Deep one (dNetHack)
h deep one 
| |
|---|---|
| Difficulty | 11 |
| Attacks |
Weapon 1d6 physical, offhand weapon 1d6 physical, kick 2d4 physical, passive 0d0 shared soul |
| Base level | 7 |
| Base experience | 128 |
| Speed | 9 |
| Base AC | 5 |
| Base MR | 10 |
| Alignment | 0 (neutral) |
| Frequency (by normal means) | 2 (Quite rare) |
| Genocidable | No |
| Weight | 1450 |
| Nutritional value | 400 |
| Size | medium |
| Resistances | cold resistance, sleep resistance |
| Resistances conveyed | sleep resistance (+4,000) |
|
A deep one:
| |
| Reference | dNAO 3.25.0 - src/monst.c, line 1028 |
- For the monster in SLASH'EM and its related variants, see deep one (SLASH'EM).
A deep one, h, is a type of monster that appears in dNetHack, notdNetHack and notnotdNetHack. The deep one is a type of medium-sized, omnivorous humanoid that is aquatic, demihuman and mutated from humans: they are strong, amphibious and capable of swimming, have infravision, can be seen via infravision, will seek out gold, gems, magical items, and other objects to pick up, and can follow a hero to other levels if they are adjacent. Seeing a deep one can increase the hero's insight, and being attacked by a deep one or any of its growth stages can increase the hero's deep one-specific impurity with a 1⁄n chance (where n is the current impurity level)—reaching impurity levels of 1, 4 and 15 for this counter will also increase the hero's overall impurity. Tame deep ones may turn traitor.
Deep ones have a weapon attack, an offhand weapon attack, a kick attack, and a passive attack that triggers on death and raises the current maximum HP of every other deep one-related monster that is on the current dungeon level, increasing their monster level if necessary—this applies to the deep one's growth stages, as well as Father Dagon and Mother Hydra, and deep ones themselves gain +2 HP when this passive from any deep one-related monster triggers. Deep ones have basic prowess in martial combat, and possess sleep resistance and cold resistance.
Eating a deep one corpse or tin–or quaffing its blood–grants temporary sleep resistance for a duration of 4,000 turns before physical size modifiers.
Deep ones can be warded by an Elder Sign at any level of reinforcement.
Contents
Generation
Randomly-generated deep ones are always created hostile, and can appear in large groups. They will not be randomly generated in Gehennom, and are not a valid genocide target. A deep one can grow up into a deeper one.
A deeper one that is randomly generated will always have a group of 3–12 deep ones accompanying them, and a deepest one that is randomly generated will always have a large group of 10–19 deep ones accompanying them.
1⁄5 of the monsters randomly generated on the Sunken City map of the Sea will be deep ones.
In the Mithardir variant of the Chaos Quest, Elshava may contain a fishery shop run by a deep one shopkeeper.
A "fishing village" map inclusion with rooms that are each inhabited by 1-3 deep ones has a 1⁄20 chance of generating on each level in the Outlands rings.
Deep ones may appear in the court of a randomly-generated throne room ruled by a deepest one. They may also appear as prisoners in random throne rooms.
Deep ones are among the various H.P. Lovecraft-inspired r'lyehians that can appear in the Anachrononaut quest and Android quest, making up 3⁄28 of the monsters randomly generated on those quests. Five deep ones are also generated on the locate level of the Anachrononaut quest during level creation.
Monster starting inventory
Deep ones are generated with different equipment depending on their location in the dungeon.
- Deep ones generated in the future (i.e. the Anachrononaut and Android quests) are created with the following equipment:
- A set of body armor that has an equal probability of being a jacket, leather armor or plasteel armor
- A flack helmet and a pair of gloves
- One of the following weapon sets with an equal probability of each:
- a thoroughly rusty assault rifle, 3 stacks of bullets and a thoroughly eroded knife
- a thoroughly rusty pistol, a stack of bullets and a thoroughly eroded cutlass
- a thoroughly rusty heavy machine gun, 4 stacks of bullets and a thoroughly eroded knife
- a thoroughly rusty submachine gun, 3 stacks of bullets and a thoroughly eroded short sword
- a thoroughly rusty shotgun, 2 stacks of shotgun shells and a thoroughly eroded knife
- a thoroughly rusty sniper rifle, 3 stacks of bullets and a thoroughly eroded short sword
- A 1⁄6 chance of explosive weapons: a stack of frag grenades (2⁄3 chance), a stack of gas grenades (1⁄6 chance), or a rocket launcher and a stack of rockets (1⁄6 chance)
- Deep ones generated on R'lyeh–the lowest floor of the Lost Cities and the Neutral Quest–are created with the following: an uncursed rustproof +3 trident; an uncursed rustproof +3 ranseur; a stack of 3 thoroughly eroded and uncursed +3 javelins; a set of cursed +3 archaic plate mail; an uncursed +3 oilskin cloak; a thoroughly eroded and uncursed +3 orcish shield; and two randomly-selected potions from a potion of acid, confusion, blindness, sleeping, or paralysis, with acid having twice as much chance of being selected as the other potions.
- Deep ones generated elsewhere in the dungeon are created with a set of body armor that has an equal probability of being a jacket, a set of leather armor, or a set of chain mail that will be very rusty if the chain mail is made of a rust-prone material. They will also be given a number of weapons equal to 4d23 (rounded down, i.e. 1 or 2) that are chosen from the following set with equal probability: a two-handed sword, a scimitar, a trident, a short sword, a dagger, or a spear—each of the chosen weapons will be thoroughly rusty if they are generated with a rust-prone material.
Strategy
While deep ones themselves are not especially remarkable on an individual basis, they frequently generate in large groups, and their "shared soul" passive means that each deep one killed on the current level will gain HP and potentially become stronger or even grow up: there is no feedback for a deep one growing up this way, so be especially careful when dealing with squads of hostile deep ones and their stronger relatives! This also applies to peaceful or even tamed deep ones, so taking advantage of this is a great way to beef up a pet deep one, but also increases the risk of it turning traitor and becoming hostile.
Deep ones represent a significant hazard on the Plane of Water, specifically for heroes that attempt to preemptively genocide sea monsters before entering the magic portal to the level itself: none of the deep ones or their kin can be genocided, and are highly likely to replace the now-missing sea monsters during initial level generation. This makes such preemptive genocides a bad idea and all but ensures that the hero will be swarmed by fairly tanky and high-difficulty monsters which become even stronger if any of them are killed—this effect will be more pronounced if the hero entered R'lyeh earlier in that run. Combined with the Plane of Water and its moving air bubbles, the outcome is likely to be disastrous for most ascension runs even if the deep ones are not the biggest threats present (e.g. contending with Uiscerre Eladrin and charybdisones that cannot be genocided), and iron-hating heroes such as elves, drow and yuki-onna are especially vulnerable.
History
The deep one first appears in the Lethe patch against NetHack 3.3.1.
Origin
The Deep Ones are creatures in the Cthulhu Mythos of H. P. Lovecraft. The beings first appeared in Lovecraft's 1931 novella The Shadow over Innsmouth, but were already hinted at in the 1917 short story "Dagon". The Deep Ones are a race of intelligent ocean-dwelling creatures, approximately human-shaped but with a fishy appearance, and the males would regularly mate with human women against their will, creating societies of hybrids along the coast.
Despite being primarily marine creatures, Deep Ones can survive on land for extended periods of time and possess biological immortality, never dying except by accident or violence. The Deep One portrayed in Dagon is of a vastly larger size than the roughly human-scaled beings seen in Innsmouth, and the wider Cthulhu Mythos implies that Deep Ones continuously grow throughout their lives, hence their size changing when they grow up in dNetHack and other variants.
Encyclopedia entry
Them things told the Kanakys that ef they mixed bloods there'd
be children as ud look human at fust, but later turn mone'n
more like the things, till finally the'd take to the water an'
jine the main lot o' things daown har. An' this is the
important part, young feller - them as turned into fish things
an' went into the water wouldn't never die. Them things never
died excep' they was kilt violent.
... Folks as had took to the water gen'rally come back a good
deal to visit, so's a man ud often be a'talkin' to his own
five-times-great-grandfather who'd left the dry land a couple
o' hundred years or so afore.
