Combat

Every roll happens on the server. The client only sends “I want to attack this monster”; the server decides what happened.

Hit resolution

Attacks roll an exploding d20:

roll total + attack bonus >  target Guard   →  hit
roll total + attack bonus ≤  target Guard   →  miss

Note it’s strictly greater. Rolling exactly the target’s Guard is a miss.

Attack bonus:

• Player = floor(level / 2) + your STR modifier + weapon enchant +N
• Monster = level (not halved) — steeper than the player curve, because player Guard climbs from gear rather than level. A CSV attackBonus in monsters.csv overrides the default, and the place attack bonus below stacks on top of whichever value applies.

Place attack bonus

Player Guard has no ceiling — gear and enchants can push it arbitrarily high — but monster attack bonus is capped at level 20, and a 28-point gap can’t fit inside a single d20’s window. So difficulty isn’t scaled through the monster itself, it’s scaled through where you fight:

Dungeons: bonus = max(0, depth − 5) × 3
Surface:  bonus = max(0, distance from town − 300m) / 20m

• Monster level, HP, damage, and XP are all untouched — only the attack bonus changes.
• Safe zones keep their existing difficulty: Old Crypt’s first 5 floors and the 300m ring around town both sit at bonus 0.
• Deep dungeon floors and remote wilderness get noticeably harder as a result — enchant scrolls (see Enchanting) go from a nice extra to the price of admission out there.

Exploding d20

Roll a d20. On a 20, roll again and add it. If that roll is also 20, add again (up to 5 extra rolls — a total of 120 already beats any Guard).

Roll 13          →  total 13
Roll 20, 10      →  total 30
Roll 20, 20, 4   →  total 44

Why. A flat “natural 20 always hits” rule floors hit chance at exactly 5% — an artifact of the die having 20 faces, not a balance choice: a kobold would land a hit on a fully plate-armored player once every twenty swings no matter how much Guard you stack. The exploding die instead shrinks the odds the further short you are, without ever flooring at zero: every time the gap crosses another 20 points, the chance is cut by another 1/20. A kobold (+1) hits Guard 40 just 0.25% of the time — about once every 400 swings, or 13 minutes at its 1.9s attack cooldown. A natural 1 gets no special treatment.

Hit chance

Columns are the target’s Guard, rows are your total attack bonus.

11

Attack bonus	Guard 8	Guard 9	Guard 10	Guard 11	Guard 13	Guard 15
+0	60%	55%	50%	45%	35%	25%
+1	65%	60%	55%	50%	40%	30%
+2	70%	65%	60%	55%	45%	35%
+3	75%	70%	65%	60%	50%	40%
+4	80%	75%	70%	65%	55%	45%
+5	85%	80%	75%	70%	60%	50%
+6	90%	85%	80%	75%	65%	55%
+7	95%	90%	85%	80%	70%	60%
+8	100%	95%	90%	85%	75%	65%
+9	100%	100%	95%	90%	80%	70%
+10	100%	100%	100%	95%	85%	75%

No critical-fumble rule — and no guaranteed miss either

Unlike most D&D-derived systems, this one has no natural-1-always-misses rule. If your attack bonus ≥ target Guard, even a 1 connects — hit chance really does reach 100%. In the other direction, hit chance approaches 0% but never truly reaches it — the exploding die always leaves a chance (see above), even if it takes hundreds or thousands of swings.

Hitting each monster

Look up your total attack bonus (half your level, plus your STR modifier):

20

Monster	Guard	+0	+2	+4	+6	+8
Kobold	8	60%	70%	80%	90%	100%
Goblin	9	55%	65%	75%	85%	95%
Stalker	10	50%	60%	70%	80%	90%
Female Orc	10	50%	60%	70%	80%	90%
Orc	11	45%	55%	65%	75%	85%
Goblin Chief	11	45%	55%	65%	75%	85%
Hobgoblin	12	40%	50%	60%	70%	80%
Gnoll	13	35%	45%	55%	65%	75%
Orc Warlord	13	35%	45%	55%	65%	75%
Bugbear	14	30%	40%	50%	60%	70%
Forgotten Dead	14	30%	40%	50%	60%	70%
Ogre	15	25%	35%	45%	55%	65%
Lizardfolk	15	25%	35%	45%	55%	65%
Troll	16	20%	30%	40%	50%	60%
Stone Golem	17	15%	25%	35%	45%	55%
Ogre Warlord	17	15%	25%	35%	45%	55%
Cyclop	20	5%	10%	20%	30%	40%
Skeleton	20	5%	10%	20%	30%	40%
Skeleton Warrior	24	4%	5%	5%	10%	20%
Skeleton Knight	32	2%	3%	3%	3%	4%

Monsters hitting you

The other direction, by your Guard (DEX base plus equipment):

20

Monster	To-hit	Your Guard 10	Your Guard 14	Your Guard 18	Your Guard 22	Damage on hit
Kobold	+1	55%	35%	15%	5%	1d4
Goblin	+2	60%	40%	20%	5%	1d4
Stalker	+3	65%	45%	25%	5%	1d6
Orc	+4	70%	50%	30%	10%	1d6
Female Orc	+4	70%	50%	30%	10%	1d6
Hobgoblin	+5	75%	55%	35%	15%	1d8
Goblin Chief	+5	75%	55%	35%	15%	1d8
Gnoll	+6	80%	60%	40%	20%	2d6
Bugbear	+7	85%	65%	45%	25%	2d6
Ogre	+8	90%	70%	50%	30%	2d8
Forgotten Dead	+8	90%	70%	50%	30%	3d6
Troll	+9	95%	75%	55%	35%	2d10
Stone Golem	+10	100%	80%	60%	40%	2d10
Orc Warlord	+10	100%	80%	60%	40%	2d8
Ogre Warlord	+10	100%	80%	60%	40%	2d8
Lizardfolk	+13	100%	95%	75%	55%	3d6
Cyclop	+15	100%	100%	85%	65%	3d8
Skeleton	+20	100%	100%	100%	90%	6d8
Skeleton Warrior	+20	100%	100%	100%	90%	6d8
Skeleton Knight	+25	100%	100%	100%	100%	6d12

Stacking Guard pays off very directly — within the attacker’s plain d20 range, each +1 costs them 5% hit chance. Past that range the exploding die takes over, and the odds drop much faster than 5% per point since each extra 20-point band costs another 1/20. A full plate set (19 Guard total) plus an armor enchant scroll makes you nearly unhittable by low-level monsters, but deep-dungeon monsters keep pace better since their attack bonus tracks their level directly.

Damage

Damage is only rolled on a hit. Dice notation is {count}d{sides}:

2d6  →  roll two six-sided dice and sum (2–12)

Player melee adds your STR modifier.

Weapon damage

14

Weapon	Damage	Min	Avg	Max	Weight
Great Sword	2d8	2	9.0	16	6 kg
Steel Longsword	1d10	1	5.5	10	4 kg
Iron Sword	1d8	1	4.5	8	3 kg
Notched Iron Sword	1d8	1	4.5	8	3 kg
Morningstar	1d8	1	4.5	8	5 kg
Greatclub	1d8	1	4.5	8	10 kg
Worn Iron Sword	1d6	1	3.5	6	3 kg
Spear	1d6	1	3.5	6	4 kg
Dagger	1d4	1	2.5	4	1 kg
Goblin Sword	1d4	1	2.5	4	2 kg
Small Sword	1d4	1	2.5	4	1.5 kg
Torch	1d4	1	2.5	4	1 kg
Worn Torch	1d4	1	2.5	4	1 kg
Bow	1d1	1	1.0	1	2 kg

The STR modifier applies to every hit, so it lifts low-damage weapons proportionally more: STR 18 (+4) with a Dagger (1d4, average 2.5) actually averages 6.5 — 2.6× the base.

Ranged weapons (protocol v53)

A weapon can declare three extra fields: range (meters; absent means melee, using the server’s fixed 2m reach), rangedAbility (which ability replaces STR for the hit and damage bonus), and hands (how many hands it occupies — 2 seals the off-hand too). The Bow is the first weapon to use any of them: two-handed, 10m range, hit and damage driven by DEX.

• Range is gated on max(melee reach, weapon range) — walls, closed doors, and furniture block a shot the same way they block a swing. Fences don’t block a shot — an arrow flies straight over one (protocol v69), though fences still block movement and melee attacks. An attack beyond range but within the 10m provoke distance only wakes the target; it deals no damage.
• Chasing a target stops at the weapon’s own range and fires from there — there’s no kiting room.
• A landed shot shows a visible arrow in flight (a fixed 30 m/s, re-aiming every frame to guarantee it reaches the target’s current position). A miss keeps its original heading and flies 3m past before vanishing.

The bow’s own die is a token (1d1) — the real damage comes from the arrow, and the two dice roll together, the same path a monster takes when it adds its own die to a wielded weapon’s:

3

Item	Dice	Average	Note
Bow	1d1	1.0	The bow itself — sets range and ability only
Iron Arrow	1d6	3.5	Combined average 4.5, close to Iron Sword (1d8)
Steel Arrow	1d8	4.5	Combined average 5.5, close to Steel Longsword (1d10)

The bow needs arrows to fire: items.csv’s ammoKind pairs bow and arrow by sharing the same name (arrow); a weapon without ammoKind costs nothing to fire, so melee weapons are untouched. Arrows stack in your bag, don’t take an equip slot, and can’t be enchanted.

• Equipping a bow with no valid selection yet auto-picks the strongest stack in your bag.
• Manually picking a cheaper arrow is never overridden just because you pick up a better one.
• Running the chosen stack dry auto-drops to the next-strongest arrow; an empty bag rejects the attack (OutOfAmmo) and stops auto-attack too, so it doesn’t spam a rejection every cooldown.

Equipping a hands: 2 weapon (only the bow, for now) unequips your off-hand item to your bag and refuses any off-hand equip while worn.

The Guard scale

Guard is NetHack’s AC inverted — higher is better.

Guard	Meaning
0–7	Barely defended
8–9	Light defence
10	Ordinary
11–13	Solid
14+	Heavy armor and up

Against NetHack: Guard = 10 − AC.

Experience

XP per kill

XP = 1 + level² + max(Guard - 10, 0) × 2

Guard above 10 earns a bonus — harder monsters pay more.

20

Monster	Level	Guard	XP	Health	XP / health
Kobold	1	8	2	5	0.40
Goblin	2	9	5	9	0.56
Stalker	3	10	10	14	0.71
Female Orc	4	10	17	18	0.94
Orc	4	11	19	18	1.06
Goblin Chief	5	11	28	23	1.22
Hobgoblin	5	12	30	23	1.30
Gnoll	6	13	43	27	1.59
Bugbear	7	14	58	32	1.81
Forgotten Dead	8	14	73	40	1.82
Ogre	8	15	75	36	2.08
Troll	9	16	94	41	2.29
Orc Warlord	10	13	107	120	0.89
Stone Golem	10	17	115	45	2.56
Ogre Warlord	10	17	115	140	0.82
Lizardfolk	13	15	180	59	3.05
Cyclop	15	20	246	68	3.62
Skeleton	16	20	277	72	3.85
Skeleton Warrior	20	24	429	90	4.77
Skeleton Knight	25	32	670	350	1.91

XP / health is the efficiency column — higher means more XP per point of health you have to chew through. The Orc Warlord gives the most XP but takes 120 health to get there, so it isn’t the most efficient.

XP to level

Levels 2–50 now follow a table paced by in-game play time (see the updates log, protocol v39) instead of a pure exponential; doubling only resumes past level 50:

XP(n) = XP(50) × 2^(n-50)      (n > 50)

The table is tuned around a standard player putting in 4 hours a day: 5 to 22 minutes per level from 2–10 (2 hours cumulative), 22 minutes to 5.5 hours per level from 10–30 (roughly once a day), 5.5 to 8 hours per level from 30–50 (about once every two days late), for a total of roughly 199.5 hours (50 days) to reach level 50.

50

Level	Cumulative XP	This level costs	Orcs, roughly
1	0	—	—
2	17	17	1
3	76	59	4
4	226	150	8
5	586	360	19
6	1,256	670	36
7	2,356	1,100	58
8	4,056	1,700	90
9	6,556	2,500	132
10	9,956	3,400	179
11	17,156	7,200	379
12	29,156	12,000	632
13	48,156	19,000	1,000
14	74,156	26,000	1,369
15	110,156	36,000	1,895
16	158,156	48,000	2,527
17	219,156	61,000	3,211
18	296,156	77,000	4,053
19	391,156	95,000	5,000
20	511,156	120,000	6,316
21	651,156	140,000	7,369
22	811,156	160,000	8,422
23	1,001,156	190,000	10,000
24	1,231,156	230,000	12,106
25	1,491,156	260,000	13,685
26	1,791,156	300,000	15,790
27	2,131,156	340,000	17,895
28	2,521,156	390,000	20,527
29	2,961,156	440,000	23,158
30	3,451,156	490,000	25,790
31	3,991,156	540,000	28,422
32	4,581,156	590,000	31,053
33	5,221,156	640,000	33,685
34	5,911,156	690,000	36,316
35	6,661,156	750,000	39,474
36	7,471,156	810,000	42,632
37	8,341,156	870,000	45,790
38	9,271,156	930,000	48,948
39	10,271,156	1,000,000	52,632
40	11,371,156	1,100,000	57,895
41	12,571,156	1,200,000	63,158
42	13,771,156	1,200,000	63,158
43	15,071,156	1,300,000	68,422
44	16,471,156	1,400,000	73,685
45	17,971,156	1,500,000	78,948
46	19,571,156	1,600,000	84,211
47	21,271,156	1,700,000	89,474
48	23,071,156	1,800,000	94,737
49	24,971,156	1,900,000	100,000
50	26,971,156	2,000,000	105,264

The last column converts to Orcs (level 4, Guard 11, 19 XP each). The outdoor roster currently tops out at the level-15 Cyclops, and dungeon depth scaling stalls at depth 20, so real pacing tracks the table only up to roughly levels 15–20 — past that there’s nothing tougher to fight, so it runs well behind the table.

The death penalty

Dying costs no equipment but does cost XP:

level band = XP(L+1) - XP(L)
penalty    = max(1, floor(band × 0.15))

That’s 15% of your progress through the current level.

Losing a level

If the deduction drops you below the level’s starting XP you lose a level. Two protections:

• At most one level per death.
• Level 1 never drops.

After a drop your XP is floored at 30% through the lower band, so you don’t end up stuck just short of relevelling over and over.

12

Level	Level band	Lost on death	Orcs to recover
2	59	8	1
3	150	22	2
4	360	54	3
5	670	100	6
6	1,100	165	9
7	1,700	255	14
8	2,500	375	20
9	3,400	510	27
10	7,200	1,080	57
11	12,000	1,800	95
12	19,000	2,850	150
13	26,000	3,900	206

Losing a level costs health too

So that repeatedly levelling up and down can’t be farmed for health, the distribution of health lost on a level-down is identical to the health gained on a level-up:

roll the hit die, guarantee at least half, add the CON modifier

The long-run expectation is therefore zero — no statistical gain from cycling. Health also never drops below your level 1 value.

4

Hit die	Classes	Expected gain / loss
d10	Barbarian, Caveman, Knight, Valkyrie	6.50
d8	Ranger, Samurai, Monk, Priest	5.25
d6	Archaeologist, Healer, Rogue, Wizard, Bard	4.00
d4	Tourist	2.75

If you didn’t lose a level, you don’t lose health.

Respawning

Request a respawn and the server confirms your health is 0, refills it and returns you to the origin (0, 0, 0). Satiation resets to 300 — the bottom of the Well-Fed band — so you don’t respawn starving and immediately go Weak.

Phoenix Talisman: revive where you fell

Carry a phoenix talisman and the death dialog offers a “Use Phoenix Talisman” button. Using it revives you in place, on the same floor, restoring 70% of max HP and spending one talisman; the death XP penalty already applied is unaffected. Unlike a normal respawn, reviving in place does not reset satiation, and there’s no invulnerability window afterward. Using it while alive is refused and the talisman is kept. Sold by Rica for 5,000c, and also a 0.2% world drop.

Monster AI

Monster AI runs on the client, but attack resolution always goes to the server.

State	Meaning
idle	Waiting (30% chance to wander)
walk	Moving
run	Chasing a player (within chase range)
attack	Attacking (within attack range)
hit	Stagger from being hit (~800 ms)
dead	Dead

A dead monster is removed after 30 seconds. Per-monster chase ranges and attack intervals are in Monster index.

Both “attacks on sight” and “fights back only” monsters engage the moment a player gets within 5m, no provocation needed — “fights back only” is no longer a safe distance to walk past at.

Debuffs

Some monster attacks and foods attach a debuff. The same debuff never stacks — retriggering it just refreshes the duration — but different debuffs can be active at once, and their multipliers multiply together.

6

Debuff	Chance	Duration	DPS	Move speed	Attack speed	Max carry	Armor weight (wet)	Satiation drain	HP regen
Food Poisoning	70%	5 min	—	×0.6	×0.6	×0.6	—	×4	Stops
Bleeding	35%	8s	1	—	—	—	—	—	Stops
Wet	100%	7.5 min	—	×0.83	—	—	×1.5	—	—
Tipsy	100%	5 min	—	×1.1	×1.1	—	—	—	—
Drunk	100%	5 min	—	×0.85	×0.85	×0.85	—	—	—
Wasted	100%	5 min	—	×0.6	×0.6	×0.6	—	—	—

Bleeding — rolled on a hit from a gnoll’s claws. Its damage die was lowered from 2d8 to 2d6 to make room for the new effect. Bleeding can kill outright; the death is handled the same way as a monster kill, with no credited killer.

Food Poisoning — the risk of eating raw fish; see Food and satiation.

Wet — triggers when you wade into a river or the sea, lasting 450 seconds (one in-game hour). Move speed drops to ×0.83 (running falls from 4.5 to 3.75, between walking’s 3.0 and running’s 4.5), and armor worn or carried in your bag gets heavier from soaking up water (armor weight ×1.5) — the more armor you’re carrying, the bigger the bite out of your usable carry capacity. Walking through water keeps refreshing the timer; the countdown only starts once you step out. Standing near a lit campfire (within 3m) dries you faster — 45 seconds to go from soaked to dry. Crossing a bridge doesn’t count as wading. As of protocol v78, standing in the rain long enough triggers the same Wet debuff — see Weather for the details.

Skills and mana (protocol v71–v79)

A blue MP bar now sits under the HP bar over your character’s head, for every class — even if you don’t have any ability that spends MP yet. Max MP is calculated from your class, WIS, and level, and regenerates naturally every 16 real seconds; it won’t start regenerating until 10 real seconds after your last spend. Existing characters were topped up to their max MP the first time they logged in after this shipped, and the max recalculates on level-up.

The character panel’s ABILITIES tab lists your available skills as icons — drag one onto the existing 1–0 quickslots to use it, sharing the same drag-and-tooltip code as your inventory.

Ability	Granted to	Requires	Effect	Cooldown
Double Slash	Rogue, by default	Dagger in main hand	Your next basic attack becomes two independent hits, each at 100% damage	10s
Guardian Ward	Knight, by default	Sword or Mace in main hand + Shield off-hand	+10% Guard for yourself and party members within 20m on the same floor, for 60s	45s, costs 2 MP

Guardian Ward used to cost satiation; as of protocol v79 it costs 2 MP instead. You can’t cast it below 2 MP, and a failed cast doesn’t spend MP or start the cooldown. Recasting just refreshes the duration back to 60s — it doesn’t stack.

The server’s ability list also defines Radiance (a self-only toggled light) and True Aim (a bow skill that guarantees a hit on the marked target), fully implemented and protocol-supported — but they’re deliberately hidden from the skill list and quickslots for now, so players can’t use them yet.

Shields now have their own armorType: shield classification (currently just the Wooden Shield and Raven Shield) — an off-hand torch doesn’t count as one. The Goblin Sword and Small Sword were folded into the Sword weapon type; Dagger and Great Sword remain their own types.