I have a windmill lighter in my emergency bag. Very cool, and in my experience, very unreliable. Tuning the flow adjustment can help at altitude but I've never gotten it to work reliable enough that I'm comfortable using it as anything other than a toy. Being an untreated gearaholic, I've had several of them. When I need something other than cool, like when I really want a fire, I pull out one of my two baby bics and a couple pieces of fatwood that I've cut in half and split into thin pieces, about the size of a cigarette. Those fatwood pieces can be shaved into nice tinder. And I have a half dozen stormproof matches with a couple striker strips in my kit as backup.

Like Oldranger, I carry a stove as a primary piece of gear, even on day hikes. If I'm by myself I usually take my whitebox stove and 2oz of heet, or if I have the wife, its my snowpeak giga which I think is about $40.

Finally, practice the craft. The hardest for me is getting a fire going in wet conditions. I'm still not 100% under those circumstances.