Tooled horn

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( Horn.png
Name tooled horn
Appearance horn
Base price 15 zm
Weight 18
Material bone
Monster use Will not be used by monsters.

A tooled horn is a type of tool that appears in NetHack. It is a tonal musical instrument that is made of bone, and appears as a horn when unidentified—the tooled horn is the only type of horn to not be a magical item.

Generation

Elven Priests and Wizards have a 1⁄6 chance of starting the game with a tooled horn as their instrument.[1]

Tooled horns make up 1⁄200 (0.5%) of all tools randomly generated on the ground, in general shops or as death drops. Hardware stores can also stock tooled horns.

Description

A hero applying a tooled horn that chooses to improvise with it will produce noise that has a range dependent on their experience level:[2][3][4][5][6] this abuses wisdom, and the noise will wake up nearby sleeping monsters, scaring any that fail a roll against their MR score dependent on their proximity.[7][8] A hero that applies a tooled horn while stunned, confused or hallucinating will automatically improvise with it.[9] Improvising on a tooled horn will have no effect on monsters that wait for the hero to approach.[10]

A hero that chooses to play specific notes on a tooled horn will first be prompted to play the passtune for the Castle drawbridge if they know it, and otherwise will be asked for a set of five notes to play[11][12]—playing the passtune near the Castle drawbridge exercises wisdom, as does attempting to guess the passtune.[13]

A hero cannot apply a tooled horn if they are subjected to strangulation, if they are in the form of a sea monster, or if they are in the form of any monster that is tiny in size, unbreathing, cannot speak, lacks a head, or can only buzz.[14][15] They will also be prevented from applying a tooled horn while underwater.[16]

A frost horn or fire horn with no charges will behave as a tooled horn when applied, and playing specific notes on either instrument will have the same effect as with a tooled horn. Beatitude has no effect on the outcome of playing a tooled horn. Monsters will not use this item.

Strategy

Tooled horns are technically superior to the bugle as an escape item and means of scaring monsters, since they can also scare non-guard mercenaries that the bugle does not, but tooled horns are also almost twice as heavy as a bugle and harder to find. While tooled horns are slightly more common in random generation, Yendorian Army fighters can generate with bugles, and a hero clearing a barracks or encountering a group of sergeants will often get at least one bugle out of it.

As with most instruments, tooled horns are valuable for awakening or otherwise un-freezing pets, scaring monsters that do not respect Elbereth and forcing monsters engulfing the hero to expel them—illiterate and pacifist conduct players will especially appreciate these use cases. For a hero awakening monsters but not trying to scare them (e.g. a Knight avoiding penalties to alignment record), they will roll against their MR score if they are within a distance that is roughly 3⁄5 of the horn's range—a monster will be awakened if their distance to the hero is at most 5.48 times the root of the hero's experience level, and will potentially be scared if their distance to the hero is at most 3.16 times the root of the hero's experience level.

History

The tooled horn first appears in NetHack 3.0.0.

Messages

You produce a frightful, grave sound.
You successfully improvised with the horn.
You blow into the horn.
As above, while deaf.
You extract a strange sound from the horn!
You successfully played a tune on the horn.
What you produce is quite far from music...
You attempted to use the horn while confused.
You can't play music underwater!
You attempted to use the horn underwater.

Variants

SLASH'EM

In SLASH'EM, upgrading a tooled horn successfully has a 1⁄3 chance each of producing a frost horn, fire horn or horn of plenty, and upgrading any of those three items successfully will produce a tooled horn. Dipping a frost horn, fire horn or horn of plenty into a potion of amnesia will use up the potion and "downgrade" the item to a tooled horn.

UnNetHack

In UnNetHack, rare instruments shops have a 1⁄10 chance of generating a tooled horn on each square.

dNetHack

In dNetHack, notdNetHack and notnotdNetHack, Troubadours start the game with knowledge of the tooled horn's appearance, and orcish Troubadours have a roughly 1⁄2 chance of starting with a tooled horn as their instrument.

Music instruments shops have a 1⁄20 chance of a tooled horn being generated on each square.

The hardware store on the Troubadour quest home level has a pair of tooled horns generated inside at level creation.

Player monster bards have a 1⁄6 chance of being generated with a tooled horn as their instrument.

Dipping a frost horn, fire horn or horn of plenty into a potion of amnesia will use up the potion and "downgrade" the item to a tooled horn, as in SLASH'EM.

The tooled horn is the preferred instrument for playing Rally via the Troubadour's musicalize spell skill, and is the alternative instrument for Disruption, Fear and Cacophony. Fire horns and frost horns can be used in place of a tooled horn for playing these songs. If a song is played on a tooled horn via the musicalize spell skill, certain monsters may harmonize with the song if they are tame, and will otherwise start a counter-song if hostile:

SpliceHack

In SpliceHack, elven Cartomancers have a 1⁄6 chance of starting the game with a tooled horn as their instrument like Priests and Wizards.

A tooled horn can be combined with other items at a furnace:

  • Combining a tooled horn and a food ration will create a horn of plenty.
  • Combining a tooled horn and a wand of fire will create a fire horn.
  • Combining a tooled horn and a wand of cold will create a frost horn.

EvilHack

EvilHack adds Gjallar, a neutral artifact tooled horn that replaces The Orb of Fate as the Valkyrie quest artifact.

SlashTHEM

In SlashTHEM, upgrading functions as it does in SLASH'EM, as does dipping a magical horn into a potion of amnesia.

Rare instruments shops have a 1⁄10 chance of generating a tooled horn on each square, as in UnNetHack.

As in dNetHack and its derivatives, Bards start the game with knowledge of the tooled horn's appearance, and orcish Bards have a roughly 1⁄2 chance of starting with a tooled horn as their instrument. Similarly, the tooled horn is the preferred instrument for playing Rally via the Bard's musicalize spell skill, and is the alternative instrument for Disruption, Fear and Cacophony—fire horns and frost horns can be used in place of a tooled horn for playing these songs.

Hack'EM

In Hack'EM, rare instruments shops have a 2⁄25 chance of generating a tooled horn on each square.

Gjallar replaces The Orb of Fate as the Valkyrie quest artifact, as in EvilHack.

Upgrading a tooled horn successfully will produce a horn of plenty, and vice versa.

References

  1. ↑ src/u_init.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 814
  2. ↑ src/apply.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 3725
  3. ↑ src/music.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 840: else only occurs if improvising
  4. ↑ src/music.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 604
  5. ↑ src/music.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 609: calls awaken_monsters()
  6. ↑ src/music.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 61: awaken_monsters() function
  7. ↑ src/music.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 70
  8. ↑ src/music.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 78
  9. ↑ src/music.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 701
  10. ↑ src/music.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 75
  11. ↑ src/music.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 708
  12. ↑ src/music.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 714
  13. ↑ src/music.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 769
  14. ↑ src/music.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 693
  15. ↑ src/mondata.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 336: MS_BUZZ covers killer bees, queen bees, grid bugs, and xans
  16. ↑ src/music.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 690
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