It's a silly challenge I've wanted to win. I tried a couple times before and had no luck. The stone was alright as a weapon. It only gets +1/+2 from upgrades. It was doing 35-40 damage sometimes.
Since you start with 3 stones, the Troll Blacksmith can upgrade once and reforge twice, and with 15 upgrade scrolls in the game, you can have a +18 stone.
The Ring of Evasion was originally Tenacity from the Imp, and one Transmute turned it into Evasion. It did a lot of work! Finding +3 Platemail in a grave was clutch, too.
Got the chains super late, but they helped a bit on the ascent where my gloves were doing 0 damage most of the time. I had every artifact except Hourglass and Medalion.
Not pictured here was a +2 Ring of Wealth I found early. It helped tremendously! Mostly for getting extra consumables. Probably turned 3 Transmutes into Recycle for healing pots. Must have drank 25-30 of them during the run. Ended the game with 1 left.
I'm here to report it's not that bad. Maybe I just got lucky, but I managed to beat the game second try with this challenge. (Just because the first time I got a wand of transfusion on floor two and quit :D). Warden with camouflage. Finished with 14 healing pots. I did use reforge for rings and armor though, it does not say "upgrade", when you do it ๐ซฃ (and I forgot). But I think it would be very much doable without it. The barkskin and infinite invisibility are an unbelievable combo.
Nice idea nonetheless, after finally beating six challenges a week ago, it was nice not to have them active ๐.