Scroll of acquirement

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Version 0.29: This article may not be up to date for the latest stable release of Crawl.
Type Scroll
Name Scroll of acquirement
Icon Scroll of acquirement.png
A wonderful scroll which causes the creation of a valuable item, with the reader choosing the type of item to be created. The item produced will be heavily biased towards something fitting the reader's skills, and also towards gear that hasn't been seen yet, but, alas, nothing is guaranteed.

When read, a scroll of acquirement generates three acquirements and a sum of gold for you to choose from. The scroll can be cancelled at any time; the scroll will not be consumed (even if read blindly) and its options will persist.

General Mechanics

Acquirements are affected by a number of different factors:

  • They are biased towards items that match your skills. For instance, a character who has heavily invested in Maces & Flails is fairly likely to receive a weapon in that category. Similarly, a conjurer who uses mainly Fire Magic will likely find themselves receiving a spellbook with more spells from that school should a book generate.
  • They are biased against items that you have already seen, the logic there being that if you have seen it, you're probably either using it or have decided it isn't useful. This usually includes items in shops, but those which are far too expensive for your character to buy at present are excluded from being "seen."
  • The item is guaranteed to be usable. This means that you will be able to equip it, and using it will not incur penance with your current deity. For example, worshippers of good gods won't be given a draining weapon. Note that these guarantees are fairly minimal: acquirement may well give your heavy Armour-based hill orc a robe (although it will be biased against doing so if you have invested in the Armour skill).

Strategy

Note that acquirements are not directly affected by your current depth or location. However, the bias against items you have already seen means that later acquirements do tend to give out rarer items, as the common ones have already been seen. This can often produce better acquirements later on, although how much better depends on the item type asked for, and saving an acquirement for later runs the risk of you dying due to poor equipment before you get the chance.

Although unreliable, scrolls of acquirement are capable of producing gear that will carry you through to the end of the game in safety. It is technically true that waiting for acquirements can yield slightly better gear, since you will have seen more 'common' items later on. However, waiting to use scrolls of acquirement is generally unwise: the increased chance of survival now is always more worthwhile than the slight chance of a better acquirement later.

History

  • Prior to its removal in 0.26, you could acquire food.
  • Prior to 0.25, acquirement allowed you to choose to get an item from one of 8 categories (weapons, armour, jewellery, books, staves, evocables, food, or gold), but you did not know the specific item.
  • Prior to 0.20, you could aquire wands and miscellaneous evocables seperately.
  • Prior to 0.19, you could acquire ammo.

See Also

Scrolls
AcquirementAmnesiaButterfliesBlinkingBrand weaponEnchant armourEnchant weaponFearFogIdentifyImmolationNoisePoisonRevelationSilenceSummoningTeleportationTormentVulnerability