Music

Material required?	A musical instrument (except whistle)
80/100 giving extra checks?	Yes
Obtainable in game?	No
Wishable	Yes

Used to calm and tame animals.

Manual info

This skill controls your ability to play musical instruments. Some people contend that it is possible to tame wild animals if you are a very skilled musician.

Basics

Music skill is invoked by playing ('U'sing) any musical instrument except a whistle. The PC either plays a tune or fails to produce a melody ("You have some problems handling the -instrument-".). Playing a tune has a chance to calm an animal in the PC's vicinity (making it non-hostile), and eventually tame it (turning it into a pet).

Contrary to some sources, calming/taming efficiency does not appear to be dependent on the weight of the instrument. For example, greater claw bugs can successfully tamed multiple times using a tambourine with the same ease as with a glockenspiel. The B/U/C status of the instrument does not seem to affect the success rate. It, however, is used to calculate the effective range of Music (see below).

Taming an animal is performed in three steps:

• After the first successful Music application, the following message is generated for the affected monster: "-foo- seems to calm down." The affected monster moves into slightly hostile state (sometimes this can be observed using the 'l'ook command). In this state, monsters are neutral to the PC but usually become hostile again after one or several turns.
• After the second successful Music application (target monster must be 'slightly hostile'), the following message is generated for the affected monster: "-foo- appears more friendly now.". The affected monster is now permanently neutral to the PC (unless angered again).
• After the third successful Music application (target monster must be neutral), the following message is generated for the affected monster: "-foo- seems to be tamed." The monster is now a PC's pet.

Advanced uses

Whistles cannot be used to calm/tame animals; rather, they are supposed to "call" the PC's pets to his/her location. According to various tests, however, this feature does not appear to be functioning — thus making whistles more or less completely useless items.

Taming efficiency is affected by the number of active PC's companions. If the PC has 3 or more companions that are currently located on the same level as the PC, taming new animals becomes impossible. They, however, can be calmed down to a permanently neutral state without any difficulty. There is a way to avoid the restriction by simply leaving some active companions on another level.

Music has an effective range, which is a circular area around the PC with fixed radius. This radius is solely dependent on the B/U/C status of the used instrument (4/3/2 tiles respectively).

It is worth noting that the PC does not actually need to see the monster to tame it. It is, therefore, possible to tame animals staying safely behind walls and closed doors.

Animals in the Arena (enclosed area where the fights happen) cannot be affected, even with Music skill at level 100 and using a blessed instrument.

The inhabitants of Bug-Infested Temple can be calmed temporarily, but almost immediately turn hostile. Moreover, playing songs may sometimes result in an opposite effect: the message "-foo- seems to be really annoyed by your tunes" is generated, and the monster becomes hostile.

Obtaining

The following Races start with Music: Drakeling.

The following Classes start with Music: Bard, Mindcrafter, Priest.

Training

Successfully applying the skill. Even playing in the wilderness with no listeners whatsoever counts, at least at low skill levels.