Blob
The blob is a monster class that appears in NetHack, and is represented by the lowercase b glyph (b). Blobs are designated internally by the macro S_BLOB.[1]
The class contains the following monsters:[2]
Common traits
Blobs are neutral amoeboids that are unbreathing and lack a sense of smell or any body parts such as limbs, eyes or heads.[3] Each blob is generally slower-moving than an unburdened hero, and they have a tendency to wander around while moving. Blobs are vegan to consume.[4]
Blobs that have non-passive attacks typically use touch attacks, and they possess sleep resistance and poison resistance. They are immune to backstabs.[5]
Generation
Randomly generated blobs are always created hostile except for the acid blob, which may generate as peaceful towards neutral heroes.
History
The acid blob and quivering blob first appear in Hack 1.21, which is based on Jay Fenlason's Hack, while the gelatinous cube appears in Hack for PDP-11, which is also based on Jay Fenlason's Hack. In Hack 1.21, the acid blob uses the a glyph, while the quivering blob uses the Q glyph; in Hack for PDP-11, the quivering blob uses the q glyph, the gelatinous cube uses the q glyph, and the acid blob retains its previous glyph.
All three are part of the initial bestiary for Hack 1.0. NetHack 3.0.0 introduces the blob monster class and groups all three monsters into it under their current glyphs.
Variants
SLASH'EM
SLASH'EM introduces a few monsters to the monster class:
UnNetHack
In UnNetHack, one of the random vaults is a room that can contain one or more sleeping blob monsters.
dNetHack
dNetHack, notdNetHack and notnotdNetHack introduce several monsters to the monster class:
- b blob of preserved organs
- b crystal ooze
- b blood bloater
- b flesh that hates
- b shoggoth
- b priest of Ghaunadaur
- b mothering mass
- b coiling brawn
- b deep blue cube
- b pitch black cube
- b perfectly clear cube
Alabaster elves, Alabaster elf-elders and sentinels of Mithardir have a mutual grudge with all blob monsters.
Blobs can be warded by the Elder Sign or the Cerulean Sign.
In the Mithardir variant of the Chaos Quest, roughly half the monsters that are randomly generated in the catacombs level will be blobs.
Blob monsters make up 1⁄50 (2%) of all monsters that are randomly generated on the up stair of R'lyeh, and are only generated this way if shoggoths are genocided or extinct.
xNetHack
In xNetHack, one of the themed rooms is a room that can contain one or more sleeping blob monsters, which is imported from UnNetHack.
SlashTHEM
SlashTHEM retains the blobs added in SLASH'EM, and adds a few other new monsters to the group:
The blob is the second quest monster class for Electric Mages, and make up 6⁄175 of the monsters that are randomly generated on the Electric Mage quest.
Encyclopedia entry
These giant amoeboid creatures look like nothing more than puddles of slime, but they both live and move, feeding on metal or wood as well as the occasional dungeon explorer to supplement their diet.
But we were not on a station platform. We were on the track ahead as the nightmare, plastic column of fetid black iridescence oozed tightly onward through its fifteen-foot sinus, gathering unholy speed and driving before it a spiral, re-thickening cloud of the pallid abyss vapor. It was a terrible, indescribable thing vaster than any subway train -- a shapeless congeries of protoplasmic bubbles, faintly self-luminous, and with myriads of temporary eyes forming and unforming as pustules of greenish light all over the tunnel-filling front that bore down upon us, crushing the frantic penguins and slithering over the glistening floor that it and its kind had swept so evilly free of all litter.
