Bestiary/Nightmare

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Nightmare

General
Type	Animal / mount
Category	Mounts
Alignment	Evil
Karma	−14,000
Fame	14,000
Behavior	Attacks on sight
Speed	Fast
Stats
Strength	496–525
Dexterity	86–105
Intelligence	86–125
Hit points	298–315
Stamina	86–105
Mana	86–125
Damage	16–22
Armor	60
Taming
Tameable	Yes
Min. skill	95.1
Control slots	2
Bondable	Yes
Rideable	Yes
Favorite food	Meat
Resources
Carving	5 raw ribs, 10 barbed hides

The Nightmare is a fire-breathing horse and one of the most sought-after mounts on New Bradford. It fights with its hooves and with magic, and it attacks you on sight. A Grandmaster tamer can make it their own and ride it.

Overview

• In-game name: a nightmare
• Corpse: a nightmare corpse
• Looks: every nightmare spawns with one of three random looks (body 116, 178 or 179). Each look turns into its own matching mount when ridden.
• Behavior: it attacks the nearest target it sees and fights like a spellcaster (mage AI), using both melee and spells.
• Movement: it is one of the faster creatures in the game.

Stats

Stat	Value
Strength	496–525
Dexterity	86–105
Intelligence	86–125
Hit points	298–315
Stamina	86–105 (same as its Dexterity)
Mana	86–125 (same as its Intelligence)
Melee damage	16–22
Armor rating	60
Fame / Karma	14,000 / −14,000

Skills

Skill	Range
Tactics	97.6–100.0
Magic Resistance	85.3–100.0
Wrestling	80.5–92.5
Magery	10.4–50.0
Evaluating Intelligence	10.4–50.0

Abilities

Fire breath

The nightmare breathes fire at its target.

• Chance: 50% each time it gets a chance to act in combat, then it waits 30–45 seconds before it can breathe again.
• Damage: 5% of the nightmare's current hit points (a full-health nightmare deals about 14–15). A wounded nightmare's breath does less damage.
• Range: it needs line of sight to you, and it can reach as far as it can see.
• It stands still for about a second while it breathes.
• A peacemade (pacified) nightmare can't breathe fire.

Magic

It uses the mage AI with up to 50 Magery and 50 Evaluating Intelligence, so expect low- to mid-level spells along with its melee attacks. Which spells it casts depends on the AI and isn't listed here.

Taming

Requirement	Value
Minimum Animal Taming	95.1 (below this you have no chance)
Control slots	2
Maximum owners	5 (each previous owner makes it harder to tame)
Bonding	Yes
Rideable	Yes
Favorite food	Meat

• It fights back. The nightmare usually gets angry instead of letting you start: on 95% of your taming attempts you'll see "You seem to anger the beast!" and it attacks you. Bring a way to survive or escape. It won't attack if your Honor virtue is active.
• Success chance. For a first-time tame, your chance of success at the end of an attempt is about 10% at 100.0 skill, and it improves as your skill rises. Every previous owner adds 6 points to the difficulty.
• Don't hurt it. If it takes any damage during your attempt, taming fails with "The animal is too angry to continue taming."
• Stay close. You must stay within 6 tiles of it and keep a clear path to it.
• After its first tame, its skills drop to 90% of their wild values, or 86% if it was paralyzed while you tamed it. Its stats don't drop.

Bonding

Only the owner can bond with a nightmare, and they need at least 95.1 Animal Taming (base skill). Feed it to start bonding, then feed it again after 7 days to finish. When you see "Your pet has bonded with you!", it's done.

Riding

Double-click your tamed nightmare to ride it. It can cover 6,400 steps before it gets tired, compared with 3,840 for a horse.

New Bradford achievement

Every nightmare you tame counts toward the Tame 100 Nightmares goal in your Achievements. Only your first tame of each nightmare counts. Re-taming one you've owned before doesn't.

Loot

Every nightmare carries:

• 3–5 Sulfurous Ash
• Gold: about 320–500 in total (from its "Rich" and "Average" loot)
• 1 magic scroll from circles 1–3. With Necromancy enabled on New Bradford, necromancy scrolls can show up too.
• 1 random potion: Agility, Strength, Refresh, Lesser Cure, Lesser Heal or Lesser Poison

It may also carry:

• A magic weapon, armor, shield or jewelry (up to 6 chances, from about 20% down to 0.5% each)
• A musical instrument (about 1% or less)

Carving

Use a blade on the corpse to get:

• 5 raw ribs
• 10 barbed hides

Tips

• Be ready to fight before you start taming. It angers on most attempts, and you need a 95.1+ tamer to try at all.
• Never damage it during an attempt. Even a little damage cancels the tame.
• Its fire breath gets weaker as it gets hurt, so it's most dangerous at full health.
• Peacemaking stops its fire breath.
• Carve the corpse for barbed hides.
• Keep it away from savages and Chaos Dragoons. Savages, savage riders, savage shamans, Chaos Dragoons and Chaos Dragoon Elites deal triple melee damage to a nightmare, so a tamed one can die fast against them.