Silver dragon

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The silver dragon, D, is a monster that appears in NetHack. It has intrinsic cold resistance and reflection, and its breath weapon fires rays of frost. The silver dragon has a younger form in the baby silver dragon, D; unlike adults, babies lack reflection[1]. Neither monster conveys any intrinsics when eaten.

Generation

Main article: Dragon#Generation

Players will not see baby silver dragons through normal random monster creation outside of aligned branches and levels such as the Oracle and Sokoban, and they can also be hatched from dragon eggs. Adult silver dragons start appearing around the middle depths of the dungeon. Silver dragons can be generated in throne rooms as early as dungeon level 15, and may appear when a throne at this depth or lower is looted.[2] Silver dragons can also be created if a lawful spellcaster casts the summon nasties monster spell.

Silver dragons have a 13 probability of dropping a set of +0 uncursed silver dragon scales along with their corpse (120 if the dragon was revived).

Strategy

See also: Dragon#Strategy

The silver dragon's reflective scales protect it from the rays of spells and wands, severely reducing the amount of options ranged and otherwise that a player has against it. However, it has no other resistances besides cold resistance, and its low monster magic resistance can still be used to bring it down. Wielded or thrown potions such as sleeping can immobilize them or else soften them up for melee or peppering with projectiles, but care should be taken not to have them destroyed by cold breath. The reflective power of their scales also makes them a common target for reverse genocide by players seeking silver dragon scale mail; this is usually to complement a cloak of magic resistance or any magic resistance source they own or plan to obtain, as well as protecting their inventory from item-destroying rays.

As pets and steeds, silver dragons sometimes compete with gray dragons - both possess flight, useful breath weapons and immunity to death rays. The silver dragon has the added perk of being completely immune to elemental rays by virtue of reflecting them, which can also kill the attacker if the ray came from a wand. Its breath can also bridge moats for later crossing, though the ice will not always persist. Unfortunately, on top of low speed and lack of other resistances that can work against them, they can also fall victim to poison or polymorph traps - the gray dragon's scales at least give it a means of protection against the latter. There are also many faster and/or stronger steed than dragons in general, though most such choices lack reflection of their own.

History

The silver dragon, its baby form and silver dragon scales were introduced to the vanilla series in NetHack 3.3.0. Before that, it first appeared in the 3.1.3 variant SLASH 6.

Variants

Main article: Dragon#Variants

Variants of NetHack often subject dragons to extensive changes, including the silver dragon.

Biodiversity patch

In the biodiversity patch, the silver dragon is renamed to the amphitere.

SLASH'EM

Main article: Dragon (SLASH'EM)

As with all other dragons in SLASH'EM, baby silver dragons have a base level of 4 instead of 12, and can be encountered via random generation in ordinary levels with a frequency of 2 - they are also eligible for creation on many levels that generate random D on level creation. Adult silver dragons have a base level of 18 instead of 15.

Unlike most other dragons, baby and adult silver dragons do not hit as a +1 or +3 weapon respectively. Adult silver dragons will not turn traitor while tame.

UnNetHack

In UnNetHack, all dragons have their breaths, resistances, and colors randomized, allowing any non-chromatic dragon to appear as silver.

dNetHack

In dNetHack, silver dragons are the only source of reflection that can withstand a dragon's breath attack.

Encyclopedia entry

In the West the dragon was the natural enemy of man. Although preferring to live in bleak and desolate regions, whenever it was seen among men it left in its wake a trail of destruction and disease. Yet any attempt to slay this beast was a perilous undertaking. For the dragon's assailant had to contend not only with clouds of sulphurous fumes pouring from its fire breathing nostrils, but also with the thrashings of its tail, the most deadly part of its serpent-like body.

[ Mythical Beasts by Deirdre Headon (The Leprechaun Library) ]


"One whom the dragons will speak with," he said, "that is a dragonlord, or at least that is the center of the matter. It's not a trick of mastering the dragons, as most people think. Dragons have no masters. The question is always the same, with a dragon: will he talk to you or will he eat you? If you can count upon his doing the former, and not doing the latter, why then you're a dragonlord."

[ The Tombs of Atuan, by Ursula K. Le Guin ]

References