Gray stone disappeared after kicking
Paulus
teleports, both happened to be in the bottom-left corner. I had
(de)activated one teleport, came back, happened to step on a magic
trap in a tight spot and then used the second teleport to escape an
angry Elvenking and his suite without collecting the first stone. Came
back, killed the royal bastard, found 2 gray stones on his corpse,
picked up the one known to me before as not being heavy and kicked
another one along a dark corridor just to be on the safe side, which
is my usual technique of avoiding loadstones and doesn't normally
damage the kicked object. "The gray stone hits it." Well, I got
distracted with fighting some leftovers from the king's retinue and
cannot locate the stone now. Could someone give me an idea of what is
the case:
1. Any of the stones can disappear when used as projectiles by means
of kicking and hit a monster. (So there is a 50% chance you have just
ruined your luck buddy.)
2. None of the stones can disappear this way. (Have a good look around
for an undetectable brainless creature that is carrying your stone or
another level teleport that whoever's got the stone has stepped on.)
3. Only flint stone can be destroyed by kicking. (Relax, most likely
what you've got is the valuable one.)
Many thanks.
Janis Papanagnou
> [gray stones ...] and kicked
> another one along a dark corridor just to be on the safe side, which
> is my usual technique of avoiding loadstones and doesn't normally
> damage the kicked object. "The gray stone hits it." Well, I got
> distracted with fighting some leftovers from the king's retinue and
> cannot locate the stone now. Could someone give me an idea of what is
> the case:
>
> 1. Any of the stones can disappear when used as projectiles by means
> of kicking and hit a monster. (So there is a 50% chance you have just
> ruined your luck buddy.)
Yes, I think this is the case, but I the probability is neither
50% nor fixed, AFAICT. (Avoid hitting the monsters. And, BTW,
throwing the quest artifact luckstone at your quest leader, as
a special case, won't destroy the artifact.)
> 3. Only flint stone can be destroyed by kicking. (Relax, most likely
> what you've got is the valuable one.)
No, I suppose there's no further distinction; both, stones and
gems, are considered being of the same gem-class type for that
purpose.
Janis
TJR
> back, killed the royal bastard, found 2 gray stones on his corpse,
> picked up the one known to me before as not being heavy and kicked
> another one along a dark corridor just to be on the safe side, which
> is my usual technique of avoiding loadstones and doesn't normally
> damage the kicked object. "The gray stone hits it." Well, I got
> distracted with fighting some leftovers from the king's retinue and
> cannot locate the stone now. Could someone give me an idea of what is
> the case:
>
> 1. Any of the stones can disappear when used as projectiles by means
> of kicking and hit a monster. (So there is a 50% chance you have just
> ruined your luck buddy.)
> 2. None of the stones can disappear this way. (Have a good look around
> for an undetectable brainless creature that is carrying your stone or
> another level teleport that whoever's got the stone has stepped on.)
> 3. Only flint stone can be destroyed by kicking. (Relax, most likely
> what you've got is the valuable one.)
There is a source code comment magic stones cannot disappear. I'm not
sure about flint stones.
http://nethack.wikia.com/wiki/Dothrow.c#line1317
The most likely explanation is some magic-liking monster picked it up.
I think mostly (only?) brainy monsters have the "likes magic"
attribute, so you stand a good chance of finding the stone with
telepathy. Don't rely on object detection in this case: it shows only
one object per monster, and I don't know which one.
What would really suck is if that monster stepped on a level teleport
trap.
Janis Papanagnou
>
> There is a source code comment magic stones cannot disappear. I'm not
> sure about flint stones.
> http://nethack.wikia.com/wiki/Dothrow.c#line1317
But luckstones aren't considered magic, are they?
Janis
TJR
wrote:
They are. http://www.steelypips.org/nethack/343/wan2-343.html#magical
Janis Papanagnou
> On 20 Aug., 14:26, Janis Papanagnou <janis_papanag...@hotmail.com>
> wrote:
>> But luckstones aren't considered magic, are they?
>
> They are. http://www.steelypips.org/nethack/343/wan2-343.html#magical
Ah, I missed the flag in objects.c but it is there, indeed. Thanks.
Janis
Doug Freyburger
>
> The most likely explanation is some magic-liking monster picked it up.
> I think mostly (only?) brainy monsters have the "likes magic"
> attribute, so you stand a good chance of finding the stone with
> telepathy. Don't rely on object detection in this case: it shows only
> one object per monster, and I don't know which one.
I think it's a good idea to explore the entire level again to look for
it and/or for a monster carrying it.
> What would really suck is if that monster stepped on a level teleport
> trap.
Are objects effected by level teleport traps? I thought the "It hits
it" meant the trap just teleported the luckstone to a random level.
Exploring top to bottom would suck.
TJR
It (the projectile) hits it (a monster). No traps involved. My guess
is: the "targeted" monster picked up the luckstone projectile right
away. If the monster hadn't, Paulus probably wouldn't have asked on
RNG where the stone is.
If the RNG was especially mean to him, that monster later stepped on a
level teleport trap. Objects in a monster's inventory are of course
affected by levelport traps that whisk the monster away.
While we're at it, AFAIK the only objects that can be teleported in
their own right by a trap are boulders.
Janis Papanagnou
>
> If the RNG was especially mean to him, that monster later stepped on a
> level teleport trap. Objects in a monster's inventory are of course
> affected by levelport traps that whisk the monster away.
If the RNG would have been especially mean to him, a monster would
have stepped onto a polytrap, became a black dragon, and disintegrated
the monster with the luckstone that's residing in between you and the
dragon. ;-}
My tame dog once picked up my BoH and got disintegrated that way. :-(
Janis
Paulus
to the character who is not at Mines' End right now but from memory -
there was no other known level teleport in the area and no monster or
pet likely to grab the stone and visible by telepathy at the time of
stone's disappearance. I still carry the other stone and 2 more of the
same appearance found previously. The latter makes is a bit hard to
believe they are luckstones; at the same time, taking into account the
usual way RNG behaves, they probably are. Actually, I was just offered
30 for one at a shop, which I guess settles it. Too good. Sounds like
I am going to run into something particularly nasty just around the
corner...
Paulus
for the weekend I happened to kill an Ogre King or someone similar
carrying a gray stone among other stuff 1 level above Mines' End. Not
that I really hoped the stone to be the one from Mines' End but my
typing fingers slipped somehow so... I had a loadstone identified
straight away. Was lucky to have found 2 bottles of holy water by
then, which makes the perspective of a particularly annoying demise in
the caring hands of RNG even more promising.)
Doug Freyburger
If you want a spoiler on identifying objects in general and gems in
particular here it is -
http://www.steelypips.org/nethack/id_faq.html#gems
It starts with methods to identify gray stones by type.
A bit on having more than one luckstone - Blessed ones stop positive
luck from decaying. Cursed ones stop negative luck from decaying.
Uncursed ones stop either type of luck form decaying. If you have more
than one in your open inventory the majority wins. If I ever end up
with two I like to carry a blessed one in my open inventory and another
blessed one in the bag. If the one in my open inventory is no longer
blessed I swap which one is in the bag and bless the next time holy
water is available.