Guidebook

http://www.nethack.org/v343/Guidebook.html

The NetHack Guidebook, formally A Guide to the Mazes of Menace documents the basic gameplay and options of the NetHack game. This is the basic documentation included with NetHack itself.

For most players, the Guidebook, or rather a certain portion of it, is a very important read. This is how they learn about basic gameplay, controls, and Elbereth.

The Guidebook contains many long lists. It is very exhaustive; its role is to document all controls, configuration options, and such. pettype, pickup_burden, pickup_types, prayconfirm, pushweapon, race, rest_on_space, role, runmode, safe_pet, scores, showexp, showrace, showscore, silent, sortpack, sound, sparkle, standout, suppress_alert, time, timed_delay, tombstone, toptenwin, traps, travel, verbose, windowtype, and on some windowing systems, align_message, align_status, ascii_map, color, eight_bit_tty, font_map, font_menu, font_message, font_status, font_text, font_size_map, font_size_menu, font_size_message, font_size_status, font_size_text, fullscreen, hilite_pet, large_font, map_mode, mouse_support, player_selection, popup_dialog, preload_tiles, scroll_amount, scroll_margin, softkeyboard, splash_screen, tiled_map, tile_file, tile_height, tile_width, use_inverse, vary_msgcount, windowcolors, wraptext, and on some operating systems, altkeyhandler, altmeta, BIOS, flush, MACgraphics, page_wait, rawio, soundcard, subkeyvalue, video, videcolors, videoshades.
 * In Chapter 2, "What is going on here?", lists all of the classes of NetHack, which are: Archeologist, Barbarian, Caveman and Cavewoman, Healer, Knight, Monk, Priest and Priestess, Ranger, Rogue, Samurai, Tourist, Valkyrie, Wizard.
 * Immediately after, Chapter 2 lists the races, which are: Dwarf, Elf, Gnome, Human, Orc.
 * Section 3.1 lists the parts of the status line, which are: Rank, Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, Charisma, Alignment, Dungeon Level, Gold, Hit Points, Power, Armor Class, Experience, Time, and Hunger status.
 * Section 3.3 lists the various ASCII characters that you find on the map: - and |, #, > and <, +, @, $, ^, ), [, %, ?, /, =, !, (, ", *, `, 0, -, {, }, \, I.
 * Chapter 4, "Commands", lists the commands, which are: ?, /, &, yuhjklbn, m, F, M, g, G, _, ., a, A, ^A, c, C, ^C, d, D, ^D, e, E, f, i, I, o, O, p, P, ^P, q, Q, r, R, ^R, s, S, t, T, ^T, v, V, w, W, x, X, ^X, z, Z, ^Z, :, ;, ', @, ^, ), [, =, ", (, *, $, +, \, !, #, #adjust, #chat, #conduct, #dip, #enhance, #force, #invoke, #jump, #loot, #monster, #name, #offer, #pray, #quit, #ride, #rub, #sit, #turn, #twoweapon, #untrap, #version, #wipe, #?, and in number_pad mode, h, j, k, l, N, u.
 * Section 7.3 lists some types of armor in order of AC, which are: dragon scale mail, plate mail, crystal plate mail, bronze plate mail, splint mail, banded mail, dwarvish mithril-coat, elven mithril-coat, chain mail, orcish chain mail, scale mail, studded leather armor, ring mail, orcish ring mail, leather armor, leather jacket, and no armor.
 * Section 9.4, "Customization Options", lists all of the options, which are: align, autodig, autopickup, autoquiver, boulder, catname, character, checkpoint, checkspace, cmdassist, confirm, DECgraphics, disclose, dogname, dungeon, effects, extmenu, female, fixinv, fruit, gender, help, horsename, IBMgraphics, ignitr, legacy, lit_corridor, lootabc, mail, male, menustyle, menu_deselect_all, menu_deselect_page, menu_first_page, menu_headings, menu_invert_all, menu_invert_page, menu_last_page, menu_next_page, menu_previous_page, menu_search, menu_select_all, menu_select_page, monsters, msghistory, msg_window, name, news, null, number_pad, objects, packorder, perm_invent,
 * Chapter 12, "Credits", is a long list of contributors to the game itself, including the original Hack developers and the persons who did various ports.