Great dagger
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| |
|---|---|
| Name | great dagger |
| Appearance | great dagger |
| Damage vs. small | 1d6 |
| Damage vs. large | 1d7 |
| To-hit bonus | +2 |
| Weapon skill | dagger |
| Size | one-handed |
| Base price | 500 zm (+10/positive enchant) |
| Weight | 20 |
| Material | metal |
A great dagger is a type of weapon that appears in SLASH'EM, SlashTHEM and Hack'EM. It is a one-handed weapon that uses the dagger skill, and can be used in melee and thrown. It is made of metal.
The great dagger is the base item for the artifact The Great Dagger of Glaurgnaa.
Generation
The generation methods for great daggers depend on the variant.
SLASH'EM
In SLASH'EM, great daggers are not randomly generated, though they can be wished for and appear in bones.
Upgrading an elven dagger or dark elven dagger will produce a great dagger.
SlashTHEM
In SlashTHEM, great daggers can be randomly generated like other weapons, and general stores, weapon shops and general stores can stock great daggers.
Upgrading behaves as in SLASH'EM.
Hack'EM
In Hack'EM, great daggers are not randomly generated, though they can be wished for and appear in bones.
Upgrading a stake will produce a great dagger. A great dagger can be created at a forge by combining a parazonium and a knife.
Description
Great daggers do 1d6 damage against small monsters and 1d7 against large ones, and like most other daggers have a +2 to-hit bonus. They also weigh twice as much as ordinary daggers at 20 aum.[1]
Great daggers intentionally cannot be stacked normally like other daggers.[2] While it is possible to generate a stack of great daggers by upgrading, any dagger thrown from this stack can not be re-merged into the original stack.
In Hack'EM, upgrading a great dagger will produce an orcish dagger.
Strategy
The great dagger is the strongest type of dagger available in SLASH'EM, SlashTHEM and Hack'EM: it can serve as both a solid melee and projectile weapon, and in SLASH'EM and SlashTHEM its base material is naturally erodeproof. Whether a plain great dagger is worth obtaining depends on the methods available: Dipping a (dark) elven dagger in a potion of gain level can be worthwhile for an early hero that started with one, such as a Ranger, with the increase in damage output being more beneficial in the short to medium term than a single experience level or most other item upgrades available at that point. Gnomish heroes using singular daggers as their primary melee weapon will almost always want to tinker and upgrade it into a great dagger, given that the only cost is time. The damage increase is almost never sufficient enough for a plain great dagger to be worth a wish: an early wish for a weapon in particular is better spent on artifact daggers, crysknives, or magic markers.
Upgrading a stack of elven/dark elven daggers to use as throwing weapons is not a good idea, since most heroes amassing such stacks will also likely have them heavily enchanted, and the increase in damage is marginal. Moreover, in addition to being an interface nightmare, the non-stacking great daggers pose a strategic and tactical disadvantage: they force you to either forego multiple inventory slots, or waste turns moving great daggers in and out of a bag. Finally, they will weigh twice as much as the original stack of daggers, likely adding 100+ aum to your pack.
