Wax golem
' wax golem 
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|---|---|
| Difficulty | 5 |
| Attacks |
Claw 1d2, touch 1d4 fire |
| Base level | 3 |
| Base experience | 48 |
| Speed | 12 |
| Base AC | 9 |
| Base MR | 0 |
| Alignment | 0 (neutral) |
| Frequency (by normal means) | 1 (Very rare) |
| Genocidable | No |
| Weight | 400 |
| Nutritional value | 0 |
| Size | large |
| Resistances | sleep resistance, poison resistance, drain resistance (SLASH'EM and SlashTHEM only) |
| Resistances conveyed | none |
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A wax golem:
| |
| Reference | SLASH'EM_0.0.7E7F2/monst.c#line3489 |
A wax golem, ', is a type of monster that appears in SLASH'EM, UnNetHack, DynaHack, SpliceHack, SlashTHEM, and Hack'EM. The wax golem is a type of golem that emits light in a 3x3 square area centered on itself.
Wax golems have a claw attack and a touch attack that deals fire damage and can burn or destroy vulnerable items in the target's open inventory, and they possess sleep resistance and poison resistance; in SLASH'EM and SlashTHEM, they also possess drain resistance, while in Hack'EM they have a vulnerability to cold. A wax golem that is subjected to stoning will become a stone golem.[1]
Generation
Randomly-generated wax golems are always created hostile. Wax golems are always generated with 40 HP.[2]
Wax golems can generate as a result of polypiling if there are enough wax objects in a pile of items.[3]
Wax golems leave behind 2-8 wax candles upon death instead of a corpse;[4] in Hack'EM, they have an additional, independent 1⁄69 chance of leaving behind a magic candle.
Wax golems are not a valid target for genocide.
Strategy
Despite the threat its touch attack poses to potions, spellbooks and scrolls, wax golems are usually not a significant threat to early heroes if they have speed or decent ranged attacks.
The candles that wax golems drop upon death will more than ensure that a hero has enough for the Candelabrum of Invocation without having to wish or polypile for them, especially if there are not enough in Izchak's shop within Minetown.
Origin
The gōlem is an animate, anthropomorphic being that originates from Jewish folklore, and is created entirely from inanimate matter, usually clay or mud. The most famous golem narrative is "The Golem of Prague", which tells of the late 16th century rabbi Judah Loew ben Bezalel and his creation of a golem using clay from the Vltava River, which he brought to life to defend the Prague ghetto from anti-Semitic attacks and pogroms. In modern popular culture, the word became generalized to refer to any crude anthropomorphic construct that is made of inanimate material and brought to life by some means, with the method of animation and the resulting creation's sapience and/or sentience varying wildly.
Encyclopedia entry
The wax golem shares the same basic encyclopedia entry with other golem monsters that lack a unique entry:
"The original story harks back, so they say, to the sixteenth
century. Using long-lost formulas from the Kabbala, a rabbi is
said to have made an artificial man -- the so-called Golem -- to
help ring the bells in the Synagogue and for all kinds of other
menial work.
"But he hadn't made a full man, and it was animated by some sort
of vegetable half-life. What life it had, too, so the story
runs, was only derived from the magic charm placed behind its
teeth each day, that drew down to itself what was known as the
`free sidereal strength of the universe.'
"One evening, before evening prayers, the rabbi forgot to take
the charm out of the Golem's mouth, and it fell into a frenzy.
It raged through the dark streets, smashing everything in its
path, until the rabbi caught up with it, removed the charm, and
destroyed it. Then the Golem collapsed, lifeless. All that was
left of it was a small clay image, which you can still see in
the Old Synagogue." ...
