Bag of tricks
( 
| |
|---|---|
| Name | bag of tricks |
| Appearance | bag |
| Base price | 100 zm |
| Weight | 15 |
| Material | cloth |
| Monster use | Will not be used by monsters. |
A bag of tricks is a tool that appears in Nethack. It appears as an ordinary bag when unidentified.
Contents
Generation
Bags of tricks are generated uncursed, with 1 to 20 charges.
Description
Though they are defined with the CONTAINER macro, bags of tricks are not actually containers: they never hold any items, nor can any be placed in them.[1] Attempting to #loot a bag of tricks will cause it to bite you for d10 damage, which auto-identifies it; the death message associated with this is "killed by a carnivorous bag".
Applying a charged bag of tricks will use up one charge and either create one monster with 22/23 chance, or create 2 to 8 monsters with 1/23 chance; the bag is auto-identified in either case, and nothing happens when applying a bag with zero charges. If the bag has more than 10 charges, a blessed scroll of charging will add 6 to 10 charges, and if it has 10 or less, it will add 6 to 15 charges; an uncursed scroll will always add 1 to 5 charges. It cannot hold more than 50 charges, but can be recharged an unlimited number of times.
Using #tip with a bag of tricks will expend all the charges at once; placing a bag of tricks with charges into a bag of holding will cause a magical explosion, destroying both bags as well as everything in the bag of holding.
The following information pertains to an upcoming version (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 71754910, exploding bags of holding scatter their contents rather than destroying them outright: fragile items are destroyed, and if caused by a bag of tricks, it is still lost along with the bag itself. Per commit 6fd51c29, 1⁄13 of the bag's contents are lost (not counting fragile items that are destroyed after), and per commit ce1f4788, monsters hit by scattered items are angered.Strategy
A bag of tricks is a useful aid for altar farming, experience or even nutrition once identified. If carrying a bag of tricks in the same inventory as a bag of holding, it should be treated with the same caution as a wand of cancellation, and once used up or no longer needed it is best left alone or stashed elsewhere - a magical explosion can be a game-ending mistake.
If you only want the bag to polypile with, apply it until it runs out of charges, and make sure you can deal with the generated monsters - they will all generate at once if you #tip the bag, so beware! An uncharged bag of tricks is "safe", and if it polymorphs into another charged tool, the new tool's charges will be independent of the number of charges the bag had.
Variants
UnNetHack
In UnNetHack, a charged bag of tricks has an equal chance of producing a creature as described above, or causing a random (mostly harmful) effect, such as briefly paralyzing the player, knocking a weapon from their hand, or spewing forth a three-square wide poison cloud.[2]
| Chance | Effect |
|---|---|
| 31/40 | Creates a monster. |
| 2/40 | Spits out a random item. |
| 1/40 | Bag "wriggles away from you", causing it to drop. |
| 1/40 | Tries to pull you in, paralyzing for d4 turns. |
| 1/40 | Spits out a stinking cloud. |
| 1/40 | Causes hallucination for 10+d35 turns. |
| 1/40 | Yells "Boo!", scaring nearby monsters and possibly the player for a few turns. |
| 1/40 | Grows teeth and bites, as if looted. |
| 1/40 | Licks your wielded weapon from your hand, causing it to drop. |
The created item will be an iron chain if the bag is cursed or has been recharged. Otherwise, the game will make three attempts to create an item that weighs less than 100 aum and is small enough to fit in a container. If all three attempts generate invalid items, the bag "coughs nervously" and produces nothing.
A bag of tricks with no charges can hold items like a regular sack;[3] charging it again will destroy any items inside.[4] Since the bag of tricks is a "magical bag", it will also protect its fragile contents from shattering like a bag of holding; this also means that a cursed bag of tricks with no charges is subject to item loss like a cursed bag of holding. Both effects are possibly unintentional.[5]
SlashTHEM
SlashTHEM gives the bag of tricks the same properties as it has in UnNetHack.
FIQHack
Monsters in FIQHack are able to use bags of tricks against you, similar to a wand of create monster.
DynaHack
In DynaHack, bags of holding function as they do in UnNetHack.
EvilHack
In EvilHack, monsters are also capable of using bags of tricks against player characters.
