Bottle Flame Use

[tiberiansun371alexw]

What use cases are there for bottled flame on the first 3 characters?

It's not like there is a 1 or 2 cost 84 damage attack, which you'd probably bottle if it existed. You're not going to have a searing blow upgraded 9 times unless everything else in your deck is woefully unupgraded.

For Ironclad, I don't see much point in bottling a reaper. You'll probably want to use it once you take some damage in the fight, so it is better to now draw it.

Bludgeon leaves you with no energy in Act I and almost no energy in later Acts. This is a problem if you drew a power your deck needs, like a feel no pain when you are exhausting a bunch of cards.

Uppercut is a Waste on Enemies that don't attack turn 1.

I guess if your deck has rampage and a bunch of headbutts, you might bottle rampage? You're pretty desperate if your only hope to defeat the boss is "last long enough to play rampage a bunch of times" so you probably don't want to have a deck where this is starting to look like a good idea.

Bash followed by an attack sounds good for hallway fights, but having less than 3 energy to follow up on that vulnerable means the you aren't outputting that much on your follow up attack.

Pommel strike might be worth a shot if you have 4 energy or more on your first turn?

For the Silent, let's start with Choke. As silent a lot of the time the first turn can involved lots of played cards, so maybe this is a good idea? Honstly fi it did only 3 damage and cost 1 energy but had that debuff it would be great, but it costs 2 energy. The most spammable card at 0 energy is Shivs. So maybe this isn't so great.

Flying knee allows you to settup your next turn so if Acrt one's energy relics were really bad, you could still have 4 energy on turn 2. Giving energy into your next turn is pretty descent, but while this card is a great inclusion into a deck, I don't know about the utiltiy of bottling it.

Die Die Die has a great AoE and even against a single target, 17 damage for 1 drop is actually pretty good.

Masterful stab can be bottle to ensure you get a nice 0 cost attack in before taking damage. This sounds great. However... this is only 1 more damage than a backstab and unlike back stab which is 1 card, this play requires a card and a relic! So that doesn't look so great anymore.

Dagger throw does some damage and settup discard synergy. While I have thoguht most of the bottled flame's targets are dubious, this actually sounds good.

For the Defect, perhaps a good one is ball lightning? The damage isn't impressive, but if you took a boss relic instead of your starter relic, this ensures you have something channeled right away. However, I question the use of it if you do have your starting relic. You get to channel either way, but 1 orb vs 0 is a lot more of an improvment than 2 vs 1.

A similair argument can be made for doom and bloom but it is area of effect and therfore a bunchb etter attack. However it is more costly in terms of energy. If you don't use the card on your first turn, it's a waste, but if you want to play blocking cards the first turn there isn't much energy left.

Sunder is the type of card you want to see turn 4 or so, except maybe in Act 1 hallway fighfs where you can just one shot a target.

I don't think go for the eyes is that great as a bottled target even if it is a good card.

Maybe sweeping beam is worth a go? It hits for AoE and if you got a build that get slots of energy, you can play every card you draw.

[Re:Start-E.D.420]

i found bottled flame works best with jax or marbles (preferably both). if you can negate more damage by simply killing a mob than by defending, it makes it worth it. I've used it for something just as simple as anger before too. having a reliable 0 attack card that you can play on your first turn every battle can come in clutch sometimes.

generally i use it with anything that does aoe, so like cleave sweeping beam or even bomb

really though it just depends on my other trinkets and if i got a good enough card to use it with. i hate getting it act 1, but act 2 or 3 it can be one of my favourite trinkets cause it can let a build flourish

[Zu]

Most of the time I either skip or use it to stack weak early. That's it, honestly.

[Spawnling]

Whirlwind, Chemical X, Necronomicon.
Dagger Spray is good act 1 & 2, dagger throw if you have kite.
I don't think Defect wants to draw an attack turn 1.

[LHGreen]

I love to bottle Core Surge with Defect. It's probably the best overall usage of that relic. Defect LOVES having stacks of artifact, because of all the self-debuffing of focus in that card pool. Granted, it's not strictly NECESSARY, but if you're in for a long fight and have to build focus quickly (and either don't have a Consume, or do have one but not enough slot generation to compensate) then being able to build it through either Biased Cognition or Genetic Algorithm without having to worry about losing some each turn is very helpful. Especially if you're using Echo Form or Amplify to double those effects. And that's not even mentioning how helpful it is with other cards that reduce focus, like Reprogram and Hyperbeam. Panacea is also a great card for Defect to have, for that reason, as is Clockwork Souvenir on the relic side of things.

And I'm not just talking out of my ass, either. I'm saying this as someone who had to survive 17 turns against an A20 heart in order to kill it. Artifact+Biased Cognition can be a run saver.

[tiberiansun371alexw]

Originally posted by Spawnling:

Whirlwind, Chemical X, Necronomicon.

I don't argue that's a great combo, but we're really scraping the bottom of the barrel when we say " Oh iX good with this relic" as opposed "it's good with this common/ uncommon card and then it becomes even better with certain other relics"

Originally posted by LHGreen:

I love to bottle Core Surge with Defect. It's probably the best overall usage of that relic. Defect LOVES having stacks of artifact, because of all the self-debuffing of focus in that card pool. Granted, it's not strictly NECESSARY, but if you're in for a long fight and have to build focus quickly (and either don't have a Consume, or do have one but not enough slot generation to compensate) then being able to build it through either Biased Cognition or Genetic Algorithm without having to worry about losing some each turn is very helpful. Especially if you're using Echo Form or Amplify to double those effects. And that's not even mentioning how helpful it is with other cards that reduce focus, like Reprogram and Hyperbeam. Panacea is also a great card for Defect to have, for that reason, as is Clockwork Souvenir on the relic side of things.

I don't argue these are all great uses of Core Surge. Is bottling it that much better than having it somewhere in the deck?

[Khor]

Fun fact, Bottled flame is probably the most "skipped" relic of the game

[Cress]

Yea... it's very situational as to when you would want to even take a Bottled Flame. Unless it is a very spectacular attack then it can probably just be more of a hindrance on your turn 1s than anything. It's usually a skip relic. I would agree with most of what you said in your OP.

It can be very powerful even without relic synergies, some cases I would consider it:

Ironclad- Immolate will be useful for the vast majority of the game. Pommel Strike is +1 net draw turn 1, not great but it probably wouldn't hurt either. Obviously Searing Blow would be good.

Silent- Masterful Stab, Die Die Die, Glass Knife. Silent has a bit more leniency since she draws 7 on turn 1 (unless boss swap).

Defect- Core Surge, Hyperbeam, maybe even Doom and Gloom. FTL is somewhat of a "whatever" but it is just free damage after all (until Time Eater/Heart).

Watcher- Eruption/Tantrum, Sands of Time, Talk to the Hand, Wallop(maybe...).

With relics, there are more options that open up. Someone already mentioned some such as Bag of Marbles/Mutagens/Chemical X/Necronomicon.

Akabeko w/ multiattack,
Bag of Preparation (helps reduce the "negative impact" of when you don't need the bottled attack),
Centennial Puzzle w/ self-damage,
Gambling Chip makes it a non-issue,
Golden Eye can make Cut Through Fate very potent on Watcher,
Snecko Eye and Meteor Strike is just funny (welcome to infinite town) as well as other big attacks,
Runic Pyramid just to get something like Feed/Lesson Learned into your hand if you have a large deck (somewhat controversial I will admit),
Hovering Kite w/ Dagger Throw can be decent,
Runic Cube w/ self-damage can be decent.

[LHGreen]

Originally posted by tiberiansun371alexw:

I don't argue these are all great uses of Core Surge. Is bottling it that much better than having it somewhere in the deck?

It's a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ godsend against the heart. But it's usually helpful to have artifact stacks asap, and on the occasions it's not, you can always Hologram it or cycle it through the deck.

[Zu]

Originally posted by tiberiansun371alexw:

Is bottling core surge that much better than having it somewhere in the deck?

Acts 2 and 4? Absolutely. Got cog? Absolutely. Fighting giant head too? Not so much.

[tiberiansun371alexw]

Originally posted by Cress:

Silent- Masterful Stab

At first I though this was a great combo since Masterful Stab is best on the first turn. But ultimately isn't this relic plus card (Bottle flame and masterful stab) doing 1 more damage what a single card by itself (backstab) can do? it's kind of like how if you get 7 strikes (say 3 perfected strikes+, 1 wild strike, 2 pommel strike, and 1 swift strike) you can do 42 damage with perfected strike +s... something you could have done with bludgeon + without trying to collect a bunch of combo pieces. Maybe I'm looking at this wrong, but the Bottled Masterful Stab seems much like a backstab with 1 extra damage.

[Cress]

Originally posted by tiberiansun371alexw:

Originally posted by Cress:

Silent- Masterful Stab

At first I though this was a great combo since Masterful Stab is best on the first turn. But ultimately isn't this relic plus card (Bottle flame and masterful stab) doing 1 more damage what a single card by itself (backstab) can do? it's kind of like how if you get 7 strikes (say 3 perfected strikes+, 1 wild strike, 2 pommel strike, and 1 swift strike) you can do 42 damage with perfected strike +s... something you could have done with bludgeon + without trying to collect a bunch of combo pieces. Maybe I'm looking at this wrong, but the Bottled Masterful Stab seems much like a backstab with 1 extra damage.

It is, but it's also a meme to just bottle a Backstab on Silent due to the relic being borderline unusable.

[tiberiansun371alexw]

Originally posted by Cress:

due to the relic being borderline unusable.

I know I was having trouble finding a use for this and asked to see what people could find, but I think Dagger throw with any discard synergy is actually pretty good

[Cress]

Originally posted by tiberiansun371alexw:

Originally posted by Cress:

due to the relic being borderline unusable.

I know I was having trouble finding a use for this and asked to see what people could find, but I think Dagger throw with any discard synergy is actually pretty good

Yep, this would be a good target if you had kite or reflex/tactician in your deck. Even without it isn't horrible, although it's -1 draw/energy for 9 damage and some card manipulation so not really great. You're typically more interested in playing powers and blocking/weakening the enemy on turn 1 than playing some attack in the late game, which is where bottling "meh" cards will start to become a hindrance.

[tiberiansun371alexw]

Originally posted by Cress:

Yep, this would be a good target if you had kite or reflex/tactician in your deck. Even without it isn't horrible, although it's -1 draw/energy for 9 damage and some card manipulation so not really great.

It still counts as a discard for eviserate too

[Cress]

Originally posted by tiberiansun371alexw:

Originally posted by Cress:

Yep, this would be a good target if you had kite or reflex/tactician in your deck. Even without it isn't horrible, although it's -1 draw/energy for 9 damage and some card manipulation so not really great.

It still counts as a discard for eviserate too

True, but if you were going for discard synergy, what is more useful in the late game- a dagger throw, or an acrobatics? You're inevitably removing 1/7 card draws every turn 1 by bottling a dagger throw, which isn't some gamebreaking thing, but still something that isn't comparatively very useful regardless.