Wand of lightning
| / | |
|---|---|
| Name | lightning |
| Appearance | random |
| Abundance | 4% |
| Base price | 175 zm |
| Weight | 7 |
| Type | ray |
| Maximum charges | 8 |
| Monster use | May be used offensively by monsters. |
When zapped, the wand of lightning shoots shocking bolts.
Contents
Effects
The rays from a wand of lightning deal 6d6 damage to non-shock resistant targets. The ray bounces when it hits walls or targets with reflection.
A bolt of lightning can destroy almost any ring or wand in a target's inventory. Only the ring of shock resistance and the wand of lightning itself are immune to this type of destruction.[1] The wand of lightning will also be safe from other sources of shock damage (e.g. chest traps, returning Mjollnir, energy vortices or electric eels).
Like a wand of fire, engraving with a wand of lightning will burn text into the ground, which creates a permanent engraving. Unlike the wand of fire, however, the wand of lightning will blind you; this is much more manageable if you also have telepathy or a unicorn horn.
The bolt of lightning is guaranteed to blind you if you are in its line of fire, regardless of whether it actually hits you, whizzes by you, or is rebounded by reflection. The blindness lasts for 1-50 (more) turns, capped at 127; this becomes 1-50 if engraving, 0-99 turns if zapping yourself, and (ulevel/2+1)d50 if your own bolt rebounds on you.[2] Using a wand of lightning while inside a monster (such as a vortex) will also blind you.
If you apply a wand of lightning to break it, it deals quadruple damage[3] to yourself and all surrounding squares. Your inventory is subject to the same effects as though you were zapped with the wand, i.e. your rings and wands may explode.
Strategy
It is especially annoying when monsters zap one against you, as ; a soldier might surprise you with a bolt that destroys your only ring of slow digestion.
You should avoid breaking these wands as a form of crowd-control unless you have no valuable rings or wands in your open inventory, or are otherwise going to die next turn anyway.
Messages
- You are blinded by the flash!
- You were blinded by a bolt of lightning.
- Your arm tingles.
- While blinded, a bolt of lightning was fired at you and missed.
References
This page may need to be updated for the current version of NetHack.
It may contain text specific to NetHack 3.6.0. Information on this page may be out of date.
Editors: After reviewing this page and making necessary edits, please change the {{nethack-360}} tag to the current version's tag or {{noversion}} as appropriate.
