# Anger

A user has suggested improving this page or section as follows:
"Per 3.6.3: "When players injure themselves kicking an altar, the relevant god's wrath is no longer ignored." This implies significant effects on anger, and the article should be updated accordingly."

Religion in NetHack

priests
alignment
alignment record
altars
atheism
anger
gods
sacrifice
prayer
turn undead

Anger is a measure of how angry your god is with you.
It is a Bad Idea to ask your god for favors when it is angry with you.
If you sufficiently annoy any god, it may smite you.
Your god can be mollified by sacrificing sufficiently powerful monsters at a coaligned altar.
To reduce anger, a simple rule of thumb is that non-chaotics must sacrifice a monster's corpse of difficulty 7 or greater, and chaotic players must sacrifice a corpse of 11 or greater. For non-chaotic players, a cross-aligned unicorn will also work.

Contents

1 Effects of anger
2 Checking your god's anger
3 Ways to anger your god
4 Ways to mollify your god

4.1 Value of corpses
4.2 Messages

5 Other ways to get a god to smite you
6 Smiting
7 References

Effects of anger
Luck (both good and bad) times out more quickly if your god is angry.
Your god will smite you if you pray while it is angry.
Attempts to #turn undead will fail if your god is extremely angry.
The manner in which your own god smites you is largely determined by its anger.
Checking your god's anger
Enlightenment by a wand or potion includes a statement of your god's anger, if any.[1]

Message

Anger

"

<god's name=""> is extremely angry with you"

7+

"<god's name=""> is very angry with you"

4-6

"<god's name=""> is angry with you"

1-3

<no message="">

0

Ways to anger your god
Many of the following have other effects as well, such as on luck or your alignment record, but for brevity these are not shown here.

Action

Anger

Sacrificing your own race at an altar, and you are not chaotic

+3*

Attempting to change alignment through sacrifice a second time

+3*

Attempting to change alignment to unaligned outside Gehennom

+3*

Sacrificing on an altar of Moloch in Gehennom

+3

Sacrificing an identified fake Amulet of Yendor

+3

Sacrificing a unicorn of your alignment at an altar of your alignment

+1*

Sacrificing a former pet at an altar of your alignment

+1*

Praying before your prayer timeout

+1*

Praying to make unholy water when it was otherwise safe to pray

+1*

Killing your pet by displacing it into a trap.

+1

* Your god will smite you after increasing anger.

Ways to mollify your god
Anger never times out by itself. Sacrificing corpses to your god is the only way to reduce it.

Action

Anger

Sacrificing a unicorn at an altar of its own alignment (not yours)

-1*

Sacrificing a former pet at an altar not of your alignment

-1*

Sacrificing any other corpse to your own god

<see below="">

* The altar's god will smite you. (Your god is slightly mollified because you upset another god.) The corpse is not consumed, perhaps due to a bug.

Value of corpses
Your god's anger is reduced based on the value of the corpse sacrificed and your alignment.[2]
Value is the difficulty of the monster plus 1[3], with some adjustments:

A former pet of yours has a value of -1 and is guaranteed to anger the altar's god by 1.
A unicorn of the altar's alignment has a value of -5 and is guaranteed to anger the altar's god by 1.
A unicorn not of your alignment has +3 extra value.
Undead have +1 value if you are not chaotic.
Otherwise, the actual reduction depends on your alignment:

If you are not chaotic, your god's anger is reduced by value/8.
If you are chaotic, your god's anger is reduced by value/12.
Messages
Main article: Sacrifice#Messages

Other ways to get a god to smite you
In addition to the above, the following will result in one god or another smiting you, but will not affect your god's anger:

Action

Deity

Praying with negative luck, negative alignment record, or when your god is angry

Your god

Praying while in Gehennom

Moloch*

Sacrificing anything at a high altar not of your alignment

The altar's god**

* Moloch may not smite you if you have low positive alignment and/or good luck.[4]
** That god zaps you (as a 10+ on the smite table). You don't lose your intrinsic protection.  If you sacrificed a known fake Amulet of Yendor, this is in addition to your own god getting angry.

Smiting
Sufficiently annoying any god will cause it to possibly smite you.[5]
You will lose any intrinsic protection you may have if you anger any god to this point, regardless of the actual outcome of the attempt.[6]
There may be an additional negative effect based on the following:

Your god's anger
Whether your own god or a different god is trying to smite you
Your luck
Your alignment record
The following algorithm and lookup table show how the negative effect is chosen.

Base value
If your own god is trying to smite you, start with three times your god's anger.
If a different god is trying to smite you, start with half your alignment.
Luck modifier
If your luck is positive, subtract one third of your luck from the base value.
If your luck is negative, subtract your luck from the base value (making things worse).
If your own god is trying to smite you and your alignment is at least strident, instead subtract only one third of your luck from the base value. (Your god relents somewhat due to your past piety?)
Adjustment
If the value is less than 1, increase it to 1.
If the value is greater than 15, decrease it to 15.
Roll 1d(value) and use the following lookup table.

Roll

Message

Effect

1–2

"You feel that <god> is displeased."
("You feel that <god> is bummed" if you are hallucinating.)

No further effect.

3–4

"Thou hast strayed from the path, mortal" if your alignment is negative and your own god is smiting you;
"Thou art arrogant, mortal" otherwise.
"Thou must relearn thy lessons!"

You lose 1 wisdom and one level. However, if you are already at experience level 1, you do not lose a level and do not die from this effect.

5–6

"Thou hast angered me."
"A black glow surrounds you."

Items in your inventory will be randomly cursed.

7

"Thou hast angered me."

If you are not punished, you become punished.  If you are already punished, treat as a roll of 5-6 above.

8–9

"Thou durst call upon me?"
("Thou durst scorn me?" if you are at an altar of a god other than the one smiting you)
"Then die, mortal!"

The god summons a hostile minion.

10+

"Thou hast angered me."

The god zaps you with a fatal lightning bolt.[7]
If you are engulfed by a monster lacking shock-resistance, it dies. (Reflection will not save it.)
If you are not engulfed, and you have neither shock resistance nor reflection, you die.
If you survive for any reason, "<god> is not deterred..." and the god zaps you with a wide-angle disintegration beam.

If you are still engulfed and the monster lacks disintegration resistance, the monster dies.
If you are not engulfed, and do not have disintegration resistance, you die.
Being hit by a wide-angle disintegration beam will also destroy your shield, cloak, body armor and shirt, even if you are disintegration-resistant. However, items that provide reflection or disintegration resistance will be unaffected, as will items worn under another item that grants it (such as a shirt worn under silver dragon scale mail). Reflection will not protect you from the disintegration beam, however.
If you survive by means of disintegration resistance, "You bask in its black glow for a minute..." and the god says "I believe it not!"
If you are on the Astral Plane or the Sanctum level, "Thou cannot escape my wrath, mortal! Destroy <him>, my servants!" and three hostile minions are summoned.  

References

↑ cmd.c in NetHack 3.4.3, line 1070: degrees of anger

↑ pray.c in NetHack 3.4.3, line 1420: Corpse value determines anger reduction; alignment affects amount.

↑ pray.c in NetHack 3.4.3, line 1161: Base value is difficulty + 1.

↑ pray.c, line 1618 (Moloch smites you if  (u.ualign.record &lt;= 0 || rnl(u.ualign.record)))

↑ angrygods in pray.c

↑ pray.c in NetHack 3.4.3, line 558: smiting strips protection

↑ god_zaps_you in pray.c (divine zaps and how to avoid their effects)

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