Flaming

Version 0.30: This article may not be up to date for the latest stable release of Crawl.

It burns victims, dealing an additional one-quarter of any damage that pierces defenders' armour. Big, fiery blades are also staple armaments of hydra-hunters.

The flaming brand does the following:

• Adds an average of roughly +25% fire damage (0% - 50%) to attacks, applied after AC and all damage factors (including slaying).
• When an edged weapon of flaming (Long Blades, Axes, 2-handed Polearms, lajatangs) cuts hydra heads, flaming will cauterize the wound, preventing the hydra from regrowing heads, for a net loss of 1 head.

Sources

Along with finding flaming weapons as random loot, or using a scroll of brand weapon, flaming can be found on a few monsters:

• Efreets, as well as the uniques Erica and Azrael, often carry scimitars of flaming.
• Fire giants usually generate with flaming great swords.
• Nessos is always generated with a flaming longbow.
• Trog often gifts weapons of flaming.

Strategy

Flaming is one of a couple percentage-based brands that's good enough to beat a 3-rune game. For edged-weapon users, flaming is very desirable against hydras, who are often difficult to take out otherwise.

As flaming applies its percentage boost after AC reduction, it is no better or worse when considering strength, weapon type, slaying, or AC. An executioner's axe of freezing receives the same +25% boost to final damage as a quick blade of freezing. It's just that a quick blade's base damage is weak, so a brand like electrocution or pain will be stronger for it.

History

• Prior to 0.15, you could temporarily apply a flaming brand to your (unbranded) weapon with the spell Fire Brand, which could be made permanent with a scroll of vorpalize weapon.