Shard Dust

Shard Dust
	Cost	3 Comet Shards	Stack	6
	Effect
	Buff: +2 SPD, +15% DMG Debuff: +10% Stress, -10% Virtue Chance Stress +10 Refreshes limited use skills
	Description
	Use to tap into otherworldly power, but beware its other effects. [cannot be used while Virtuous]

Shard Dust is an item available in The Color of Madness DLC that can be bought on the Provision menu. The cost is paid with Comet Shards instead of Gold. When used, it will cause significant stress damage and debuffs, but also give heroes a powerful SPD, DMG, and, if used enough, CRIT buff for a time.

Effects

Shard Dust has different effects depending on how many times it has been used consecutively. These vary in the duration of the buffs, which decrease with each use, as well as the severity of the stress obtained. The primary use of Shard Dust is to refresh limited use skills like the Man-at-Arms' Bolster, allowing those skills to be used multiple times in one battle.

The debuffs from Shard Dust notably cannot be removed, so be prepared for stress buildup if using Shard Dust on longer dungeons.

• First use:
  • Buff: +2 SPD, +15% DMG (1 Battle)
  • Debuff: +10% Stress, -10% Virtue Chance (Quest)
  • Stress +10
  • Refreshes limited use skills
• Second use:
  • Buff: +2 SPD, +15% DMG (10 rds)
  • Debuff: +20% Stress, -10% Virtue Chance (Quest)
  • Stress +20
  • Refreshes limited use skills
• Third use and onwards:
  • Buff: +2 SPD, +15% DMG, +9% CRIT (5 rds)
  • Stress +40
  • Refreshes limited use skills

Strategy

Since Shard Dust refreshes limited use skills, it can be used to great effect for stacking battle-long buffs, such as the Man-at-Arms' Bolster or the Plague Doctor's Emboldening Vapours. As these tend to be very powerful and balanced by their limited use, using Shard Dust can be beneficial; Bolster, for example, can provide enormous amounts of DODGE, and the -Stress buff will cancel out the debuffs from Shard Dust (though Stress buffs still have a maximum of -80%), allowing it to be used with little consequence.

Aside from stacking buffs, the ability to refresh skills is especially useful for the Farmstead, where battle limits will not be reset until after the boss at the end of each wave group, while the buffs from them will fade after each wave.

The DMG and SPD buffs from Shard Dust are also significant in that they (at least initially) last the whole battle, making it a viable option for damage dealers in longer fights. Using Shard Dust multiple times will add the buffs again, but for a shorter duration. It can be stacked as many times as necessary; however, the enormous stress hits will surely result in a heart attack if used improperly.

Trivia

• The internal name of the Shard Dust, the Spice, is a reference to the highly valuable substance called Melange or the Spice, one of the central subject in the sci-fi hit novel Dune. Like Shard Dust, Spice are extraterrestrial in origins, namely, from an alien planet called Arrakis. Spice granted the user a longer lifespan and heightened their senses to the point of being able to see through the barrier of space-time, allowing them to safely navigate a spaceship through the cosmos.