Eye or sphere
The eye or sphere is a monster class that appears in NetHack, and is represented by the lowercase e glyph (e). Eyes and spheres are designated internally by the macro S_EYE.[1]
The class contains the following monsters:[2]
- e gas spore
- e floating eye
- e flaming sphere
- e freezing sphere
- e shocking sphere
- Deferred monster:
- e beholder
Contents
Common traits
Eyes and spheres are round unbreathing monsters without limbs or a head that are capable of flight—except for the floating eye, all of them are mindless, and they can all be seen via infravision except for the gas spore.
The three spheres use explosion attacks that target the defender's square, destroying themselves and inflicting elemental damage to the target as well as their open inventory; the hero can "duck" these explosions and take reduced damage based on their dexterity, and will take no damage at all if they have the appropriate resistance property. Gas spores do not actively attack, though they explode on death in a 3x3 square centered on their tile.
The following information pertains to an upcoming version (NetHack 3.7.0). If this version is now released, please verify that it is still accurate, then update the page to incorporate this information.
Per commit 6b60618e, spheres create actual explosions with their attacks, which cover a 3x3 area around them and affect items and other monsters caught within the blast radius - this does not count the inventory of a hero that is polymorphed into a sphere and explodes. This is adapted from xNetHack.
Per commit 9942b65d, extrinsic elemental resistance properties protect the open inventory from damage by that element 99⁄100 of the time. Per commit 67295bc7, wearing non-metallic gloves will protect worn rings from shock damage.
Per commit ef6a88e1, chargeable rings hit by the explosion of a shocking sphere and other forms of shock damage may be charged rather than destroyed.Body parts
Sphere also refers to the grouping of body parts for the forms of bulbous creatures like the monsters in this monster class - this grouping is used primarily to maintain a sort of symmetry between spheres and other monsters, e.g. whenever the hero or a monster is transformed into a sphere while wearing certain items. It affects the messages referring to the appropriate body parts as follows:[3]
| Bodypart[4] | Description |
|---|---|
| Arm | Appendage |
| Eye | Optic nerve (cornea for floating eyes) |
| Face | Body |
| Finger | Tentacle |
| Fingertip | Tentacle tip |
| Foot | Lower appendage |
| Hand | Tentacle |
| Handed | Tentacled |
| Head | Body |
| Leg | Lower tentacle |
| Light Headed | Rotational |
| Neck | Equator |
| Spine | Body |
| Toe | Lower tentacle tip |
| Hair | Cilia |
| Blood | Life force |
| Lung | Retina |
| Nose | Olfactory nerve |
| Stomach | Interior |
Strategy
The gas sphere and floating eye are two of the bigger threats for an inattentive hero in the early game: the former can blast a starting character to death if the explosion deals enough damage, while a character frozen by the floating eye's paralyzing passive gaze has a high risk of dying to any nearby hostile or even starvation if they are paralyzed long enough.
The elemental spheres are quite annoying, but can be dealt with by quickly dropping or stashing vulnerable items before engaging one; they can also be put to sleep or immobilized, though the former option is preferable for a hero low on resources. Pets that attack spheres may end up being targeted by their explosions instead, which can make them effective guards. Be sure to check for spheres when entering a treasure zoo, even if you have stealth - the spheres' explosions will wake up most of the denizens.
The following information pertains to an upcoming version (3.7.0). If this version is now released, please verify that it is still accurate, then update the page to incorporate this information.
Shocking spheres are now considered a target for genocide due to the item destruction threat.History
The floating eye and freezing sphere appear in Hack for PDP-11, which is based on Jay Fenlason's Hack, and is included in the initial bestiary for Hack 1.0—in Hack 1.21, the evil eye (not to be confused with the evil eye from variants of NetHack) and ice ball are somewhat similar monsters included in the bestiary.
NetHack 3.0.0 introduces the eye or sphere monster class and moves the floating eye and freezing sphere to their current glyphs. The flaming sphere first appears in NetHack 3.0.10, and makes its vanilla debut alongside the gas spore and shocking sphere in NetHack 3.3.0.
In NetHack 3.4.3 and earlier versions, including some variants based on those versions, flaming and shocking spheres are capable of picking up items—this is bug C343-138, and is fixed via commit cbab68a4.
Variants
SLASH'EM
SLASH'EM adds two monsters to the monster class:
SLASH'EM also includes the deferred flame sphere and freeze sphere spells and makes them functional.
Encyclopedia entry
The attack by those who want to die -- this is the attack against which you cannot prepare a perfect defense.
--Human aphorism
