Corpse

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Name	foo corpse
Base price	5 zm
Nutrition	(depends on monster)
Turns to eat	{{{turns}}}
Weight	(depends on monster)
Conduct	{{{conduct}}}

A corpse is the body of a dead monster. It is a very common comestible. Some monsters never drop corpses, while others may sometimes do so. Trolls are an exception and always leave corpses, except on the Rogue level.

Some monsters leave poisonous corpses. Eating these drains your strength, so avoid unless you have poison resistance. See below for a list of poisonous corpses. Pets will instinctively avoid eating poisonous species. As a rule, if your pet can eat it, so can you. Tripe rations, dog, and cat corpses are exceptions to this rule.

Corpses must be eaten when fresh because they rot within a few turns. Undead monsters never leave fresh corpses (after all, they are walking corpses to start with). An ice box or tinning kit can be used to prevent rotting and preserve corpses for later use. Eating a rotten corpse results in food poisoning, which is fatal if not cured.

The corpses of yellow molds and purple fungi are hallucinogenic. Some claim that shriekers are hallucinogenic; this is incorrect.

Special corpse behaviour

• Lizard and acid blob corpses cure stoning.
• Lizard and lichen corpses never rot away.
• Acid blob corpses never become unsuitable for sacrifice, but they do rot away.
• Troll corpses can come back to life.

Corpse benefits and dangers

Eat these corpses

• wraith (level up)
• giant (strength up)
• mind flayer (intelligence up or gain the telepathy intrinsic)
• floating eye (you get the telepathy intrinsic)
• stalker (gives you permanent invisibility when eaten while invisible)
• quantum mechanic (you get the speed intrinsic if you don't already have it, but lose it if you do)
• blobs, jellies, fungi (F), gelatinous cubes and puddings (often hurts you a little, but a good way to gain intrinsics if you are observing vegan/vegetarian conduct. Black puddings are not vegetarian. Don't eat yellow molds or violet fungi unless you can unhallucinate yourself.)
• lizard (if needed; cures stoning, lowers stun + confusion to two rounds, will not rot)
• unicorn (poison resistance. Killing unicorns of your own alignment massively lowers your Luck, but eating unicorns, even of the same alignment, has no such effect.)
• dragon (gain intrinsics that that dragon has, so red dragons give fire resistance, black dragons give disintegration resistance, green dragons give poison resistance, etc)

Don't eat these corpses

• kobolds (poisons you, okay for poison resistant characters like orcs, barbarians)
• bats and stalkers (stun you for a while)
• mimics (you can't move for a while)
• cockatrice, chickatrice, Death, Famine, Pestilence, Medusa (you die)
• green slimes (slimes you)
• your own race (cannibalism gives you the aggravate monster intrinsic unless you're a caveman or orc)
• cats and dogs (gods don't like it, okay if you're a caveman or orc)
• werecreatures (you become one, considered cannibalism for humans)
• leprechauns, nymphs and tengu (if you don't want teleportitis; some people see it as a benefit, though, especially with teleport control.)

External links

• HiSPeed's Nethack Helper - contains the corpse attribute database from below.
• Eating Corpses For Food And Intrinsics - a very useful table.