Blink

Blink
Level	2
School1	Translocation
Source(s)	Book of Minor Magic Book of Spatial Translocations Book of Party Tricks
Casting noise	2 (at the destination)
Spell noise	0

This spell translocates the caster a short distance, however only to spaces you can see.

Blink is a level 2 Translocations spell which warps you to a randomly selected nearby open tile. This tile must meet the following restrictions:

• The tile may not contain deep water or lava (traps, excluded tiles, and harmful clouds are all legal, however)
• The tile must be within your line of sight
• The tile cannot be behind a translucent wall
• The tile will normally be 3-6 tiles away, but if there are no legal options in that range, it will be 1-2 tiles away

Blink is one of the easiest-to-acquire escape spells in the game, and can be made more reliable through teleport control (by way of spell, ring, mutation, or certain randarts). Should you have teleport control active, it will be a semi-controlled blink: upon casting, you will be prompted to select a direction you would like to go and blink 2-7 spaces away. This incurs light magic contamination. Note that if you cast the spell, reconsider, and then cancel the controlled Blink, you still expend one turn.

For even better control, the level 7 spell Controlled Blink lets you select the exact tile you blink to. The scroll of blinking has a similar effect.

Exceptions

• The Abyss: Blinking is unreliable here, only working 1/3 of the time. The Controlled Blink spell will succeed half the time (but only provides a semicontrolled blink).
• Prevent Teleport Items: Some equipment will actively stop you from blinking or teleporting, such as an amulet of stasis or artefacts with the -TELE property.
• The following blink types will always be random: Lugonu's Bend Space ability, a Level 0 Warp card, blinks while confused, blinks induced by miscast or distortion effects, and a Draconian shifter's Blink Other spell.
• Randarts that confer Blink as an ability cost 1 MP and 50 food to use, and require 9 Evocations skill to use reliably. The ability is otherwise identical to the spell.

Tips & Tricks

A lifesaver particularly in the earlier game, get this spell or an item with it if at all possible. Since it randomly teleports you somewhere within your field of vision, the trick is to minimize the amount of squares you can see where you don't want to end up. It also pays to remember that although a blink won't drop you in lava or deep water, it can and will drop you into a cloud, so take care when blinking around miasma, flame, or any other cloud you really don't want to land in.

Monster Version

Many monsters can cast the spell Blink, and their version can pass through translucent walls. There is no equivalent of Controlled Blink for monsters: player ghosts who had it in life will have Blink instead. However, some monsters are capable of casting the following Blink variations:

• Blink Close: Blinks the caster to a space closer to your character than the caster's starting location.
  • Jumping spider
• Blink Away: Blinks the caster to a space farther away from your character than the caster's starting location.
  • Jumping spider, hellbinder
• Blink Range: Blinks the caster to a space as far away as possible while still remaining within range for their ranged attacks.
  • Nessos, Lom Lobon, cloud mage

Some monsters, most notably phantoms and blink frogs, have a chance to blink when they hit you. Most such monsters have the spell as well, meaning they tend to blink around rather a lot.