Cleansing yourself by bathing/washing

Many experiences or events in the land may cause you to wish yourself cleansed of their effects - such as being painted with the strange anti-magical symbols of the forestry expert, or covered in the sticky kural poison affecting your freedom of movement and inventory handling. There are four ways to cleanse or bathe yourself - each effective in a slightly different fashion and able to wash away the effects of a specific range of markings/effects.

Firstly: you can type BATHE when in a location containing sufficient water to give yourself an immersive (or suitably well-supplied) cleansing. Rivers and lakes are the best places for this most effective of washing; type SURVEY and you will perceive the water/bathing potential of a location. River and lake bathing may require more than one immersion but it is capable of washing away all of the painted, poisoned and other afflictions as well as dousing any flames you may find pursuing. This type of bathing is the fastest and any balance loss consequent of the BATHE is as short as possible taking into account whatever afflictions are being cleansed.

Secondly: you can carry water with you in your inventory - like in a bucket - and when you type BATHE away from a natural water-source (i..e. some distance from a river or lake etc) the washing will be done using some of the water from your inventory. This bathing is just as effective as the first cleansing described above in terms of the range of afflictions washed away but it requires you to maintain sufficient water in your inventory and takes twice as long to regain any lost balance consequent of the BATHE depending on your afflictions cleansed.

Thirdly: you can use the weather to bathe yourself - naturally, in the background - by standing out of doors in the rains. This method is less reliable since the storms have a wide range of intensities but if sufficiently strong, the rains from a potent torrential downpour can wash away many of the afflictions cleansed by the pro-active bathing; and effect that washing away without the loss of any balance or the need for you to divert any attention from whatever else you may be doing. Certainly if one is, for example, aflame due an encounter with fire - or having been attacked by a wielder of fire as an attack - the rains can be the most simple and effective and undiverting means of dousing the flames and thereby arresting their painful (and potentially fatal) spread.

Fourthly: there are some two dozen skill-based or artifact-based ways to create a localised cleansing - from the spiritualist's evocation of the rains (which causes a location to receive a quick burst of intense rainfall) to the globe-stave rainstorm (see HELP GLOBESTAVES for further info) bombarding a locale with an intense but entirely unnatural storm. The pros and cons of the various skill-based or artificial rains/waters, their effects on you and your surroundings, and their usefulness versus afflictions requiring a cleansing: experimentation and close attention to the specific helpfiles associated with the particular skill or artifact is advised.

There is no substitute for the wonderful and pure bathing in one of the land's beautiful rivers, lakes, streams and waterfalls.

See HELP CONTAINERS, HELP RAIN and HELP RIVERS for associated helpfiles.