My favorite has got to be the classic - Diazepam. More euphoria and the nice body high from the muscle relaxation... I scored like 40 or 50 of them back in the day, and used to do them occasionally, but now I reserve them for super special occasions, since I've never gotten a chance to get any more! Good for generalized anxiety - but not fast enough for a panic attack or anything like that.
Clonazepam is decent for general anxiety, or for sleep -> anxiety relief the next day - but can be kind of sedating if you take it straight up for anxiety. It might be in the low end of my top 10...
I love phenazepam for general anxiety - take one dose, you aren't consciously aware of being on it, but your anxiety is relieved and it's very conducive to productivity if it's anxiety that's blocking that. I'd probably rate it #3 if we;re rating out favorites - but for recreation, it's totally unusable, and you'll just end up in a multiday rolling blackout, complete with bad behavior and horror stories recounted to you by friends if you try to take enough to make it fun. So if we're talking recreational use, it's not even on the list.
I'm seeing a lot of people praising Etizolam - I avoid that stuff like
the plague covid-19. I've had TWO paradoxical reactions from it (like, emotional meltdowns) when I'd had like 1.5mg for fun (and not because I was in crisis beforehand or anything) and had two drinks the day after taking it once - and not only was I pretty fucked up (which I expected), I spun out and puked... But assuming you don't have my ideosyncratically bad reaction to it, it's a good benzo - my impression is that it also can provide a strong enough kick to be good on
I think Ativan is my #6... all around nice, balanced, synergizes really well with weed, esp if you get weed anxiety - on lorazepam, you can smoke til the cows come home and enjoy the high and not get the weed anxiety. Occasionally has a flicker of the weirdness normally associated with the Z-drugs, too - but not to the extent that you'll end up doing crazy shit, just a touch of it.
Temazepam takes the #2 spot on the grounds of it's sheer recreational value - it is spectacular for sleep, but it's so much fun if you stay up on it, I consider it too much fun to actually use for sleep! Unfortunately, it's short - if it and valium had the same duration, it would win hands down, but valium gives you a great day, and a nice afterglow the next day.
Xanax is my #4 - and it's one of a fairly small number of benzos that I think have the kick to really take out panic attack type stuff.
Assuming we left phenaz off the list because it's not fun, I'd slot Clonazolam (RC benzo, the triazolo structure of xanax/alprazolam with the chloro/nitro substitutions of clonazepam). It feels like... better xanax to me. And the dose is low enough that if you buy powder, you can put it on blotter (though also low enough that you'll get fucked if you try to eyeball doses - don't do that!)
Diclazepam (another RC) takes my #5; both structure and effects similar to ativan, but it's got a bit more euphoria, imo, and a bit more of that nice muscle relaxation body high that I love so very much. More amnesia too though!
#7 goes to Flub - flubromazolam (another RC). Very long acting. They say it was being investigated primarily as a hypnotic. I don't find it to be outstanding for that or anything (though some friends have reported that it knocked them out for 8-12 hours, so I may be weird here). Though I also, you know, take it in reasonable doses - most of those friends say they do too, but do we trust their measuring and judgement? I find it,,, similar effects profile as clonazolam, but less of a tendency to make me lazy. Same super low dose that begs to be laid on blotter like c-lam (and threatens dire effects for people who try to eyeball or mistake for another drug).
I think I'd give #8 to Zolpidem - not a benzo, technically, but it binds the same receptor, and has all the same risks and benefits, plus that Z-drug weirdness (be sure to take in a safe space, and take some measure to make sure you don't repeatedly redose because you forgot you'd already redosed, and end up engaging in insane behavior having taken the whole bottle and having no memory of WTF you're doing or why. But assuming you like, don't do that, the weirdness from sane doses is fun. IIRC it's got some nice muscle relaxation too.
#9 gets flubromaze
pam, another RC (actually, maybe it should be higher). It's relaxing and chill, euphoric, but mildly so. Doesn't kick you in the face like xanax or flub, but still very pleasant.
And as predicted, that leaves Clonazepam in 10th place.
flualprazolam doesn't quite make my list - it's similar to xanax, but more sleepy and less fun; strikes me as strictly worse. I've also tried bromazolam, the bromine homolog; I haven't taken it enough to feel like I can judge it though! Initial impressions are quite good - but it felt like it's either more potent than I'd been led to belive, or the vendor dosed the solution too high (I hate when they insist on selling you solutions rather than powders - they charge a huge premium, it makes the packages bigger, and I much prefer to lay it on blotter instead of make droppers....
Of course, I've never taken Midazolam or Triazolam (argh, I had a chance to get some midazolam too, and I didn't take it! And some other weird nitro-substituted sleep aid). It was early in my career as a drug user, before I'd observed that I never regretted buying a drug, nor buying a larger quantity of a drug, but frequently regretted not buying something, or cheaping out and not buying enough. So my policy now is when in doubt, buy more drugs in larger quantities.... It helps that I've been working longer now, and have enough savings that I don't feel the financial hit so much. But I also don't hang out on the dark web anymore, so way fewer chances to blow money on weirdo drugs
