your run. Furthermore, gods like Hephaestus have boons which synergize directly with armor, so you can get such a snow ball rolling early on that you can reach the end of a run with your armor upwards of 100.