Curare

Version 0.30: This article may not be up to date for the latest stable release of Crawl.

It is tipped with a substance that causes asphyxiation, dealing direct damage as well as poisoning and slowing those it strikes. It is twice as likely to be destroyed on impact as other darts.

Curare is a rare, poisonous brand. For vulnerable targets, curare deals 2d6 damage, and inflicts both poison and slow. It has no effect on monsters with poison resistance. For players, poison resistance gives a 66% chance for curare to fail, and reduces the poison if it does work. Players need poison immunity to be immune to curare.

Curare is normally found on darts and the unrand whip "Snakebite". In addition, the Concentrate Venom spell will upgrade a creature's natural venom (both from venomous attacks and the Spit Poison ability) to curare.

Strategy

Curare darts are among the most dangerous darts available, particularly because they can take full effect even with zero Throwing or Stealth skill. Many dangerous enemies throughout the game lack resistance to poison, from ogres or giants up to powerful uniques like Gastronok or even Antaeus. Any of these can therefore be reliably slowed by curare, meaning even unstealthy brutes with no interest in Throwing will wish to carry around any curare darts they find.

Be aware that curare will work equally well on you, should you lack poison immunity. Most of the time you won't have to worry about it, but the occasional kobold brigand or spriggan rider may be carrying curare darts, the unique kobold Sonja is guaranteed to spawn with several curare darts, and naga magi and Amaemon can grant their allies curare-branded attacks.

Trivia

Curare is a general term referring to resinous, organic substances derived from tropical south and central American plants, crude preparations of which have long been used as arrow poisons to aid in the capture of wild game. Curare produces profound skeletal muscle relaxation, which can lead to respiratory paralysis and death. As such, curare alkaloids were once used in western medicine to induce general anesthesia.

The world "curare" is itself a European interpretation of the South American Indian word for poison.

History

• Prior to 0.27, curare dealt asphyxiation damage. Unbreathing creatures were immune to the damage but not poison or slow.
• Prior to 0.24, curare was found on needles instead of darts.
• Prior to 0.17, curare would interrupt Breath-based abilities, like dragon breaths and Word of Recall.