Overview
Few items have such a bad rap in BoI as Soy Milk. But is it always awful?
Introduction
Listen. There’s a lot of people out there who are gonna tell you, “Oh, never pick up Soy Milk, Soy Milk’s so bad, it’s a run ruin-er, never pick it up.” And you know what? For the most part, those people are right. Soy Milk sucks, you guys. It quadruples your rate of fire, but sets your damage to one-fifth. What can you do with one-fifth damage? Nothing, besides dying immediately.
But, you picked it up anyway. Maybe you didn’t realize what it was, or maybe you had Curse of Blind, or maybe you picked it up just for giggles. Right about now, you’re ready to restart your run, but don’t hold down that button just yet! There are items out there that can save a Soy Milk run, and these items are the reason this guide exists, because I’m a good Samaritan, and I don’t want you to squander an amazing opportunity because “Soy Milk bad”.
We will evaluate how good Soy Milk is by using the metric, “How long can I play with Soy Milk and [Item] as The Lost before I die?”.
What About Standalone Soy Milk?
First things first, we need to evaluate Soy Milk on its own. So, using a character-modding software, I’ve given The Lost Soy Milk and nothing else.
This was, for all intents and purposes, a bad idea.
Let’s take a look at the stats here (represented using “Missing HUD 2”, download it if you haven’t already). In eleven seconds, we’ve shot more than one-hundred tears. Under normal circumstances, this would be pretty “baller”, as the kids say. But look – we have a damage of .70. The standard starting damage for The Lost is 3.50, meaning (as was stated earlier) our damage has been decreased by 80%. This means for every five tears that actually land, it’s the same as a single tear landing, and keep in mind there is no guarantee that every single shot is going to land.
Listen, I forgot to get a screen-cap, but believe me, The Lost died in the next room. Zero out of ten, would not recommend.
GOOD SYNERGIES
Not all is lost. There’s a bunch of items out there that make Soy Milk a top-tier item. These are those items.
Libra
Libra balances all of your stats out. This means that a Damage up is a Damage, Speed, Tears and Range up. Likewise, taking something like a Tears Down pill decreases your range, tears, speed, and damage.
Woah Nelly! Take a look at that!
We’ve shot thirty-five tears in six seconds, so doing some fast and loose math, that comes out to seventy tears per ten seconds compared to Normal Soy Milk’s one-hundred or so per ten seconds. However, this is a small price to pay for all the other buffs we’re given.
We have a Speed of 2.00, which, as you may have guessed, means right off the bat we’re at double our normal speed. We have a Range of 61.91, which is almost triple our standard range of 23.75. But the real beauty here is our damage – a staggering 18.76. This is more than five times our base damage of 3.50, and twenty-five times our base Soy Milk damage of .70.
Six minutes and twenty-two seconds, on The Depths I. Admittedly, I was playing pretty fast and loose, but when you’re playing fast and loose with The Lost, you usually have a life expectancy of three or four seconds.
Yes, of course, yes, pick it up, always pick it up you imbecile, never don’t go for Soy Milk/Libra.
Mysterious Liquid
Mysterious Liquid creates a small amount of creep when a tear hits an enemy or runs out of range. This creep is similar to the creep Sloth and Ultra-Pride produce, except it damages your enemies rather than you.
Since Soy Milk gives you a bunch of tears, you produce a bunch of creep. These actually provides a pretty decent offensive strategy for enemies like Globins (the guys that look like Sloth) and Knights (the skull guys with exposed brains), because once the start chasing you, the walk directly into the growing creep-puddle in front of them. And let me tell you something – that makes ’em hurt real bad.
Eleven seconds from entering the first room.
Okay, so listen. We all make mistakes. My mistake was overestimating the offensive power of Mysterious Liquid. It’s the sin of hubris, and it’s one we all fall victim to sometimes.
Eh. You can pick it up if you want. It’s pretty good in theory, and sometimes decent in execution. It’s not going to hurt you, and it might even help you a little bit. Go for it.
Pisces
Pisces is a Tears buff, but that’s not too important in our scenario. The real star of the Pisces scene is the fact that it gives “knock-back tears”, or tears that (what else?) knock back enemies upon contact.
The most defining characteristic of Soy Milk is its high rate of fire. Since each tear that hits an enemy pushes it back a little bit, a whole bunch of tears all hitting an enemy at the same time pushes an enemy to the end of your range. This makes you a defensive Juggernaught if you play your cards right, giving you a one-way shield that extends as far as you can shoot tears. You can even pin an enemy up against the wall, trapping him, if you’re diligent enough.
Two minutes and four seconds, on the boss of Basement I. Compared to our Mysterious Liquid run, this is a pretty good step up.
I’d say so. It gives you a great defense boost, which you’ll certainly be needing when you have such low damage. The only other thing I’d say is while there aren’t any scenarios I can think of where you shouldn’t pick up Pisces, you absolutely if you have something like Flat Worm or Pupula Duplex from the Afterbirth DLC. Since this increases the physical size of your tears, this increases the width of your tear-shield, giving you a better chance for survival. Of course, 20/20 wouldn’t hurt either, but when does it ever hurt?
Fire Mind
Fire Mind is, generally speaking, one of the best tear modifiers. It burns enemies upon contact, effectively poisoning them. Your tears also have a small chance to explode upon contact, lighting a fire at the point of explosion. These fires will hurt enemies if the pass through it, but will not hurt you. Take heed, though – the explosions that make the fires will, in fact, hurt you.
As a general rule of thumb, any tear modifier when paired with Soy Milk means that said modifier is going to show up a lot. This is true of Fire Mind as well. That “small chance to explode upon contact” actually becomes very significant when we have Soy Milk. This is really important, because while, say, Mom’s Perfume may fear a bunch of enemies, Fire Mind creates so many explosions, as is illustrated by the above screencap.
Four-and-a-half minutes. Here we go. Now we’re starting to reach Libra levels of survival.
Nineteen times out of twenty, yes. The only time I wouldn’t suggest picking up Fire Mind is if you have the very specific set up of high luck, short range, and low health. For example, let’s say you have Soy Milk, Fire Mind, and Number One, and you’re playing as Cain. You’ll be creating a lot of exploding tears – just by sheer estimation, between ten and twenty per room – and if those explosions are happening really, really close to you, you’re going to have a bad time.
Ipecac
Hoo boy, you guys. There are double-edged swords, and then there are sword that are nothing but edges. Ipecac makes your tears bombs, and poison bombs at that. You almost certainly will get hit by one of your own tears at some point, and unless you have Pyromania (or Afterbirth’s Host Hat), it’s gonna hurt.
Also, as a side note, please take a moment to appreciate how Ipecac also gives you one tiny eye.
For one, it murders your rate of fire. As you can see, after ten seconds of constant shooting, we’ve only shot thirty-six tears. This is made up slightly by the fact that your tears are, in fact, bombs, and do 8.70 damage each, more than twice The Lost’s base damage. Your tears also generally kills enemies in one shot, and since your tears are bombs, you can get into secret rooms lickety-split. Also, if you find yourself in a room where you’re not confident you’ll survive, you can always bomb a door for free and escape.
Two minutes and thirty-three seconds – and by one of my own tears, no less. Such is the life of the Ipecac user.
Honestly, it all depends on how good you are with normal Ipecac. If you can dodge your own shots, by all means, go for it. But if you’re still struggling with such a high-risk-high-reward item, don’t pick it up. It’s essentially just Fast Ipecac, and if you can’t handle it, avoid picking it up. Just remember though – your tears are in fact bombs. Be careful.
BAD SYNERGIES
Now, don’t go thinking that Soy Milk is all rainbows and lollipops. You have to keep in mind that Soy Milk is still a massive damage downgrade, and for a lot of items, that can really shoot you in the foot. These are those items.
Dr. Fetus
I know I said that Ipecac makes your tears bombs, but Dr. Fetus makes your tears literal, actual bombs. Like, the ones you collect. Any effects that your bombs and tears have carry over to your shots. For example, if you have Spoon Bender, you get homing bomb-shots, but if you have Bobby Bombs and not Spoon Bender, you still get homing bombs.
As you may have come to expect, Soy Milk and Dr. Fetus makes a whole bunch of bombs. Like, wow. So, so many bombs.
Well, look up top there – our boy The Lost died after two seconds of constant bomb spewing. When a bomb explodes, it knocks the other bombs away from it, even if they are spectral.
(NOTE: The Lost’s Dr. Fetus bombs are spectral by default, and not a result of Soy Milk.)
Honestly, I’d say no. If you feel confident that you won’t get hit (or if you have Pyromania), then by all means, pick it up – Dr. Fetus is pretty good overall. However, since Soy Milk increases your rate of fire by so much, it makes Dr. Fetus more of a burden than a boon.
Mom’s Knife
Mom’s Knife is – and you’re never going to believe this – a knife. It’s kind of a charge-shot item in the sense that the longer you hold down the button to shoot, the further you can launch your knife. When it comes into an enemy, it does a constant stream of damage. You chuck it at enemies, and they usually die in one hit.
Usually. Remember, Soy Milk drops your damage by 80%. This makes Mom’s Knife very weak, but on the plus side, it charges up to full-chucking-capacity almost instantly.
Twelve seconds. While it’s nice to charge up Mom’s Knife quickly, it doesn’t make up for the fact that it drops the damage by so much.
Never. It makes the item absolutely useless. Not only do you have the low damage that is famously associated with Soy Milk, but you lose the benefit of a constant stream of tears since Mom’s Knife stops tears. There are no tears – only knife.
Monstro’s Lung
Monstro’s Lung is a charge-shot item in the more traditional sense. You hold down your “shoot” button until fully charged (notated by Isaac’s cheeks being full and flashing red, or since I have a mod installed, a full bar over Isaac’s head), and when you let go, it lets loose a barrage of tears of varying sizes.
Due to the high rate of fire, Monstro’s Lung charges almost instantaneously. This allows you to rapid-fire, shooting out set of tears after set of tears. If you’ll notice, in ten seconds, we’re able to shoot off almost two-hundred tears, a noticeable step up from the hundred or so Soy Milk shoots on its own. The downside, though, is that all of the tears fired are of standard Soy Milk capacity – .70 damage per tear. Doing some quick math, it means if every shot fired lands on an enemy, it’s the equivalent of landing three normal tears at once.
Thirty-seven seconds. This may sound half-decent, but let me tell you – they were thirty-seven of the dullest seconds of my life. I managed to clear one room, in which time I had to fire more than five-hundred tears.
No. The fact that you can shoot an entire set with the press of a button may seem glamorous at first, but in reality, it’s what we’d call a “gilded turd”, shiny on the outside, and utter horse-apples when you go a bit deeper. Much like, Mom’s Knife, it takes away the ability to shoot tears normally. Since you have to shoot them in sets and not freely, you’re actually doing exponentially less damage.
(NOTE: Soy Milk has the same effect on Brimstone, Cursed Eye, and Afterbirth’s Technology-X, so if you want entries for those, go re-read this passage and mentally swap the words as necessary.)
The Ludovico Technique
The Ludovico takes away your ability to shoot and gives you a large, single tear which can be controlled wit the “fire” buttons. This tear does a constant amount of damage to any enemy it passes through or over. It also automatically makes your tears (or rather, tear) spectral and piercing.
Soy Milk makes the tear much smaller and faster. That’s it, really, aside from the obvious damage down.
Forty-two seconds. High, yes, but only in the context of this particular set-up.
I’d say no, but probably not for the reason you’re thinking. With Mom’s Knife and Monstro’s Lung (and all the other charge shot items), the main problem is you can’t shoot tears normally, and your DPS suffers greatly because of it. With The Ludovico Technique, your DPS actually isn’t that bad, all things considered. The main problem is that it decreases the size of your tear, and it makes it incredibly quick. Because of this, it’s hard to make contact with any enemies. Unless you have some other synergies with Ludo, like Strange Attractor.
Speaking of which…
Strange Attractor
Strange Attractor magnetizes your tears. This means that enemies are pulled towards your tears, as are consumables and trinkets (but not chests). Strange Attractor has somewhat of a reputation as a tricky item to work with, to the pointed where it’s featured in the challenge “Waka Waka”, along with Anti-Grav Tears.
Strange Attractor magnetizes your tears, so it only makes sense that a lot of tears means a lot of magnetization. All enemies are pulled into (or at least towards) your stream of tears, as are any loose collectibles hanging about.
Wow! Three seconds! That’s almost a record!
I wouldn’t advise it. The idea of being a walking gravity well seems attractive at first, but once you encounter an enemy that charges towards you, you’re basically already dead. Are there advantages to it? Sure. But the risk you run of getting hit from the very enemies you pull towards you far outweighs the benefits of it.
Conclusion
Now, I know I haven’t covered everything. But just as a rule of thumb, here’s the majority of everything else:
- Damage ups are usually useless because Soy Milk has a damage multiplier of .20.
- Damage multipliers can be good, but since you need to gather up a staggering damage multiplier of 5.00 to get back to base damage, they’re a little bit useless.
- Polyphemus is fine. It gives you a damage that’s a little less than normal, and tears that are a little higher than usual. It’s pretty boring, to be honest.
- Bloody Lust and Lusty Blood fall prey to the same “faults”. Your damage increases, but it only takes the run from bad to mediocre.
- Any tear-modifying item gives you a lot of tears of said modifier – Mom’s Contact gives a bunch of petrifying shots, and Head of the Keeper gives a lot of penny-spawning shots.
With that behind us, I’ve taken the time to create a table, ranking the items listed from best to worst. Have fun, stay safe, and I’ll see you next time.
NEXT WEEK (MAYBE): MY REFLECTION