Dungeon Core Online

Chapter 21

"What's the worst that can happen? It's not a souls game after all." Oak's voice was echoing through the dungeon as he stared hard at Z. When the first sacrificial lamb detonated, it had set off the other two in the area as well, creating three consecutive explosions. Apparently, three explosions, coupled with the buff from Old Man Jenkins, had created enough damage to completely wipe Z's party. After the rain of popcorn had stopped, James had watched as 5 floating orbs slowly drifted away from where the group had been, all the way to the door that led to the first floor. The moment the orbs passed through the door, it slammed shut. A second later, the orbs materialized back into Z and his group.

"Hey, at least we found out at level one." Z was holding his arms up in defeat, though he had a grin on his face. "Just imagine the poor saps that learn when they are near like level 5 or 10." When the group had respawned, they had all pulled up their character sheets, and while James couldn't see the screens they were viewing, he knew what they were about to see. A moment later, the group had started cussing up a storm, having found all of their experience had been taken away, leaving them back at 0 experience.

James had checked his character sheet the moment they started cursing, just to confirm what Rue had told him about experience gain. Sure enough, he had an extra 594 experience, putting him at 3094 total exp. He had gained 200 from his Baaha Blast achievement, and another 394 from the group. They had been so close to level two, it really was a shame…for them.

"You don't think word's going to get out?" Faust was glancing from Z to Oak, and both shook their heads in unison.

"Who's going to warn the other players?" Z's face was taking on a wicked grin as he looked at his group. Faust paused for a second, before a smile appeared on his face as well.

"You're right." Faust's smile grew even larger. "No one's going to warn the others about that mechanic, at least not early on. No reason helping the competition out just yet, right?" James was certain they were right that no one would share the dangers of dying to other players just yet. In MMOs, players were constantly racing to become the strongest, because the stronger you were, the better gear, and the more opportunities you had to take on and clear challenges before others. All the hardcore players, the ones who would likely end up making the mistake early on of trying to tackle too large an enemy, would want to keep the loss of experience a secret. They wouldn't want others getting a one up on them, and playing it safe early on. Though, James was sure once enough people had fallen and lost experience, word would finally get out. At that time though, the first few teams would likely have made up their experience loss and still climbed ahead of the others. That was the nature of these games, learn from your mistakes, and continue to grow.

"So, think we should dive back in, and try to make up for lost experience?" Z turned towards the others, who all let out a cheer. He turned to the door, and approached it slowly, likely worried about opening it up into another sacrificial lamb. The archer put his hand on the door, and tried to open it. However, instead of swinging outwards into the first floor of the dungeon, a red countdown timer appeared on the door. 00hr 59min 58sec

"What the?" Z and James both asked at the same time. While Z's party stared at the door, unable to answer, Rue turned to James. Unlike the group, James had a pixie to help answer his questions about game mechanics.

"That's a cooldown timer." She smirked as she said it, looking down as Z tried once more to open the door. "When a party either completes your entire dungeon, or is completely wiped out, they are placed on cooldown."

"They get a cooldown for completing the dungeon too?" James could understand being penalized for wiping and entire dungeon floor. Heck he had played games where instances themselves had time limits, and when the limit was done, your team was done. He had also played games where you had to wait in a que in order to even start an event. Waiting was a pain, but the prizes were usually worth it.

"Mhmm." Rue reached into her popcorn bowl, only to find it was empty. With a sigh she flicked her wrist, making it disappear. "The developers didn't want players to simply rush into a floor after dying to keep trying to defeat a boss over and over. They also put in limitations against zerging floors, and free farming experience." This was all news to James.

"So, what did they do?" He could understand setting restrictions to pace gameplay for characters but was interested to see just how they did it. Such restrictions could be a turn off for players, and James figured he needed to fully understand these, otherwise he could accidently chase away players.

"Well, first." Rue held up a finger. "The developers have limited the number of adventurers that can dive into a dungeon instance at 20 players."

"A dungeon instance?" James had read about such things in some of the Dungeon Core novels he had read. One such book, Slime Dungeon, had unlocked the ability to create unique instances per team entering the dungeon, allowing for multiple groups to enter the dungeon at the same time, without running into other players.

"When players step foot into your dungeon entrance, they will be teleported into an instance of your dungeon. The developers set the default number of instances to a maximum of 10 instances, with each instance being able to support up to 20 players." If James's math was correct, which he was confident it was, that meant up to 200 players could enter his dungeon at a time, spread out through the 10 instances.

"Can I interact with those instances?" He was curious if he would be able to not only watch these adventurers during their dives, but also influence the dungeon while they were in it? What if he was adding new mobs, or traps, while adventurers were diving?

"You can individually monitor and interact with each instance through the Instances tab." Of course, there was an Instances tab. "This tab will pull up individual windows of each instance. By focusing on one, you will be able to make that your main instance for the moment, which will allow you specifically effect that instance in various ways."

"What if I wanted to implement a new trap?" At 50 resources for a trap, James would be loath to make an instance specific trap, even if it seemed funny at the moment.

"Jeez you ask a lot of questions." Rue sighed and let her finger drop. "Anything you do that would be permanent, is applied to the master layout for your dungeon via the Dungeon Creator. It will not affect instances in progress, but all new instances after you have implemented your changes will take effect."

"Thanks Rue. What else did the developers implement?" James could tell he was angering the pixie, maybe he should let her finish her explanations without asking questions? However, he felt the more he knew now, the better prepared he would be later. The more you know, after all.

"You sure, no more questions?" The pixie stared at him hard, and he shook his orb side to side. "Promise?"

"Promise." If he could smile at her, he would have.

"Uh huh." She didn't seem convinced, but she held up two fingers, continuing her explanations. "The second restriction the developers put in, is a death timer. If players die, but their party is still alive, they will turn into floating orbs, as you saw. For two minutes after their death, they will have the ability to be resurrected by any player that has an item or skill capable of doing that. If, after two minutes, they are still dead, they will be sent to the start of the dungeon and must wait an additional three minutes before they can reenter the dungeon and join their party again." So, that would keep parties from zerging a boss, or simply throwing themselves over and over at a high leveled mob while a single member of their party sat somewhere safe. Made sense.

"Next?" James really didn't have any questions regarding that mechanic, at least none that he could think of at the moment.

"Third, is the cooldown timer." She nodded towards Z and his party, who had all started to walk back to the part of the dungeon with the mining walls. It seems they had given up trying to force past the door. "The cooldown timer activates whenever players clear the entire dungeon or have a party wipe."

"Does it vary depending on the circumstances?" The question came out before James could stop himself.

"Just couldn't help yourself, could you?" Rue had her hands on her hips, glaring at James. She was mad, he could tell, but she looked so cute right there. Blasted pixie.

"Sorry." He was, really. Sort of. It wasn't like he had anything better to do right now.

"If a party completely clears your dungeon, they will be locked out for an hour per floor cleared. If a party wipes, they will be sent to entrance to the floor they had been on, and will have to wait one hour." So, clearing the entire dungeon, if he had more than one floor, would actually lock players out for longer than simply wiping on a later floor, interesting.

"Why-"

"Why are they set up that way?" Rue smirked, cutting James off before he could finish his question. She was on to him. "The developers want this world to be like a brand new community for everyone. They don't want players simply spending every moment in the dungeon. By setting cooldown timers, players will be forced to head back to town, and actually interact with each other. They will grow as a community by doing so. Also, by locking players out, new instances will be able to be formed with new players, allowing more and more adventurers to cycle through your dungeon each day." Oh, that made sense. That way more players could conduct their dives, while also being forced to rest, relax, and enjoy the entirety of DCO. It seems the developers had put a good amount of thought into the world they were creating. James was curious how the players would take such restrictions though.

"Once players are in an instance, are they free to stay in it as long as they want farming mobs?" That was the final way to abuse the system James could think of at the moment. If players were kicked out for beating a boss, why not just stay and farm mobs? Did his mobs respawn while adventurers were on a floor? James hadn't checked during Z's dive as he was busy laughing at their struggles against his farm animals.

"Your mobs will respawn a finite amount of times per instance. The default is that each mob can respawn one time per player that is in the instance." She motioned at Z's group. Four of the members were sitting on the ground, tossing rocks towards what appeared to be a larger rock. James was certain they were seeing who could get a rock the closest. The fifth member, Oak, was hacking away at the rock wall holding iron ore. If he had to guess, Oak was the only member with a mining skill. "For their group, each mob would have been able to respawn five times. Once they had finished, ahem, farming," Rue smirked at her own joke as she continued, "they would have received a notice that they had five minutes to attack the boss. Failure to do so, would result in them being removed from the instance."

James had to admit, the mechanics seemed solid. To his gamer mind, everything was making sense, and he could see the developers had planned a way to allow adventurers to grow at a steady pace, while offering the ability to allow other players to take part in his dungeon. He was also glad there was a cap on instances, as he had been worried what would happen if his dungeon was simply flooded with thousands of players. Old Man Jenkins wouldn't have stood a chance.

"What if-" James started, but Rue held up her hand, shaking her head.

"No more questions."

"But-" It really wasn't an important question, but he his curiosity was getting to him. Plus, he didn't really have anything else to do. He had an upgrade point for his sacrificial lambs, but he didn't want to use that until he saw more teams dive. He also had less than 10 resources, so not much he could with regards to improving his dungeon. Heck, his research still have over 10 hours left on it before it unlocked. Quite frankly, he was bored, and Rue was his only source of entertainment.

"-no buts." Rue waved her hand, and a tent appeared next to her. Was she about to go to sleep on him?

"What are you doing?" The pixie had unzipped the entrance to her tent, and was climbing inside. Once she was inside the tent, she grinned at him, flicking her wrist as she did. Suddenly she was in a very sheer nightgown, and James instinctively looked away. He could feel heat rising to his face. He was really glad his orb couldn't change colors.

"Obviously I'm going to sleep. We've been at this for over 26 hours you know." She started to zip the tent shut, ever so slowly. "Unlike you, I'm not chasing a foolish achievement." She stopped with the zipper just below her chest, leaning almost out of the tent towards him. "You're welcome to join me." The way she said it made his blood rise. What exactly had the developer used to create this AI's personality? James felt like he was in an anime.

"Nope, I'm good." James was very far from good.

"Suit yourself, Glyax." She whispered his name, and closed the tent. The fabric could not muffle her laughter. Evil pixie. She was definitely like a girl from an anime. The bane of every teenage nerd.

"Now what am I supposed to do." James whispered to himself, glancing around. Z's group still had fourty minutes before they could enter his dungeon for round two. James scanned the area around his dungeon and was surprised to see one of the trees in the forest suddenly disappear. A second later, more trees disappeared. He looked at the edge of the forest, and saw many forms appearing, all seeming in small groups. Some were making their way excitedly towards his entrance. Others appeared intent on looking the area over and clearing out the trees. The other players were finally arriving.