Pet

Pets are your companions in the dungeon. By default, each character starts with a pet.

Acquiring pets

Every pet is a tame monster and every tame monster is a pet.

Every hacker enters with a pet. This is a kitten, a small dog, or a pony. The pet may or may not have a name, depending on whether certain environment variables (catname, dogname, horsename) in Defaults.nh are set. Names of pets (and other critters) can be set/changed using capital-C, e.g. to baptize your dog.

Critters can be tamed (i.e. domesticated, adopted as pets) with a scroll of taming or spell of charm monster. Critters of the three species named above (dog (white d), cat (white f), horse (brown u)) can be won over with food. Throw [t] the food at the critter in question. Dogs and cats will readily devour tripe rations, and most fresh meats that are non-poisonous. Horses will eat most things vegetable, yellow mold being one exception. All three of these species will eat food rations if they are hungry, and all non-tame ones are hungry.

Another way to obtain pets, if one is a weremonster, is to call one's #monster brethren.

Carrying an egg of a monster (Dragon, Naga, or Snake) may cause it to hatch and become your pet. Here's another scenario which results in a pet:

You see a guardian naga hatchling slither out of your pack!
Its cries sound like "daddy?"

It is (should be?) considered irresponsible to adopt more pets than you can afford to feed and otherwise look out for the welfare of.

Protect your pet

It is in very bad form to attack your pet. #chat with all hallucinations first. Also be very careful when blinded.

Pets are vulnerable, especially when young. In the first few dungeon levels it is incumbent on you to lead, not follow your pet into unexplored rooms, where pits and other traps are far more dangerous to your pet than to you. If your pet does get trapped, try #untrap'ping it. A wand or spell of undead turning can be used to rescue your pet, but only if the manner of its demise leaves a corpse.

They say discretion is the better part of valor. Pets don't always possess such discretion, and often find themselves overpowered by opponents they take on. Be especially careful about bringing dogs in the Gnomish Mines, or horses into shops, especially in the deeper levels. Horses seem especially vulnerable to mimics, and have also been known to attack shopkeepers, perhaps due to confusion from hunger or perhaps some kind of alignment incompatibility.

Speed

Your pets follow you along stairways and portals if they are adjacent to you when you climb/descend/enter.

Life can be frustrating if you are considerably faster than your pet. A wand of speed monster can be helpful, as can a whistle, especially a magic whistle.

Removal of items which may be cursed from corridors can't hurt, unless of course one of the items is a load stone. See junk.

Feeding pets

For the three cardinal domesticable species, appropriate foods for routine feeding are as for taming. Eggs are appropriate for feeding dogs and cats, but they should be droped ([d]...[d1] to drop 1 egg), not thrown.

Generally your pets (especially the carnivorous ones) will feed themselves. Sometimes they will feed you.

It is advisable to #chat with your pet frequently. Their vocalizations change noticeably when they are hungry.

Preferred Pets

Dragons can fly and have very good attacks.

Gargoyles can fly and also have decent AC and attacks; in addition, they are resistant to stoning and starvation.

Aleax, Angel, Ki-Rin don't eat, fly, and have superb attacks. The Ki-Rin can fly and take a saddle.

Vampires and vampire lords don't breathe or eat, fly, and regenerate.

Cursed items

Pets will not pick up cursed items, with one(?) exception: pets have been known to pick up cursed conical hats. Sometimes pets move reluctantly in the presence of cursed items. This is why their presence in corridors can stand between you and your pet (see speed, above).

Learning from pets

Anthropomorphic pets can be sources of 'transferrable (between sessions) knowledge' in that observation of their weapon-wielding and armor-wearing preferences can yield information about the relative merits of such items, in general and in specific situations. Observation of various pet species in combat (as well as of combat situations your pets seem to avoid) can also be very instructional. They say discretion is the better part of valor. As with BUC, pets seem to understand this instinctively.