Baby long worm
w baby long worm 
| |
|---|---|
| Difficulty | 6 |
| Attacks |
Bite 1d4 physical |
| Base level | 5 |
| Base experience | 113 |
| Speed | 3 |
| Base AC | 5 |
| Base MR | 0 |
| Alignment | 0 (neutral) |
| Frequency (by normal means) | 0 (Not randomly generated) |
| Genocidable | Yes |
| Weight | 600 |
| Nutritional value | 250 |
| Size | Large |
| Resistances | None |
| Resistances conveyed | None |
|
A baby long worm:
| |
| Reference | monst.c#line987 |
A baby long worm, w, is a type of monster that appears in NetHack. The baby long worm is a worm that is a juvenile form of the long worm. Baby long worms cannot be displaced.[1][2]
A baby long worm has a single bite attack.
Contents
Generated
Randomly generated baby long worms are always created hostile. A baby long worm can grow up into a long worm.
Baby long worms are only randomly generated within levels and branches that are biased towards a particular alignment, e.g., the Oracle and Sokoban.
Strategy
Baby long worms are incredibly slow at 3 speed and are not remotely threatening in most cases—they can be easily dispatched unless a hero is severely incapacitated.
History
The baby long worm first appears in NetHack 3.0.0. From this version to NetHack 3.4.3, including variants based on those versions, the baby long worm has the same monster level (8) and difficulty (9) as its adult form, but possesses a stronger bite at 1d6—this is fixed in NetHack 3.6.0 via commit 6bcfa8f8.
Origin
The long worm is based on the sandworm from Frank Herbert's Dune series of novels. Sandworms are colossal annelids that live on the desert planet Arrakis, with lamprey-like features such as an array of crystalline teeth which are used primarily for rasping rocks and sand. Sandworms grow to hundreds of meters in length, with specimens observed over 400 metres (1,300 ft) long and 40 metres (130 ft) in diameter, and worms more than 1.5 miles (2.4 km) in length occur in the story as well; these gigantic worms burrow deep in the ground and travel swiftly. Due to this given size, it can be inferred that the long worms of NetHack and their young are either significantly smaller-scale or simply small and very young versions of these sandworms.
Sandworms are described as "incredibly tough", and it is said that a high-voltage electrical shock applied separately to each ring segment is the only known way to kill and preserve them: "atomics" are the only explosive powerful enough to kill an entire worm, since conventional explosives are unfeasible as "each ring segment having a life of its own"; while water is poisonous to the worms, it is in too short supply on Arrakis to be of use against any but the smallest worms. The sandworms are reverently called "Shai-Hulud" (from the Arabic شيء خلود, šayʾ khulūd "thing of eternity") by the planet's indigenous Fremen, who worship them as agents of God whose actions are a form of divine intervention.
Sandworm larvae produce a drug called melange (known colloquially as "the spice"), the most essential and valuable commodity in the universe because it makes safe and accurate interstellar travel possible; melange deposits are found in the sand seas of Arrakis, where the sandworms live and hunt, and harvesting the spice from the sand is a dangerous activity because sandworms are aggressive and territorial. Harvesting vehicles must be airlifted in and out of the sand sea in order to evade sandworm attacks, and the struggle over the production and supply of melange is a central theme of the Dune saga—the relationship between sandworms and spice is given homage in some variants of NetHack.
Variants
Variants of NetHack based on NetHack 3.4.3 may retain the baby long worm's stats from that version or use them as a baseline for changes.
SporkHack
In SporkHack, the baby long worm is renamed to the baby sand worm, and retains its stats from NetHack 3.4.3.
UnNetHack
In UnNetHack, baby long worms retain their stats from NetHack 3.4.3.
The corpse or tin of a long worm or baby long worm is described as "spicy" when eaten as a reference to the Dune novels.
dNetHack
In dNetHack, notdNetHack and notnotdNetHack, baby long worms have a monster level of 4 and a difficulty of 5, move at a slightly faster 6 speed, have a slightly weaker bite at 2d2, and can slither between iron bars.
Ten baby long worms are randomly placed on the locate level of the Drow Noble quest at level creation.
xNetHack
In xNetHack, the corpse or tin of a long worm or baby long worm is described as "spicy" when eaten as a reference to the Dune novels, similar to UnNetHack.
Encyclopedia entry
[The crysknife] is manufactured in two forms from teeth taken from dead sandworms. The two forms are "fixed" and "unfixed". An unfixed knife requires proximity to a human body's electrical field to prevent disintegration. Fixed knives are treated for storage. All are about 20 centimeters long.
