Engraving

An engraving refers to any form of text inscribed into the ground; the act of engraving refers to any act of inscribing such text in the ground, usually invoked with the command E. The concept includes carving or burning characters into the dungeon floor, writing on the floor with a writing instrument, and drawing in the dust with fingers, wands, etc. This can ostensibly be done by a player to record messages to themselves, and there are also random engravings left in the dungeon; however the most common use of engraving is to inscribe the name Elbereth.

Speed and Quality

Engraving techniques may be classed as fast (fingers, wand, athame) or slow (other edged weapons, hard gems). A fast method safely engraves up to 9 characters a turn, while a slow method requires one turn per character. Time is a concern because, while characters reading a spellbook or eating a food ration will stop when approached by hostile monsters, characters busy engraving will insist on continuing the job. Thus any character engraving with a hard gem or other slow method is vulnerable to attacks from monsters.

Fast methods of engraving can safely engrave 9 characters per turn, or unsafely engrave 19 characters per turn. The difference between the two is that if you write 10 or more characters, your engraving will be ineffective until the start of your next turn. For example, if you engrave “ElberethElbereth” (16 characters), monsters will be free to attack you until your next turn arrives, but you will then be able to spend that turn freely. If you are very fast and you know that you will get two turns in a row, you might be able to safely engrave up to 19 characters during the first turn.

The engravings themselves may be classified as permanent (will not degrade), semi-permanent (will degrade slowly), or temporary (will degrade very quickly).

Permanent engravings are burned into the floor with a wand of fire or wand of lightning. The wand of lightning can blind you if your eyes are not protected. (Note that the blindness takes effect after the engraving is completed--you will not increase your risk of misengraving through blindness.) Permanent engravings will not erode from being stood on or walked over, but can be eliminated through techniques such as engraving over them or engraving with a wand of polymorph.

Semi-permanent engravings are carved into the floor with an edged weapon, a hard gemstone, a ring containing a hard gemstone, a wand of digging, or written with a charged magic marker (consuming one charge for every two letters). Engraving with any weapon other than a non-cursed athame will make the weapon dull (reduce enchantment) to a minimum of -3, at which point the weapon is too dull to engrave any more. (If it is not cursed, an athame will engrave forever without dulling. This, and its speed, make it highly prized as an engraving tool.) The weapon ordinarily suffers a -1 degredation for every second letter engraved, but a loophole in how this calculation is done can allow you to write longer messages by breaking the engraving job up into smaller parts: engraving three letters is still only a -1 penalty, so it is possible to use a +0 weapon to engrave three letters, then add three more, and then another three, for a total of nine characters before the weapon is useless, rather than only seven if you had attempted to engrave all at once. This is especially important when engraving the eight-character word Elbereth. Semi-permanent engravings can erode over time as they are walked over or stood upon, but not nearly as quickly as will temporary (finger) engravings.

Temporary "engravings" (actually just drawing in the dust on the floor) with your fingers by responding "-" when asked what to engrave with, or you can use another object such as a soft gemstone, or any wand other than fire, lightning, or digging (certain wands may have undesirable effects on the engraving itself, such as polymorphing it). This is fast, but subject to the 1/25 chance of mis-engraving per letter, and any movement, such as fighting or throwing missiles, will damage the engraving. Even standing still on the engraving will eventually degrade it, as no one stands perfectly still. Temporary engravings can also be erased with a towel. Attempting to write in the dust while polymorphed into a demon or vampire will instead scrawl in blood, which shares properties with writings in the dust.

Chances of Engraving

You are not guaranteed to engrave perfectly if you are impaired or writing in the dust. For each letter, you have a chance of messing up the engraving if you are blind (1/9), confused (1/12), stunned (1/4), or hallucinating (1/1). If you are writing in the dust (with fingers, a wand, a soft gem, etc.), you have a 1/25 chance of messing up each letter. This is not usually much of a concern unless you are engraving "Elbereth," since an error there renders the word powerless (note that attempting to write "Elbereth" in the dust only works approximately 72% of the time as a result). If you can see, you can inspect your work with the "look" command, ':'.

Additional Notes

• The epitaphs on gravestones share these properties, for obvious reasons.
• Using a magic marker to engrave graffiti on the floor is generally seen as a waste of the magic marker, but is also the most common type of writing used for engravings that are randomly generated in the dungeon.
• Burning with a wand of fire or lightning into ice will instead melt letters into the ice, which is like a semi-permanent engraving.
• Engraving may also be used to identify wands.
• When you name an object, the game seems to consider that you are engraving the name on the object, because it is possible to get messages about your "hand slipping" while you are doing the engraving if you try to use an unallowable name. This is certainly a special kind of engraving, because it is absolutely permanent and requires no tool at all!
• The limit of 9 or 19 characters per turn is due to the way C handles integers. (Characters/10) is rounded down to 0 with up to 9 characters, and rounded down to 1 with up to 19 characters.

See also

• Elbereth