Binding of Isaac: Rebirth Wiki

Polyphemus is a passive item.

Effects[]

  • Greatly increased damage:
  • (except in Repentance) Tears down:
  • (in Repentance) Tears fired per second * 0.42.
  • If a tear kills an enemy and has left over damage, the tear travels on with the remaining damage.

Notes[]

Synergies[]

  • (in Repentance) Abyss: When Polyphemus is picked up instead of being converted into a locust, it grants all of Abyss's locusts the high damage up without suffering the tears down allowing Isaac to increase his damage rate substantially the more items he uses Abyss on.
  • Dr. Fetus: Increases tear delay, and after the first bomb explodes, a second bomb appears where the first one exploded, doing roughly half the damage of the first.
  • The Inner Eye/Mutant Spider/(in Repentance) C Section: The tear rate is not lowered further, but the effect on damage becomes a flat +5 bonus instead.
  • (in Afterbirth † and Repentance) The Forgotten: The Forgotten's bone club becomes massive. It deals very high damage but has a very low swing rate. The size of the bone club becomes big enough to shake the screen.
  • (in Repentance) Rock Bottom: Allows Isaac to keep his previous fire rate in addition to the massive damage boost.
  • (in Repentance) Shard of Glass: The rapidly spawning red tears do full damage.

Interactions[]

  • (in Afterbirth † and Repentance) Haemolacria: The main tear retains the semi-piercing ability and may not burst when hitting a weaker enemy. Split tears do not semi-pierce.
  • (in Afterbirth † and Repentance) Lachryphagy: Greatly increases how big the fed tear can grow.
  • Lost Contact: Isaac's tears will block enemy shots and continue, but lose 10 damage. If the tear had less than 10 damage left, it disappears.
  • Piercing tears: Semi-piercing is replaced by proper piercing, with no loss of damage on any enemy contact.
  • Polyphemus: No further effect when multiple copies are acquired.

In-game Footage[]

Trivia[]

  • Much like other eye-altering passive items, Polyphemus has a unique appearance on The Forgotten, appearing as an empty eye socket.
  • Polyphemus, ancient Greek for "The much vaunted", is a Cyclops. He is the son of Poseidon and the sea nymph Thoosa. This item is a reference to the cyclops named Polyphemus from the poem by Homer called "The Odyssey"
  • This item is used in Slow Roll (challenge #15).