Sleep
- For the trap that inflicts sleep via gas (not to be confused with the sleep gas breath weapon), see sleeping gas trap.
Sleep is a status condition that occurs in NetHack, and can affect both the hero and monsters, rendering them immobile and unconscious for several turns.
Description
Sleep can be inflicted by various items and attacks, and some monsters may even be generated asleep.
A hero that is asleep cannot move for the duration of the status, and their normal rate of nutrition burn (i.e. not counting ring hunger, voracious hunger, or extra hunger from conflict and regeneration) is decreased by 9⁄10.[1] A monster attacking the hero has a 1⁄10 chance per attack of waking them up.[2] While the hero is asleep, "You hear" in sound-related messages is replaced with "You dream that you hear":
- You dream that you hear some noises in the distance.
A monster that is asleep cannot attack and will be rendered immobile for a maximum of 127 turns—[3][4]a monster that is put to sleep in the middle of their attack routine will have it aborted.[5] If a monster holding the hero in some manner is put to sleep, their grip will relax and let the hero free.[6] A hero attacking a sleeping monster will gain a +2 to-hit bonus, but attacking will wake the monster up if they were not put to sleep by magic or by an attack.[7][8] This also applies to the hero's blinding venom and cream pies that hit them, but not to active gaze attacks, which are completely ineffective if the monster cannot see.[9][10] A lawful Knight attacking a sleeping monster takes a -1 penalty to alignment record.[11] The flash of an expensive camera will awaken a sleeping monster with no other effects.[12]
If a sleeping monster is attacked by another monster, they have a 4-point penalty applied to their AC, but will also wake up unless the sleep was applied through magic or an attack.[13] Sleeping shades that are attacked under these conditions will wake up even if they were unaffected by the attack.[14] If a sleeping monster is displaced by another attacking monster, they will always be woken up regardless of how they fell asleep.[15]
Monster generation
More than a few monster types are created asleep, either at level creation or when generated independently, with the exception of bones:
- Leprechaun-class monsters are always generated as asleep.[16]
- Jabberwock-class monsters and nymph-class monsters are generated asleep 4⁄5 of the time unless the hero currently has the Amulet of Yendor.[17]
- The wumpus, long worm, giant eel, and non-unique major demons are generated asleep 4⁄5 of the time at level creation unless the hero currently has the Amulet of Yendor.[18]
- Many special rooms generate with sleeping denizens: throne rooms, barracks, graveyards, beehives, leprechaun halls, cockatrice nests, and antholes.[19][20]
Monsters that are generated asleep will remain so until they are attacked, are awakened by a source of noise, or else wake up with a chance that occurs each time the hero or one of their pets moves without stealth:[21][22] by default, the hero has a 1⁄7 chance of awakening a sleeping monster on each move if they are in the monster's direct line of sight, their position is within a 10-square radius of the monster, and the monster is not imitating furniture or an object (e.g. they are a cloaked mimic).[23][24] A hero that has aggravate monster, or else is walking near a sleeping canine, human or elf will wake that sleeping monster immediately unless they also have stealth.[25]
Nymphs, jabberwocks and leprechauns are not as easily disturbed, and have a 1⁄50 chance of waking up on each move if all other conditions apply, i.e. they have a 1⁄350 chance of being awakened if the hero does not aggravate monsters[26]—conversely, an ettin ignores stealth 9⁄10 of the time.[27]
Sleep sources
Various items and obstacles can cause the hero or monsters to fall asleep:
- Quaffing a potion of sleeping or being subjected to its vapors
- Sleep rays from a zapped wand of sleep, a spell of sleep or a sleep breath weapon
- The restful sleep property, granted by wearing an amulet of restful sleep
- Sleeping gas traps
- Eating a cursed apple—this is a reference to Snow White
- Applying a magic flute with charges
Some monsters also have sleep-inducing attacks, which use the AD_SLEE damage type flag:
- The bite attack of a homunculus, which has a 1⁄5 chance of putting the hero or a monster to sleep[28][29][30]
- The breath weapon used by orange dragons, Nazguls and randomly by the Chromatic Dragon, which can put the hero or a monster to sleep for several turns upon hitting[31][32]
Note that though the breath weapon is described as a "blast of sleep gas", it is the same as the ray from a wand of sleep or the sleep spell and does not behave like the gas from a sleeping gas trap.
Resisting sleep
Sleep resistance is a property that prevents the hero or a monster from falling asleep by any means.
Free action protects the hero against sleep from potions of sleeping.[33][34]
Strategy
Sleep can be an overwhelmingly powerful tool to have access to in the early stages of the game, where it can trivialize combat against otherwise-overwhelming monsters as often as it can spell the hero's doom if they are put to sleep long enough.
History
Sleep as a status property first appears in Hack 1.21 and Hack for PDP-11, which are based on Jay Fenlason's Hack, and is also included in Hack 1.0.
The slowed nutrition drain while the hero is asleep is introduced in NetHack 3.6.1 via commit 43df8c01.
Messages
- You are put to sleep <by the monster>!
- A monster put you to sleep with its melee attack, with the monster's identity omitted if you are blind and cannot see them.
Variants
Variants of NetHack often add several other sources of sleep, including various attacks.
Encyclopedia entry
Sleep is a death; oh, make me try
By sleeping, what it is to die,
And as gently lay my head
On my grave, as now my bed.
References
- Jump up ↑ src/eat.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2799
- Jump up ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 801
- Jump up ↑ src/mhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 301
- Jump up ↑ src/mhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1507: sleep_monst function
- Jump up ↑ src/mhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 526
- Jump up ↑ src/mhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1530: slept_monst function
- Jump up ↑ src/uhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 281
- Jump up ↑ src/uhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 285
- Jump up ↑ src/uhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1000
- Jump up ↑ src/mhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 661
- Jump up ↑ src/uhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 243
- Jump up ↑ src/uhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 301
- Jump up ↑ src/mhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 313
- Jump up ↑ src/uhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1393: end of shade_miss function; youdef is used since shades are nopoly
- Jump up ↑ src/mhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 225
- Jump up ↑ src/makemon.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1259
- Jump up ↑ src/makemon.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1262
- Jump up ↑ src/makemon.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1262
- Jump up ↑ src/makemon.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 255: throne room ruler is placed independently
- Jump up ↑ src/mkroom.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 345: many special room mons are created asleep
- Jump up ↑ src/uhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 2343
- Jump up ↑ src/monmove.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 209
- Jump up ↑ src/monmove.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 224
- Jump up ↑ src/monmove.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 234
- Jump up ↑ src/monmove.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 232
- Jump up ↑ src/monmove.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 226
- Jump up ↑ src/monmove.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 225
- Jump up ↑ src/mhitu.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1104
- Jump up ↑ src/mhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1177
- Jump up ↑ src/mhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1967
- Jump up ↑ src/zap.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 3811
- Jump up ↑ src/zap.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 4199
- Jump up ↑ src/potion.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 809
- Jump up ↑ src/potion.c in NetHack 3.6.7, line 1727
