Introduction

The level screen is what you see most of the time during the game. It consists of three parts: the level map, a message line and a statistics/state line.

The Level Map

The level map shows the parts of the current level which you already explored and all creatures and objects which you can currently see. A little example:

                --------+--
                |       > |
                |         +
           #####+         |
           #    -----------
 ---+------#
 |........|#
 |....H..:@#
 |........|
 ----------

Each level consists of rooms and tunnels which connect the rooms. The map characters have the following meaning; of course we don't reveal everything - there should be something left for you to discover! :-)

• @ - your current position in the level
• -| - walls of a room
• . - a lit location inside the room you're currently in
• + - a passage through which you can enter or leave a room
• # - a tunnel
• > - a staircase to the next level
• < - a staircase to the previous level
• ~ - might be dangerous ground; step on it with care
• { - an obstacle, e.g. a chest which possibly contains an interesting object

There can also be creatures, which are mostly represented by letters; a lower-case letter means that the creature currently doesn't act, e.g. because it's sleeping. If you have enabled color support, most creatures will appear in red color. As you get deeper into the dungeon, you'll meet more and stronger creatures and ones with special abilities which make your life harder.

You'll also see characters which represent objects lying around in the level; if you have enabled color support, most objects will appear in green color. As you get deeper into the dungeon, you'll find "better" objects - more solid armor, stronger magic potions and scrolls etc.

• ] - armor
• ) - weapon
• : - food
• % - gold
• * - stone
• ! - magic potion
• / - magic wand, staff or rod
• ? - magic scroll
• = - magic ring
• & - tool (e.g. lantern)
• , - the Amulet of Yendor

The Message Line

The message line below the level map contains messages (what else:-) which appear during the game, e.g. when a creature hits you or when you pick an object. If you see "-more-" at the end of this line, there are more messages available which didn't fit into the line; press <SPACE> to get them.

The Statistics/State Line

The statistics/state line contains lots of information about game statistics and your current state. An example:

L:c1  H:n12/12 S:16/16 E:0  A:3  M:15&0  T:9 C:3 LN

The individual parts of this line have the following meaning:

• L (level): a lower-case letter indicating the gameplay difficulty you selected in the intro screen ("c" means "normal") and the number of the current level
• H (health): a lower-case letter indicating how many actions you can do yet, and your current/maximal health; "n" means normal, "h" hungry, "w" weak, "f" fainting and "s" starved; if it's not "n", you should eat some food; you can act for about 1000 ticks before getting hungry, but less if you do strenous things like fighting or searching. The health will e.g. decrease when you are hit by a creature and grow to the maximum while you're healing (e.g. when you rest); watch this carefully if you don't wanna die surprisingly! :-)
• S (strength): your current/maximum strength values
• E (experience): your current experience
• A (armor): if you're wearing armor, it will hold some damage off you when you're hit; this part shows "-" if you aren't wearing armor, "?" if you didn't yet find out how good your armor is or a number indicating how much damage the armor can hold off.
• M: magic energy and experience; you can perform magic actions only if you have enough magic energy! If you need more energy, quaff some yummy potions...
• T (ticks): how many ticks have passed since the beginning of the game; in the magic dungeon, time is measured in discrete ticks, the continuous "real" time is meaningless - so you can think about your next action without time pressure...
• C (count): this only appears if you have entered a count/number argument with the keyboard command "C"

To the right of those, some letters might appear, describing your current state further:

• B - blind
• C - confused (the same letter as for the count/number argument, but this should not confuse you:-)
• F - frozen, you can't act
• H - hasted
• I - invisible
• L - levitated
• N - napping (sleeping, you can't act)
• S - slowed

The maximum health and strength values will increase as you gain experience during the game.