[D'sP] Just Do The Inverse - Chapter 391

Ally, ‘And with that in mind, I’ll note the “elder” in elder assassin vine and in elder kobold represent different things. The assassin vines is simply an elder of that species. Whereas with the kobold, it represents the Akashic connection they have to dragons.

‘Now, you have monotreme kobolds and so I don’t know how many of the dragon age categories they’ll have picked up, but the more the better. As it is, we only know they can become elders, but I’ll cross my fingers for you in hope of getting the entire slate. I know that the more dog-like kobolds tend not to have them and the fae kobolds of the mines are fae. I am simply not up on how close the monotremes are to the lizard-like kobolds.’

Doyle, ‘Well, that answers what I wanted to know. Though I have to ask, is there any kind of evolution that a “pure” enlightened would get? There has to be a reason for so many humans when there is an option for half-dragons and what not.’

Ally, ‘It is partly because mixes are unstable besides a few combinations that most just consider full fledged races at this point. The most common being a combination of human with elf and human with dwarf. Don’t call them half-whatevers though as they see it as an insult most of the time. The first are the Halvyr and the other are the Dhatun.

‘So, if it isn’t a combo like that, any future child after the first will begin to lose the whichever bloodline isn’t being re-upped or otherwise the strongest bloodline. And it will always be the strongest bloodline that fades first, because stronger bloodlines have a harder time having kids, which carries into this as well.

‘As for what options someone is trying to stick to what they see themselves as being? That is where you get into the “high” races and paragons. High elf, high human, high dwarf, and so on and so forth. The key being that the base race can’t be too powerful so there aren’t any high dragons.

‘On the other side of the coin, paragons simply are those who are recognized by the universe itself as being exemplars of their species. This technically doesn’t require them to be “pure” anything. Except that it does remove any heritage that hasn’t been fully developed. So a half dragon would end up losing all their dragon features if they become a paragon without developing their dragon half to the fullest.

‘Though to be fair, since this is a being that needs to be recognized by the system? Well, you rarely become a paragon. Rather, you are born a paragon and any kind of creature can be a paragon, even if stronger species having a paragon is much rarer.’

Doyle, ‘So heaven’s own luck and a perfect body as decided by you species, plus presumably a number of other perks?’

Ally shrugs, ‘Just about. Anyway, back to your new floor. The elder kobolds will be important. With them, your kobolds will work together even better than when you simply assigned one of them as a group’s leader. Not that you shouldn’t still do it, the elders are exactly that, elders.

‘Despite being physically and mentally more capable than regular kobolds, they’re best used as a council of elders supporting the normal kobolds from the back. Sure, you could make a group of all elders, but that doesn’t work to their strengths. After all, when have you ever seen a tribe of all elders that isn’t dying off? You need the young to advance and the old to maintain.’

Doyle, ‘I would be tempted to do more caves for this. But that is just my preconception of where kobolds should live. I’m guessing that while they might have some advantages in a cave system, they live fine in most places?’

Ally, ‘The cave connection isn’t wrong, per se. After all, there are the mining based fae kobolds and the lizard kobolds definitely prefer cave homes. However, like humans, they’re fine living in most places.

‘In fact, if I had to guess, the kobolds you have would probably do best living on the shores of a lake. That or the complete opposite and they’re more of a desert people. Monotremes are a little hard to pin down.’

Doyle, ‘Well, I don’t really have monsters for a desert setting, so lake it will be. Besides, I just had a floor of islands, so it would be interesting to basically reverse it. In fact, I could literally reverse it. Where the islands were on the 16th floor be lakes on the 17th.’

Ally, ‘That isn’t a bad idea. Though what will you do about the crescent island?’

Doyle, ‘I’m thinking a bog or swamp. The center having filled in with plants and dirt over time with only a crescent of water where a stream flows in.’

Ally, ‘And the volcano island can instead be a deep lake or some such.’

Doyle, ‘Maybe a waterfall? Like, the area behind it could be a bit of a cliff with a waterfall dropping into it, half the lake surrounded on the sides by steep cliffs.’

Ally, ‘And the main kobold village can be behind the waterfall, built into the cliff.’

Doyle nods, ‘Certainly, what good waterfall doesn’t have something hidden behind it?’

Ally, ‘Though that raises the question of if anything should be on top of the cliff?’

Doyle, ‘No, or at least nothing mission critical for completing the floor. Should probably add in some of my birds to live on the cliff face as well to discourage climbers. Then put a bunch of harvesting nodes up there. Not anything too crazy, but enough that those looking for herbs and plant-based food will be happy to go through the effort..

Ally, ‘Maybe throw up an extra portal on top? Not one they can travel to except if they had just used it to get to the next floor. No using it to quickly get to ground level of flour 17.’

Doyle, ‘That’s a good idea. I’ve already used multiple entrances and exits, so this isn’t anything new. Still, it would add some quality of life and make it so people don’t have to try and climb down a cliff with a bunch of plants on their back.’

Ally, ‘Delvers will do the stupidest things while turning their noses up at significant rewards if it requires a little too much regular labor. Sure, death defying fights all day, but a little climb? Not in their life! Which is probably why no one else has really done your cliff challenge. Well, besides the fact that most people rush through the floor now. Maybe make this cliff act like that one, except with birds to attack them?’

Doyle sighs, ‘Yeah, while there are certain people who have to run the early floors a few times. They’re definitely more of a once and done, especially if they have any combat experience outside of the dungeon.’

Ally shrugs, ‘Eh, that’s what usually happens in dungeons. There will be a few floors which bottleneck people. Otherwise, they’ll keep advancing until their levels stop growing as fast. Though things are quicker than usual because this is the first generation after magic and the system arrived. They have the experience boost from their life before this to get them through the early levels.’

Doyle, ‘That’s right, that is a thing. Why aren’t I rocketing ahead as well?’

Ally, ‘Because you’re a dungeon core now. All that life experience was for being a human. I’m sure you got a bit of a boost, but it isn’t like your time learning to write as a kid is going to transfer over to normal dungeon core stuff.’

Doyle, ‘Fair enough. Now, we’ve got the basics and some not so basics roughed out. I’ll get the terrain set up and we can refine it from there.’

With that, Doyle goes off and starts filling the floor half with air and half with ground. Then it is a matter of carving out where the lakes will go. Though after he is done, one problem does present itself.

Doyle, ‘Welp, that’s a problem.’

Ally nods, ‘Definitely could be.’

Doyle, ‘So uh, what should we do about the floor just ending at the void? Unlike previous floors, I can’t exactly cheat by checker boarding other sections onto the edge. Besides, while it doesn’t actually look like the true Void, the black depths of space aren’t exactly better.’

Ally sighs, ‘There is a reason most terrestrial based dungeons start with caves of some sort. You don’t have to worry about this.’

Doyle nods, ‘It is a lot easier to hide the edges of a place if you just put up walls.’

Ally, ‘Well, not that you can’t do that still.’

Doyle, ‘It would look a bit strange to have an open area in a box of stone.’

Ally shakes her head, ‘Do it like your world’s video games handled it before computers were powerful enough. Throw in some invisible walls. Well, not actually invisible, we want to hide what is being them after all. Rather, make the walls into a skybox for the floor.’

Doyle, ‘That might just work. I’m sure the delvers will realize it quickly enough, but it isn’t like I’m trying to trick them into thinking this is an area of infinite size. Been there, done that.’

Ally, ‘Might as well give it a try. I bet your strange Dungeon stone can handle the skybox part. Not that you need to make the entire outside, but out of it. Just make a facade of the stuff. You might even get away with basically gold leafing it, though it would risk delvers scratching it and seeing what’s behind the curtain.’

Doyle laughs, ‘That would be hilarious! I think I’ll give that a try first to see if it would work. Give me a second.’

Doyle throws up a box of compressed stone. Though he frowns a little as the compressed stone isn’t quite as sturdy as it needs to be now. He shakes his core and gets back to work. While the idea of applying the strange dungeon stone like gold leaf is simple to say, it takes some effort. After all, it’s stone and not metal.

However, after a good bit of trial and error, Doyle manages it. Well, the strange stone is a bit thicker than gold leaf, but the stuff’s cheating. After all, from what he can remember, its thickness is measured in nanometers. He didn’t get anywhere near that, but it was still thin enough that if you’re strong enough, you can scrape it off just fine.

Though no matter how much weaker it is than the condensed stone, it is still amazingly sturdy so it would take a good bit of effort. No one was going to hit the sky box with an errant fireball and blow a hole in it, revealing the stone behind. Well, Ruby probably could, but she’d have to be trying to do it. Not just have a random fire spell miss its target and hit the skybox.

Though speaking of skybox, that part worked as well. Doyle was able to get the bits near the ground to display basically a thick forested area you wouldn’t really be able to walk through. If only as a half-hearted attempt to make delvers less likely to mess with it. Then the sky bits were easy enough. Doyle had them mirroring the sky itself, sans any non-sky, non-cloud objects and such.

Well, it didn’t quite do that? It was more like it sampled what the sky sort of looked like and then drew up a believable version of it. Sort of like how many pre-system courts in his country, especially at the highest levels, still used a courtroom artist instead of cameras. The only thing that shows up in a drawing is what the artist draws. You don’t have any accidental reveals or courtroom circuses as people doll themselves up and angle themselves for the camera. All while still keeping the spirit of the scene.

Besides, this was somehow cheaper to run? Doyle and Ally both were uncertain why this was the case, though with his computer knowledge, Doyle guessed it had to do with compression. The strange stone didn’t need a 100% accurate image to work off of, only one good enough to get an idea of the clouds and light level.

Seventeenth - Chapter 390

No Reversing That - Chapter 392