Lembas wafer
% 
| |
|---|---|
| Name | lembas wafer |
| Base price | 45 zm |
| Nutrition | 800 (1000 for elves and 600 for orcs) |
| Turns to eat | 2 |
| Weight | 5 |
| Conduct | vegan |
A lembas wafer is a kind of comestible in Nethack. It is a vegan food, and has the highest nutrition/weight ratio of all the comestibles; lembas wafers provide 1000 nutrition for elves, and only 600 nutrition for orcs. Lembas wafers can also tame cats and dogs.
Strategy
Lembas wafers take only two turns to eat, which gives them a high nutrition per turn; for all characters excluding elves or orcs specifically after 3.6.1, it is tied for the highest with K-rations. The combination of their high nutrition/weight and nutrition/turn makes them highly suitable for use in ascension kits; if you do not polypile food, you are unlikely to have enough lembas alone, so it is normal to make up the shortfall with K-rations.
Non-cursed lembas wafers are never rotten, which makes them a safer option than most other comestibles if you must eat while hostile monsters are nearby—this can be particularly useful during the ascension run and encounters with Famine.
Messages
- A little goes a long way.
- You ate a non-cursed lembas wafer as an elf.
- !#?&* elf kibble!
- You ate a non-cursed lembas wafer as an orc.
History
The differing nutrition for elves and orcs was added in NetHack 3.6.1.
Prior to 3.6.2, orcish non-Wizards could potentially start the game with lembas wafers; there is code in prior versions intended to substitute tripe rations for lembas and cram rations, and 3.6.2 fixes a bug that prevented the code from working, making it no longer possible.[1]
Encyclopedia entry
In the morning, as they were beginning to pack their slender
goods, Elves that could speak their tongue came to them and
brought them many gifts of food and clothing for their
journey. The food was mostly in the form of very thin cakes,
made of a meal that was baked a light brown on the outside,
and inside was the colour of cream. Gimli took up one of the
cakes and looked at it with a doubtful eye.
'Cram,' he said under his breath, as he broke off a crisp
corner and nibbled at it. His expression quickly changed,
and he ate all the rest of the cake with relish.
'No more, no more!' cried the Elves laughing. 'You have
eaten enough already for a long day's march.'
'I thought it was only a kind of cram, such as the Dalemen
make for journeys in the wild,' said the Dwarf.
'So it is,' they answered. 'But we call it lembas or
waybread, and it is more strengthening than any foods made by
Men, and it is more pleasant than cram, by all accounts.'
Origin
In J. R. R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, lembas was a lightweight, extremely nourishing food of the elves, which was given to the Fellowship to feed them on their journey.
References
This page may need to be updated for the current version of NetHack.
It may contain text specific to NetHack 3.6.1. Information on this page may be out of date.
Editors: After reviewing this page and making necessary edits, please change the {{nethack-361}} tag to the current version's tag or {{noversion}} as appropriate.
