Dungeon Master

Dungeon Master #1

by Eric Vall

What would you do if you were the most powerful dungeon deity in the world and the bindings keeping you trapped within your dungeon were broken? Would you escape? Would you acquire a party of beautiful female minions? Would you use your new minions to conquer other dungeon deities, consume their magic, and grow even more powerful? Would you take over the world? Would you then take over the heavens and destroy the gods? Yes, you would do all of the above. This novel contains harem elements.

Genres: Fantasy, Harem, Audiobook, Magic, Romance, Gods, Science Fiction Fantasy

273 pages, Kindle Edition

Published October 8, 2018

About the author

Thanks for reading!

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www.ericvall.com

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www.patreon.com/ericvall

https://www.facebook.com/authorericvall

Reviews

[Jay Collins · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 stars, I did like it for the most part but I did have some issues with the story/plot holes and characters. I have liked other books by this author more but I will continue with this series.

[Jake · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hard to get started

I really only enjoyed the last half of the book and the first half took nearly a week to get through because I kept switching out to other books.
I enjoyed the author's other book, Planet Broker, very much.
I think my problem with this book was the inconsistent nature of the MC, being beaten over the head with topics, and the rather slow pacing/buildup of the other characters
I did, as I said, enjoy the back half of the book. The character development of the other characters really began in earnest and the story moved along at a good pace. I did also enjoy the fact that the supporting characters didn't immediately accept the MC. It took time to buildup trust and a relationship before they became a cohesive unit. I really enjoyed that.

Due to the back half of the book I will read the next installment, just to see if it continues on in the same vein.

[Cr Rider · Rating 2 out of 5]

Underwhelming

Read this book because this author has two others that are good . However, this story was not quite about a dungeon. Moreover, this Saddam old powerful god but hardly demonstrates any godly ability or powers. This story is dry and somewhat predictable. Confusing departure from his usual fare.

[George Saoulidis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Carmedy is the best.

[Al · Rating 3 out of 5]

While not a bad story, this series lacks any sort of charm. The characters are pretty forgettable and at times annoying. The MC is pretty one dimensional as are the supporting characters.

It is hard to point to anything that was more than just average about this book.



Series update... 2.5 out of 5 stars. (after reading the whole series)
Overall the story fails to deliver anything new or interesting. After the first couple of books, it gets repetitive and really goes nowhere.

This my least favorite series by an author that usually brings creativity, fun and charm to the genre.

The MC only has small glimpses of charm and the supporting characters can be charming but that is also few and far between.

While usually I have very high praise for the narrator (who often enhance the enjoyment of even mediocre books), the narrator for this series doesn't help the lack of charm. I am not sure if this was per request of the author or the narrators decision, but the voice acting felt clipped and emotionless. This only detracted more from an already soulless series.

Finally the end comes like an avalanche in the last book. What could have actually saved this series if the author had not tried to get as many books in the series and actually gone for a conclusion earlier. The last book should have been two or three books with some of the middle repetitive books tossed out. Yes, that last book crammed a lot of ideas into one volume without much details and it was pretty bad.

[Bigmohunter · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great start to the series!

Once powerful god get banished to a dungeon to live for the rest of time. He manages to escape. Now he gathers power to get back at those who wronged him. Not your normal dungeon core book.

[Kara · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF'd after 14 seconds - a new record. Annoying as F'K narrator voice.

[Dave Stone · Rating 2 out of 5]

Remedial level plot & dialog. 1 brief sex scene out of nowhere. borders on WTF did I just read.

This book is jarring and discordant. This book just isn't very bright. The thing that kept me going is that it always seems on the verge of becoming something. Smarter, sexier, Focused, or entertaining, Dungeon Master seems likes it's about to stop limping and take off. I confess that I mistook this for an erotic harem novel, it is not. I do have lower expectations for books with smoking hot sex scenes. This has all the wit of a porn novel, with out the porn to justify it.
And yet I'm reading book#2 so the jokes on me I guess. I do love the cover art. 5 stars for the cover artist!

[Isaac · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ehhh...to keep it short...

The whole story is underwhelming. The beginning is very slow and boring. All you get is the "dungeon master" monologuing. And the master is also underwhelming. The dungeon felt so weak. For a god, he doesn't really have much magical powers or able to bestow upon others or craft magical items or anything. Someone said the second half is better but the thing is, you need to get pass the first half to get to the second half. And that's not happening. The first real battle felt really really stupid, at least the monologue sounded stupid. Does this author likes to stupefy things?

Like, the master supposedly took out 4 chests full of treasures from hundreds of years ago. It's treasures that adventurers risk their life to get. The author made it sounds like it's enough to be filthy rich for life. But, in the end, they sold it for I don't know how many gold coins but gold coins a shop with no business in a run down village/town can afford. Maybe you don't care but small these like this makes me feel detached from the story.

And, I understand that the master isn't a real "dark" god. He's only a "dark" god because he got banished from heaven for getting into a relationship with a mortal. But he's a total pushover. The author likes to make the master put up the whole facade of a master and minion relationship crap, but the master is a complete pushover. I mean, the whole idea of the "master" being a "master" to help make his "minions" better but "observing" and "pinpointing" their weaknesses and "helping" them improve is stupid.

It's a stupid idea that's executed very stupidly. It's more like you wanna date these four girls (minions), so you gotta learn more about them.

I'm pretty much done with Eric Vall and giving him second chances. I mean, look at his Summoner series. Book 2 is probably better but Book 1 was plain stupid.

[Douglas · Rating 2 out of 5]

Note: I listened to the audio books of Dungeon Master 1 & 2 but I am putting my review here since the audio versions are not listed on Goodreads.com at this time. Book 2 in this series isn't currently listed on Goodreads.com either but when it is (if I notice, which I won't) I'll just copy and paste this review.

Having listened to first two books in this series I have the same review for both. They are written for morons. The MC, a fallen god who takes some noob adventurers under his wing, repeatedly explains how he has the power to destroy the foes they face but won't so his "minions" can have a learning experience. This is repeated so often it is probably 1/4 of the book.

Another 1/4 is the author explaining what he is doing. For example: Minion 1 makes sarcastic statement in an attempt to divert attention. MC: "I noted the sarcastic comment from minion 1 and how she used it to divert the groups' attention."

Bottom line: I like straight forward action/adventure, which was why I was able to make it through two of these books. However, these books have gone way past straight forward and have nestled deeply into moronic.

[Bob McGough · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book type it seems isn't for me. It's written fine from a craft stand point, nothing wrong there, but the content was a little...oof.

[MKenfield21 · Rating 1 out of 5]

Sort of like Everybody Loves Large Chests, except without humor, crafting, leveling, or Fizzy.

[Sam Koumi · Rating 2 out of 5]

Dungeon Master 1 by Eric Vall, narrated by Joshua Story is an audio book that I really did want to like. However, it didn't reach my expectations.


This book has most of what makes me want to read/listen to a book, even before I start; it's a fantasy Book, it has LitRPG elements, the main character is insanely OP, there's cute girls that can stand up for themselves, and more. Sadly, Vall compensates for all these positives through making it dangerously generic.


Being generic is not always a bad thing, I've read many a book that could be considered as such, however, there was always SOMETHING putting a twist on the genericness, making it more interesting. Vall doesn't manage to create this twist however, and that's this book's largest failing.


The characters have their archetype and they stay true to them. Which is usually a good thing, but when it's to the point of making them seem stupid, then it has gone too far. It's almost like when you play as a Game Master in a Table Top RPG and your players justify every stupid thing they do with "it's what my character would do!"


There is the cat girl who is supposed to be the stupid ditzy type, but that's her charm and why people like her, but she's stupid to the point of being annoying at occation.


Another character is this Fox girl thief who are independent and have an aggressive attitude but it's just because of her past and she's just being defensive. However, she almost kills her friends just because she couldn't realize that sometimes it's good to work together. It made me Wonder why she even joined up with the others.


Then there's the strong-willed fighter who always takes leading position and keep the morale high, but just like her vulpine friend, she almost gets everyone killed because she wouldn't listen to the others.


And then there are more, but I think you get the point. All of these characteristics are good and such, but Vall takes them a few steps too far, just making them annoying. Some will probably say that they just played their roles and that they're supposed to learn from their mistakes, but it feels like they barely do so and you should still not drag it to the extent that Vall did.


The story is good enough, even though it's pretty rushed. I'd have like to see the characters explore more, rather than just walking into the dungeon, doing a challenge or two, then leave. The dungeons would've been good opportunities to develop the world,bit it felt like they were just skipped over as fast as possible.


The worldbuilding is good enough, but it's nothing special. If anything it feels kind of boring when there's no limit to the Dungeon Master's powers. I really do like OP characters, but there should still be some limit to it, or else there won't be any tension in the story.


As for the narration, Story does a good job. My only gripe is that he uses an extremely rough voice for the main character and narrator parts. This voice is pretty annoying, but it would've been fine if he used that voice only for when the main character speak, and then use s softer voice for the narration.


Overall, it's fine, but it has too much that made me dislike it, so I give it 4 stars!

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rough Finish, No World Boundaries, Failed Female Heroes
At the very beginning of the book, there is a party of female adventurers. Sounds good, some strong female characters able to fend for themselves.

Quickly goes downhill. They are incompetent, all seriously limited and flawed, and quickly end up subservient to a Masculine incarnate dungeon, who, of course, makes them call him master (Dungeon Master, GET IT!)

Annalise, impetuous to the point of rash, charges in without a plan constantly.
Carmedy the cat-woman, who is an air-head who can't be trusted to do anything, will shirk her responsibilities, is a sugar/desert glutton, and is a pacifist.
Rana, the aloof fox women who is very angry about stereotypes that foxes are thieves, even though she is a thief.
Morrigan the high-elf necromancer, (practicing dark arts got her into trouble, cast out from her tribe, etc.) with two ravens who have strange and scary soul sucking powers, and are more powerful than her by all evidence.

Master claims he is a cast down god, and that all dungeons are constructs around similar cast down gods. A mysterious group of mages more powerful then gods did it to him, and there are undertones of revenge motivation. He's been trapped in his dungeon for more than a thousand years, but a very novice inexperienced necromancer can break the runes imprisoning him. (<-problem)

The four women agree to be his minions and travel with him to conquer all other dungeons so that Master can absorb their gods powers.

The go through several dungeons, and Master is omnipotent (<-problem) and can conquer the other dungeons with little more than a thought, and sends his dark ghost servants in to loot the entire place afterwards, but he puts off the conquering so make his minions try and fail, so he can have teaching moments.

There are now apparent rules or boundaries, so the dungeons are little more than one encounter with the god of the dungeon, who without boundaries can just try to kill them however they want. Each dungeon has its own take on things, but the story totally lacks the dungeon ecosystem style mechanics that make living dungeon stories "fantasy-plausible" enough to read. Every dungeon has killed every single person who entered before the party.

Master starts to teach Morrigan one spell, but it seems there is no well-thought out magic system or any underlying rationale for how magic works.

[Travis · Rating 3 out of 5]

A decent story. I wouldn't call it LitRPG though, even though amazon showed it as a link when I was searching for such. It seems to be more of a quest and conquer type of tale, even though it's not presented in either form. It's nice to see a main character with virtually unlimited power actually not using it, to drive the story along, that's unusual, so definitely points for that.
It's interesting we never learn the main character's name, but I guess that was supposed to add to the suspense of the story. (it doesn't). I suspect further stories in this world will contain considerably more harem elements than this one did, and at that point, depending on how it's handled, the stories may become more of a slog than a fun read, but I'll reserve judgement on that until we see what happens. For most gamelit/LitRPG fans, I suspect this story will be a nice to have in their read collection, though I don't see it becoming number one on anyone's must read list, as it's an average story, even with it's unique treatment of a few concepts. Still, if you have some time, and are looking for something to read, and you've pretty much covered all the things you really wanted to read, this book might be a good selection to hold you over until you find something else to satisfy your cravings.

[Sharon♡ · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really liked the idea of this book, as well as the audiobook narration and it was entertaining enough to finish. Additionally, since this book is categorize as harem I was expecting it to be smutty but this was, in my opinion, a slow burn and actually had only one sex scene. This was a surprise I ended loving.
However, there were a few things I didn't love. The main character is supposed to be this powerful and smart god, nothing wrong with that since I adore overpowered characters, but this was showed by turning everyone else into complete morons, making the conversations between the characters weird and tiresome. Also, I didn't buy the reason why he wouldn't use all his powers and the magic system, if there is one, wasn't well fleshed out.

[Daniel · Rating 2 out of 5]

Extremely weak plot

The plot was extremely weak. The main character had awkwardly forced limitations that were obviously there only to keep him from just overpowering any problems because he was written too powerful from the start but even then most of the problems ended up being solved by him just waving the problem away with his ridiculous "I'm a super god" powers. The character were not horrible but very stilted in personality and development. There is hope for future stories but they will need a lot more effort put into plot and characters for it to be an enjoyable experience.

[Niels Baumgartner · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautifully done

Have slight issues with bits of it if I’m being picky. But I love the idea and how the author illustrated the journey so far. Excellent book.
Only thing I would recommend to the author is to draw on historical roots for examples of tactics and strategy. They are easier to copy than one might think and will help develop a depth I feel is lacking in bits of the story. To be clear, I didn’t feel like this detracted much at all as it is mainly a story of freedom, friendship, and dungeon diving. I enjoyed the puzzles and traps and descriptive writing immensely.

[Ian · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's okay

It's not bad, dialogue is okay, plot is okay it's all fine. But there is a lot of potential that feels squandered, the MC is both super old and wise and acts like a teenager it's very jarring. The women's personalities are too reliant on their quirks and not actual personalities. And the situations should be more advanced then just fighting bandits or random group of brothers. He kills hundreds of adventurers but these women are good enough to spare, but can barely do anything. Might as well have the OP MC do really cool OP stuff occasionally.

[Jeff Nason · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good start to a strong fantasy adventure

Eric Vall is a very good writer and this book is professionally edited. The overall premise is interesting and a fun adventure to follow. The issues that keep this from being a 5-start review for me are that some aspects seem too formulaic and predictable and sometimes the dialog is stilted by repetitiveness. I definitely recommend it and will be checking out the next book in the series to see what happens. I am sure I will enjoy the journey.

[Paps · Rating 3 out of 5]

Finally maged to read this and I have to tell you it was exasperating, the story is quite unexciting (If thats even a word) I mean the whole story feels like the mc just knows how to glorify himself, by actually doing nothing of worth. The training the minions things felt lazy, how he judged every antagonist he run across as evil, scum, unforgivable villain for doing the exact same thing he has been doing since he felt in the dungeon. In resume the story has an interesting plot but the characterization of the MC killed it.

[Jordan Pedigo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Probably closer to a 4.5 but still great

The only problem I had with this book, was that it says in the blurb that the M.C. is evil. For most of the book he is amoral at best... Definitely not evil. Not a deal breaker for me, but some might be upset by that. The author spends so much of the book showing how much the M.C. cares about his "minions", that towards the end where he does a few things that might be considered "evil" or borderline, they seem out of character. Still a really fun read, and an original take on the dungeon genre.

[Bolajide Adeyoye · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fun

I liked this story...it was solidly fun. The characters were likable. The world was familiar and enjoyable. The MC had the same grandiose self-view as the author's other book about the summoner but somehow it seemed less annoying because here the mc is supposed to actually be "all that" rather than some "more talented than average" young nobody...anywho, this story was cool and I eagerly look forward to more.

[Timothy May · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fun book

Just 1 bone to pick really, well there may be more but this one sticks out a bit, the cover of the book is inaccurate, only half of it happens in this book if you know what I mean.... at no time is he that intimate with ONE of those girls on the cover, probably in next book he will get the second like that at this rate. I just get annoyed when I see a cover than shows a scene or represents something that doesn't happen in the book, it's like false advertisement.

[Sean Hall · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not a bad series

So the story is about a dark god that is going around the world to build his power by conquering other dungeons. 3 problems I have with this is 1 he is to OP he has no problems fighting anybody but leaves it to his minions to fight. 2. For a dark god he is not very evil but seems the opposite of what you would expect. 3 sexual content that is not needed in this story

[Imkmoney]

Master

Fighting in a dungeon can be both fun and dangerous for you and your party of hero's. Here we have a party of four misfits that decide to fight above their abilities, but a dungeon master that wants to break out of his own and needs their help to leave. Here starts their adventures to fighting other dungeons. This out of place party go forth and together using their strengths and brains learn to work together as a team to servive.
Fun read!

[Jamie Ross · Rating 5 out of 5]

Adventure awaits!

Whilst I have been an avid reader of Eric Valls books for over a year now, I've decided to catch up on some of the older series.

Dungeon Master reminded me of another fun series involving dungeons and I thought to give it a go. I was not disappointed.

Fun, exciting and character with intelligence, with and humor to boot, but all involving flaws that we get to see them ackowledge and begging to work on overcoming.

Looking forward to the rest of this series!

[Akeesa · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked it more than I expected.
However, I think the intimate relationship with Morgan felt much too hurried and forced. Especially so soon after uncovering the reason for DM's exile from the heavens.
Going dungeon to dungeon is the main premise but I would have appreciated more worldbuilding, especially because DM had not left his dungeon in eons and thus the world was basically new to him and then to us readers.

[matthew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Better than I was expecting

For people who are worried about the harem tag, worry not no romance until 78% and even then it was short and tasteful enough not to offend even the tiniest of sensibilities. The side characters are really fleshed out, even more so than his other books. Now if he'll just write a sequel to one of them...

[Edwin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great dungeon novel

Great intro book.
Though the only thing that was disappointing was that MC was not more evil but still good read.

Of the four girls, my favorite is Morrigan; followed by Rana and then Carmedy. Annalise is my least favorite; good what stupid girl.

Will definitely read the next book.