Paper golem

' paper golem
Difficulty	4
Attacks	Claw 1d3 physical

' paper golem
Difficulty	4
Attacks	Claw 1d3 physical
Base level	3
Base experience	31
Speed	12
Base AC	10
Base MR	0
Alignment	0 (neutral)
Frequency (by normal means)	1 (Very rare)
Genocidable	No
Weight	400
Nutritional value	0
Size	large
Resistances	sleep, poison
Resistances conveyed	None
A paper golem: does not breathe. is mindless. has a head, a couple of arms, and a torso. does not eat. (*) is neither male nor female. is normally generated hostile.

A paper golem, ', is a type of monster that appears in NetHack. The paper golem is one of the weakest types of golem in the monster class, and is likely to be the first one a hero encounters.

Paper golems have a claw attack, and possess sleep resistance and poison resistance like all golems. A paper golem that is subjected to stoning will become a stone golem. Fire damage that sets a paper golem aflame can cause them to burn up completely; paper golems that take damage from fire traps, the fire effect of magic traps, and the fire effect of container traps can lose maximum HP up to a value equal to that maximum plus one. A hero polymorphed into a paper golem can also burn up if they take fire damage and can lose the same amount of their current form's maximum HP plus one from the same traps; dying from burning up returns them to normal form, even if they are wearing an amulet of unchanging.

Generation

Randomly-generated paper golems are always created hostile. Paper golems are always generated with 20 HP.

Paper golems can generate as a result of polypiling if there are enough paper objects in a pile of items.

Paper golems leave behind 1-4 scrolls of blank paper upon death instead of a corpse, unless they are burnt up completely by fire damage. They are not a valid target for genocide.

Strategy

Hostile paper golems are not especially threatening with their weak claw attacks, unless the hero is low on HP and struggling to gain distance from one. In a pinch, any available source of fire damage (such as a wand of fire or a lit potion of oil) can be used to instantly destroy one. Paper golems can provide a useful source of blank paper for writing other scrolls with a magic marker.

History

The paper golem first appears in NetHack 3.3.0.

From NetHack 3.3.0 to NetHack 3.4.3, including some variants based on those versions, casting stone to flesh at a statue or figurine of a golem produces a single meatball, since any golem other than the flesh golem or leather golem is considered "vegetarian" due to not being composed of normally-edible material - this is fixed in NetHack 3.6.0 via commit d8a0f734 so that doing so produces a live flesh golem.

From NetHack 3.3.0 to NetHack 3.6.0, including some variants based on those versions, paper golems will still leave death drops even when killed in a manner that causes the "burns completely" message to print - this is fixed in NetHack 3.6.1 via commit 892f210c.

Origin

The gōlem is an animate, anthropomorphic being that originates from Jewish folklore, and is created entirely from inanimate matter, usually clay or mud. The most famous golem narrative is "The Golem of Prague", which tells of the late 16th century rabbi Judah Loew ben Bezalel and his creation of a golem using clay from the Vltava River, which he brought to life to defend the Prague ghetto from anti-Semitic attacks and pogroms. In modern popular culture, the word became generalized to refer to any crude anthropomorphic construct that is made of inanimate material and brought to life by some means, with the method of animation and the resulting creation's sapience and/or sentience varying wildly.

Messages

<The paper golem> burns completely!

A paper golem was hit with fire damage that destroyed it instantly.

You smell burning paper.

As above, while you are blind.

Variants

SLASH'EM

In SLASH'EM, paper golems are always generated with 36 HP. This also applies to SlashTHEM.

dNetHack

In dNetHack, notdNetHack, notnotdNetHack, spell golems are stronger versions of paper golems that drop random scrolls upon death in place of a corpse.

xNetHack

In xNetHack, paper golems can drop various items with an object material of paper upon death - any non-blank scrolls, spellbooks and other invalid objects generated this way are each replaced with a scroll of blank paper.

EvilHack

In EvilHack, wood golems can drop various items with an object material of paper upon death - any non-blank scrolls, spellbooks and other invalid objects generated this way are each replaced with a scroll of blank paper.

Hack'EM

In Hack'EM, paper golems can be instantly destroyed by rot-inducing attacks, such as the bite of a brown pudding.

Paper golems can drop various items with an object material of paper upon death - any non-blank scrolls, spellbooks and other invalid objects generated this way are each replaced with a scroll of blank paper.

Encyclopedia entry

The paper golem shares the same basic encyclopedia entry with other golem monsters that lack a unique entry:

"The original story harks back, so they say, to the sixteenth
century. Using long-lost formulas from the Kabbala, a rabbi is
said to have made an artificial man -- the so-called Golem -- to
help ring the bells in the Synagogue and for all kinds of other
menial work.
"But he hadn't made a full man, and it was animated by some sort
of vegetable half-life. What life it had, too, so the story
runs, was only derived from the magic charm placed behind its
teeth each day, that drew down to itself what was known as the
`free sidereal strength of the universe.'
"One evening, before evening prayers, the rabbi forgot to take
the charm out of the Golem's mouth, and it fell into a frenzy.
It raged through the dark streets, smashing everything in its
path, until the rabbi caught up with it, removed the charm, and
destroyed it. Then the Golem collapsed, lifeless. All that was
left of it was a small clay image, which you can still see in
the Old Synagogue." ...

[ The Golem, by Gustav Meyrink ]