Croesus
@ Croesus 
| |
|---|---|
| Difficulty | 22 |
| Attacks |
Weapon 4d10 |
| Base level | 20 |
| Base experience | 746 |
| Speed | 15 |
| Base AC | 0 |
| Base MR | 40 |
| Alignment | 15 (lawful) |
| Frequency (by normal means) | Unique |
| Genocidable | No |
| Weight | 1450 |
| Nutritional value | 400 |
| Size | Medium |
| Resistances | None |
| Resistances conveyed | None |
|
Croesus:
| |
| Reference | monst.c#line2306 |
Croesus, @, is a unique monster that appears in NetHack. He is the rich human owner of Fort Ludios and all the vaults in the dungeon, and has many guards and Yendorian Army soldiers on his payroll. Croesus can see invisible, is an overlord to his kind, will pick up all sorts of items, and can follow the player character to other levels if he is adjacent.
Croesus possesses a strong weapon attack.
If you encounter a guard while inside one of the vaults, you can respond with "Croesus" when the guard asks for your name and cause them to leave; the name can also be spelled Kroisos or Creosote. This incurs a -1 penalty to alignment record for lawful characters, unless it is also their actual name. Answering with these names after killing the real Croesus will instead make the guard hostile.
Contents
Generation
Croesus resides in a throne room on the right half of Fort Ludios, occupying the throne a few squares away from the secret door to his treasure vault[1] - while he generates asleep like other throne room monsters, the alarms in Fort Ludios will always wake them up immediately.
Croesus always generates with a two-handed sword.[2]
Strategy
Characters that are ready for the Castle should be able to deal with him with some caution. While Croesus lacks any resistances and has only one weapon attack, he is quite fast at 15 speed and can deal enough damage to wipe out under-leveled or poorly armored characters in a few swings - like all humans, he also does not respect Elbereth. Dispatching him at a distance is a good idea for mid-level characters, especially since he has no resistances - a wand of sleep will render him much easier to dispose of, although his 40 MR and decent AC of 0 can make this difficult.
You can freely shoot wands and projectiles at Croesus from across Fort Ludios' moat and chip him down: he can only retaliate if he spawns with his own attack wand or picks one up (usually from another monster killed by the ranged assault), and poses no more danger in this regard than the multiple soldiers you will have dealt with in order to reach him. Using a source of conflict can turn the throne room denizens against each other, which can result in him killed if they are strong enough, or else weakened enough that you can mop him and the other survivors up at your leisure - this is not reliable, unfortunately, and even at lower HP his weapon attack can slice through an unwary character.
You can also cross the moat and take the fight to Croesus yourself, though you must contend with the throne room monsters; a boulder (e.g. from a scroll of earth or any giants on the level) or a source of levitation are among your best options if you have them. If you are using a wand of cold, frost horn or other means of freezing water, you can instead wait for him to step onto the ice, then use a fire-based attack (e.g. wand of fire) to melt it and drown him. Even a low-level character can defeat Croesus this way - but his speed may enable him to cross the ice before you can melt it.
History
Croesus first appears in NetHack 3.1.0.
Origin
As indicated by the encyclopedia entry, Croesus (Greek Kroisos) is named for a Lydian king renowned for his wealth. Creosote is a similarly wealthy character that appears in Discworld, and is named after the same figure.
Variants
Variants that use the object materials system may give Croesus gold armor and weapons.
SLASH'EM
In SLASH'EM, hitting Croesus with a potion of amnesia will produce YAFM, but otherwise has no effect on him.
xNetHack
In xNetHack, Croesus generates with a gold two-handed sword and gold body armor - the armor has a 1⁄8 chance of being plate mail, and will otherwise be chain mail.
EvilHack
In EvilHack, Croesus will always generate with a set of gold body armor, helm and boots, as well as a gold two-handed sword. With an equal probability of each item, the body armor will be either plate mail or banded mail, the helm will be either a standard helmet or a dwarvish helm, and the boots will either be kicking boots or dwarvish boots.
Encyclopaedia entry
Croesus (in Greek: Kroisos), the wealthy last king of Lydia;
his empire was destroyed when he attacked Cyrus in 549, after
the Oracle of Delphi (q.v.) had told him: "if you attack the
Persians, you will destroy a mighty empire". Herodotus
relates of his legendary conversation with Solon of Athens,
who impressed upon him that being rich does not imply being
happy and that no one should be considered fortunate before
his death.
