There`s the update after the China lunar new year!
over 4 years ago – Tue, Oct 05, 2021 at 02:16:13 PM

Hello everyone,there`s our late update.

In the new year, we continue to optimize the work process,now the most of the the United Network models` working already progressed more than half,there will be soon enter the stage of finishing and delivery to the factory.

At same time,we also started the production of the Guardians Of Freedom models,and to prepare for the final 1.0 version of the rules.

The following is the work schedule for this time.In the next update,we expected almost complete the Guardians Of Freedom`s models,and we will add a rule book and a schedule of paper products at the same time.

Here is the work schedule for this time,some friends may cautions that our priority in the progress of the Guardians Of Freedom is the content of the justice expansion pack.The main reason is from a design perspective,the modeling of the Justice Expansion Pack is more complicated in craftsmanship,we hope to explore the new work process.

Due to the Chinese Lunar New Year, all our studio members are also on holiday. We apologize for the postponement of the update.By this special festival,we hope all our fans are getting through the hard times.

See you next time!

Dev log 12. Long time no see!
over 4 years ago – Tue, Oct 05, 2021 at 02:16:02 PM

Hello, everyone! We’re so sorry that the update we had planned to release in March was delayed for almost 2 months. Many of you might get upset about this and we’d like to apologize sincerely to all of you!

Let me just cut to the chase and elaborate our progress!

The following are the main contents of this update:

1.Progress of model development

2.Progress of rules revision

3.Progress of paper products revision 

4.APP development plan

5.Progress expectations, PM and refunds

6.Development for Season 2 and crowdfunding plan

This update is long and kind of jumbled. If you do not feel like reading the whole thing, you can directly go to chapter 5 which contains the most important information about PM plan and refunds. The rests are basically about development.

1.Progress of model development

First of all, about the development progress of the miniatures, we have received quite many suggestions that our development schedule should be simplified. We appreciate your advice and have added the overall progress expectations to the table.

As the charts show, so far we have completed all the pieces for Season 1 except for a few parts, which means that we have almost finished the “Blue phase”. The last part of the blue phase is expected to be completed within a week after the May Day holiday.

The following “Purple phase” is production in factory. For now, We don’t have a table showing the detailed progress for this phase, but we will bring news of the field work in factory along with more graphs in May if everything goes well.

Regarding the molds, the only photos we receive from the factory are those of simple molds:

From the photos, we can vaguely identify the part of rail gun. And that's all I can see.

I know you would rather see the photos of the molds of trial production instead of endless renderings and “factories are working overtime.jpg”, and we will update the progress of trial production as soon as possible.

Anyhow, when all of the progress reaches the blue stage, it means all the design for Season 1 miniatures is finally completed. We have really learned a lot during the whole process, especially the lessons.

For example, we had realized that the whole process would take “longer than expected”, but it turned out to take “much much longer than the time we expected”.

Another example is the difficulty of parts design. We had thought about it in the early stage, but when actually working on it, we realized that many things were not as simple as we had thought. We had to give up a lot of design that I adore and compromise with production requirements.

Plus, we have consumed a terrific amount of energy and money, as well as your trust in us. The lesson we’ve learned lasted for a whole year(we announced the model manufacturer in April, 2020), and it seems that it has not come to an end.

Let's show less renderings this time, mainly showing four kinds of Drones. By the way, we changed to yellow this time, hoping to be more energetic!

2.Progress of rules revision

At the beginning, I need to admit (This is not a confession, but I do have a lot of mistakes to confess) that: In 2019, I significantly underestimated the workload of models and the time I had to spend working on designing.

Therefore, although I have been devoting all my spare time to modifying and refining the rules, I am still short of time.

Luckily, as the model design work is finished, our next focus will be on designing paper products (packaging/maps/instructions/cards, etc.) and editing the rulebook. And now we are integrating these little adjustments, including but not limited to:

* Use 1-inch squares so that the movements could be more precise, and miniatures of different sizes could be placed.

*Adjust the standard unit size for constructions to conform to the scale of 1:56. We are currently discussing how to make the constructions accessible and the detailed scale of them – this will allow the constructions to have actual interior space and you can adapt them to your other 28mm wargame and of- course to the Obsidian Protocol infantry that will be released in the future.

*Modify the mechanism of vision field. We tried to apply the Scale Board similar to Infinity the Game and optimize the calculation process of vision field on squares.

*Remove the heat mechanism to simplify the game.

*Introduce the momentum mechanism to make it strategic to dodge and move. The mechanism applies to various mechs differently.

*Adjust the electronic warfare system to simplify the game.

*Reintroduce the differences between “two-handed weapons” and “single-handed weapons” to make the two-handed weapons feel real.

These adjustments still need refining, and I am working on it. If everything goes well, in the next update we will introduce the framework of rulebook and the glossary (which has been delayed for a long time).

I am often asked why I don’t hire someone to take care of the rules and here is a brief explanation. I am a pretty controlling person, and I think the first official version of the game is vital. I tend to do most of the rules-related work myself until I find someone perfectly in tune with me. In the foreseeable future, I will definitely look for a rule designer who is much better than me to take over my job, but not yet.

At the same time, we have found several excellent helpers for rule work, and welcome new helpers to join us. Assistance itself is paid, and we will seriously thank you in the official product.

3.Progress of paper products revision

There is really not much to say about this part. In simple terms, we will include the progress of paper products in our reports, including:

Cards. Our plan is to re-optimize a version of the cards design. The logic of the original cards is a bit messy, and we hope to further integrate it. The work is expected to start in late May(that is, after the rules are finalized) and last 2-3 weeks.

Rulebooks. Apart from waiting for the final version of main rules, we are also working with some illustrators and concept designers. We are inviting them to produce paintings for Obsidian Protocol or buying some of their works to visualize the setting.

Speaking of stories, we've seen some of the stories created by players in the QQ-group, many of which are very interesting. Thank you very much for your love. We are considering translating some of them and plan to share these stories with you in the future!

Maps. There won’t be too many modifications. We will do a little refinement on the original basis and draw two new maps, which will be done in May.

Packaging. We expect to redesign the packaging in June.

4.APP development plan

In Nov. 2020, we posted the hiring announcements on Modian, including Unity front end developers. One of our goals in hiring programmers is to develop a companion APP for Obsidian Protocol.

We had our first discussion meeting for the APP last week, and basically determined that the APP would include following features:

1. You can view the stats of all the equipment, how to obtain it and its background information.

2. You can use this APP to allocate your squad. We are also planning to use a simple scoring system to show you the strengths and weakness in terms of mobility/firepower/defense/electronic-warfare.

3. When playing Obsidian Protocol, you can use the APP to replace the cards deck and some of the markers to make your desk clean.

4. You can use the APP to preview the color of the miniatures and see the settings of each squad.

5. Most importantly, the database of the APP will be constantly updated. We want that the stats of the parts could be updated so that we can make adjustments to game balance in the future. Just like the way of X-wing.

That’s right, we tried to make the APP more look like a mobile game instead of a tool. The official version will be much more functional, so the UI might look a little cluttered.

FYI, our APP team only has a 3D artist, a programmer and a concept designer, who are currently also working on an indie game (about space battleships). The optimistic estimate is that the APP will be finished between September and November. Therefore, if the rest of our progress goes well, you will still have to play Obsidian Protocol with cards by the time of release.

We also discussed other possible features on this APP. However, some of those which look great are hard to realize at the moment, so we have limited the features to those above for now.

5.Progress expectations, PM ,and refunds

The following is an update on progress expectations:

We will be completing the design of all the parts in 2 weeks. The main job in May is to negotiate/coordinate with the factory.

We expect to receive all the T0 pieces of the Reconstruction and Development League in May. Hopefully we will have finished producing the T0 molds of all the pieces by July.

After that the factory still needs time to adjust the molds and start injection molding. The whole production is expected to finish in September.

On the other hand, before that we have to coordinate with another factory to finish the production of paper products, which takes about 2 months. Therefore, we need to finish the design of most paper products in July.

After delivering all the design to the factory, we will have an official meeting with the factory workers to confirm the expected time. But for now, since we haven’t finished all the design, the factory cannot anticipate the exact time.

As we mentioned in the previous update, we felt that since the project had been delayed so long, we might as well just wait until all the models were designed before opening PM. Now that all the models are basically done, it’s time to plan the release of PM. We will start to update the materials and confirm shipping costs with the shipping contractors once again. We will post another update when it’s done to inform you of the exact date of PM release, which should be between May 15thand June 1st.

Just to be clear, we may not respond in time, but we do understand all of our supporters who demand a refund. By now, we have refunded all those who have made applications. Please allow me to express my sincere gratitude to all of our backers. Without your support, we would never have gotten this far.

On the other hand, as mentioned earlier, we still need some time – to finish the production. We totally understand if you do not want to wait any longer. We accept that criticism that we fail to keep communication with you effectively. Although this is our first crowdfunding project, we could have done much better.

At present all we can do is to finish the rest properly, learn from our experience and apply it to the work that follows, and secretly hope that there will be more people willing to join in the PM.

6.Development for Season 2 and crowdfunding plan

It might seem a bit early, but we have basically confirmed some plans, so we decide to share them with you.

First of all, although the development cost of Season 1 is way beyond expectation, we believe that this is a promising project, and we will be able to sell more products to keep it running healthily.

So, we’re already working on developing Season 2. It is confirmed that there will be 3 “mixed” suppliers and cooperative gameplay. Most of the work is still on paper for now, but the new hired concept designers will start to design the appearance of these factions, and our modelers who have just finished designing all the parts will be working on the molds of Season 2.

There will still be crowdfunding for Season 2, but we have learned a lot from the past experience. So, we will adjust the pace of the project:

We will keep updating the development progress in this project(season 1), including rules revision and parts designing. We expect to open the crowdfunding after we have finished designing all the parts, which is when we are about to order the molds from the factory. In this case, the money from crowdfunding is mainly used to pay for the costs of the molds. When we finish crowdfunding, all we have to do is to wait for the factory to break the molds and produce them.

Yet the premise is that the product we deliver for this season is good enough. To achieve that, there is still a lot of work to do and much room for improvement, and we will try our best to do it right.

That’s all for this update. If everything goes well, in the next update there will be news from the factory, the date of PM and photos of new samples (I know you don’t want to see renderings anymore).

Dev log 13. May Status Report & V0.9.5 Rules Update 1
over 4 years ago – Tue, Oct 05, 2021 at 02:12:49 PM

Hello everyone, here’s the update to conclude our work in may.

The RDL prototype models should have been done by last weekend(29th or 30th May),  however due to a factory black out(yes that happens during summer peak),  the prototyping was delayed to 4thor 5th of June.  Therefore there will be another mini update next week to update you guys on this.

As I’m writing this one, our manufacturer Takom have already started the Trimming Process -which is the polishing of the parting line shutoff, a process that requires significant experience and patience – and to our surprise the factory appointed their senior fitter to do our pieces,  so yeah,  I thrilled to see the final result!

Now about the model schedule:

GoF: we are one sniper rifle(MR21) away from completing their arsenal,  currently working on the centaur chassis and the remaining two core box bodies.

UN: all done,  files already sent to our manufacturer.

Regarding the dice tower and building sets,  we are modifying them now and it’s going smoothly.  Praise the geometry!  I would post some renders if the final design is done before the mini-update next week.

And here is some changes about the rules in V0.9.5.

1. Small grids.

All grids rescaled to 25mm(1 inch),  standard building units rescaled to 75x75x50mm(3x3x2 inches),  this change effects all grid/building related entries.

Our current miniatures now require square bases when you play with grid-based rules. And of course, the extra bases will come with your purchase for free:

Most shell/micro drone/projectile /beacon, and potential single infantry,  will use 25mm round base and 25mm squire base(1 grids) ;

Light drone,  and potential heave infantry/motorcycle,  will use 50mm round base and 50mm squire base(4 grids) ;

Most chassis/medium drone,  and potential light vehicle(wheeled vehicles like jeeps),  will use 50mm round base and 75mm squire base(9 grids) ;

A few heavy chassis/heavy drone, and potential medium vehicle(armored vehicles),  will use 75mm round base and 75mm squire base(9 grids) ;

Potential super heavy chassis/ super heavy drone/ heavy vehicle(MBTs),  will use 100mm round base and 100mm squire base(16 grids) .

Most of the buildings/ terrain blocks/ Scenery Structures have been rescaled accordingly so not only their size are more reasonable, while also providing a more intuitive experience when interacting with units:

Small Scenery Structures such as small container/terminal/fuel tank are rescaled to 25x25x50mm, so in actual size they would be something like 1.4x1.4x2.8m；

Medium Scenery Structures such as a fountain(do they have them on da moon tho?) or a pile of supplies are now 50x50x25mm, so 2.8x2.8x1.4m in size；

1 grid walls, usually breast walls or rooftop parapets, are rescaled to 75x25x25mm. They are 1.4 meter in height thus providing cover for infantry and drone. However such meager wall can not give cover to a massive mech. The updated cover system shall be explained later;

2 grid walls, usually billboards/fences, artificial mech covers or terrain. Their new 75x25x50mm size grant them the capability to cover mechs. This is also the size of our new “Turtleshell” mobile cover；

Standard building unit, usually an one story height building, a neatly shaped natural structure or an artificial platform. They are 75x75x50mm, corresponding to their 4.2x4.2x2.8m real life size. 

In the world of Obsidian Protocol, these cramped building units were first designed by JASA, made of moon-dirt concrete in lunar bases and serve as prefab FOB structure for fast deployment into the Relics. The lower lunar gravity allows these building units to easily stack up to 20 storeys high without external bearing structure - however any of these building higher than 4 storeys are rarely seen as nobody would want to climb up 20 floors, even on the moon. #groundcrewbestcrew

2. Vision Mechanic and Silhouette Template.

We are introducing infinity-styled silhouette template to our Free-move Mode, a dedicated caliper and some silhouette template will be added to the game set. 

Whenever vision measurement are not clear enough, use the caliper to replace both miniatures with Silhouette Template, then observe the defender’s Silhouette Template via the hole on attacker’s Silhouette Template.While this method may not always resolve conflict, it’s the most optimal solution we can think of.

Personally I consider ruler-based miniature wargames as gentlemen’s game, which require the consent and cooperation of both parties to proceed. If measurement conflicts still happen after the introduction of Silhouette Template, then it will have to be settled by a game judge.

For now Silhouette Template are classified as below:

(AxB, A: width and chassis size; B: height)

Size 1，25x25mm，mostly exclusive for mines, rarely applies but they were in the rulebook.

Size 2，25x50mm，mostly exclusive for ammunitions, same as above.

Size 3，50x25mm，no appliance for now, reserved for potential special drones.

Size 4，50x50mm，light/medium drones

Size 5，50x75mm，mostly MAPs

Size 6，75x25mm，no appliance for now, reserved for potential special drones.

Size 7，75x50mm，heavy drones

Size 8，75x75mm，MAPs with large chassis

The problem with these Volume Templates is that most MAPs have horizontal arm extension so they might cause some confusion at first.

Or you know, just play the grid-based Standard mode to escape these drama.

The vision mechanic modification for Standard mode are focused on it’s vertical aspect. The horizontal vision is pretty easy to check in Standard mode, we even planned a vision checker on our app, just point two grids and it will tell you if there’s vision, avoiding the micro angle vision fiasco all together.

However, the vision calculation become complicated once we brought in vertical dimension. Following changes has been made in rule version 0.9.5:

1. In Standard mode, terrain heights are limited to 1-6, meaning neither negative height nor terrain higher than 6 grid is allowed.

2. When calculating vision, first check if theres altitude difference higher than 2. If true, then it is considered Uneven, otherwise Even.

3. Check if there’s any obstructing terrain along the Line of Sight. Add a unit’s height to the grid height it’s standing on to get two Total Heights, if any terrain along the Line of Sight was higher than any of the two Total Heights, then it is considered Obstructed, otherwise Visible.

4. If Obstructed, check if there’s available Line of Sight between the two grids. If true, then it is considered Partially Visible, otherwise Not Visible.

5. With the rules above we classify vision between two units into 5 types:

·Not Visible

·Uneven, Partially Visible

·Even, Partially Visible

·Uneven, Visible

·Even, Visible

When firing towards a Partially Visible unit, the defender is considered covered by terrain, gaining 1 extra white dice when they choose to defense or 1 extra re-roll when they choose to dodge.

When firing towards a Uneven unit, if the attacker had the advantage of height, they may re-roll each of their dies marked with eye symbol once.

When firing towards a Uneven unit, if the defender had the advantage of height, they are considered to have one more level of terrain cover.

This method of vision calculation is simpler than before, but we are still considering simplify it even further. One solution that come to our mind is to combine the grid-based Standard mode and Tutorial mode into a new “Tactical” mode, where projectiles can only be fired in front, back, left and right four directions, abstracting the rules into something completely different, instead of just being a butchered free-move mode.

3. Heat changes.

Heat changes were actually made few versions back. Starting as a mechanic to limit player action spring and immersion tool, on later tests we found players were overwhelmed by the numbers they need to track, including heat, ammo and Link Value. They may be fun to manage when you are controlling only one MAP, but in a squad versus squad scenario they were proven to cause more harm than good. That’s why we scratched it.

However, we are currently implementing the “heat” keyword onto certain weapons, replacing the “meltdown” keyword from before. When a “heat” weapon hit target, it’s penetration mark does not break through armor, instead causing 1 damage and leave one “heat” token on target. Whenever units with “heat” tokens rolled a lightning mark (whether to attack, move or dodge), each “heat” token would deal irresistible damage to their corresponding component at the end of that action, representing the mechanical failure from weakened component triggered by sudden movement.

We still need to adjust the green dice for this change, but all in all this would make heat weapon more “control” oriented, forcing your opponent’s MAPs with high mobility/using quickshot weaponry to slow down.

4. Momentum and the new maneuver mechanic.

We added the Momentum mechanic back in rule version 0.9.4 and the results were promising. So we went one step further this time and made this change to all chassis:

First of all, to ensure the dynamic of the battlefield, we made a radical adjustment, which was merging the movement actions of most chassis into one – sprint. Maneuver instead became a chassis specific stat instead of a universal one.

For example, the LM-231 chassis originally had the stat of: 

‘Dodge, 2 Green’;

‘Action A, Move, Step 3, Range 6’;

 ‘Action B, Sprint, Step 6, Range 6 + 1 Blue’.

We changed it to:

 ‘Movement, Range 4, Momentum 1’;

‘Dodge, 2 Green’;

‘Action, Sprint, Step 6, Range 8, Momentum 2’.

As you can see we changed this chassis actions into sprint with a fixed range of 8, while maneuver was changed into movement with the default range of 4. This change has tremendous impact on how the game playout, please allow me to briefly explain some related adjustments.

First, the concept of Momentum. A MAP with Momentum token indicate it’s currently moving, and the Momentum token can be spend when attacked to enhance your dodge action: 

When choose to dodge, you may spend any mount of Momentum tokens you had, each grants you one additional blue die, and if you spend two Momentum tokens you may choose to get one green die instead of two blue die(if we decide to keep the green die, that is). After the dodge, whether took damage or not, the die result would grant your MAP extra maneuver.

On the other hand, a MAP with no momentum means it’s “Stationary”, certain weapons, mostly rifles, are more precise when wielder is Stationary, it’s Fire Action would have trait such as “Gain 1 Red if Stationary” or something like that.

This action cut was also an experiment to test if we can cut all component actions down to one. Side-actions such as Reload would be placed to the back of the card, then we can add “Flip Card” to the end of action descriptions, on both side of the card. Some card representing two weapons, for example dagger/missile, will have a mark to indicate that they can be Flipped at will under certain circumstances.

The idea behind this is that, one, we now have too much function on a single MAP; two, liberate the cramped card space and simplify card info.

5. Just some ranting on One-handed/Two-handed Weapons.

Much like the change above, we are torn between differentiating One-handed and Two-handed Weapons, while also trying to simplify the game.

Differentiating One-handed and Two-handed allow certain weapons (rifles or two-handed melee) to have different effect when equipped on off-hand, which is an approach that favors realism and complexity.

While another thing we have been seriously working on is to reduce the type of dice in our game, like combining Blue/Green/White dies into one? Or perhaps combining Purple/Red/Orange/Black dies into two? This approach favors simplicity and streamlining.

The “Off-hand” and “Versatile” keywords we implemented in rule version 0.9.5 is an attempt on former approach, as we would like to observe how they impact the weapon performance on the battlefield.

While we will not cut the types of die just now, we are active on finding a solution to this matter. Using rainbow-colored dies can be flamboyant and all, but the game experience would be much smoother if only one or two types of die are throwed in a whole game.

We are still tidying up the detailed 0.9.5 stats, including the new virus/tactical card list, which will be uploaded later. Also keep an eye out as we might organize a test-play in this month(Planning in Beijing and Shanghai, and maybe Tokyo).

Finally, we are currently contacting with a graphic designer, with any luck you guys can expect update and snippet on our paper product soon enough.