Where to find the (semi-rare) runes?

[Wrathraven]

Re the countess, now I try directly going to the Countess chamber before doing the side wings. So far, I've gotten some of the common runes now (previously I got 1 or 2 only) and I've had one time she dropped 3 runes, albeit just an El, Eld and Ith). This in nightmare difficulty v1.09 single-player.  Haven't gotten the runes above Thul from the NM Countess yet (but still doing some more countess runs).

just keep doing them, in about 30-40 NM countess runs I've gotten several Thuls, several Amns, 3 or 4 Sols, a Shael, a Dol, and 3 Hels. So they're out there, and with a Sorc you can do a run in a couple minutes, easy. And remember, you can cube Thuls and the rest now :)