Trust me, there's nothing all that interesting about BTH.
I was addicted to Oxycontin, quit cold turkey then relapsed a few months later because I still felt like I was half dead. However, by the time I started using again I had burned my Oxy dealer and the morphine pills I'd relapsed on and had become physically dependent on were unsatisfying and also very expensive. So I made the switch to BTH.
I'd used heroin before out of curiosity and when I'd been out of other opiates, but when I made the switch it was the first time I was using it regularly. BTH is very foul, no matter the quality. Smoking it is disgusting, it tastes like some awful mix between vinegar and soy sauce. Literally, when I smoked it I would gag and even dry heave from the taste alone.. I had to force myself to smoke enough to get high. Which is horrible when you're sick from WDs and just want to feel better but you really don't want to do this shit.
So of course I ended up switching to IV, and everything went downhill fast from there. I already had a massive tolerance from Oxy, so switching didn't save me money. But for the first time, I experienced intense cravings for opiates and I lost control of my habit. I was shooting up several times a day, I was extremely thin, and completely physically addicted... I had to use or I would be incredibly sick. BTH is extremely filthy, it's made in unsanitary conditions... if you ever watched it made, you would throw up. Better to eat dog shit, tbh.
This didn't start all at once.. At one point, I was just like you. Curious to try opiates, especially this drug that everyone thought was so bad. I never thought I would be addicted. I used here and there, always careful. Till one day I didn't use and was so sick I couldn't work. And I realized what a trap I had fallen into. The amount you have to use to become addicted varies by person, no one here on BL could answer that question. No drug is ever "safe", but heroin is a street drug... it's not clean like pharmaceutical opiates which come in pills. There's not quality control, dealers cut it to make more profit.
Do yourself a favor, don't even try it. If you've never experienced physical addiction it's hard to explain... but it traps you. I've quit before, but even after getting through the major WD symptoms I still didn't feel okay. It can take a year for your opiate receptors to normalize. In the meantime, your body won't produce endorphins. So things that make you feel happy, like eating good food, taking a walk, hanging out with friends, just feel like.. nothing. It's like hell on earth, you want to be normal again but you're trapped. I can't even begin to find the words to explain, but trying BTH is the worst idea ever. And it's not worth it either, it's not a great drug. Other opiates are way better and don't produce intense cravings. But you can and will become physically addicted if you use them more than once every month or less.
Edit: In response to the post above, with BTH it won't take weeks of continuous use.. you can experience WD symptoms much sooner than that. Also, tar and powder are about equal in terms of potency. But tar is definitely more crude, less refined, and just a dirty drug.