Shotgun (dNetHack)
) 
| |
|---|---|
| Name | shotgun |
| Appearance | shotgun |
| Damage vs. small | 1d2 |
| Damage vs. large | 1d2 |
| To-hit bonus | +20 |
| Weapon skill | firearms |
| Size | one-handed |
| Base price | 200 zm (+10/positive enchant) |
| Weight | 35 |
| Material | iron |
- For the firearm in SLASH'EM and its derivatives, see shotgun (SLASH'EM).
- For the "automatic" counterpart, see auto shotgun (dNetHack).
A shotgun is a type of weapon that appears in dNetHack, notdNetHack and notnotdNetHack. The shotgun is a medium-size futuristic launcher that uses the firearms skill and is designed for use with shotgun shells.
The shotgun has a default material of iron, and appears as a broken crossbow for heroes in most roles when unidentified—Anachrononauts, Androids, Pirates, and Undead Hunters will instead see the unidentified item as an "unfamiliar long gun".
Generation
Anachrononauts and Androids start each game with knowledge of the shotgun's appearance.
Shotguns are not randomly generated, though they can be found in bones and can only be wished for by Tourists. They cannot be created by smithing unless the hero is an Undead Hunter that knows their appearance.
Some shotguns can be found on the Anachrononaut quest: A chest in the northeastern-most hall of the base on the Anachrononaut quest home level contains 4 shotguns along with several stacks of shotgun shells, three shotguns are each randomly placed around the locate level at level creation, and two more are randomly placed around the goal level at level creation. These also appear on the Android quest, though the chest only contains two shotguns that each have a 1⁄2 chance of generating.
Shopkeepers and human smiths generated in the future (i.e. the Anachrononaut quest and Android quest) are always generated with a shotgun and two stacks of shotgun shells as ammo.
Deep ones and deeper ones generated in the future have a 1⁄6 chance of generating with a shotgun accompanied by two stacks of shotgun shells as ammo, with the properties of the shotgun itself dependent on which monster is given one: deep ones will have fully eroded shotguns, while deeper ones will have shotguns with 1 level of erosion and an enchantment ranging from +1 to +4.
Description
A shotgun has a +20 to-hit bonus, a very limited range of 3 squares and a -1 rate of fire. The negative rate of fire means that a hero who is Skilled or better in firearms will generally need a shotgun with a high enchantment in order to fire more than one shot per action.
Shotgun shells deal slashing damage when properly fired from a shotgun, and also deal +2d6 damage to zombified monsters that they hit.
Origin
A shotgun, also known as a scattergun, peppergun, or historically as a fowling piece, is a long-barreled firearm that is designed to shoot straight-walled cartridges known as shotshells: these shells either discharge "shot" (numerous small spherical projectiles) or slugs (singular solid projectiles). Shotguns are most commonly used as "smoothbore" firearms, meaning that their gun barrels have no rifling on the inner wall, but rifled barrels for shooting sabot slugs (slug barrels) are also available. Shotguns are derived from older smoothbore firearms, such as the musket widely used by European militaries from the 17th until the mid-19th century—their most direct ancestor is the muzzleloading blunderbuss, also used in similar roles from self-defense to riot control.
Shotguns were often favored by cavalry troops in the early to mid-19th century, due to its ease of use, generally good effectiveness on the move, and its substantial power (particularly for coachmen); by the late 19th century, they were largely replaced by breech-loading rifled firearms shooting spin-stabilized cylindro-conoidal bullets, which were far more accurate with longer effective ranges. The military value of shotguns was rediscovered in the First World War, when American forces used the pump-action Winchester Model 1897 shotgun in trench fighting to great effect. Since then, shotguns have been used in a variety of close-quarters combat roles in civilian, law enforcement, and military applications.
Shotguns come in a wide variety of calibers and gauges, ranging from 5.5 mm (.22 inch) to up to 5 cm (2.0 in), though the 12-gauge (18.53 mm or 0.729 in) and 20-gauge (15.63 mm or 0.615 in) bores are by far the most common. Almost all shotguns are breech-loading and can be single barreled, double barreled, or in the form of a combination gun. Like rifles, shotguns also come in a range of different action types, both single-shot and repeating. For non-repeating designs, over-and-under and side-by-side break action shotguns are by far the most common variants. Although revolving shotguns do exist, most modern repeating shotguns are either pump action or semi-automatic, and are also fully automatic, lever-action, or bolt-action to a lesser extent.
Shotguns have an effective range of about 35 m (38 yd) with buckshot, 45 m (49 yd) with birdshot, 100 m (110 yd) with slugs, and well over 150 m (160 yd) with saboted slugs in rifled barrels, with the spread of small projectiles making a direct hit unnecessary. Comparatively, shotguns and shells in SLASH'EM are exaggeratedly short in range but high-accuracy: this is likely based on a similar trend applied to shotguns in many shooter games, where they are portrayed as close-range weapons with a conical spread range that inflicts heavy damage to targets within the area (presumably due to much of the shot hitting those targets before any spread occurs).
