Potion of polymorph
! 
| |
|---|---|
| Name | polymorph |
| Appearance | random |
| Base price | 200 zm |
| Weight | 20 |
| Monster use | May be used by monsters as misc items. |
The potion of polymorph can be used polymorph items, monsters or the player.
Contents
Effects
Quaffing, throwing and wielding
Quaffing this potion will make you polymorph.
Monsters can quaff this potion. Mercifully, this will not generate out-of-depth monsters.[1]
Throwing this potion at a monster will cause it to polymorph. You can also cause a monster to polymorph by wielding the potion and smashing it on them.
Dipping
Dipping an item into this potion may polymorph the item. Invocation items, the Amulet of Yendor, and spellbooks/wands/potions of polymorph will never be polymorphed. Other artifacts have a 95% chance of resisting, and other items 5%[2]. The usual checks for golem creating, items vanishing, artifacts resisting, etc. are skipped, but large stacks still merge to small ones[3]. Dipping this potion into another one (except water) will similarly polymorph the other potion, rather than resulting in random alchemy.
When an item resists polymorph, you receive the message "Nothing happens."; this doesn't use up the potion and doesn't break polypileless conduct. When an item accidentally polymorphs into itself, you receive the message "Nothing seems to happen"; this uses up the potion and breaks polypileless. In both cases, the potion isn't formally identified but you can #name it, since both messages are different from the "Interesting..." that usually appears when nothing actually happens after dipping.
Identification
Most players can easily identify the potion by dipping an item into it. However, trying to use-test or dip-test potions may result in the loss of the polyselfless or polypileless conduct. Because of this, some conduct players try to price-id the potions and identify the 200 zm potions otherwise. Here are a few other ways that do not require magical identification:
- Dipping a resisting item, such as a wand of polymorph or the Bell of Opening, is always safe and doesn’t use up the tested potions.
- Quaffing while wearing an amulet of unchanging. This uses up the potion and exposes you to its effects; luckily, all the others 200 zm potions are safe to drink (although you may want to bless them first).
- Quaffing while having polymorph control. If asked, choose to polymorph into your own race—this doesn't break the conduct, but may have other undesired effects.
- Witnessing a monster using it. Monsters with difficulty 5 or less are occasionally generated with one as their miscellaneous item. You could also try leaving 200 zm, potions in the path of intelligent monsters.
Strategy
Without polymorph control, quaffing the potion of polymorph will likely destroy your armor. Therefore it is usually a bad potion to quaff.
Wielding the potion and hitting a monster is not advised because if by an unlucky chance that monster becomes a cockatrice, you will be petrified.
If you only have one unicorn horn, be careful when dip-testing potions: if the potion is polymorph, your horn will probably be turned into some other tool. Dipping a junk item before trying to dip your horn could potentially save the horn. However, if you have more than one unicorn horn, polymorphing one of them might be desirable: it could turn into a magical tool.
References
- This page is a stub. Should you wish to do so, you can contribute by expanding this page.
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