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Dungeon of Chance: Even Odds

Serious Probabilities, Book 1

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In a world dictated by probabilities, Clay was an anomaly....

Thousands of Heroes protect the land, defending against the periodic incursions by gigantic monsters known as World Threats. This was the way it had always been, and Clay Shuntwise was perfectly fine with that. Running deliveries for his family’s shop in the sleepy town of Renton, the young teenager barely even thought about Heroes and their role in keeping the world safe.

That was, at least, until the world came crashing down on him.

Reborn into the brand new and unfamiliar form of a Dungeon Core, Clay struggles through learning more about Heroes and the dungeons they delve through to get stronger. According to the guide that was trying to help him understand his new life, however, because he was a former Hero, Clay should already know most of what he needed to succeed; all of the finer parts regarding the relationship between Heroes and dungeons, including information about probabilities and drop rates, should be common knowledge.

The problem? Despite wishing that he had been that lucky in his past life, Clay had never been a Hero…but now, he might be forced to become one, though not quite in the way he ever expected.

This book contains Dungeon Core, LitRPG, and GameLit elements including dungeon construction and defense, monster summoning, character progression, and a game-like interface. In addition, many of the probabilities the world is based upon are similar to Gacha-type mechanics. Contains no profanity, harems, or explicit sexual content.

©2020 Jonathan Brooks (P)2020 Jonathan Brooks
Epic Epic Fantasy Fantasy Fiction Genre Fiction Movie, TV & Video Game Tie-Ins LitRPG
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Listener received this title free

While there are obviously a number of elements you need to have in a dungeon core novel/series, the author does a good job with this first book in his new series in finding some new twists and angles to take to ensure the basic premise feels fresh.

Using an idea such as adventurers respawning and thus both them and the dungeon growing in parallel rather than a dungeon being actively altruistic or antagonistic makes a nice change in this sub-genre. There also being more fundamental links between the presence of dungeons and adventurers is an interesting premise to setup as one of the foundations of the world-building too and some of the grindier/gacha aspects of the levelling process also works fairly well as a main mechanic in the world too, the balance of explaining the mechanics sufficiently and avoiding repetition was maintained well in the book too. Oddly enough, despite the name of the book and series, one aspect that didn't really work for me was the focus on the odds and probabilities, it makes sense to know this stuff in the actual games that use such mechanics, but it just felt like pointless padding in this book, although there is still time for it to actually matter in subsequent books.

The performance of the narrator was good overall with suitably distinctive tones for the main cast and avoiding the trap of caricature when voicing characters of the opposite gender.

Overall, a good blend of world-building for the series as a whole and telling enough of a story to make this instalment work in it's own right too.

[Note - I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.]

Interesting ideas to start this new series

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Listener received this title free

The story develops at a good pace, good introduction to the main characters and their backstories. One thing I would add is when listing the dungeon monsters for some time, an author note would be good to say"if you do not want to hear all monsters available to the dungeon please skip this chapter/xx amount of seconds/minutes". Other than that brilliant!

Fun and light

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Listener received this title free

I like the change and new perspective for Dungeon Core. I definitely look forward to the next one

Good story

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Listener received this title free

I got this book as part of a code give away from the author but that hasn't effected my opinion of this book at all. This is a fresh take of some of the usual Dungeon Core books with monsters and traps bought by the DC in a gotch'a style mechanic with random drops instead of the DC deciding they want say a goblin or something they could get a rat or it could be as good as a golem. It's a nice detail and changes things up a bit. The world building is also handled quite well by being done conversationally rather than through exposition dumps. Now the not so great bits. The characters while not bad really need more fleshing out as we learn very little about them. The author also needs to work on the mini chapters of stat dumps. I like crunchy litrpgs but these are a bit too often and too long. All that being said, the story was enjoyable and the narrator was great and I can't wait for book 2 and will be looking at some of the authors other books

One of the better Dungeon Core Books

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Listener received this title free

good balance told between two viewpoints with enough but not too many stats. Very well narrated conveying additional depth to the characters.


Will be looking out for book 2

great story well narrated

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