TomeNET

(5.9b) Artifacts and artifact resets                                            
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(For information about the 'timeout' on true artifacts, see 'Artifact resets'
further below.)

Artifacts of any type cannot be enchanted by any means, nor harmed by elemental
attacks of any type. Also they have a high chance to resist disenchantment
effects. (If the player actually resists disenchantment already then they are
completely safe.)

Artifacts can be destroyed only by very few means:
By a monster that has KILL_ITEM or TAKE_ITEM (and won't drop it again on death)
flag, by Nazgul if it's a weapon, or by reading a scroll of curse armour or
of curse weapon. Artifacts generally have a decent (or in case of Nazgul-touch
even a very high) chance to resist destruction.
Three artifacts are even indestructible: Morgoth's crown, hammer and the ring
of phasing.


Artifact types in general
-------------------------
Some items are 'named', those possess especially great magic powers and are
also called 'Artifacts'.
Different from other items artifacts will pseudo-ID as 'special' (given
sufficient combat/magic/archery skill) or as 'terrible' if they are cursed.

The artifact name can either be given as a real name, for example:
    The Dagger 'Nimthanc'
or it can be in the form of a description like for example:
    The Whip of Gothmog
The 'The' indicates that this item is one of a kind, aka an artifact.

To find out all about the magic powers of an artifact it needs to be
*identified*, for example by a 'Scroll of *Identify*' or in one of the *ID*
shops that occur in most towns, which will usually cost around 2000..3000 gold.

Some artifacts can be 'A'ctivated for a special effect. This will be shown
in the list of its powers that you get when *identifying* it.

Artifact ammunition never breaks or (in case of boomerangs) falls down to the
floor instead of returning. Artifact weapons are harder to get disarmed.

There are two classes of artifacts, 'true artifacts' (or short 'truearts',
also called 'static artifacts') and 'random artifacts' or short 'randarts':


True artifacts ('Truearts', also called 'static artifacts')
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True artifacts, are predefined in the a_info.txt file and will always sell for
their defined value even if they have not been *identified*.
You can search a list of all true artifacts in game, by pressing  ~ 6 .

True Artifacts are unique. If an artifact is owned by a player, noone else can
find it anymore until it's lost (for example if the player dies) or sold to a
shop, or if the player drops it to the floor and leaves it behind.
Depending on a server's configuration artifacts that are sold to shops usually
stay a while in the shop and can be bought by other players before they finally
disappear from the stock.

Usually true artifacts may not be dropped into a house (will just disappear!)
and may not be picked up by winners, ie characters that have beaten Morgoth.
Artifacts in possession by a player when he beats Morgoth and hence acquires a
royal winner title will disappear if he drops them. If he decides to keep them,
they will now time out at twice the normal speed.
There are a few exceptions: True artifacts specifically designed for winners!
These have the WINNERS_ONLY flag and will actually timeout at half the normal
speed at which artifacts time out (for non-winner players). So usually they
should last for 10 weeks instead of the usual 5 weeks of normal true artifacts.
These winner-artifacts can also be handled, dropped and traded between winners
normally without disappearing.

Since static artifacts are predefined and have fixed abilities, their number
therefore is limited and only one of them can exist at a given time in the game
world. Thanks to the existence of random artifacts (see below) this won't be
able to cause any shortage of artifacts that can be found though, as you can
still find infinitely many random artifacts even if all true artifacts are
already in possession of other players.

True artifacts will also be erased if they are left on the ground and the
dungeon level or worldmap sector gets 'unstaticed', that means it gets reset
because no players have been on it for a while (can be instantaneous for world
map sectors or dungeon floors that are left without any players on them, and up
to many hours in case someone ghost-died on a dungeon level, which can render
the dungeon level 'static' for that time to allow others to retrieve the loot).

For that reason, if you want to drop an artifact and pick it up with another
character, make sure you do this in town, not in a wilderness sector!

Note that some cursed true artifacts can be sold to stores after you removed
the curse. Having a curse does not necessarily mean the item's value is zero,
but shops in general will not buy any item that still carries a curse.


Random Artifacts ('Randarts')
-----------------------------
Random artifacts are composed randomly and even if they happen to bear the same
name might have totally different powers. Randarts need to be *identified* to
sell for what they are really worth.
Randarts can be dropped in houses and used by anyone just fine, with the
exception that randarts that give a hit point bonus can only be found/created
by winners (characters that have beaten Morgoth), and that the hit point bonus
will not apply if a non-winner character happens to use them.

As was just mentioned, randarts can actually be created by players, using a
'Scroll of Artifact Creation' which are somewhat often sold in the 'Expensive
Black Market' in Minas Anor, but also may very rarely spawn in normal black
markets.
The advantage of creating an artifact is that the player can determine the
base item type he wants to use. For more information about artifact creation
see (9.4).

The abilities a randart gets do not depend on depth, monsters, chests, the
player himself or any 'Luck' bonus. Instead, they are always truly random and
only depend on the item base type.
(The only exception is the hit point bonus restriction mentioned above.)

The level of the final object (ie the level restriction that determines what
minimum level someone else has to be to become the new item owner when trading
the item) depends partially on its powers and partially on the depth where it
was found, similar to any other type of loot actually.
If the item was manually created (via scroll of artifact creation) then the
object level is determined as if the item was found on dungeon level 50.

Note that randarts that don't auto-curse themselves can be sold after you
removed the curse (except if the base item type is already worthless).


Artifacts vs Nazgul
-------------------
Artifacts greatly resist Nazgul, which cause most other weapons to break more
or less instantly. So even if an artifact weapon you find seems not very
appealing in particular you might want to keep it just for slaying Nazgul.
(See (1.3a) for more information about Nazgul.)

Note: 'The Stormbringer' is not a real artifact but it will show the same
resilience as true artifacts and random artifacts vs Nazgul.


Set bonus from wearing similarly named artifacts
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If you wear/wield multiple artifacts of similar name, you will receive a luck
bonus (see (5.8), 'LUCK', for details about luck). For example if you equip
    The Whip of Gothmog    (which happens to be a true artifact)
and also
    The Hard Leather Armor 'Gothmog'    (which is actually a random artifact)
You'd get a small luck bonus, or 'set bonus'. The more artifacts of similar
name you equip the greater the luck bonus will be.

If your client is newer than 4.8.0, it will display the indices of equipment
slots providing set luck bonus in colours (see table below). This behaviour
can be toggled with the 'equip_set_colour' option in =4.

The randart rings of power dropped by Nazgul are exempt from this and won't
give any kind of bonus nor contribute to one.

The exact luck boni for those 'artifact sets' starting at two items are:

  Number of artifacts equipped  |  Luck bonus  | Equip slot index colour
  ------------------------------+--------------|------------------------
                    2           |    + 3       |       green
                    3           |    + 6       |       light blue
                    4           |    +10       |       violet
                    5           |    +15       |       red
                    6           |    +21       |       orange
                    7           |    +28       |       light umber
                    8           |    +36       |       light umber
                    9 or more   |    +40 (cap) |       light umber

..which is actually the sum of all numbers from 1 up to the number of artifacts
you have equipped. Eg 2 artifacts -> 1+2 = 3. 4 artifacts -> 1+2+3+4 = 10.

Multiple equipped sets don't stack, only the biggest set counts!


Artifact resets
---------------
The old system of resetting all true artifacts at once every 3 months has been
replaced by a new "fluent" reset system that utilizes 'artifact timeouts' which
are counted down separately for each artifact, starting when it is found:

Artifacts will last for 5 weeks after they have been found (ie dropped by a
monster/chest/just being generated on the dungeon floor, and picked up by a
player), after which they will "time out" and disappear. This timer is specific
for each single true artifact, depending on when it is found (again).

No compensation is given when an artifact times out and disappears, since that
would encourage hoarding, so sell an artifact to a store in time before it
actually vanishes.

To check the timeout of an artifact, inspect it ('I' to inspect).
For your character to 100% "know" if an artifact is a true artifact or not it
needs to *Identify* the item. So this will be required to see the timer on it.

The timer will also continue to run out while the owner/carrier of an artifact
is offline.
Trading artifacts between characters has no effect on the timeout.

Grond and Morgoth's crown do not time out. These are the only artifacts that
can exist multiple times, ie are not unique, so every player can acquire them.

There are a few special artifacts that can only be found by winners (kings/
/queens/emperors/empresses). These have twice the timeout delay (10 weeks).

Level 100 artifacts are also treated specially: They do not get their remaining
timeout halved when their wearer beats Morgoth.

If a character who is carrying true artifacts wins the game, ie beats Morgoth,
all the true artifacts he is already carrying will from now on time out at
double speed - except for artifacts that have a native level of 100, which
currently are only The One Ring and the Power Dragon Scale Mail 'Bladeturner'.

Characters that are inside the Ironman Deep Dive Challenge dungeon will always
have all their true artifacts time out at double speed. (This is not cumulative
with the doubling from 'winner' status mentioned above.)

'Ironman' server: All artifact timeout delays are doubled here (10 weeks for
regular true artifacts, 20 weeks for winners-only true artifacts).

The Ring of Phasing has no timeout (!) but will instead immediately reset when
someone else kills Zu-Aon. Until then its owner can keep it indefinitely.