Unicorn horn

A unicorn horn or unihorn is an important tool for curing your adventurer. An uncursed or blessed unihorn can cure blindness, confusion, hallucination, stuns, sickness, and it can also restore lost status points to strength, dexterity, and intelligence. Repeatedly apply the horn until you are completely cured. However, a unihorn cannot restore health, cannot restore magic power, and cannot undo amnesia. You can also wield a unicorn horn as a two-handed melee weapon doing d12 damage; it makes a great non-artifact for roles who are not restricted in the "unicorn horn" skill.

Thus, a unihorn is an important part of almost any ascension kit. Most importantly, sickness is normally fatal, and the unicorn horn is the easiest way to cure sickness (you might not have the right potion or spell, and you might not be able to safely pray). The other ailments, such as blindness and confusion, normally time out, but a unihorn removes them faster. You can also use a unicorn horn to help identify potions.

Obtaining a unicorn horn

There are few different ways to obtain a unicorn horn; for example, from a bones level. However, by far the most common method is to kill a unicorn and take its horn.

When Random Number God starts sending you unicorns, you might encounter any of the three varieties: black unicorn, gray unicorn, and white unicorn (representing chaotic, neutral, and lawful alignment). A unicorn that matches your alignment will be peaceful; do not harm them or you will displease your god. Any other unicorn is hostile; if you can kill it, it will drop its horn.

During your first encounter with a hostile unicorn, you will probably not be strong enough to fight them in melee; a unicorn are fast and can hit you multiple times per turn. Let your pet attack it; hit with ranged attacks. When it dies, it might or might not drop its corpse, but it will drop its horn.

Is it cursed?

Now check if the horn is cursed. Test it with your pet, or drop it on an altar. (If you do the pet test, you should later drop it on an altar or identify it so you know the actual BUC status and can notice if it later becomes cursed.) A cursed unihorn will never cure anything, and can even cause harm. If your only unihorn is cursed, kill another unicorn.

Save extra horns

As you kill more unicorns, you will obtain more of their horns. Save them into your chest stash or remember their locations so you can retrieve a spare. You might lose or horn, or something might polymorph your unihorn or make it cursed.

Using a unicorn horn to identify potions

Once you posess a (not cursed) unicorn horn, you can use it to identify potions. The basic strategy is simple:

1. BUC test the potion. (Never quaff a cursed potion.)
2. Quaff an unidentified potion.
3. If the effect was harmful, cure it with the unicorn horn. (This at least undoes potion of blindness, potion of confusion, potion of hallucination and potion of sickness.)

But first you should wait for your health and magic power to completely heal. This way, should you quaff a potion of healing, potion of extra healing, potion of full healing, or potion of gain energy, then your maximum health or power stat will increase.

But what about potion of paralysis and potion of sleeping? You will be immobile or asleep for some turns, and unable to apply the unicorn horn, but the effect will wear off in under 50 turns. The main problem is if a monster kills you before them. To avert this, be on a higher dungeon level, kill all monsters around you, have your pet nearby. If you a paranoid enough, lock yourself in a closet.

But what about potion of polymorph? The trouble with the polymorph potion is that it might kill you (system shock) or change you into a vulnerable monster, and a unicorn horn does not undo polymorph. The usual strategy for this is to dip some junk object into each potion before quaffing it; if the object polymorphs, then you identifed the potion.

Can I read unidentified scrolls? Unlike with potions, unihorns are not so useful with scrolls. If you read a scroll of amnesia or a scroll of punishment, a unihorn is no help.

Dipping unicorn horns into potions

As you can do it with any object, you can dip a unicorn horn into a potion. With some of the harmful potions, the unicorn horn will change them to water or fruit juice.

Generally do not dip unicorn horns into unidentified potions. If you are trying to identify the potion; quaff it, then apply the horn. If you dip into a potion of polymorph, your unihorn will become a leash or some other much-less-useful tool. If you are dipping unihorns into unidentified potions, and you have not identified potion of polymorph, you need to first obtain a second unihorn as a spare.

As usual, dip it into holy water to uncurse or bless your unicorn horn, and do not dip it into unholy water. (If you need to learn about holy and unholy water, read the page about the potion of water.)