Battlefields: A SoldierNodes Game (hopefully).
The following is a game design I have pitched to the SoldierNodes company.
A little bit of background:
Disclaimer: I have no connection to the SoldierNodes company — I am just a big fan who is passionate about the project reaching its full potential.
SoldierNodes launched 16 days ago to enormous initial success with the promise of combining a daily rewards earning node protocol with gaming DeFi.
The soldiers community was uber excited about this unique product (sending the native $SLD price soaring to $21.45), however after a few technical hiccups, daily rewards being reduced (in order to keep the project sustainable), and the general sell pressure seen in many crypto protocols prior to Christmas, has seen the price back down to conservative levels ($2.8 at time of writing — still 900% up from launch).
For an easy to understand pictorial summary of the SoldierNodes story so far I suggest you check out the very talented Will’s twitter thread:
(twitter.com/williamthemself/status/1474294579029364737)
Introducing myself (Steve Croft — @SteveCeeGames on twitter):
For the past 5 years I been on a journey of game design exploration.
Being a child of the 90s I grew up playing video games on consoles such as early Atari / Sega / Gameboy / PS4, however in 2013 a friend introduced me to the world of strategy tabletop gaming and I was hooked.
Obviously since the advent of computers, tabletop gaming has always been the poor cousin of video games in sales and innovation, however around mid 2000s a resurgence of strategy games occurred (also known as eurogames), and I was instantly blown away by the quality of game play, strategic depth and drawn in by the the beautiful worlds & character art.
So I went in deep — really really deep.
I thought “hell”, I could even design my own game!
I listened to every game design podcast I could find, I read every game design book I could get my hands on. I joined playtesting groups, I helped develop a few games (my names even in a few rulebooks), and I immersed myself in designing my own games.
On top of the games themselves what I fell in love with most was the community. Passionate and welcoming people who’s excitement for upcoming games was contagious and their dedication to build an inclusive and accessible hobby melded with my outlook on life.
So when SoldierNodes popped up a few weeks ago I instantly saw parallels with that of hobby gaming communities — an appetite for something new & creative and an engaged & enthusiastic community.
Opportunity Arises
In 2020 I had assembled a collection of some of my most promising game designs ready to get travel to gaming conventions around the world (Germany & USA being the biggest) and pitch my designs to established and indie publishers.
But when Covid hit, travel disappeared, getting together to play games evaporated and the business of publishing tabletop games got really challenging (shipping cardboard boxes wood and plastic from China to the USA tripled)
Therefore I had to adapt. I started playing and designing games for online implementation on a series of online services that popped up — digital strategy board games in essence.
Presenting Battlefields:
When I saw that SoldierNodes were planning on launching a war game based on Risk, I thought Whoa! this is right down my alley.
I wondered how I could help out or get involved (perhaps even just to playtest the game prior to release).
As I learned more about reward based node protocols and tokenomics I thought wait-a-minute I have an existing game design that would fit perfectly into their ecosystem — Battlefields!
Battlefields is gaming system designed to be a franchise game:
Battlefields: WW1
Battlefields: WW2
Battlefields: Ancient Wars
Battlefields: Nuclear War
and even Battlefields: Fantasy
The game mode is player vs environment where you (the player) represent an army that starts at the bottom of the battlefield and must transverse your way through terrain and enemy obstacles such as trenches, barricades, gunfire, etc.
Each themed battlefield will introduce a fresh mechanical twist based on the historic setting.
A samurai in Battlefields Japan may be just be a singular threat but he will be persistent and fight until death.
Whereas a WW2 army tank will cause serious destruction if it lands a hit, but is cumbersome & slow so a trained soldier like yourself should easily be able to maneuver around it’s course.
Game Play:
Each session of Battlefields is in essence a puzzle to get from A to B in order to kill the enemy objective (akin to a boss in modern gaming).
To successfully achieve the objective you must use a combination of strategy and tactics together with local knowledge (system mastery of your favorite battlefields).
The game rules are easy to understand but hard to master.
I am a big proponent of accessible rules onboarding, and a hidden emergence of depth that rewards players who explore the game further.
This game system allows for an ongoing layering of fun game mechanics to thematically match the Battlefield theme.
Strategy: Each session presents an asymmetric setup, hence a glance over the terrain and obstacles present is required to plot your path.
Tactics: Battlefields has a unique mechanic called morale.
Army morale changes dynamically throughout a gaming session so the player will be required to constantly parse risk vs reward each and every action.
You will have a love / hate relationship with this mechanic — it is heavily influenced my one of my favorite board games Pandemic.
System Mastery: Each session has a procedurally generated layout of obstacles (ie. enemy threats).
Therefore, you may have played “Battlefields: The Punic Wars” two-thousand times and know every nook and cranny, but a dynamic enemy will always keep you on your toes.
Note: If you’re familiar with the roguelike deck-building game Slay the Spire you will see where my inspiration lies.
play2earn
As each game is a player vs environment session how does play2earn work you ask?
Well the answer is… Battle Royale.
Every time a new Battlefield setting is released with new terrain layout and fresh enemy obstacles, the player base will scramble to master the battlefield and become the best fighter.
Players will earn a big slice of the liquidity pool via skill of risk vs rewards tactics and via particular battlefield experience.
The bulk of rewards will come through:
- top placement in daily rankings,
- bonus “XP” rewards for beating your best score on new battlefields,
- successfully attempting “feature maneuvers”.
The exact distribution of rewards for Battle Royale placements will be determined by the play2earn / node company but I will push for a fair and evenly awarded pool (rather than a winner-takes-all).
Example model of “Daily Rewards Resolution”:
1st: 20% of rewards pool
2nd: 10%
3rd: 5%
4th to 10th: 3%
Unplaced Top 50%: You would earn your investment back — break even.
Bottom 50%: You would lose this time — get better.
Note: Clusters of players are likely to achieve the same ranked score so reward distributions would be weighted.
Feeling confident? Why not go all in:
In addition, a confident player may up their ante on a particular battlefield.
If unsuccessful their army would take casualties and would be put to rest and not earn for a period of time.
You will never outright lose armies (investment) in this game.
Conclusion:
There you have it, this is just a game overview I plan to pitch to SoldierNodes to release on their gaming ecosystem.
The SoldierNodes dev team along with the discord mods have done an amazing effort to get all us investors into this position.
Growing pain are bound to happen with new startups and I think it would be a shame for the community to give up on them before they’ve even got going.
They’re a talented young team and their Risk game could be a lot of fun.
I firmly believe if they take the time to consider my game design, their gaming platform would benefit from Battlefields, and the $SLD price could potentially get back to $20 and above.
Lets stick together soldiers.
Wish me luck on my game pitch.
Thanks for reading.
Steve
If you have questions or would like to follow the game’s progress I will provide regular updates via my twitter account (handle: @SteveCeeGames).
