Dev Update – A Return to Order

Hey all,

Petrichor here, we’re reviving the Dev Updates to give you more visibility on what’s going on behind the scenes. Gods Unchained is a complex creature, some are drawn to the game, strategizing in the Workshop or cutting swathes in the Arena; others are here for the marketplace, looking to trade up and expanding their collection; and then there are those mortals who are here for the frontier, eager to tread the new roads of NFT and play to earn gaming.

As a result, we’ve got a few teams working in very different spaces, so here’s a glimpse of the hard work they’re putting in to get the content and systems to you – no matter what draws you to our ecosystem!

Divine Order expansion

We’ve announced the new set and, after a series of community reveals, you can now preview the upcoming card list. A few different teams are working in this space:

• The road to releasing the next expansion: The gameplay team is working hard to get this expansion set out the door. Testing, refining, and getting this set ready to ship is the priority here. Alongside the name and the card list, the new God Powers have also been revealed. The exciting news? We’re hoping to get you playtesting this on PTR in the next few weeks.
• Immutable X sales platform: The economy team is working on building out new sales tools so that the sale of Divine Order will happen through Immutable X. Immutable X is currently used to facilitate player to player trading of existing assets. Securely purchasing directly from us and distributing brand new assets is a completely different beast. Getting this right means:
• You’ll be trading and purchasing within the same Layer 2 system;
• There will be no gas fees on trading (gas still applies to first register and transfer ETH to Immutable X);
• Waiting time for cards to show up in your inventory will be reduce from hours to seconds, as waiting for packs to be minted onchain will be a thing of the past, and;
• We can distribute assets (such as Weekend Ranked rewards) far easier.
• Community reveals: Did you get a chance to catch the community reveals of Divine Order cards? It's so amazing for us behind the scenes to watch everyone come together and puzzle out the new mechanics, as well as theory-craft with the new cards. Some of you are bang on the money with a few of your predictions, while others are way out there, but also brilliant. Thanks for all who took part!

Gameplay

Beyond the expansion our teams are currently focusing on:

• Reworking ward: Something we’ve been wanting to look into for a while, ward has had some inconsistencies that’s been talked about by many a mortal in Discord. The goal behind the ward rework is to reduce overall confusion, as well as balance a few cards that currently have some frustrating interactions. More on this down the line, but a heads up that this is something we’re looking into at the moment, and one to prepare for! If you have thoughts on this keyword, now is a great time to share them! Hit us up in the comments of the Reddit post, or #balance in Discord.
• Updating the Core set: This sees huge improvements across the board for one of our most-used sets, with lots of changes coming down the pipeline. This is still a while off, but big shifts like this take time.
• Taking Gods Unchained to the top: An internal goal is to not only make Gods Unchained great, but make it the best damn Trading Card Game out there. This means we are constantly looking at our systems and working to improve them. You will have noticed the updates in the last quarter have been focusing on stability and consistency. We’ve waged a war on bugs, as well as vastly improved disconnects and reconnects, with the addition of sweeping rewrites that often aren’t visible on the front-end, but make the game run much more consistently. Behind the scenes, we’ve also been working on VFX improvements, card balance, and gameplay improvements.
• Mobile progress: Mobile is progressing well, the team is working towards multiple internal release milestones. The designs and UI is significantly different on the mobile app, but we’re pretty stoked with how this is looking. The current goal is to show off something to the wider community before the end of the year.
• Low-mana heroes: Here’s a look at the most played cards in the current meta. Even after the nerf, Vanguard Axewoman is still going strong as players are currently favoring low-mana cards. An important note: Neutral cards are generally leaders here, as they can appear in any deck.

Play to earn

• Working towards reopening the Forge: The cries for the Forge are many, and they’re heard. This is part of the essential play to earn experience for Gods Unchained. For those not in the know, the process is: you earn cards in-game, you fuse them into Layer 2 NFTs in the Forge, you trade them on the marketplace (or take that good lookin’ NFT to the Arena). We’re working on getting this back in the game, but it’s not as simple as just turning it on. We’re doing the due diligence to ensure that the Forge, flux, and fusing all work in a way that sets the ecosystem up for success in the long run. While $GODS will inevitably become a core element of fusing, we are looking into a healthy and fair way that the Forge may function pre-$GODS too.
• Polishing $GODS: Speaking of $GODS, the token team has been busy at work building out the foundations of the $GODS token. The whitepaper is coming along and in its final stages, but we’re currently navigating a few operational-related blockers that need resolving before we can launch, The main goals for us in this stage of $GODS are:
• Ensuring we find the best and most functional way to reward all our early supporters;
• Creating a sustainable and effective staking program that adequately rewards $GODS holders, and;
• Setting play to earn up for success with a sustainable future that sees $GODS flow through all parts of the ecosystem.

Nice to know

• Crypto Product Manager: We’ve welcomed a new Crypto Product Manager into the Gods Unchained team, with experience in blockchain tech to improve the user experience and the interaction of game mechanics with blockchain.
• Carbon neutral trades with Immutable X: Some end-of-week feel good news. When it comes to the gas used in publishing proofs to the Ethereum blockchain, Immutable X is able to reduce the energy output by a whole lot. The energy used here and greenhouse gas emitted is just 1% of equivalent L1 trades, using roughly 127 times less energy. Any remaining energy is offset by credits.
• Petrichor's favorite dessert: It's tiramisu. Pretty big news here, tell your friends. Better yet, go get one and treat yourself this weekend!

Over the last quarter, we’ve let our Trello roadmap slide into stagnancy. This was an old initiative that we stopped supporting as it takes time to upkeep. We’ve had a few requests for it recently, and may have been too hasty in retiring it.

So we’d like to finish with a question: do you look at the roadmap and get value from it? If so, let us know on the Reddit post we can bring it to Malissus, God of Death, and ask her to bring it back from the void.

All the best in the Arena!

- Petrichor, Gods Unchained Editorial Lead