Gnarled Claw

A rare melee weapon with 13 uses that starts at 1 damage and gains +1 damage and +1 use on every kill. With consistent kills it builds into a high-damage, long-lasting weapon by late run. Damage resets at the end of the adventure, so it's a within-run investment. Maximize its potential by chaining kills on weaker enemies early to push the damage up before harder fights.

Every kill adds both a damage and a durability stack, creating a positive feedback loop: more damage means faster kills, more kills means more damage. Starting at 1 damage it requires investment before becoming powerful, but after 5-10 kills the weapon begins to outdamage many fixed-value alternatives. The additional use per kill also means the weapon self-sustains as long as you keep landing kills.

Best in runs with abundant weak enemies to farm kill stacks early. Equip immediately and use it on every enemy to build stacks across multiple encounters before boss fights. Pairs well with builds that have guaranteed kill setups or area attacks that can clean up weakened enemies for the kill credit. A snowball weapon that rewards committing to it early in a run.