Explosion attack
- This article is about the attack type. For the portion of the source code that handles explosions, see explode.c.
An explosion attack (or simply explosion) is an attack type that appears in NetHack, and is primarily used by monsters. The attack type is defined by the AT_EXPL flag within monattk.h in the source code.[1]
Description
A monster that has an explosion attack will attempt to self-destruct and direct the explosion at the square of a hero or monster, which will automatically hit if the target (or any other monster) is present at that square.[2][3] This naturally kills or destroys the attacker in the process and creates noise that can awaken sleeping monsters in a 7-square radius[4][5]—it is a distinct form of attack from the passive attack-style on-death explosion used by gas spores that die of HP loss, which uses a 3x3 explosion centered on its square instead of a directed one.
Since the attack uses a targeted explosion, it can be affected by invisibility, confusion or displacement.[6] If a hero is hit by a targeted explosion that deals HP damage, they have a dexterity-based chance of taking only halved damage (rounded up) from the blast.[7] A cancelled monster will be unable to use this attack.[8] A hero or monster that resists the explosion's damage type will be completely unaffected by it.[9]
The following information pertains to an upcoming version (NetHack 3.7.0). If this version is now released, please verify that the information below is still accurate, then update the page to incorporate it.
Per commit 6b60618e, the explosion attacks of spheres use "real" 3x3 explosions of their respective elements, damaging heroes and monsters caught within the explosion range and affecting their open inventory as well as the squares themselves and any items on them (e.g. freezing spheres cooling lava and turning moats to ice, or flaming spheres melting ice and burning scrolls and books).List of monsters
The following monsters have explosion attacks:
- e freezing sphere (cold)[10]
- e flaming sphere (fire)[11]
- e shocking sphere (shock)[12]
- y yellow light (blind)[13]
- y black light (hallucination)[14]
Strategy
Directed explosion attacks can be fairly annoying to deal with, but are also rare and easy to account for—spheres can be deterred with the proper elemental resistances and do not threaten your inventory in any way, while lights can be handled by preemptively blinding yourself (e.g. with a blindfold or towel), since their attacks have no effect on a blind hero. Spheres and lights can also be confused or else fooled by displacement and invisibility, causing them to target the wrong square and usually self-destruct harmlessly.
The following information pertains to an upcoming version (NetHack 3.7.0). If this version is now released, please verify that the information below is still accurate, then update the page to incorporate it.
The changes to spheres' explosion attacks makes them much harder to deal with, to the point that their monster difficulty is raised and shocking spheres in particular are often considered worthy of genocide. Their explosion attacks will also still inflict damage to adjacent monsters and heroes, even if they are fooled by invisibility or displacement.History
The explosion attack type is formally defined in NetHack 3.0.0. From Hack for PDP-11, which is based on Jay Fenlason's Hack, and Hack 1.0 to NetHack 2.3e, the explosion attack of the freezing sphere is defined by a monster-specific case, as with other monster attacks prior to the re-formatting done in NetHack 3.0.0.
Messages
- <The monster> explodes!
- A monster used an explosion attack against you.[15]
- You hear a blast.
- A monster exploded outside of your range of vision.[16]
- You get blasted!
- A sphere's explosion attack hit you.
- You duck some of the blast.
- The sphere's explosion damage was reduced.
- You seem unaffected by it.
- You resisted the elemental damage type of a sphere's explosion.
- You are blinded by a blast of light!
- A yellow light's explosion attack hit you.
- You get the impression it was not terribly bright.
- The attack failed due to the light not being visible.
- You are caught in a blast of kaleidoscopic light!
- A black light's explosion attack hit you.
- You are freaked out.
- The explosion made you hallucinate.
- You seem unaffected.
- There was no observable effect, e.g. you were blind and thus unaffected.
Variants
Variants of NetHack may add new monsters with explosion attacks, as well as different types of explosion attacks.
References
- ↑ include/monattk.h in NetHack 3.6.7, line 23
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2045: calls explmu() function
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2038-L2139: explmu() function
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2119: black light is removed from the map while resolving attack effects
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2135-L2137
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2048-L2052
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2081-L2083
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2045
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2130
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2060-L2063
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2064-L2067
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2068-L2071
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2096-L2108
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2120-L2125
- ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 67: monster goes boom versus hero
- ↑ src/explode.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 307
