> I've always heard that one of the enjoyable experiences of Nethack was figuring things out for yourself

Ehhh. I guess "enjoyable" from a masochism perspective? Nethack has a lot of very specific mechanics and hazards that aren't explained to you.

If you're just looking to explore, then by all means dive in. But if you're trying to finish the game (or even just, make something resembling meaningful progress towards doing so), you realistically probably never will without either reading guides or putting in thousands of hours wandering and dying.

To put it in perspective - many people have played the game with guides for years without ever beating it.