Praying spoiler for Nethack 3.3.1

by Matthew Lahut <mlahut@andrew.cmu.edu>
HTML conversion by Kate Nepveu

Contents

0) Some definitions
1) I'm in trouble! Will prayer save me?
2) When can I pray without bad things happening?
3) Okay, I can safely pray, and I'm doing so. How much help do I get?
4) A favor? What's that?
5) What happens if I pray at the wrong time?
6) Negative effects? Like what?
7) How much will sacrificing help my standing with my god?
Appendix) Ways to alter your alignment

0) Some definitions

"Alignment" refers to your standing with your god. Its initial value is 0 for character classes CPTVW, and 10 for character classes ABHKMRoRaS. Its maximum is initially 10, and its upper bound increase by 1 for every 200 game turns. It has no lower bound. The value can not be found precisely (except in wizard mode), but enlightenmenting yourself (such as with the wand or potion) can give you a clue. Additionally, your quest master will not permit you to go on your Quest if your alignment is below 20.

Your alignment gradually increases as you kill monsters, and decreases when you do actions your god does not approve of. A list of ways to change your numerical alignment is listed in the Appendix. Note that this is not the same as your character's Lawful/Neutral/Chaotic alignment. To clarify, I will use "alignment" to always refer to the numerical quantity and "lawfuls", "chaotics", etc. to refer to players that follow those paths.

"Prayer timeout" refers to how much time you need to wait before your god will accept another prayer. Nethack gods are often benevolent, but prefer if you wait some time between prayers. The initial value of your prayer timeout is usually between 300 and 500, and decreases by one each game turn. Note that if you are fast or very fast, you may move more than once per game turn, and your prayer timeout may appear longer because you take more actions in the same number of game turns. The exact amount by which your prayer timeout increases after praying is a complex mathematical function involving several random variables, causing the increase to range between about 50 and 1000.

"Luck" is your character's luck value, which ranges from -13 to +13. See the gems and luck spoiler "gems-341.html" for a discussion of luck.

"God's Anger" refers to the degree to which your god is currently angry with you. It is incremented for certain actions which annoy your god (described below). Its value can also be partially discerned by enlightenment.

"d" is the universal notation for multiple-sided dice. For example, in Monopoly, you roll 2d6 to see how far you move; that is, you roll two six- sided dice and add them. Likewise, some of the praying calculations use expressions like "1d(Level)" which means a random number between 1 and your level.

1) I'm in trouble! Will prayer save me?

Praying in a time of need may cause your god to help you with a problem that your character is facing. If your character is in really bad shape, your god may help you with more than one problem, generally the most dangerous one (in the judgement of your god). The list of fixable problems is below. Problems at the top of the list have the highest priority.

Major problems:

• Stoning from a cockatrice or chickatrice (the non-instantaneous type)
• Sliming from a green slime
• Wearing an amulet of strangulation
• Standing in lava
• Soon-to-be-fatal illness (food poisoning or sickness attack)
• Hunger status "Weak" or worse
• HP less than or equal to 1/7 maximum (rounded down) or less than 6 [*]
• Lycanthropy
• Being Overtaxed or worse as a result of strength drain (based on your base strength, so this can even be fixed if you are wearing gauntlets of power)
• Being stuck in a wall without means of escape
• Wearing a cursed blindfold
• Wearing a cursed ring or boots of levitation

Minor problems:

• Punishment
• Wearing any cursed item
• Blindness
• Poison
• Having wounded legs (xan attack, kicking something, land mine)
• Being "Hungry" but not worse
• Stunning
• Confusion
• Hallucination

[*] Note that when low HP is cured, not only are you restored to maximum HP, characters with low maximum HP (maxHP <= 5*(level+2)) will receive an additional 1d5 maximum HP at the end of the prayer. Most non-fighter characters start with 15 or less HP, so if these characters successfully pray for HP before level 2, they are likely to get their maximum HP increased. However, this trick is quite risky, and may fail if your initial prayer timeout is high.

2) When can I pray without bad things happening?

You may NOT pray safely if any of these things are true:

• You are polymorphed into a demon and attempting to pray to a non-chaotic god.
• You are polymorphed into an undead creature and attempting to pray to a non-chaotic god. (Neutrals have a 10% chance of being able to pray anyway. This creates a small chance that a potion or wand of enlightenment will lie to you.)
• Your alignment is negative.
• Your luck is negative.
• The gods are still angry at you from an earlier event.
• Your prayer timeout is not yet zero. (If you are currently suffering from a major problem, it is safe to pray with a timeout as high as 200; if a minor problem, it may be as high as 100.)
• You are in Gehennom.
• You are standing on another god's altar.

Additionally, sacrificing will give an indication about your current prayer timeout.

• "You have a hopeful feeling" means that you can't pray yet because your prayer timeout hasn't expired.
• "You have a feeling of reconciliation" means that your sacrifice reduced your prayer timeout to zero and it is now safe to pray.
• "You glimpse a four-leaf clover at your feet" or no messages other than "Your sacrifice is consumed..."- unless you have some reason to believe that your luck is still bad even after this luck increase, prayer is OK.
• "An object appears at your feet!" - you could have prayed (barring bad luck, as usual) but now can't, because receiving an artifact adds to your prayer timeout.
• "<god> seems slightly mollified." - your god's anger was reduced, but you still can't pray because your anger is not yet zero.
• "<god> seems mollified." - your god's anger was reduced to zero, and your luck is raised to zero if it was negative, so it should be OK to pray again.
• "You feel partially absolved." - your alignment was negative, and has been increased, but not necessarily to zero. Sacrifice again to find if it's safe to pray.

3) Okay, I can safely pray, and I'm doing so. How much help do I get?

If you can safely pray, you are invulnerable for the duration of the prayer. ("You are surrounded by a shimmering light.")

When your prayer is done, you will get a clue to your alignment. ("You feel that <god> is <feeling>.")

Praying on a coaligned altar with uncursed water on the altar will create holy water.

If you were not in any trouble and your alignment was 14 or greater, your god grants you a favor.

Otherwise, your god's answer is based on the table below.

• If your alignment is 0 and your luck is less than 3, your result is 1d2 - 1.
• If you are not standing on an altar, but have positive luck, your result is 2.
• If you are not standing on an altar, and have zero luck, your result is 1d2.
• If you are standing on an altar, your result is 1d3 + luck.
• If you are standing on an altar with a priest, your result is 1d4 + luck.
• If your alignment is less than 4, your result is capped at 1.

4) A favor? What's that?

If your god is very happy with you, your god may grant you a favor. Roll 1d(luck+6), divide the result by 2 (rounded up), and look in the following table.

5) What happens if I pray at the wrong time?

It depends on which condition you violated.

If polymorphed into a demon and praying to a non-chaotic god,

"The very idea of praying to a <non-chaotic> god is repugnant to you."

Prayer aborted with no further effects.

If polymorphed into an undead creature and attempting to pray to a non- chaotic god,

"Vile creature, thou durst call upon me?" (lawful) "Walk no more, perversion of nature!" (neutral) "You feel like you are falling apart."

You return to natural form (even if wearing an amulet of unchanging) and take 1d20 - 1 damage.

If your prayer timeout is too high, your god is not happy. Your god's anger is incremented by 1, your lose 3 luck, and a possible negative effect occurs.

If your alignment or luck is negative, or if your god is angry with you, then you get a possible negative effect.

If standing on another god's altar, and attempting a water prayer by praying with potions of water on the altar, your own god's anger is incremented, you lose 3 luck, your prayer timeout is increased, and a possible negative effect occurs. Due to a bug in Nethack 3.3.1, the water on the altar is not in fact made unholy (cursed) unless it was originally holy (blessed).

If standing on another god's altar and not attempting a water prayer, you will pray to that god, get the usual clue about your alignment, but get no benefit. After receiving the clue, you lose 1 alignment, but get no other bad effects. Your prayer timeout remains the same.

Praying while in Gehennom is considered a prayer to Moloch. You get a negative effect unless your alignment is very low or negative. High luck may also reduce your chance of having a negative effect.

6) Negative effects? Like what?

The degree of your negative effect depends on your god's anger, your alignment, whether you are praying to another god, and your luck.

Start with a base value of 3 times your god's anger, or half your align- ment if you are not praying to the correct god (because of either standing on the wrong altar or being in Gehennom). Note that if you are in Gehennom, you're likely to have extremely high alignment, which will make the later numbers on the table far more likely.

Reduce this value by 1/3 your luck if your luck is positive or your alignment is at least 4, otherwise subtract your luck (which will increase the result if your luck is negative).

Roll 1d(max(result,15)) and check the following table: (In all cases, prayer timeout is increased.)

[*] A quote from the source: "Yup, you get experience. It takes guts to successfully pull off this trick on your god, anyway." Note that this will break pacifist conduct.

7) How much will sacrificing help my standing with my god?

Sacrificing powerful creatures can help you get back on your god's good side, if you are in trouble, or increase the rewards you get. The value of most sacrifices is based on the level of the creature killed. A monster's level can be found with a stethoscope. Monster's with high-damage attacks, special attacks, and/or low armor class are considered slightly higher level for this calculation. The value (difficulty) that is used can be found at J. Ali Harlow's spoiler page, http://avrc.city.ac.uk/nethack/VernonSpoilers.html.

If you have negative alignment, you may feel "partially absolved" when sacrificing, and your alignment is increased by the level of the corpse, to a maximum of 0.

See also section 2 for more messages you get when sacrificing.

Sacrificing can be dangerous in the following circumstances:

• Sacrificing at an alter of Moloch is very bad. You gain 3 anger, lose 5 alignment, lose 2 wisdom, and lose 5 luck, and get a negative effect.
• Attempting to convert an altar by sacrificing at a non-coaligned altar can convert *you* instead if your alignment is negative. This makes the game impossible to win if done before the Quest. Additionally, you lose 3 luck and your prayer timeout is incremented by 300. (If your alignment is positive, the altar will be converted smoothly with probability (YourLevel+2)/(YourLevel+8). Attempting to convert an altar may summon a minion of the altar's original god, but only if you are at least level 7 and have high alignment. The probability varies, but is never greater than 1/4.)
• Sacrificing your own race can summon a named demon, which will be hostile if you are not chaotic. Chaotics should be careful not to anger the demon. (Minetown bones files with Juiblex are never fun.)
• Don't sacrifice former pets; you'll lose 3 alignment and gain the aggravate monster instrinsic ("So this is how you repay loyalty?")
• Don't sacrifice a unicorn on an altar of its own alignment, and do not sacrifice a unicorn of your own alignment on another god's altar unless you want to change alignment. A full list of possible unicorn sacrifices and their effects is available at http://www.nethack.de/spoiler/32unioffer.txt

Appendix) Ways to alter your alignment

"L" refers to the current maximum alignment, which is 10 + (moves / 200). This chart does not include the (large number of) monsters that you will get one or more alignment points for killing. Generally, for a character not attempting a pacifist conduct, who has not irritated his god, your alignment will be very close to the maximum.

Thanks to...

• Eva Myers, Irina Rempt, Karl Knechtel, and Chris Goedde for corrections and comments on previous drafts.
• J. Ali Harlow for providing the list of monstr's.
• All the folks at r.g.r.n for being so friendly and helpful.

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