Newt

: newt
Difficulty	1
Attacks	Bite 1d2

: newt
Difficulty	1
Attacks	Bite 1d2
Base level	0
Base experience	1
Speed	6
Base AC	8
Base MR	0
Alignment	0 (neutral)
Frequency (by normal means)	5 (Common)
Genocidable	Yes
Weight	10
Nutritional value	20
Size	Tiny
Resistances	None
Resistances conveyed	None
A newt: can swim. can survive underwater. has no hands. is an animal. is carnivorous.
Reference	monst.c#line2849

A newt, :, is a type of monster that appears in NetHack.

Eating a newt corpse or tin has a a ¹⁄₃ to raise your current power by 1 to 3 points, and will always do so if it is less than or equal to ²⁄₃ of your maximum power - if this increase would raise you above your total maximum Power, there is a ¹⁄₃ chance of increasing your maximum and current power by 1.

Generation

Newts are among the first monsters encountered in the dungeon, and are fairly common early on for low-level characters.

Strategy

Newts are primarily a nuisance for starting characters, and are a non-issue once you are decently armed and/or armored.

History

The newt first appears in NetHack 3.0.6.

Origin

The newt is a type of salamander, with over 100 species in the subfamily Pleurodelinae. Like other salamanders, newts are lizard-like amphibians, but unlike most of them are semiaquatic, alternating between aquatic and terrestrial habitats - not all aquatic salamanders are considered newts. More than 100 known species of newts are found in North America, Europe, North Africa, and Asia. Newts metamorphose through three distinct developmental life stages: aquatic larva, terrestrial juvenile (eft), and adult. They return to the water every year to breed, otherwise living in humid, cover-rich land habitats.

Adult newts have bodies similar to other salamanders, but lacking the grooved sides typical of others. Their skin secretions contain toxins employed as a defense mechanism against predators - the toxins are only dangerous if they are ingested or absorbed through mucous membranes or breaks in the skin. Newts can safely live alongside frogs and other amphibians, and may even be kept as pets.

Newts have an association with witchcraft, due partly to their nature as salamanders and also due to the Shakespeare tragedy Macbeth, where "eye of newt" is named as a spell component in the incantation of the three witches (as quoted by the encyclopedia entry). It is commonly thought to be a cryptic name given to mustard plant seed in order to obscure their uses in herbology.

Messages

You feel a mild buzz.

You gained energy from eating newt meat.

Dudley's dungeon

Newts are featured prominently in Dudley's dungeon, where early strips often featured Dudley dying at the hands of these typically-weak monsters, which is typically improbable in normal play (but not impossible by any means). This has become a common enough gag to the point that Dudley has a profound fear of them - however, most newer strips featuring newts killing Dudley are usually rated poorly and referred to as "newt jokes" or YANC ("Yet Another Newt Comic").

One of the highest scores on NAO (eighth as of August 19, 2022) belongs to Adeon, who intentionally died to a newt for comedic value similar to the Dudley's dungeon joke.

Encyclopedia entry

(kinds of) small animal, like a lizard, which spends most of
its time in the water.

[ Oxford's Student's Dictionary of Current English ]

 
"Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the cauldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog,
Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork and blind-worm's sting,
Lizard's leg and howlet's wing,
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble."

[ Macbeth, by William Shakespeare ]