The term monster frequency applies to random monsters generation, as opposed to deliberate polymorph results and more specific ways of monster generation. It refers to a number which can technically range 0-7 (though 6 and 7 are not used) used internally to determine how frequently a monster is generated; it can be thought of as a relative probability that a particular monster will be selected.
When a monster is randomly being selected, the game picks a random monster subject to the following list of conditions with relative probabilities equal to the ratios of numberic monster frequencies (thus a monster with a 4 is twice as common as a monster with a 2); this can be thought of as generating a list of monsters with each monster appearing a number of times equal to its monster frequency and choosing purely randomly off of this list.
Randomly generated monsters must be:
- No greater in difficulty than the average of the level's difficulty and the player level [1]
- No lower in difficulty than one-sixth that of the current level's difficulty[2]
- Neither unique nor marked as not randomly generated (G_NOGEN) [3]
- Not genocided or extinct
- If you are on the rogue level:
- Represented by an upper case letter
- If you are in Gehennom:
- Not Lawful
- Not marked as not generated in Gehennom (G_NOHELL) (e.g. winter wolf)
- If you are not in Gehennom:
- Not marked as only generated in Gehennom (G_HELL) (e.g. hell hound)
Before monster frequencies are used for generation, a number is added to them depending on the relationship between the monster's alignment and the dungeon or special level's alignment. [4]
The following terms are used to describe the frequency of a monster in the infobox on monsters' pages:
| Frequency | Description |
|---|---|
| 0 | Not randomly generated |
| 1 | Very rare |
| 2 | Quite rare |
| 3 | Rare |
| 4 | Uncommon |
| 5 | Common |
| 6 | (unused) |
| 7 | Prolific (unused) |
References[]
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