Sword of Balance (SLASH'EM)
) Sword of Balance 
| |
|---|---|
| Base item | silver short sword |
| Damage vs. small | 1d6 +5 +(1d20) |
| Damage vs. large | 1d8 +5 +(1d20) |
| To-hit bonus | +2 |
| Bonus versus | cross-aligned |
| Weapon skill | short sword |
| Size | one-handed |
| Affiliation | |
| When carried |
(none) |
| When wielded |
(none) |
| When invoked |
(none) |
| Base price | 5000 zm |
| Weight | 36 |
| Material | silver |
- For the artifact in other variants, see Sword of Balance.
The Sword of Balance is an artifact that appears in SLASH'EM and SlashTHEM. It is neutral-aligned, and its base item is a silver short sword.
Generation
A silver short sword generated on the ground has a base 1⁄20 chance of being turned into an artifact, which will always be the Sword of Balance, if no other artifacts have yet been generated. Neutral heroes can be given the Sword of Balance as a sacrifice gift.
In SlashTHEM, the Sword of Balance is one of many artifacts available at The Forge, where it has a base price of 1500zm.
Description
While wielded, the Sword of Balance has +2 to-hit and +5 damage bonuses against cross-aligned monsters, i.e. those that are not neutral, in addition to dealing extra damage against silver-hating monsters.
Strategy
The Sword of Balance is relatively weak, with only modest to-hit and damage bonuses that does not apply against various always-hostile neutral monsters—despite this, it can be a passable weapon in the early stages of the game and can prove especially handy against werecreatures, which are always chaotic and are much tougher and more varied than in NetHack. Other valuable targets include the chaotic mumakil, whose 9 speed can be exploited to land consistent hits without being pulped by its powerful headbutt.
As a hero approaches the mid-game, they will want a better long-term weapon in light of the aforementioned monsters such as leocrottas and energy vortices, and neutral hostiles only become even more threatening in the late game (e.g. minotaurs and mastodons). While the Sword of Balance also becomes somewhat weaker in Gehennom due to the lack of lawful monsters outside of certain demons, including demon lords and princes, the presence of chaotic demons, vampires and silver-hating shades prevent the artifact from falling off as harshly as the similar Sceptre of Might; it also remains viable for performing two weapon combat with the artifact in the offhand, where it outperforms ordinary silver sabers, though heroes that have access to artifacts like Skullcrusher or Doomblade will prefer them in the offhand.
History
The Sword of Balance first appears in NetHack Plus, and also appears in SLASH 6.
In previous versions of SLASH'EM, the Sword of Balance could be named in the manner of Sting or Orcrist. This was changed to no longer be possible in the latest stable release.[1]
