Dungeon of Chance: Even Odds: A Dungeon Core Novel (Serious Probabilities Book 1) Jonathan Brooks (book recommendations txt) 📖

The Spawn Egg immediately cracked down the center in a jagged line, all the way to the bottom and on both sides, and then the two halves fell apart.  As soon as they separated, Clay could see a sparkly fog emerge from the inside of the Egg; it swirled around the now-empty shell pieces before drifting above it until it was around the same level as his Dungeon Core, and then condensed in place.  That lasted all of a moment, and then it seemed to gently explode with a tinkling sound, shooting out insubstantial multi-colored streamers in all directions, leaving something behind that floated in the air opposite of his current Core-based vision.

It looked like a rectangular glass plate an inch thick, a foot and a half wide, and a foot tall.  Painted or imprinted inside the glass was a lifelike picture of a light blue-ish colored bat of some kind, with its wings spread and with its deadly-looking fangs bared towards him.

As he was staring at it in confusion, words started to appear underneath the glass plate, giving him a little more information.

Ice Bat ★

Attack Type: Aerial

Rarity: Common

Element: Water

Moments after the words appeared for him to read, they disappeared just as the glass plate exploded and shattered into countless pieces.  Clay freaked out for a moment because he thought something happened to it and was coming for his precious gem-like Core next.  He panicked even more at what happened next, even if it turned out that it was something that was supposed to happen. The shattered pieces were contained in a small explosive radius, gathered up by some external force, and then streamed toward him.

Aaaaahhhh!  What went wrong?!

However, instead of slamming into him, his Core seemed to suck up the glass fragments in less than a second; he supposed they were absorbed into his gem-like form, but he couldn’t feel exactly what it did.

“Excellent!  You now have access to this Ice Bat to place in your dungeon.  You can find more information about it in your Available Monsters section of your Core Assessment and Transcribed Status.”

What…the…HECK…was that?

“Congratulations on your first summoning!  Each time you purchase a new Spawn Egg, this process will repeat, creating an exciting experience for every new summons!”  Dwight suddenly sounded like some of the hawkers he had once seen the one time he had visited a big city, as they shouted to be heard about some fancy product or another.  It also sounded like something rehearsed or required for her to say, as it didn’t really sound genuine.

He had to admit, though, that – apart from being freaked out because he had no real warning of what was going to happen – it was actually kind of fun seeing what kind of “prize” he would get from opening up the Spawn Egg.  Of course, he had no real idea how…well, “good” was a relative term…his new Ice Bat was.

Dwight?  What do those things that accompanied the name mean, exactly?  Like Rarity, Attack Type, and Element?

“The Rarity you saw refers to how likely it is for you to receive a certain monster,” the baby dragonling promptly answered, using her instructor tone of voice again. “There are Common, Uncommon, Rare, Ultra Rare, and Legendary monsters; as you can probably assume, Common monsters are much weaker than Legendary, even if both have the same Star rating.  I’m sure you have seen this in your own delves through—” Dwight stopped her lecture in mid-sentence, and adopted the slightly annoyed voice he was growing accustomed to, but hoped would fade over time as he eventually learned how everything operated.  “But you wouldn’t have, of course.  And yes, there are probabilities for these Rarities, which are chosen after the Star-rating is determined; I’m giving that data to you now so that you can peruse it while I explain what the Elements are in relation to your monsters.” [3]

Another chart popped up in his vision, and he looked at it while still listening to Dwight speak.  From what he could see, it was obvious that he would probably be acquiring quite a lot of Common monsters, since there was an 80% chance each would be that rarity; on the other end of the spectrum, with a very low chance of 0.1% of getting a Legendary monster, he figured that he would be lucky to ever see one.  Thinking about it to determine how hard it would be to get a Legendary 10-Star monster from an Epic Spawn Egg, there was a 1 in 100,000 chance that it would appear.  With a Common Egg, that number went up to a 1 in 10,000,000,000 chance of occurring.  Wild.

“The Attack Type refers to how each of the monsters perform the majority of their attacks.  They come in 5 basic Types, though there are some monsters that encompass more than one Type depending on certain factors.  The 5 Attack Types are: Melee, Stealth, Aerial, Ranged, and Magical.  I will explain each one if you require a deeper explanation; if not, I will move on.”  Dwight waited for a few seconds, but when Clay didn’t say anything, she moved on.

“The Elemental affinity of each monster not only affects some of their attributes and attacks, but also plays a part in facing off against opposing elements in Heroes.  For instance, most Fighter-based Hero Classes have a Fire Element associated with them; your Ice Bat, in this case, would be able to inflict 10% more damage to the Hero than if it were a different Element.  However, if instead you had a Leaf Bat – which has a Nature Element associated with it – the Fire Element Hero would do 10% more damage to your Bat.  Before you ask, these amounts are always 10%, but some armor or weapons that Heroes use may have additional attributes that can lessen or entirely negate these Elemental strengths and weaknesses.