Orcish dagger

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) Orcish dagger.png
Name orcish dagger
Appearance crude dagger
Damage vs. small 1d3
Damage vs. large 1d3
To-hit bonus +2
Weapon skill dagger
Size one-handed
Base price 4 zm
(+10/positive
enchant)
Weight 10
Material iron

An orcish dagger is a type of weapon that appears in NetHack. It is a stackable one-handed weapon that can be used in melee or thrown as a projectile, and uses the dagger skill. It is made of iron and appears as a crude dagger when unidentified.

The orcish dagger is the base item for the artifact Grimtooth.

Generation

Orcish heroes start the game with knowledge of the orcish dagger, and orcs in roles that receive daggers will be given orcish daggers instead:[1][2] Orcish Rangers start each game with a +1 orcish dagger as their secondary weapon, and orcish Rogues start each game with a stack of +0 orcish daggers as their secondary weapon.[3][4]

Orcish daggers make up 1.2% of all randomly generated weapons. General stores, antique weapon outlets and used armor dealerships can sell orcish daggers.

Orcs that are not undead have a 12 chance of being generated with an orcish dagger, with the exception of the orc shaman.[5]

Player monsters, including those on the Astral Plane, have a chance slightly lower than 1% of generating with an orcish dagger as their initial weapon before role-based replacements.[6] Player monster rogues have a 14 chance of their initial weapon being made into an orcish dagger.[7]

Strategy

Orcish daggers are usually the first type of dagger seen in the dungeon - at d3 versus all monsters, they are the weakest dagger in terms of damage and one of the weakest weapons overall. An orcish dagger is still suitable as a weapon for roles such as Healers and Wizards that seek to train the dagger skill in the early game. Orcish Rogues are the most likely to get use out of orcish daggers, even if only until they can assemble a stack of better daggers.

History

The orcish dagger first appears in NetHack 3.0.0.

Variants

SLASH'EM

In SLASH'EM, upgrading an orcish dagger will produce a standard dagger.

Kobolds have an effective 38 chance of generating with an orcish dagger.[8]

dNetHack

In dNetHack, notdNetHack and notnotdNetHack, orcish daggers deal d3 damage to small monsters and d5 to large monsters, and have a +1 to-hit bonus. Orcish heroes in roles that would start with daggers, knives or athames will instead start with orcish daggers replacing each of them.

Any orcish dagger can be named to create Grimtooth.

EvilHack

In EvilHack, an orcish dagger can be created at a forge by combining 2 orcish arrows and a knife. Orcish daggers can be used at a forge to create a few items:

Hack'EM

In Hack'EM, upgrading a great dagger will produce an orcish dagger. Forging recipes are the same as in EvilHack.

References

  1. src/u_init.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 858
  2. src/u_init.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 213: Race-based substitutions for initial inventory
  3. src/u_init.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 114
  4. src/u_init.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 125
  5. src/makemon.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 426: default orcish weapons
  6. src/mplayer.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 155: 12 to get a random weapon - the designated range of objects covers weapons from the spear to the bullwhip inclusively in objects.c, and uses normal generation odds
  7. src/mplayer.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 229
  8. makemon.c in SLASH'EM 0.0.7E7F2, line 851