Dancing weapon

dancing weapon (
HP	16-54
HD	15
XP	1146
Speed	13-19 "-19" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 13.
AC	17
EV	18
Will	Immune
Attack1	36 (hit: plain)
Resistances	rF++, rC++, rElec+++, rPois+, rN+++, rTorm, rRot+++, rDrown
Vulnerabilities	None
Habitat	Land
Intelligence	Plant
Uses	Uses nothing
Holiness	Non-living
Size	Small
Type	dancing weapon, dancing weapon
Flags	Fighter Levitate

A weapon enchanted to dance through the air and attack under its own power.

Useful Info

Dancing weapons are weapons animated into life and capable of attacking on their own. They are fast and hit relatively hard, and their high EV, wide array of resistances, and immunity to many spells makes up for their minimal HP. Be aware that their stats vary based on the weapon type (dancing daggers are much less of a threat than dancing eveningstars, for instance), and that dancing branded weapons will have especially potent attacks.

Instead of leaving corpses, dancing weapons simply become their base weapons when killed (unless they were summoned, in which case they disappear). These weapons may be enchanted or branded.

Friendly weapons can appear via:

• Tukima's Dance
• Xom action
• High power Blade card

Hostile weapons can appear via:

• Tukima's Dance cast on a cursed weapon
• At the entrance to, and inside, the Hall of Blades (often branded)
• Xom action
• Beogh's wrath

Tips & Tricks

• Non-elemental Conjurations, such as Airstrike or Iskenderun's Mystic Blast, are very effective against dancing weapons (Airstrike especially so, since its being applied to a levitating target).
• Dancing distortion weapons should be your highest priority, and having a wide variety of other resistances will help with the other brands.
• Note the differences between a hostile dancing weapon and a weapon mimic: weapon mimics are much slower, have only a poison-branded attack which bears no relation to the weapon being mimicked, and leave no "corpse."
• In the character-based version of Crawl, dancing weapons are distinguishable at a glance from normal melee weapons since they are "reversed": dancing weapons are represented by (, while normal weapons are represented by ).