Knight/SLASH'EM

In SLASH'EM, the Knight is one of the roles from NetHack that is available to the hero.

Knights are always lawful humans.

Starting equipment

Each Knight starts with the following equipment:

• a +1 long sword (wielded)
• a +0 lance (alternate weapon)
• +0 plate mail
• a +0 helmet
• a +0 large shield
• a +0 pair of leather gloves
• 10-20 uncursed apples
• 10-20 uncursed carrots

Knights start with knowledge of all non-magical weapons and armor.

The Knight's default starting pet is a saddled pony.

Intrinsics

Knights gain the following intrinsic properties upon reaching the given experience levels:

• Level 7: Speed

Attributes

The Knight's starting attributes are distributed as follows:

Attributes	Strength	Dexterity	Constitution	Intelligence	Wisdom	Charisma	Remaining
Minimum attributes	13	8	10	7	14	17	6
Distribution percentages	30%	10%	20%	15%	15%	10%
Mean w/ standard deviation	14.95±1.24	8.66±0.89	11.27±1.10	7.97±1.01	14.96±0.97	17.43±0.53

Skills

Knights have the following skills available to them:

Knight skills
Max	Skills
Basic	Weapons: dagger, knife, pick-axe, scimitar, club, paddle, flail, hammer, trident, bow Spells: body
Skilled	Weapons: axe, short sword, broadsword, two-handed sword, saber, mace, morning star, polearms, spear, javelin, crossbow Combat: two weapon combat Spells: healing, protection
Expert	Weapons: long sword, lance Combat: bare hands, riding

Knights start with Basic skill in longsword, lance, and riding. They use the wisdom stat to cast spells, and their special spell is turn undead.

Techniques

Knights can learn the disarm technique by reaching Skilled in any weapon, and also gain the following techniques at the listed experience levels:

Level	Technique
1	Turn undead
1	Healing hands

Special rules

Knights have an inherent ability to jump like the knight piece in chess - this ability is restricted to destinations two squares horizontally and one square vertically away, or vice versa. Jumping from other sources (i.e. jumping boots or the jumping spell) function as normal.

Knights only take ¹⁄₂ damage from breaking wands by applying them.

Knights do not reduce the tameness of a steed when mounting it.

Knightly conduct

Knights follow a code of conduct, and take a -1 penalty to alignment record for the following actions, with the accompanying messages being printed:

• Attacking a sleeping, paralyzed or fleeing monster in melee, even if the monster continues to attack while fleeing - this does not apply to monsters that flee after stealing items from the hero. Monsters putting on armor or items (e.g., "the soldier puts on a crested helmet") are considered paralyzed for this purpose. Projectiles, wands and spells do not incur a penalty.

You caitiff!

• Eating while satiated.

You feel like a glutton!

• Digging down in a shop, if the shopkeeper is alive.

You feel like a common thief.

Rank titles

The status line displays one of the following ranks for the corresponding experience levels:

• XL 1–2: Gallant
• XL 3–5: Esquire
• XL 6–9: Bachelor
• XL 10–13: Sergeant
• XL 14–17: Knight
• XL 18–21: Banneret
• XL 22–25: Chevalier/Chevaliere
• XL 26–29: Seignieur/Dame
• XL 30: Paladin

Gods

The Knight pantheon is based on the mythology of Celtic peoples.

• Lawful: Lugh
• Neutral: Brigit
• Chaotic: Manannan Mac Lir

Quest

The Knight's quest sees them fighting Ixoth for The Magic Mirror of Merlin, an artifact mirror. It grants magic resistance and telepathy while carried, and a Knight carrying it also deals doubled damage to their enemies with offensive magic (i.e. some wands and most spells). Applying or wielding the Mirror causes it to speak a random rumor that is true if the Mirror is blessed, false if it is cursed and either if it is uncursed.

Strategy

Compared to NetHack, Knights have a much easier early game due to consistently higher physical attributes, and can take advantage of lances somewhat more reliably with SLASH'EM using the same speed system as NetHack 3.4.3—however, their HP growth and other attributes such as dexterity are still on the lackluster side, and offensive options are somewhat more limited in the mid- and late game due to changes in spellcasting and spell school distribution.

A user has suggested improving this page or section as follows:

"Detail to match the layout of other NetHack/SLASH'EM role strategy sections and distinguish it from those, particularly ascension kits."

Early game

Knights in SLASH'EM are typically stronger and sturdier due to the heavy (but high-quality) armor necessitating boosts to minimum carrying capacity, meaning they will often have strength above 18 and constitution above 12. Knights also retain their starting long sword and reliable access to Excalibur, which is boosted by the damage bonuses from strength and by the flat damage bonuses universal to artifact weapons in SLASH'EM. This makes the challenging early game of SLASH'EM much more manageable and shifts one of the Knight's starting priories to lightening their armor's load, even if it involves sacrificing some points of AC—mithril-coats are all 300 aum lighter than the starting plate mail, and the "worst" one (the elven mithril-coat) gives only 2 fewer points of base AC.

The starting pony is much easier to keep fed, as a corpse can generate a fungus or mold once it becomes old enough: a Knight that is satiated or has enough food rations can move corpses to their own squares, so that more of them can grow molds for the Knight or their steed to kill. Lichen corpses in particular can be carried as permafood to give to the pony when necessary.

Mid-game

SLASH'EM allows twoweaponing of artifacts, making the Knight's already-potent damage output stronger still - Grayswandir, the Sword of Justice and Snickersnee are some of the more worthwhile candidates. Knights seeking pets may opt to seek out tame minions from sacrifice or prayer to their lawful god: movanic devas are available as early as experience level 7, and monadic devas can be obtained at XL 10; the latter are powerful enough that they can mow down trolls and dragons, and a magic whistle can call them to the Knight's side at a moment's notice.

Spellcasting is not nearly as accessible in terms of offense for Knights in SLASH'EM: The Magic Mirror of Merlin still grants Knights doubled damage for any applicable spells they use, but they are restricted in attack spells, and body armor options are slim and inflexible - any such armor other than robes and crystal plate mail will raise spell failure rates. A robe of power is their best body armor for reducing failure rates, and can be obtained from aligned priests, polypiling, or upgrading, or a wish for the particularly desperate; the amulet of reflection is the most reasonable source of reflection to pair with it (with Nighthorn being a much less convenient candidate); and ideal sources of magic resistance will likely be either a cloak of magic resistance or a lucky quest artifact found in bones.

Late game

Knights that gain enough experience levels can obtain ki-rins, astral devas, Archons, Planetars, and even Solars from their god - the latter three are capable of savaging their way through armies of hostile monsters with little to no effort. Ki-rin are more formidable for Knights when obtained by wishing for a figurine: bug C341-18 is left in as a feature and allows them to be kitted out with armor providing necessary resistances. Minions also will not wear armor or saddles, and will not wield new weapons.

In terms of offensive spellcasting, a level 30 knight with maxed out stats (including a +5 HoB) will have a 57% failure rate for magic missile, which is reduced to 12% with robe-type body armor - the aforementioned robe of power is the only way to get to a 0% failure rate for the spell.

A good potential ascension kit for a Knight consists of the following:

• ki-rin that has a +5 shield of reflection, an amulet of life saving, +7 elven boots, and +5 gloves (of any kind)
• +7 Excalibur
• +7 Grayswandir, +7 Sword of Justice, +7 Snickersnee, +7 Frost Brand, or +7 Fire Brand
• +7 elven boots, +5 jumping boots, or +5 fireproof water walking boots
• +7 cloak of magic resistance
• +5 gauntlets of dexterity
• if spellcasting:
  • an amulet of reflection
  • a +5 robe of power
  • a +5 helm of brilliance
• Otherwise:
  • an amulet of life saving
  • +5 silver dragon scale mail
  • a +5 helm of telepathy or +7 elven leather helm