Hi, I'll answer what I can.
Attachment 47221
Kooky pretty much spelled everything out in post 1 in this thread, but I attached a screenshot of the "info" page.
You can *either* craft or breed a Spellspine dragon, or both. I was lucky enough to breed two on each of my two accounts, so I didn't need to bother with crafting. It is good if you can get 2 because you can evolve one up to level 10 to get more points while the 2nd one is on quests for points, but if you only get 1, level it up and then start sending it on quests.
The dragon itself doesn't actually do anything, like manipulate fissure or whatever you said. It just helps you get points toward the prizes.
Probably the best place to find the info on all different aspects of playing this game and to read about the events is in this forum, quite frankly.
You don't *have* to spend any gold. Spending gold would help you advance further faster so that you might be able to get tall the prizes, but you don't *have* to if you don't want to. However, at this point, if you don't already have a Spellspine dragon, you're kind of far behind to catch up. I started playing right away when the event started and was lucky to quickly breed the Spellspine dragons, and I'm still at under 4000 points on both of my accounts, so I haven't unlocked community prizes yet, but I will get there before the event ends. I'm not sure if I will get the first dragon prize, and I almost certainly won't reach the final dragon this time. *sigh*