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NETHACK(6)                       Games Manual                       NETHACK(6)



NETHACK 6 "21 February 2022" NETHACK'

NAME
       nethack - Exploring The Mazes of Menace

SYNOPSIS
       nethack [ -d|--directory directory ] [ -w|--windowtype interface ]
       [ --nethackrc:RC-file | --no-nethackrc ] [ -n ] [ -dec | -ibm ]
       [ -u playername ] [ -X | -D ] [ -p profession ] [ -r race ] [ -@ ]

       Also [ -A|-Arc | -B|-Bar | -C|-Cav | -H|-Hea | -K|-Kni | -M|-Mon |
       -P|-Pri | -R|-Rog | -Ran | -S|-Sam | -T|-Tou | -V|-Val | -W|-Wiz ]

       nethack [ -d|--directory directory ] -s|--scores [ -v ]
       [ -p profession ] [ -r race ] [ playernames ]

       nethack [ --usage | --help ] [ --showpaths ]
       [ --version[:copy|:dump|:show] ]

DESCRIPTION
       NetHack  is a display oriented Dungeons & Dragons(tm) - like game.  The
       standard tty display and command structure resemble rogue.

       Other, more graphical display options exist for most platforms.

       To get started you really only need to know two commands.  The  command
       ?   will  give  you  a list of the available commands (as well as other
       information) and the command / will identify the things you see on  the
       screen.

       To  win  the  game (as opposed to merely playing to beat other people's
       high scores) you must locate the Amulet of Yendor  which  is  somewhere
       below the 20th level of the dungeon and get it out.  Few people achieve
       this; most never do.  Those who have done so  go  down  in  history  as
       heroes  among heroes -- and then they find ways of making the game even
       harder.  See the Guidebook section on Conduct if this game  has  gotten
       too easy for you.

       When  the  game ends, whether by your dying, quitting, or escaping from
       the caves, NetHack will give you (a fragment of) the list of top  scor-
       ers.   The  scoring  is  based  on many aspects of your behavior, but a
       rough estimate is obtained by taking the amount of gold you've found in
       the  cave  plus four times your (real) experience.  Precious stones may
       be worth a lot of gold when brought to the exit.  There is a  10%  pen-
       alty for getting yourself killed.

       The  environment variable NETHACKOPTIONS can be used to initialize many
       run-time options.  The  ?  command  provides  a  description  of  these
       options  and syntax.  (The -dec and -ibm command line options are mutu-
       ally exclusive and are equivalent to the  decgraphics  and  ibmgraphics
       run-time  options  described  there, and are provided purely for conve-
       nience on systems supporting multiple types of terminals.)

       Because the option list can be very long, options may also be  included
       in a configuration file.  The default is located in your home directory
       and named .nethackrc on UNIX systems  (including  descendants  such  as
       linux, NetBSD, and macOS).  On Windows, the name is also .nethackrc but
       the location can vary (see --showpaths below).  On other  systems,  the
       default may be different, possibly NetHack.cnf.  On MS-DOS, the name is
       defaults.nh in NetHack's directory (folder), while on VMS|OpenVMS it is
       nethack.ini in your home directory.  The default configuration file may
       be overridden via the --nethackrc:rc-file command  line  option  or  by
       setting NETHACKOPTIONS in your environment to a string consisting of an
       @ character followed by the path and filename.

       The -u playername option supplies the answer to the question  "Who  are
       you?".   It  overrides any name from the options or configuration file,
       USER, LOGNAME, or getlogin(), which will otherwise be tried  in  order.
       If  none  of these provides a useful name, the player will be asked for
       one.  Player names (in conjunction with uids) are used to identify save
       files, so you can have several saved games under different names.  Con-
       versely, you must use the appropriate player name to  restore  a  saved
       game.

       A playername suffix can be used to specify the profession, race, align-
       ment and/or gender of the character.  The full syntax of the playername
       that  includes  a suffix is "name-ppp-rrr-aaa-ggg".  "ppp" are at least
       the first three letters of the profession (this can also  be  specified
       using  a  separate -p profession option).  "rrr" are at least the first
       three letters of the character's race (this can also be specified using
       a separate -r race option).  "aaa" are at least the first three letters
       of the character's alignment, and "ggg" are at least  the  first  three
       letters  of the character's gender.  Any of the parts of the suffix may
       be left out.

       -p profession can be used to determine the character  profession,  also
       known  as the role.  You can specify either the male or female name for
       the character role, or the first three characters of  the  role  as  an
       abbreviation.

       Likewise, -r race can be used to explicitly request that a race be cho-
       sen.

       The -A|-Arc | -B|-Bar | -C|-Cav | -H|-Hea | -K|-Kni | -M|-Mon | -P|-Pri
       |  -R|-Rog  |  -Ran | -S|-Sam | -T|-Tou | -V|-Val | -W|-Wiz options for
       role selection are maintained for compatibility with older versions  of
       the  program.   They  are mutually exclusive and the single-letter form
       must be uppercase.  Ranger has no single-letter choice  because  -R  is
       already used for the Rogue role.

       -@  tells  nethack  to  choose  any  omitted  characteristics  (profes-
       sion/role, race, gender, alignment) randomly without prompting.  Other-
       wise, leaving out any of these characteristics will result in you being
       prompted during game startup for the information.

       The -n option suppresses printing of any news from the game administra-
       tor.

       The  -X  option  will start the game in a special non-scoring discovery
       mode (also known as explore mode).  -D will start  the  game  in  debug
       mode  (also  known as wizard mode) after changing the character name to
       "wizard", if the player is allowed.  Otherwise it will  switch  to  -X.
       Control  of who is allowed to use debug mode is done via the "WIZARDS="
       line in nethack's sysconf file.

       The -d or --directory option, which must be the first  argument  if  it
       appears,  supplies a directory which is to serve as the playground.  It
       overrides the value from NETHACKDIR, HACKDIR, or the  directory  speci-
       fied   by   the   game   administrator   during   compilation  (usually
       /usr/games/lib/nethackdir).  This option is usually only useful to  the
       game  administrator.   The  playground  must  contain several auxiliary
       files such as help files, the list of top scorers, and  a  subdirectory
       save where games are saved.

       The  -w  or  --windowtype interface option can be used to specify which
       interface to use if the program has been built with  support  for  more
       than  one.   Specifying a value on the command line overrides any value
       specified in the run-time configuration file.  NetHack's #version  com-
       mand shows available interfaces.

       The  --nethackrc:RC-file option will use RC-file instead of the default
       run-time  configuration   file   (typically   ~/.nethackrc)   and   the
       --no-nethackrc  option  can  be used to skip any run-time configuration
       file.

       Some options provide feedback and then exit rather than play the game:

       The -s or --scores option alone will print out the list of your  scores
       on  the  current  version.   An immediately following -v reports on all
       versions present in the score file.  '-s|-s -v' may also be followed by
       arguments  -p  profession and -r race to print the scores of particular
       roles and races only.   Either  can  be  specified  multiple  times  to
       include more than one role or more than one race.  When both are speci-
       fied, score entries which match either the role or the race  (or  both)
       are  printed rather than just entries which match both.  '-s|-s -v' may
       be followed by one or more player names to  print  the  scores  of  the
       players  mentioned, by 'all' to print out all scores, or by a number to
       print that many top scores.  Combining names with role or race or  both
       will  report entries which match any of those rather than just the ones
       which match all.

       --version or --version:show can be used to cause NetHack  to  show  the
       version  number,  the date and time that the program was built from its
       source code, and possibly some auxiliary information about that  source
       code, then exit.  The optional auxiliary information is git commit hash
       (reflecting the source code's most recent modification  when  extracted
       from  the  git  version control system, if that is in use) if available
       when the program was built.  On some  platforms  such  as  Windows  and
       macOS,  a  variation,  --version:copy,  can be used to cause NetHack to
       show the version information, then exit, while also leaving a  copy  of
       that  information in the paste buffer or clipboard for potential inser-
       tion into things like bug reports.  On any platform, --version:dump can
       be used to show most of the data used when checking whether a save file
       or bones file is compatible with the program.  The program will display
       a line containing five numbers expressed in hexadecimal, then exit.

       --showpaths  can be used to cause NetHack to show where it is expecting
       to find various files.  Among other things it shows  the  path  to  and
       name  for  the  player's run-time configuration file, a text file which
       can be edited to customize aspects of how the game operates.

       --usage or --help will display information similar to this manual page,
       then exit.  Use 'nethack --usage | more' to read it a page at a time.

AUTHORS
       Jay  Fenlason  (+  Kenny  Woodland, Mike Thome and Jon Payne) wrote the
       original hack, very much like rogue (but full of bugs).

       Andries Brouwer continuously deformed their sources  into  an  entirely
       different game.

       Mike Stephenson has continued the perversion of sources, adding various
       warped character classes and sadistic  traps  with  the  help  of  many
       strange  people who reside in that place between the worlds, the Usenet
       Zone.  A number of these miscreants are immortalized in the  historical
       roll of dishonor and various other places.

       The  resulting mess is now called NetHack, to denote its development by
       the Usenet.  Andries Brouwer has made this request for the distinction,
       as he may eventually release a new version of his own.

FILES
       Run-time  configuration options were discussed above and use a platform
       specific name for a file in a platform specific  location.   For  Unix,
       the name is '.nethackrc' in the user's home directory.

       All   other   files   are   in   the   playground  directory,  normally
       /usr/games/lib/nethackdir.  If DLB was defined during the compile,  the
       data  files  and  special levels will be inside a larger file, normally
       nhdat, instead of being separate files.

       nethack                     The program itself.
       Guidebook | Guidebook.txt   NetHack's user manual.
       data, oracles, rumors       Data files used by NetHack.
       bogusmon                    Another data file.
       engrave, epitaph, tribute   Still more data files.
       symbols                     Data file holding sets of specifications
                                   for how to display monsters, objects, and
                                   map features.
       options                     Data file containing a description of the
                                   build-time option settings.
       help, hh, cmdhelp           Help data files.  ('cmdhelp' is obsolete.)
       opthelp, optmenu, wizhelp   More help data files.
       keyhelp, usagehlp           Even more help data files.
       *.lua                       Predefined special levels, dungeon control
                                   for special levels, quest texts.
       history                     A short history of NetHack.
       license                     Rules governing redistribution.
       record                      The list of top scorers.
       logfile                     An extended list of games played
                                   (optional).
       xlogfile                    A more detailed version of 'logfile'
                                   (also optional).
       paniclog                    Record of exceptional conditions
                                   discovered during program execution.
       xlock.nn                    Description of dungeon level 'nn' of
                                   active game 'x' if there's a limit on the
                                   number of simultaneously active games.
       UUcccccc.nn                 Alternate form for dungeon level 'nn'
                                   of active game by user 'UU' playing
                                   character named 'cccccc' when there's no
                                   limit on number of active games.
       perm                        Lock file for xlock.0 or UUcccccc.0.
       bonD0.nn                    Descriptions of the ghost and belongings
                                   of a deceased adventurer who met his or
                                   her demise on level 'nn'.  A subsequent
                                   character might encounter this old level.

       save/                       A subdirectory containing saved games.

       sysconf                     System-wide options.  Required if
                                   program is built with 'SYSCF' option
                                   enabled, ignored if not.

       The location of 'sysconf' is specified  at  build  time  and  can't  be
       changed  except  by  updating source file "config.h" and rebuilding the
       program.

       NetHack's Guidebook  might  not  be  present  if  whoever  packaged  or
       installed the program distribution neglected to include it.

       In a perfect world, 'paniclog' would remain empty.

ENVIRONMENT
       USER or LOGNAME         Your login name.
       HOME                    Your home directory.
       SHELL                   Your shell.
       TERM                    The type of your terminal.
       HACKPAGER or PAGER      Replacement for default pager.
       MAIL                    Mailbox file.
       MAILREADER              Replacement for default reader
                               (probably /bin/mail or /usr/ucb/mail).
       NETHACKDIR or HACKDIR   Playground.
       NETHACKOPTIONS          String predefining several NetHack options.

       If  the same option is specified in both NETHACKOPTIONS and .nethackrc,
       the value assigned in NETHACKOPTIONS takes precedence.

       SHOPTYPE and SPLEVTYPE can be used in debugging (wizard) mode.
       DEBUGFILES can be used if the program was built with 'DEBUG' enabled.

SEE ALSO
       recover(6)

BUGS
       Probably infinite.

COPYRIGHT
       This file is Copyright (C) Robert  Patrick  Rankin,  2024  for  version
       NetHack-3.7:1.31.   NetHack  may  be freely redistributed.  See license
       for details.

       Dungeons & Dragons is a Trademark of Wizards of the Coast, Inc.



Project(uc)                    24 December 2024                     NETHACK(6)
