Metal Head (dangerous)
| Metal Head (dangerous) | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Type | Monster |
| Location | Dangerous Mines |
| Floors | 81-119 |
| HP | 280 |
| Damage | 19-26 |
| Defence | 24 |
| Speed | 2 |
| XP | 6 |
The dangerous Metal Head is what the lava floors become once the Shrine of Challenge is switched on. The ordinary version is a small health pool behind thick plating; this one keeps the plating, triples it, and adds a health pool to match. Nothing about how it fights changes, which is the point: it still walks over and still ignores knockback, so the only thing that has moved is whether the farmer's weapon can get through. It carries the same Solar Essence and the same ore as its weaker form, and it drops the Squire's Helmet as well, so a farmer who turned the shrine on for Radioactive Ore collects the same rewards for much harder work.
Behaviour
There is nothing to dodge. No spell, no charge, no projectile. A dangerous Metal Head closes the distance and deals damage on contact, exactly as the standard one does, and that similarity is why the fight feels so different.
Defence decides everything. Every point of defence is taken off each hit the farmer lands, and this version's armour is heavy enough that a mid-tier sword stops being a weapon and becomes a chisel. A Galaxy Sword or better turns the fight back into a short one. Below that, the honest answer is to walk past.
Knockback resistance makes the long fight dangerous rather than merely slow. A monster that cannot be pushed away stays in contact for every swing, so each extra second the armour buys is a second of damage taken. Counting two or three swings and then stepping back is the whole technique, and it matters far more here than on the ordinary floors because the damage per contact is much higher.
Blocking with a sword cancels a hit outright, and on these floors that is worth using between swings rather than only in emergencies. A dish that raises defence and a Crabshell Ring both shorten the arithmetic in the farmer's favour.
Location
Dangerous Metal Heads appear in the lava floors of the Mines, in the stretch from the eighties down to the bottom, and only while the Mines are in their dangerous state. That state has two causes. Accepting Mr. Qi's Danger In The Deep order from the board in Qi's Walnut Room switches the whole mine over and resets the elevator, with the bottom to be reached inside a week. Completing that order unlocks the Shrine of Challenge on floor one hundred and twenty, which from then on acts as a switch: flip it and the change arrives the following morning.
Radioactive Nodes are the reason most farmers leave the switch on. They appear nowhere else, and Radioactive Ore is what the late crafting recipes are built from. The dangerous Metal Head is simply part of the rent on those nodes, alongside dangerous Shadow Brutes, Shadow Shamans and Shadow Snipers on the same floors.
Riding the elevator to a floor in the eighties, clearing it and returning to the entrance resets the layout for another pass, which is how the nodes and the essence are farmed in volume.
Drops
The drop list is unchanged from the ordinary Metal Head, which is both the good news and the complaint. Solar Essence still comes off roughly two kills in three, and the Iridium Band still wants fifty of them alongside fifty Void Essence and five Iridium Bars. The dangerous floors at least supply both halves of that recipe at once, because dangerous Shadow Brutes and Shadow Shamans on the same depth carry the void half.
Copper Ore, Iron Ore and Coal appear at the same modest rates. Coal is the useful one on a dangerous run, because the ore pulled out of the same floors has to go through a Furnace afterwards and every bar smelted there burns a lump of it.
The Squire's Helmet still drops here, and a dangerous Metal Head counts towards it exactly as a normal one does, so a farmer who left the shrine on does not have to switch it off to chase the hat. Dwarf Scrolls III and IV turn up rarely and belong in the Museum.
Items this monster can drop when it is defeated, with the chance of each.
| Item | Image | Chance |
|---|---|---|
| Coal | 
|
10% |
| Copper Ore | 
|
10% |
| Copper Ore |
|
10% |
| Dwarf Scroll III | 
|
0.5% |
| Dwarf Scroll IV | 
|
0.1% |
| Iron Ore | 
|
10% |
| Iron Ore |
|
10% |
| Solar Essence | 
|
65% |
| Diamond | 
|
0.05% |
| Prismatic Shard | 
|
0.05% |
Notes
Danger In The Deep also resets the gear the Adventurer's Guild has unlocked for sale, so a farmer who takes the order loses access to the shop's deeper stock until the floors are walked again. That is worth knowing before accepting it, because the dangerous Metal Head is one of the monsters that punishes a downgraded weapon hardest.
The dangerous Mines keep every monster type the ordinary Mines have and add several of their own, so the lava floors hold a heavier cast than before. Clearing a floor for ore means fighting all of it, not picking a target.
Monster Musk doubles the number of monsters waiting on a floor. On dangerous lava floors that is a decision rather than an improvement: twice the essence, and twice the armoured bodies standing between the farmer and the ladder.
All Monsters
Every entry in this group, with its key details.
| Name | Image | Location | HP | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Armored Bug | 
|
Skull Cavern | 1 | 8 |
| Armored Bug (dangerous) | 
|
Skull Cavern | 250 | 20-27 |
| Bats | 
|
The Mines & Skull Cavern | 24, 36, 80, 300,; 268, 277 | 06, 07, 15, 30, 13, 14 |
| Blue Squid | 
|
The Dangerous Mines | 310 | 18 |
| Bug | 
|
The Mines | 1 | 8 |
| Bug (dangerous) | 
|
Dangerous Mines | 250 | 15-16 |
| Carbon Ghost | 
|
Skull Cavern; The Dangerous Mines | 190 | 25 |
| Cave Fly | 
|
The Mines | 22 | 6 |
| Cave Fly (dangerous) | 
|
Dangerous Mines | 266 | 13-15 |
| Duggy | 
|
The Mines | 40 | 6 |
| Duggy (dangerous) | 
|
Dangerous Mines | 280 | 8 |
| Dust Sprite | 
|
The Mines | 40 | 6 |
| Dust Sprite (dangerous) | 
|
The Mines | 280 | 13-15 |
| Dwarvish Sentry | 
|
Volcano Dungeon | 300 | 18 |
| False Magma Cap | 
|
Volcano Dungeon | 290 | 15 |
| Ghost | 
|
The Mines | 96 | 10 |
| Grub | 
|
The Mines | 20 | 4 |
| Grub (dangerous) | 
|
Dangerous Mines | 265 | 12-13 |
| Haunted Skull | 
|
Quarry Mine; The Mines random dungeon floors | 160 | 15 |
| Haunted Skull (dangerous) | 
|
Dangerous Mines | 310 | 19-26 |
| Hot Head | 
|
Volcano Dungeon | 215 | 18 |
| Iridium Crab | 
|
Skull Cavern | 240 | 15 |
| Iridium Golem | 
|
Wilderness Farm | 430 | 15 |
| Lava Crab | 
|
The Mines | 120 | 15 |
| Lava Crab (dangerous) | 
|
Dangerous Mines | 340 | 19-26 |
| Lava Lurk | 
|
Volcano Dungeon | 220 | 15 |
| Magma Duggy | 
|
Volcano Dungeon | 380 | 16 |
| Magma Sparker | 
|
Volcano Dungeon | 310 | 15 |
| Magma Sprite | 
|
Volcano Dungeon | 220 | 15 |
| Metal Head | 
|
The Mines | 40 | 15 |
| Metal Head (dangerous) | 
|
Dangerous Mines | 280 | 19-26 |
| Mummy | 
|
Skull Cavern | 260 | 30 |
| Mummy (dangerous) | 
|
Skull Cavern | 445 | 38-55 |
| Mutant Fly | 
|
Mutant Bug Lair, Skull Cavern | 66 | 12 |
| Mutant Grub | 
|
Mutant Bug Lair | 100 | 12 |
| Pepper Rex | 
|
Skull Cavern | 300 | 15 |
| Putrid Ghost | 
|
The Dangerous Mines | 500 | 25 |
| Rock Crab | 
|
The Mines | 30 | 5 |
| Rock Crab (dangerous) | 
|
Dangerous Mines | 272 | 13 |
| Royal Serpent | 
|
Skull Cavern | 150 + (50 × tail segments) | 32-48 |
| Serpent | 
|
Skull Cavern | 150 | 23 |
| Shadow Brute | 
|
The Mines | 160 | 18 |
| Shadow Brute (dangerous) | 
|
Dangerous Mines | 370 | 22-32 |
| Shadow Shaman | 
|
The Mines | 80 | 17 |
| Shadow Shaman (dangerous) | 
|
Dangerous Mines | 310 | 21-30 |
| Shadow Sniper | 
|
The Mines | 300 | 18 |
| Skeleton | 
|
The Mines | 140 | 10 |
| Skeleton (dangerous) | 
|
Dangerous Mines, Quarry Mine | 655 | 16-18 |
| Skeleton Mage | 
|
Dangerous Mines, Quarry Mine | 355 | 20-25 |
| Slimes | 
|
The Mines, Skull Cavern, Quarry Mine, Secret Woods, Tiger Slime Grove, and Volcano Dungeon | Varies | Varies |
| Spider | 
|
The Mines (Shrine ON) | 200 | 15 |
| Squid Kid | 
|
The Mines | 1 | 18 |
| Squid Kid (dangerous) | 
|
The Dangerous Mines; Skull Cavern | 250 | 22-32 |
| Stick Bug | 
|
The Dangerous Mines | 700 | 20 |
| Stone Golem | 
|
The Mines | 45 | 5 |
| Stone Golem (dangerous) | 
|
Dangerous Mines | 283 | 13 |
| Truffle Crab | 
|
The Farm | 30 | 5 |
| Wilderness Golem | 
|
The Farm | 30 | 5 |