Might

Might is a status effect and monster-only spell that increases melee damage for its duration.

Effect

Player

Adds +1d10 damage to melee and each auxiliary attack, except constriction.

This is considered separate from the effective enchantment roll (slaying + to-damage of your weapon). Might provides roughly the same damage boost as +10 slaying, but is worse due to the lack of accuracy boost.

Monster

Monsters get +50% damage in melee. This is often stronger than the player effect, so exercise caution around mighted monsters.

Sources

The possible sources for Might are:

• Potions of might.
  • Also available through Gozag's Potion Petition.
• Using Dithmenos' Aphotic Marionette ability on a monster with the Might spell.
• The Demonspawn mutation Powered by Pain can cause a might effect.
• Xom and chaos effects can inflict might.

Berserk includes a might effect. While berserk, might has no additional effect.

Strategy

Might is useful for dealing with monsters that are troublesome, but for which berserk or haste would be overkill and/or unsafe - compared to those, might has no real drawbacks and is safe to use. Unfortunately, as it is only easily available through a potion, the uses are limited. Since might increases your combat ability, use it early in a fight - you'll get more out of a might potion at 100% HP than 50% HP.

Might is a 'flat' damage boost, so it has a more pronounced effect on Short Blades and other fast weapons. It can let a quick blade punch through high AC foes, for instance. It's also disproportionately strong with auxiliary attacks; e.g. monstrous Demonspawn and worshippers of Jiyva can get +2d10 to +4d10 damage per round.

Even casters will want to keep around potions of might, in cases where they run out of MP.

Monster Spell

Monsters can cast the Might spell to induce the effect on themselves. They can also use Might Other to induce it on a single other monster, or Battlecry to induce it on all nearby monsters of the same genus.

History

• Prior to 0.25, Might provided a +5 bonus to Strength.
• Prior to 0.19, the player could get the Might status effect by drawing a Potion card.
• Prior to 0.12, extending might through further quaffing of potions would inflict one point of magic contamination.
• Prior to 0.8, you could get Might as an Okawaru ability.
• Prior to 0.3, you could get Might as a Trog ability.