wan2-343.txt Last edited 2006-08-17 for NetHack 3.4.3
Breaking wands, cancelling, and polymorphing in NetHack 3.4
Compiled for 3.2.2 by Kevin Hugo.
Updated for 3.4.3 by Dylan O'Donnell <
[email protected]>.
Breaking wands
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
(Adapted from a spoiler by Jeffrey Robertson.)
You can destroy a wand by (a)pplying it. You will be prompted for
confirmation, and you must have hands and a strength of at least 10.
Wands with no charges and some wands listed below have no effect ("But
nothing else happens...").
Most wands will produce an explosion when broken. The explosion causes
damage to yourself and any monsters that were in the adjacent squares
when you broke the wand. This damage can be reduced or eliminated if
you (or the monster) has an appropriate resistance. Damage is also
reduced to 1/2 for Healers and Knights and to 1/5 for Monks, Priests,
and Wizards. Further effects can occur as if you had zapped yourself
with the wand. The explosion can also affect objects in your inventory,
on your square, and on adjacent squares, and affect locations as if they
were zapped. Finally, some types of wands have explosions that make you
identify the wand.
Specific effects are detailed below. In any case, you destroy the wand
and owe the cost if it was unpaid.
WAND EFFECTS
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~
cancellation There is an explosion from 1 to (4*charges) damage.
Monsters and objects in the affected squares are
cancelled.
cold There is an explosion of cold with (8 * charges)
damage.
Potions may freeze.
You identify the wand.
create monster There is an explosion from 1 to (4*charges) damage.
You are surrounded by monsters.
death There is an explosion of death with (16 * charges)
damage. Non-living monsters and demons resist this
damage.
You identify the wand.
digging There is an explosion from 1 to (4*charges) damage.
You are surrounded by pits and holes.
enlightenment No effects.
fire There is an explosion of fire with (8 * charges)
damage.
Armor, scrolls and spellbooks may burn.
Potions may boil.
Burns away slime.
You identify the wand.
light There is an explosion from 1 to (4*charges) damage.
You are blinded for (charges+1)d25 turns;
surrounding monsters may also be blinded, and
gremlins take damage.
The room is lit.
lightning There is an explosion of lightning with (16 *
charges) damage.
Rings and other wands may explode.
You are blinded.
You identify the wand.
locking No effects.
magic missile There is an explosion of magic missiles with
(4 * charges) damage.
You identify the wand.
make invisible There is an explosion from 1 to (4*charges) damage.
You and surrounding monsters are made invisible (in
your case, a 10% chance of its being permanent, a 90%
chance of it lasting for (charges) to (250*charges)
(more) turns).
nothing No effects.
opening No effects.
polymorph There is an explosion from 1 to (4*charges) damage.
Monsters and objects in the affected squares are
polymorphed.
probing No effects.
secret door detection No effects.
sleep There is an explosion from 1 to (4*charges) damage.
You and surrounding monsters may be put to sleep.
slow monster There is an explosion from 1 to (4*charges) damage.
You and surrounding monsters are slowed.
speed monster There is an explosion from 1 to (4*charges) damage.
You and surrounding monsters are sped up.
striking "A wall of force smashes down around you!"
There is an explosion from 1 to (charges+1)d6
damage.
You and surrounding monsters are hit by a force
bolt.
Fragile objects in your and adjacent squares may
be destroyed.
teleportation There is an explosion from 1 to (4*charges) damage.
Monsters and objects in the affected squares are
teleported.
undead turning There is an explosion from 1 to (4*charges) damage.
Monsters and objects in the affected squares are
turned.
wishing No effects. Not really a good idea.
Cancelling
~~~~~~~~~~
(Adapted from the spoiler "cancel", by Boudewijn Waijers.)
Monsters (including you) can be cancelled when hit by wands or spells of
cancellation, and sometimes by Magicbane. The monster may resist. Also,
when a gremlin (including you) manages to steal an intrinsic from a
monster, the monster is automatically cancelled as well. Cancelled
monsters cannot use most of their special attacks against you (ongoing
effects of previous attacks will continue, however):
Blind you with light
Cast spells at you
Charm you
Confuse you
Drain your constitution
Drain your dexterity
Explode in your face
Paralyse you
Poison you
Put you to sleep
Rust, rot or disenchant something, offensive or defensive
Seduce you
Slime you
Slow you down
Spit at you
Steal an item (other than the Unique Items)
Steal intrinsics
Steal your gold
Stick to you
Stun you
Teleport you away
Use acid offensively against you
Use its breath weapon
Use its cold attack, offensive or defensive
Use its electricity attack, offensive or defensive
Use its fire attack or gaze, offensive or defensive
Wrap itself around you
Many monsters also lose abilities specific to their species as well:
Medusa's gaze cannot turn you to stone
Medusa cannot be turned to stone with a reflecting item
A black or brown pudding cannot divide
A clay golem will die
A chickatrice or cockatrice can't turn you to stone by hissing
A demon cannot summon other demons
A floating eye cannot be paralysed with a mirror
A lycanthrope cannot change you into another one
A lycanthrope cannot summon help
A lycanthrope cannot polymorph into their wereform by attacking
A mimic cannot revert to mimicking an object
A nurse won't heal you with its attack
A nymph or succubus won't steal your mirror if you apply it
A tengu cannot teleport
An umber hulk cannot be confused with a mirror
A xan's prick doesn't weaken you
Note that some attacks aren't susceptible to cancellation:
Defensive acid splashing
Disease attacks
Famine's hunger attack
Mind-flaying attacks
Physical blinding attacks
Physical damage attacks
The Oracle's magic defences
Touch of Death
Wizard or Quest Nemesis stealing the Amulet, Bell, Book or Candelabrum
When a monster cannot use a certain attack on you, it normally cannot
use it on another monster either.
A wand or spell of cancellation will also affect objects on the floor, or
objects in your inventory if you zap yourself. However, it does not
affect other monster's inventories or the contents of containers.
Affected objects will always become uncursed. Specific effects are
described below:
OBJECT RESULT
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~
weapon uncursed +0 weapon, same erodeproofing
armor uncursed +0 armor, same erodeproofing
scroll of mail uncursed scroll of mail
other scrolls uncursed scroll of blank paper
spellbook of cancellation uncursed spellbook of cancellation
Book of the Dead uncursed Book of the Dead
other spellbooks uncursed spellbook of blank paper
potion of sickness uncursed potion of fruit juice, same dilution
potion of see invisible uncursed potion of fruit juice, same dilution
potion of fruit juice uncursed potion of fruit juice, same dilution
potion of booze uncursed potion of booze, same dilution
potion of oil uncursed potion of oil, same dilution
other potions uncursed potion of water
charged ring uncursed +0 ring
wand of cancellation uncursed, still charged
other wands uncursed, uncharged, can't wrest last charge
Bell of Opening uncursed Bell of Opening (0)
Candelabrum of Invocation uncursed, same number of candles attached
charged magic tools uncursed, uncharged
charged non-magic tools uncursed, still charged
uncharged tools uncursed, unaltered
containers uncursed, still same type, contents unchanged
Note that cancellation won't work on corpses; if it is resurrected, the
monster will still function exactly the same as if the monster had
not been cancelled when it was still alive.
Polymorphing
~~~~~~~~~~~~
You can use a wand or spell of polymorph on both monsters and objects.
The beam acts over a maximum distance of 6 to 13 squares, and cannot be
reflected. Polymorph traps may also affect monsters, but not objects.
Potions of polymorph can be quaffed to polymorph yourself, thrown at
a target, or used to dip an object into. Quaffing from a sink has a
1/20 chance of polymorphing you.
When a monster (including you) is affected, the monster may change into a
different species. Magic resistance will prevent a monster from
polymorphing, unless the monster zapped itself (or yourself). Some
monsters may also resist the attack, as well. A polymorphing monster has
a 1/25 chance of dying of system shock, unless it is a natural
shapeshifter. Objects in the monster's or your inventory are not affected,
nor are objects dropped as a result of the polymorph.
There are several special cases when you are polymorphed. If you are
wearing an amulet of unchanging, you will not polymorph. If you have
polymorph control, you can choose the creature you wish to be polymorphed
into. If you are wearing dragon armour, you will become that type of
dragon (unless you have polymorph control) and will lose your cloak and
shirt; the armour will merge with your skin and be unharmed if not
broken by a further polymorph. If you have lycanthropy, you turn into
that were-creature (or vice versa); if you are a vampire, you become a
vampire bat (or vice versa). If you have none of the above, you have
a (19 - Constitution) in 20 chance of getting system shock ("You shudder
for a moment", lose 1 to 30 HP, and abuse your constitution); if this
does not occur, there is a 1/5 chance (which also applies to controlled
polymorphs) that you become a "new man/woman/<race>" rather than a
different monster, and your level, hit points, energy, and statistics will
be randomly adjusted.
How long you are polymorphed depends on your experience level and the
level of the monster you became (this prevents abuse by low-level
characters); you will not revert while you have unchanging. You can
always return to your natural form by losing all of your hit points
(in a pinch by throwing objects upwards (<) and letting them hit you)
unless you have unchanging; in this case, you will simply die. Other
monsters remain the same species indefinitely (except true shapeshifters).
You can also polymorph objects. Many people call this "polypiling",
because they painstakingly collect items, line them up into several
piles, and polymorph them all at once. Each item may become a new item
in the same object class. The objects retain their blessed/cursed state,
erosion, erosionproofing, traps, and poisoning. Wands keep their number
of charges, whereas weapons and armor keep their enchantment. Worn items
are removed on polymorphing. Magical objects (see the next section) will
tend not to polymorph into non-magical ones, and vice versa; the
probabilities of this for the object classes that have members of each
kind are as below.
class magical -> non-magical non-magical -> magical
~~~~~ : ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
armour : 54% 0.6%
gem : 92% negligible
potion : 1.7% 41%
scroll : negligible 92%
spellbook : negligible 95%
tool : 60% 0.3%
wand : negligible 93%
You will eventually lose some objects. Items appearing in quantities of
2 or more have a (quantity in 1000) chance of merging into one object.
Items also have a probability of "shuddering": 1/3 if a wand or cursed,
1/8 if uncursed, 1/12 if blessed (if in quantities greater than 4, 100%,
1/4, and 1/6, respectively). This will decrease the quantity of the item
randomly, cause any remainder not to be polymorphed, and has a one in
(luck + 45) chance per object of creating a golem from the material of
the shuddered item (provided at least two items total remain in the pile).
Scrolls of mail will never merge or shudder.
There are some limitations to polypiling. You can't change scrolls of
mail, wands of polymorph, potions of polymorph, spellbooks of polymorph,
Rider corpses, the invocation items, or the Amulet of Yendor. Artifacts
have a much higher chance of resisting polymorph than non-artifacts; the
result of a polymorph will never be an artifact. Eggs laid by you become
other types of eggs, still laid by you. Spellbooks will become more faded,
wands have their recharge count incremented. Magic markers will be
considered to have been recharged once. Crocodile corpses become
non-cursed fireproof +0 low boots. Containers lose all of their contents.
There are limits to converting stones (e.g. rocks and luckstones) into
gems and glass; you won't get more than four. Note that balls and chains
become (surprise!) balls and chains. You can never create the following
objects through polypiling:
magic lamps wands of wishing wands of polymorph
potions of polymorph spellbooks of polymorph
and, since the probabilities of the new item are the same as for random
generation of that object class, you'll never get anything you wouldn't
find randomly created in the dungeon either.
Magical objects
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
(Adapted from a spoiler by Peter Snelling)
To maximise the results from polymorphing objects, it's useful to know
which objects the game considers "magical" and which not.
Magical armour (all other being non-magical):
cloak of displacement dunce cap
alchemy smock cornuthaum
cloak of invisibility helm of brilliance
cloak of magic resistance helm of opposite alignment
elven cloak helm of telepathy
robe
cloak of protection elven boots
kicking boots
gauntlets of dexterity fumble boots
gauntlets of fumbling levitation boots
gauntlets of power jumping boots
speed boots
shield of reflection water walking boots
all dragon scale mail (but not dragon scales)
Magical tools (all other being non-magical):
bag of holding magic whistle
bag of tricks magic flute
magic lamp frost horn
crystal ball fire horn
unicorn horn horn of plenty
figurine magic harp
magic marker drum of earthquake
Magical stones (the remaining gems and stones are non-magical):
luckstone
loadstone
touchstone
Non-magical potions (all other being magical):
booze
fruit juice
sickness
water
acid
oil
No weapon, food, boulder, or statue is magical.
All non-blank scrolls are magical (except non-polyable scrolls of mail).
All non-blank spellbooks are magical.
All wands except nothing are magical.
All rings (except meat rings, which are food) are magical.
All non-fake amulets are magical.
All Unique Items are magical, but can't be polymorphed anyway.
Acknowledgements
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Thanks to Bruce Cox for proofreading the original version of this file.
Further corrections and clarifications provided by Joe Bednorz,
Roger Breitenstein, David Corbett, Kent Paul Dolan, Michael Deutschmann,
David Gale, Wes Irby, Toni Keskitalo, Bruce Labbate, Oberon, Jason Parker,
Pat Rankin, Irina Rempt, Stanislav Traykov, and Jeremy Turner.