Brand

Version 0.13: This article may not be up to date for the latest stable release of Crawl.

Armour brands are also called egos. See the ego page for armour brands.

A brand is a special enhancement that a weapon can have, affecting its damage output, giving it a particular damage type, or causing effects. Weapons can have at most one brand, and randarts are guaranteed a brand, although some unrandarts do not have one. Brands are auto-identified when a weapon is wielded. Missile brands are known on sight. If you use branded ammo with a branded launcher, only the ammo brand will take effect. Exceptions include launchers with the vorpal or speed brands, which stack with their ammo's brands, and launchers of flaming and missiles of frost (or vice versa) will cancel each other out, resulting in an unbranded missile.

Aside from the permanently-branded weapons found in the dungeon, two spells provide temporary brands to weapons: Warp Weapon (distortion) and Excruciating Wounds (pain). The Blade card likewise provides a (random) temporary brand. Each of these will override a weapon's current brand (if any).

There are two ways to create weapons with a permanent brand. First, a scroll of brand weapon will apply a brand to one of the non-artefact weapons you are carrying, overwriting the previous brand, if any. The second means of creating a branded weapon is through the act of a god. The Shining One, Lugonu, and Kikubaaqudgha will grant especially pious worshipers permanent holy wrath, distortion, and pain brands, respectively. Divine branding will replace any previous brand the weapon held. Note that this still does not work on artefacts. As for the chaos brand, Xom may randomly place that on an unbranded weapon, most often one in a monster's inventory.

List of Brands

Melee Weapons

• Antimagic (causes monster spell failure and reduces the player's maximum MP)
• Chaos (Xom's special brand; can inflict different brand effects per attack)
• Disruption (found only on the artifact great mace, Undeadhunter)
• Distortion (Lugonu's special brand; can have multiple damaging and Translocation related effects upon a successful hit, including Banishment to the Abyss)
• Dragon slaying (found only on the artefact lance, Wyrmbane)
• Draining (reduces monster HD per hit)
• Electrocution (inflicts additional electrical attack upon a successful attack)
• Flaming (average 25% extra fire damage per attack, less on resistant creatures)
• Freezing (average 25% extra freezing damage, can temporarily slow cold-blooded monsters)
• Holy wrath (The Shining One's special brand; average 75% extra damage to demonic and [[undead] monsters)
• Pain (Kikubaaqudgha's special brand; inflicts additional damage based on the player's Necromancy)
• Protection (+5 AC when wielded)
• Reaping (raises an allied zombie of slain creature if it produces a corpse; found only on the unrandarts Spear of the Botono and the Sword of Zonguldrok)
• Speed (increases attack speed; found only on short blades, staves, and some artefacts)
• Vampiricism (heals the player for a portion of his or her inflicted damage)
• Venom (inflicts damage over time to affected monsters)
• Vorpal (average 16.67% extra damage per attack; described as Chopping, Slicing, Piercing, Crushing, Slashing, or Piercing, depending on the branded weapon)

Some brands are more desirable on certain melee weapons than others. For example, brands such as flaming or freezing add a percentage damage bonus dependent on the weapon's base damage. Others add a special effect that triggers on a successful attack, such as distortion, electrocution, or pain.

As such, a flaming Executioner's Axe is generally superior to a flaming dagger because of its high base damage, while an electrocution quickblade is far better than an electrocution Bardiche because of its low base delay. Choose branded weapons accordingly.

All added brand damage is calculated after AC reduction, and does not get further reduced by AC.

Launchers

• Electrocution
• Evasion
• Flame
• Frost
• Penetration
• Speed
• Venom
• Vorpal ("Velocity")
• Chaos

Crossbows can have flame, frost, evasion, chaos and vorpal. Artifact crossbows can also have penetration, electrocution, venom and speed.

Bows, longbows and slings can have flame, frost, evasion and vorpal. Speed and venom are possible on artifacts (the Bow of Krishna "Sharnga" has the speed brand).

Blowguns can only be generated with evasion. Artifact blowguns can have speed.

Missiles

• Dispersal
• Exploding
• Flame
• Frost
• Penetration
• Poisoned
• Returning
• Silver
• Steel

Flame, frost, and poisoned can all be found on arrows and crossbow bolts. Poisoned javelins are also possible. Silver and steel can be found on crossbow bolts, sling bullets, tomahawks, and javelins. Dispersal can be found on arrows and tomahawks. Exploding can be found only on sling bullets. Penetration can be found on crossbow bolts or javelins. Returning can be found on tomahawks and javelins. Stones, large rocks, and nets are never generated with a brand, though branded large rocks may occasionally be found in ammo shops. (Exception: one of the Dungeon Sprint maps offers a large rock of returning. Naturally, it's being used against you.).

Needles

Needles have their own brand selection; most often poisoned, but they can instead bear one of the following unique brands:

• Confusion
• Curare
• Frenzy
• Paralysis
• Sleep
• Slowing

Needle brands

All needle types except "poisoned" were introduced in version 0.6. There's a saving throw for monsters: if 1 + 1d(4 + your throwing skill + your blowgun’s enchantment) is greater than the monster’s hit dice, the effect will be applied. You also have a straight 2% chance of succeeding for monsters with a hit dice of 14 or below.

Some statistics: with no skill you’re still at 100% to succeed on HD1 or HD2 (gnoll, D1 monsters), 75% on HD3 (Sigmund), 50% on HD4 (Duvessa), and 25% on HD5 (ogre). With 4 skill as an early Assassin, you’re up to 56% on an Ogre, or 33% on a Yak.

Notes

As of 0.10 all Polearms have Reaching.