There are several ways to get rid of cursed items.
-Dip in holy water. Use the ! command to dip an item, and put in the water. It will become blessed. You can make holy water by dropping regular water on a friendly altar as long as your god is "very pleased" with your character.
-Read a scroll of uncursing. If it is blessed, it will uncurse your entire inventory. Otherwise, it will uncurse one item. If it is cursed, it will curse one item.
-Cursed weapons can also be removed from a helpful ratling fencer, duelist, or master swordsman, who will disarm you quite frequently.
-If you drop all of your gear except a cursed item, you can stand under an acid trap and press Ctrl-T to activate the trap until it is destroyed. Watch your HP while you do this...
-The best way to avoid cursed gear is not to put them on in the first place. If you play a priest, you will have the Detect Item Status skill that will tell you which items are cursed. Dropping items on a friendly altar will also show you their status.
-If your god likes you, you can pray and they will sometimes uncurse something (make sure you're full HP/PP).
-Alternatively, you can drop all of your useful gear, and pray many times. Eventually your god will get so mad that he will destroy all of your worn equipment.
Identification depends on the item:
-Easiest way is to read a scroll of identification. A blessed scroll will identify ALL of your items. Uncursed will identify all items of one type (rings, etc.). Cursed will identify one item.
-Weapons can be ided by equipping them. Obviously, if its cursed, you're stuck with it. But if you can identify status (eg. by an altar), you can safely ID all uncursed or blessed weapons. Alternately, if you find one of the disarming monsters I mentioned, switch to coward and equip-ID all of your weapons.
-Most armor can be identified by wearing it as well. Armor is harder to get rid of though, so if you can't identify status, equip-ID is probably a bad idea unless you are reasonably certain that even if the item is cursed, it's still better than what you have. Also note that wearing some types of cursed armor may prevent you from wearing other types of items. For example, if your armor is [-3,+5] chainmail, equipping clothes is a bad idea, because most clothes are [0,0]. OTOH, if you have [0,0] clothes, equipping chainmail is a good idea, because even if it is cursed, it's still probably better than what you have. Be very careful with (10s) gauntlets. These can be the super-annoying gauntlets of peace, which are auto-cursing. I would never suggest equipping gauntlets of this weight, even if you know they are uncursed from an altar.
-Scrolls can be identified by reading them. Early in the game, this is normally safe--only a few scrolls are harmful, and only one of these (item destruction) is particularly common. Since identify scrolls happen to be one of the most common scrolls, this can be a pretty profitable way to go.
-Some wands can be identified by zapping them. To be safe, you may want to test them in a wilderness square where you won't accidentally fry yourself with ball lightning or something.
-Some potions can be identified by drinking them. I don't recommend this unless you're desperate. Potion that cause poison or sickness are somewhat common, as are potions of exchange which can really screw up your character. Better to wait until you've got a scroll of ID.
-If you make it to Dwarftown, there is a quest there that will identify all of your gear OR give you a potion of literacy, if you are illiterate. There's also a guaranteed altar there. Usually getting to DT takes care of all of your early-game ID problems.
-If you sell items unidentified items to a shop, eventually the shopkeeper will ID them and you can buy them back. Price will be inflated greatly though. Shops can also provide a handy way of determining status. If you have 3 orcish spears, for example, and the shoppie offers 50g, 80g, and 100g for them, then the 50g one is probably cursed, and the 100g one is probably blessed. It could also be that the 100g one is uncursed or cursed but has better stats or modifiers, though. Particularly true if there's a large price difference. If it's 50g, 80g, and 700g, the 700g one is probably pretty good.
-I will also add that you should pay attention to the weights of items. This will tell you something about their quality or type (sometimes). For example, there is only one kind of boots that weigh 30s, only one sword that is 35s. Lighter weapons or armor may indicate higher metals.
Spider webs can be broken using fire spells such as fire bolt. If you have high strength, you will break through them more quickly. Or get a monster to break them for you.
[edit]I've bolded where it shows your level.
Code:
Veto St:41 Le:12 Wi:22 Dx:23 To:33 Ch: 7 Ap:17 Ma:16 Pe:21 L+
DV/PV: 62/50 H: 860(860) P: 150(150) Exp: 44/19123206 DrCh Sp: 124
Last edited by JellySlayer; 05-18-2012 at 08:19 PM.
Hoping to win with every class, doomed. Archer, Barbarian, Bard, Beastfighter, Druid, Elementalist, Farmer, Fighter, Monk, and ULE Priest down.