Archeologist

Archeologists are one of the harder classes, but can become powerful in the late game. NetHack spells archeologist without the extra a in the middle. Most people call them Arcs for short.

Archeologists can be lawful (human or dwarf) or neutral (human or gnome).

Starting equipment

• +2 bullwhip,
• +0 leather jacket,
• +0 fedora,
• 3 to 6 uncursed food rations,
• +0 pick-axe,
• uncursed tinning kit (30 to 99 charges),
• uncursed touchstone,
• uncursed sack.
• Following chances of ONE of:,
  • 10% uncursed tin opener,
  • 22.5% uncursed oil lamp,
  • 6.75% uncursed magic marker (30 to 99 charges).

Abilities

Archeologists gain the following abilities upon reaching the specified experience level:

• XL 1 : Stealth
• XL 1 : Speed
• XL 10: Searching

Additionally:

• You can use two-weapon combat.
• You can use uncursed touchstones as blessed.

Stats

Main article: Hit points and power

You start with a base 11 HP, with a racial bonus: +2 for humans, +4 for dwarves, +1 for gnomes.

You start with a base power of 1, with a racial bonus: +2 for gnomes, +1 for humans.

Quest

Main article: Archeologist quest

The archeologist quest artifact is The Orb of Detection, a crystal ball. When carried, it confers magic resistance, telepathy and half damage when attacked by spells. When #invoked, it toggles invisibility on/off.

Gods

Main article: Religion

• Lawful: Quetzalcoatl
• Neutral: Camaxtli
• Chaotic: Huhetotl

Archeologist rank titles

The status line shows you to be one of the following ranks when you reach the specified experience level:

• XL 1-2: Digger
• XL 3-5: Field Worker
• XL 6-9: Investigator
• XL 10-13: Exhumer
• XL 14-17: Excavator
• XL 18-21: Spelunker
• XL 22-25: Speleologist
• XL 26-29: Collector
• XL 30: Curator

Origin

The archeologist's attire is heavily influenced by the Indiana Jones movies - you start with a leather jacket, fedora and bullwhip. The encyclopedia entry for Archeologist states:

             Archeology is the search for fact, not truth. [...]
             So forget any ideas you've got about lost cities, exotic travel,
             and digging up the world. We do not follow maps to buried
             treasure, and X never, ever, marks the spot.
                     [ Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade ]

Strategy

Weapon selection

The best early weapons are the pick-axe and your starting whip (purely for the +2 bonus; whips are ordinarily quite poor). Dwarvish mattocks are two handed pick-axes that do more damage than any other non-artifact weapon.

A good artifact weapon for you is Grayswandir, which does double-damage and silver damage. A plain non-artifact silver saber is an excellent weapon - the watch captain in Minetown often carries one, so consider getting a pet to kill him for it.

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