Arc 1: Preparing Chapter 2, Part 6: Touchdown (V2)
Twenty hours later
The planning for floors 1 to 3 is now complete, the floor crystals now need almost three thousand mana to create them. And I was only able to push in eight hundred mana so far even with that boost quest. With Mana Regeneration at 2.3 points per hour that is like watching paint dry. I know that a soldier’s task is month of waiting followed by minutes of intense workout or combat, but this is ridiculous.
"Booble, is there anything I can do while waiting for mana or to speed up mana regeneration?"
<you can level up skills by using them, although with no areas created yet that is limited to those skills of Manage Rumors or Manage Art etc. Mana regeneration is based on core-power and you don''t have any points to increase it any more. And the remaining quests cannot be completed without excavating the dungeons.>
"That''s not enough for the five weeks I would have to wait, anything else?"
<If you need to pass time, I suggest slowing down your processing cycles until you get an alert for full mana.>
"That''s a joke, right? I don''t even sleep anymore, and a human can''t slow down thinking. There has to be a way to pass time!"
<table>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center; background-color: rgba(100, 200, 221, 1)" colspan="2">Xenotic Ability triggered
Skill Learned</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Meditation[Limited] +1 (0/100)
</td>
<td>Meditation is a skill that is perfect for solving anger management issues, and it even has the minor side effect of increasing Mana Regeneration by +10% for every hour when the skill check is successfull.
Effect increases with higher ranks</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
“There is someone really snarky behind the world system and its descriptions, isn’t it?”
I don''t have hands to hold cards, and with the sight as a dungeon core I would know everything anyway. But I can use one "Art" picture to paint a board...
"Booble, have you ever heard about something called chess? I''ll think I explain the rules to you to pass the time..."
...
Five Weeks Later
"No, Booble, you need to learn to calculate more than two or three moves into the future if you ever want to win - but the last game was much better already, I really had to work for victory here. But now the three floor crystals finally have enough mana to place all three floors at the same time, with some leftovers for me in case of problems."
<you could have placed the first floor weeks ago if you had just changed it to fullfill the requirements.>
"But that would have given away my real exit. No matter, [Activate all Floor Crystals for excavation]."
<table>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td colspan="2">Excavating Floor 1 to 3
Placing prepared structures and defenses
Excavation XP bonus: +2362 XP
Two Quests Completed, +200 XP
New Quest available</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center; background-color: rgba(100, 200, 221, 1)" colspan="2">Level Up
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td colspan="2">Level 7 Experience Cap 700/700 reached.
Excess Experience stored for next level. Cost for Level-up to Level 8: 7 MP (47 MP available)
Do you with to level up [yes]/[no]?</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center; background-color: rgba(100, 200, 221, 1)" colspan="2">Warning: EXP overstore state (II) added
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td colspan="2">You now have enough excess Experience to enable multiple level-ups. For each excess level beyond the first you''ll gain one stage of the overstore state, with each such stage halving all regeneration values (HP, IP, MP). You are now at 25% Regeneration until level-up.
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center; background-color: rgba(100, 200, 221, 1)" colspan="2">Modify Something
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Questline</td>
<td>Dungeon Training
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Details</td>
<td>Basic defenses (spawn, swarms, traps and plagues are nice, but they aren''t very effective. It is much better if you can modify them, especially if that changes them enough to give adventurers problems guessing their strength.
You should have at least one modification from your starting list. Please select a defense that can hold it and modify that defense with it.
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Hints</td>
<td>Modifications that add bonus levels are the best, but any modification increasing values is good for improving your defenses.
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Rewards</td>
<td>200 XP
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
"Problems like needing mana for several levelups... [Yes], level up, [one free point each to Core-Power, Core-Influence and Core-Size]."
"Wait - TWO quests completed? There was only one, where is the log?"
Let''s look back - "Place Defenses"??? They were expecting the dungeon cores to excavate an empty floor and then only place defenses? No wonder so many lose, it would be much more effective if the floorplan and the defenses are developed together...
One level before I get the reincarnation skill to revive Gunny. Let''s check what is missing [Status]
<table>
<tbody>
<tr style="background-color: rgba(0, 200, 49, 1)">
<td style="text-align: center">Infos/Titles</td>
<td style="text-align: center">Quests</td>
<td style="text-align: center">Gallery/Knowledge</td>
<td style="text-align: center">History/Log</td>
<td style="text-align: center">[Locked]</td>
<td style="text-align: center">[Locked]</td>
</tr>
<tr style="background-color: rgba(0, 200, 49, 1)">
<td style="text-align: center; background-color: rgba(100, 200, 221, 1)">Status</td>
<td style="text-align: center">Storage</td>
<td style="text-align: center">Core Class: The General</td>
<td style="text-align: center">Defense Values</td>
<td style="text-align: center">Skills</td>
<td style="text-align: center">Abilities</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Name</td>
<td colspan="2">general</td>
<td>public Title:</td>
<td colspan="2">N/A</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Level (L)</td>
<td>10/120</td>
<td>Experience (XP)</td>
<td>672/1000</td>
<td>Core Rank</td>
<td>mythical</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Floors (F)</td>
<td>3/10</td>
<td>free Attribute Points</td>
<td>0</td>
<td colspan="2">Needs:</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Core-Density (CD)</td>
<td>12/120</td>
<td>Health (HP)</td>
<td>142/190</td>
<td>Mana</td>
<td>23/40</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Core-Power (CP)</td>
<td>24/120</td>
<td>Mana (MP)</td>
<td>23/310</td>
<td>DP</td>
<td>58/20</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Core-Influence (CI)</td>
<td>19/120</td>
<td>Influence Points (IP)</td>
<td>184/260</td>
<td>RankedEscapees</td>
<td>0/0</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Core-Size (CS)</td>
<td>19/120</td>
<td>Dungeon Points (DP)</td>
<td>58/260</td>
<td>RankedKills</td>
<td>0/0</td>
</tr>
<tr style="background-color: rgba(100, 200, 221, 1)">
<td style="text-align: center" colspan="6">Regeneration and Gain Values</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>HP (10% CD/day)</td>
<td>1.2</td>
<td>MP (10% CP/hour)</td>
<td>2.4</td>
<td>[Locked]</td>
<td></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>IP (10% CI/day)</td>
<td>1.9</td>
<td>DP (L/Level-Up)</td>
<td>11</td>
<td>[Locked]</td>
<td></td>
</tr>
<tr style="background-color: rgba(100, 200, 221, 1)">
<td style="text-align: center" colspan="6">Temporary Status Effects</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Name</td>
<td colspan="5">Effect</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td></td>
<td colspan="5"></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td></td>
<td colspan="5"></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
"Booble? The need values for the next level not ony show much more mana costs, but also require 20 DP. Why is that?"Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.
<You are at a rank-up from [Limited] level 10 to [Very Low] level 11. The increased mana cost will remain for the [Very Low] levelups, but the DP cost is only for the rank-up.>
"That is a surprise - I have the DP due to keeping a reserve and multiple levelup at the same time, but other dungeons might sometimes be blocked and require DP from adventurers to proceed. And if that can happen - what exactly are the Ranked Escapees and the Ranked Kills as needs?"
<The escapee value was added to prevent dungeons from becoming deathtraps - that would break the life cycle in a different way than the current problems. To count as an escapee, an adventurer has to be hurt for more than 50% of his or her health and then still manage to escape. To count as an Ranked Escapee, the adventurer has to be of the same rank as the currently lowest possible floor and has to have reached that floor before escaping.>
<This limit will first activate on leveling from 20 to 21, when you are at [Very Low] floors. An adventurer would have to be level 11 to 20 (higher ranks don''t count either) and reach at least floor 11 before escaping, then he would count against that level need.>
<The Ranked Kills is a new value for needs that the gods have experimented with. Last status was that it is added for levels 60+. It is meant to make taming more difficult as in this case, the ranked adventurer needs to be killed on that floor to count.>
<This was supposed to stop the advancement of tamed dungeons, but several countries responded by offering high-ranked criminals a chance to try their luck with a dungeon instead of being executed. If they reach the required rank (usually proven by getting a specific loot object) and then escape, then they are allowed to leave. This is sometimes made more difficult by requiring them to go in without equipment to make it more likely that they count as Ranked Kills.>
"OK, I''ll keep that in mind. I need a few hundred XP for the next level before I can reincarnate Gunny. That means the next quest and some added excavation of the current floors and floor 4. Any advice on modifications?"
<You can either make a quick modification and let the system handle it, or you can concentrate for a specific way as to how the modification should work. The second case usually costs more Influence Point, but has a better chance of adding minor effects and can result in the offer of a new template, making the modification permanent.>
<A new template would also have an advantage for further modifications - the more modification a template holds the more expensive future modifications get, but a new template resets the count.>
Arctic Foxes, here we go.
Nice teeths and claws you have.
Concentrate
"Yes, I wish to pay 10 DP for the Silver Fox template".
<table>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td colspan="2">Quest Completed.
+200 XP
New Quest Available
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center; background-color: rgba(100, 200, 221, 1)" colspan="2">Select Environment and Effect for a floor</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Questline</td>
<td>Dungeon Training
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Details</td>
<td>Each floor can have one environment and one effect. An environment can include effects (especially higher-ranked environments), and higher-ranked effects can have multiple effects or a higher strength on an effect.
However each floor can only contain environments and effect of its own or lower ranks - adding a higher ranked effect or environment is not possible without a downrank-modification.
Selecting an environment physically changes the way how the entire floor looks - but the walls are still dungeon walls with that stability even if an environment makes them look like paper or a mess of trees.
Some environments have additional effects - from your lists for example the town sewers have a chance to encounter roaming sewer rats in addition to regular spawns.
The effect you can add to a floor can be anything - from your lists for example the safe floor effect would prevent you from placing traps and plagues, and all spawns and swarms will get a Timid state added that prevents them from attacking (but they can still pass through the floor). On a positive side the safe-effect would enable a lot of rooms that cannot be placed on a regular floor like transfer gates or breeding pits.
Select one environment and one effect for a newly excavated floor.
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Hints</td>
<td>Removing an already placed environment or effect later so that another can be placed is possible, but requires ten times the placement cost to remove.
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Rewards</td>
<td>200 XP
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
Already done that for my floors, will have to do the quest on floor 4. Now just a bit of excavating that and a short wait and I can finally get Gunny alive again.