Deathsword (SLASH'EM)
| ) Deathsword (No tile) | |
|---|---|
| Base item | two-handed sword |
| Damage vs. small | 1d12 +14 (15-26) |
| Damage vs. large | 3d6 +14 (17-32) |
| To-hit bonus | +5 |
| Bonus versus | |
| Weapon skill | two-handed sword |
| Size | two-handed |
| Affiliation | |
| When carried |
(none) |
| When wielded |
(none) |
| When invoked |
(none) |
| Base price | 5000 zm |
| Weight | 150 |
| Material | iron |
- For the artifact in Hack'EM, see Deathsword (Hack'EM).
Deathsword is an artifact that appears in SLASH'EM and SlashTHEM. Its default alignment is chaotic, and its base item is a two-handed sword.
Generation
A two-handed sword generated on the ground, in shops or as a death drop has a base 1⁄20 chance of being made into Deathsword assuming no artifacts have been generated.[1]
Chaotic heroes can receive Deathsword as a sacrifice gift, and it is the second guaranteed sacrifice gift for Barbarians in SLASH'EM, but it will not be given to human, doppelganger or lycanthropic heroes. In SlashTHEM, it is no longer a guaranteed sacrifice gift for Barbarians, but will still not be given to chaotic heroes that are humans, doppelgangers, lycanthropes, or incantifiers.
Description
Deathsword has flat +5 to-hit and +14 damage bonuses against all human monsters.
Strategy
While not an inapplicable weapon by any means due to werecreatures being especially annoying and/or threatening in SLASH'EM and SlashTHEM, Deathsword is ultimately not very remarkable compared to the ability to perform two-weapon combat, including with two artifacts and/or silver weapons. This is especially true for chaotic heroes when the Bat from Hell is one of many better options that can deal more consistent damage against all monsters while being wielded on its own, and Barbarians in particular can reach Skilled in clubs.
Deathsword may seem like a useful weapon in theory for taking on shopkeepers and stealing from shops, but SLASH'EM and SlashTHEM shopkeepers are much stronger than those of vanilla NetHack and will use firearms such as shotguns instead of attack wands to possibly shred through a hero's HP. The artifact can have several possible use cases from the mid-game stages onward, from barracks in the dungeon, Fort Ludios and even quest nemeses such as Thoth Amon on the Barbarian quest, to the aligned priests in Moloch's Sanctum and hostile priests and player monsters on the Astral Plane—however, the lack of the #tip command and other convenient insurance against effects such as the curse items monster spell makes it an unattractive long-term option in most cases.
History
Deathsword first appears in NetHack-- 3.1.3, where it is an artifact long sword—SLASH 6 changes its base item to a two-handed sword.
