Dear SolChicks Fam,
We are thrilled to unveil the first installment of the SolChicks game development blog. Through this blog, we will be sharing our latest progress, design decisions, and other exciting game development updates with you. We also aim to use this medium to gather feedback from the community to keep improving the design and build of the SolChicks game. So be sure to let us know your thoughts in the comments section.
The development team at SolChicks and 0xPlay have been really heartened and energized by the positive responses from you to our game demo and recent sneak peeks. To this end, we have been hard at work over the past months and have some really cool updates with regards to our NFT-based equipment system.
Equipment System
SolChicks is an RPG game at its core, and one of the most important things is to balance out sources of power for the character. While the base NFT character provides benefits in terms of greater stats, power, and higher earn rates for the players, equipment also plays an important role in determining the player’s power level. Our guiding principle is to create a game that is “easy to learn, difficult to master”. With this in mind, we have endeavored to create an equipment system that is easy to use and comprehend, while not compromising on its depth and breadth.
To start with the basics. Each character will have four equipment slots — weapon, primary armour, secondary armour, and accessory — where players will be able to equip equipment (and equipment NFTs) in their collection to get the benefits from the item. In order to preserve the PFP nature of the SolChick NFTs, we have decided that only the equipped weapon will change the in-game appearance of the character while primary armour, secondary armour, and accessories will only be displayed as icons in the character info pane.
Equipment will not only increase stats and provide unique bonuses to characters, but also be a way for players to equip skills to their SolChicks. Players will collect skill books while adventuring, which will, when bound to an equipped item, allow the character to use the skill in combat. When a skill is bound, the skill book is consumed in the process. We feel that this system will allow players to experiment with a variety of skills and builds for their characters, while providing weight to player choices. Further, any skills bound to the equipment will be part of the metadata in the corresponding item’s NFT, which further increases the uniqueness and depth of these items and hopefully increase their tradability and value.
We have settled on having five unique classes which each SolChick can be — Knight, Outlaw, Ranger, Wizard, and Priest (more details to follow in subsequent updates). To build more class identity, we have currently designed five types of weapons and primary armour, with each corresponding to a different class. Secondary armour and accessories will likely be shared across all five classes.
The broad idea we have for item power will come from three sources — (i) the type of the equipment, (ii) equipment rarity tier, and (iii) equipment level.
Type of the equipment
Not all equipment types are created equal. Weapons and primary armour slots will almost always provide higher stat bonuses than secondary armour and accessory slots, however, that is not to say that secondary armour and accessories are less valuable. We plan to have secondary armour and accessories provide unique or passive bonuses which will allow for more character customization beyond just stats and numbers.
Equipment rarity tier
There will be five rarity tiers for equipment: Common, Uncommon, Rare, Epic, and Legendary. Like in many RPG games, the tier of the equipment will determine its base power level and also its likelihood for a player to obtain. The rarity of the item will be shown in the item icon (grey being common, while orange being legendary) as well as in its item tooltip. Rarity tiers for an equipment cannot be upgraded (for example, an Uncommon can never be upgraded to a Rare).
Equipment level
In order to reward players who have spent time and effort in the game, we have also designed an equipment progression system (which we are currently calling the Blacksmith System). Each piece of equipment starts from level 1, and can be gradually upgraded by the player to a maximum level of level 10. In order to not flood the ecosystem with a large number of equipment and equipment NFTs, players can disassemble existing equipment to acquire crafting materials. Crafting materials will also have a rarity tier (Common, Uncommon, Rare, Epic, and Legendary) based on the rarity of equipment being disassembled. For example, if a Rare piece of equipment is disassembled, the player will likely obtain Rare crafting materials. These crafting materials can be used to upgrade the equipment to increase its power level, which is displayed as a “+x” number on the top left corner of its icon. This can be significant as a high level Uncommon could be better than a low level Rare. Furthermore, any in game upgrades through the Blacksmith System will alter the NFT metadata and is stored on the blockchain, creating another way for players to earn value by playing the game. There are however risks to this activity and there will be a certain probability for an upgrade to fail, or possibly even destroy the equipment in the process. Again, the emphasis here is to give players choice that matters, with the right balance of risks and rewards in the game system design.
In short, along with the SolChicks NFTs, equipment adds depth, helps define class identity, and is a key source of power for characters, allowing players to equip skills they can use for combat.
Equipment can be acquired either through gameplay as a reward, or by purchasing Loot Stashes with our $CHICKS token. We are also contemplating allowing certain items to be crafted in game for players who are just missing that one final item in their build. We hope that the variety and depth of the equipment system will provide hours of fun for players to collect and customize and eventually craft their meta-changing builds in the world of SolChicks.
We hope you are as excited as us about this update and hope to see you in the SolChicks Village!
From,
Jun and Ben
The SolChicks Game Development Team
About SolChicks
SolChicks is the fastest growing and largest P2E in the Solana ecosystem, with a team of over 100 members, including a blue-chip game development team who have previously brought to market titles such as MapleStory, PUBG, Dungeon Fighter and Tera, and a business management team from institutions such as Wharton and McKinsey & Company.
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Game Mechanics | Whitepaper | Pitch Deck:https://www.solchicks.io/papers
