Aleax

From NetHackWiki
Revision as of 09:55, 6 March 2024 by Umbire the Phantom (talk | contribs) (Generation: word choice)
Jump to navigation Jump to search

An Aleax[1], A, is a humanoid angelic being that appears in NetHack. It is the only humanoid angelic monster that is a valid polymorph form.

Generation

Aleaxes are rarely generated randomly and will never appear in Gehennom. Randomly generated Aleaxes will be peaceful towards lawful characters with good alignment record. Aleaxes may also appear as minions of a lawful god.

An Aleax is generated with an uncursed erodeproof large shield 34 of the time, and an uncursed shield of reflection otherwise, and their weapon will be a blessed erodeproof long sword, with a 15 chance of the sword being either Demonbane or Sunsword if neither artifact has been generated.[1]

The following information pertains to an upcoming version (NetHack 3.7). If this version is now released, please verify that it is still accurate, then update the page to incorporate this information.

Aleaxes can only receive Sunsword, as Demonbane's base item is changed to a mace.

Strategy

Aleaxes are one of the few sources of reflection in the game. Since they are slow, they are usually not threatening to a player who is deep enough to encounter one, and even lawful characters who encounter peaceful Aleaxes may want to kill them for a chance at their shield.

Variants

UnNetHack

In UnNetHack, the Aleax behaves similarly to how it does in Dungeons & Dragons (as described below), and will be generated with erodeproof +0 copies of all of the player's equipment and weapons worn at that time; artifacts will be converted to their base item.

Origin

In Dungeons & Dragons, an Aleax is an avatar of a deity sent to punish a specific mortal; the Aleax takes on the target's exact appearance and carries identical equipment.

Encyclopedia entry

Said to be a doppelganger sent to inflict divine punishment for alignment violations.

Notes

  • ^  In Dungeons & Dragons, the proper pluralization of Aleax is Aleaxi[2]. However, in NetHack 3.6.6 code "Aleaxi" is not in the list of irregular plurals[3], and so NetHack pluralizes Aleax as Aleaxes. This article follow NetHack's convention.

References

  1. src/makemon.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 326
  2. David "Zeb" Cook (1994). Planescape Campaign Setting, Monstrous Supplement. Edited by David Wise. (TSR, Inc), pp. 2–3. ISBN 978-1560768340.
  3. src/mondata.c in NetHack 3.6.6, line 760