Disenchantment
Disenchantment is a damage type that appears in NetHack and can reduce the enchantment of weapons, armor and other items. The damage type is defined by the AD_ENCH flag within monattk.h in the source code.[1]
The only monster with an active or passive disenchanting attack of either type is the disenchanter.
Description
A hero that is hit with an active disenchanting attack may lose a point of enchantment from a worn chargeable ring or their outermost worn piece of armor, while a monster takes ordinary physical damage.[2][3][4][5] Passive disenchantment attacks can drain a point of enchantment from the attacker's weapon, gloves (if using bare hands or martial arts) or boots (if kicking).[6][7][8]
Active disenchanting attacks can be blocked by magic cancellation, and are nullified if the attacker is cancelled—neither of these are true for passive disenchantment. Artifacts have a 9⁄10 chance of resisting disenchantment in both cases.
Strategy
Though disenchantment is only a risk when dealing with one specific monster in the game, that risk is significant enough that many heroes resort to preemptive genocide of disenchanters, or at least consider precautions for them: a non-enchanted side weapon, unenchanted projectiles and/or extensive use of magic ranged attacks are all means of killing disenchanters without losing vital weapon or armor enchantments to their claw attack.
History
The disenchantment damage type is introduced along with the disenchanter in NetHack 3.3.0.
Variants
Variants of NetHack give disenchanting attacks to monsters other than the disenchanter.
SLASH'EM
In SLASH'EM, the steel golem has a passive disenchanting attack.
dNetHack
In dNetHack, notdNetHack and notnotdNetHack, a few monsters have disenchantment attacks:
- Dokkalfar eternal matriarchs have a pair of disenchanting weapon attacks.
- An ancient of blessings has a passive disenchanting attack and many disenchanting weapon attacks.
- The Adamach has a passive disenchanting attack.
All types of disintegration in these variants except wide-angle disintegration beams will instead disenchant armor before destroying it: disintegration resistance protects armor from being disenchanted by disintegration rays, but not from disenchantment by beams or melee attacks that inflict disintegration.
EvilHack
In EvilHack, Mephistopheles has a disenchanting claw attack.
Hack'EM
Hack'EM retains the steel golem's passive disenchanting attack and the disenchanting claw attack of Mephistopheles.
References
- ↑ include/monattk.h in NetHack 3.6.7, line 78
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1654: disenchantment vs. hero
- ↑ src/uhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1991: disenchantment vs. polymorphed hero
- ↑ src/mhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1445: disenchantment vs. other monsters
- ↑ src/uhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1991: hero disenchantment vs. monsters
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2854: passive hero disenchantment vs. monsters
- ↑ src/mhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1626: passive disenchantment vs. other monsters
- ↑ src/uhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 3026: passive disenchantment vs. hero
