This is not true. Falling into poisonous pit traps, meeting hordes of
orcs with poisonous arrows, a swarm of killer bees; all are common in
the early game, and getting poison resistance I'd certainly consider
an achieved milestone in being prepared for surviving.
Poison is the #1 in the special deaths subset
1 47146 2.939 poison related
How rare is the "special death" subset?
Couple things. A wished for artifact weapon (as I laid out) is going to completely mitigate many of these deaths. A wished for artifact weapon will be selected, so it will be very powerful (rather than a random one from a sacrifice). The +d5 and double (
or more) damage from an artifact weapon will kill bees in a single hit, (they only have 1 hit die) and you will most likely hit the first time because of the bonus to hit. That completely mitigates (doesn't eliminate but highly mitigates) that form of
poison.
When you are looking at "death by poison" I think you are really looking at "Death by killer bees". Killer bees are one of the most common ways to die in nethack. Players even die with poison resistance from killer bees, they are very fast, and if you
keep missing them,
For orcs, the reason people get killed by them is that they use their pets to fight at a long distance from them, which is a mistake. The proper strategy is to only fight these orcs up close. Since most people meander at a distance using their pets, they
will get hit with poison missiles. Because of my pro-artifact petless combat strategy, I can only remember one time when I was killed by an orcish arrow. This is also an experience thing. Most players don't know they can be killed by a single arrow. It's
mitigated by knowledge as well.
Poison resistance is mitigated by knowledge as well. Once you have a unicorn horn to mitigate the penalties from eating corpses that can give you the resistance, you are off to the races. This can vary by game, but often happens that you encounter a
unicorn way before the castle (usually after completing sokobon and the mines). And yes I kill co aligned unicorns, because poison resistance and the ability to negate all status ailments is key.
This leaves dart traps, poison spikes, and chests. I would say those are rare. You can go the whole game without hitting a dart trap. Chance of poison 1 in 6 and chance of death 1 in 10. I have never been instakilled by a dart trap.
Iron Golems and Green Dragons? You will have poison resistance by then.
People also die of eating poisonous corpses (not food poisoning, but actual hp loss from eating poisonous corpses). Newbies die from eating kobolds all the time. I did it many times as a newbie, and even once after I could ascend.
Poisonous pit traps that kill you are not "common". That has happened to me... uh... 3 times or so over 20 years of nethack. Sure that happens. It's a hater. But not something I would wish/prevent.
Barbarians, Orcs, Healers and Monks don't have to worry about poison resistance, so they wouldn't wish to prevent being poisoned. I haven't died from poison in... many years now. I know how to avoid it. (and playing petless helps).
In my wish list, you could, instead of wishing for an escape item or wand of polymorph, use your fifth wish on amulet of poison resistance. I think that would be a waste though. Since dying of poison is rare for experienced players an AOLS is also an "
Amulet of not dying from poisoning".
This is also the WORST likelihood. You have a 1/3 chance of only getting 5 wishes from a WOW. You may get 6 or 7.
In terms of "Light", that is, seeing monsters in advance, many things give you that ability. In every game I am of course looking for ways to see monsters. The main dark areas are the gnomish mines, the levels just before medusa's island (which are often
dark) the Valley of the Dead and maze levels in gehennom. Telepathy gives you that ability, for instance. With telepathy, set your blindfold to (a) and then just tap "a", "a" to turn it on and off rapidly. In my last game I used normal lamps and
polypiled for potions of oil. Only took me 7 potions of oil (and spellbook of magic mapping) to get through the whole game with the same effect of a magic lamp. Game before that I played wizard and used the Light spell all the time. Game before that I
used a lamp wish for SDSM and then wished up helm of telepathy at the castle. One of my favorite artifacts to wish for (if I get the chance) as a lawful is the eyes of the overworld. MAN x ray vision is FANTASTIC (plus you get magic resistance from them).
Rings of warning even are good. This game I got Sunsword, which does the exact same thing as a magic lamp, and also is, you know, a weapon that deals damage and extra to undead.
At the castle I usually also wish for spellbook of magic mapping if I can, this is less time walking around in the dark, so rather than doing those levels with no light source you can do them wiht a regular oil lamp. I also have been known to use wishes
at the castle for a magic marker: all of the charges (and after recharge) being used for magic mapping the maze levels of gehennom. Less time wandering around in the dark.
Extrinsic Telepathy also has a range larger than a magic lamp. Consider the value of wishing for an artifact that ALSO grants intrinsic Telepathy. It does, (better than a magic lamp) what you want, but is also an artifact that grants other properties.
Helm of telepathy, amulet of esp, longbow of diana, Orb of detection, magic mirror of merlin, and PYEC all produce extrinsic telepathy, meaning you can see monsters up to 18 diameter around you. This is strictly better than a magic lamp and not only that,
these artifacts provide other important properties as well (reflection, magic resistance, magic resistance, magic resistance/charging). You can't compare a magic lamp to these and rationally conclude a magic lamp is better. That's madness!
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