Companion Traits

Why do almost all massively multiplayer online games have pet systems? There's many reasons, but creating emotional engagement is one of the biggest. I’d argue that for crypto games, creating personal attachment via collectibles and cosmetics is DOUBLY important to prevent the financial aspects of the game from reducing the game world down into a 1D yield vehicle to be maximally exploited. Growing collections of dynamic, ever-evolving assets is a core activity in the universes that we're building. Here's an preview of the design of some of these ingame interactions & traits 👇

What are Companions?

Two weeks ago, we launched the 🏵️ Cores factory NFT to create an onchain framework around new cosmetic/collectible asset generation in a way where distribution, pricing, rarity, etc. is player (market) controlled (see our blog post on Cores for more on this). Now, we’re implementing Part #1 of the corresponding factory output collections - Companions, a dynamic collection that represents all Companions owned by players in game. Companions are ingame follower NPCs provide ingame QoL / time-saving utility in addition to being complex collectible that have their own traits, progression, and personalities.

Summoning

How do you mint new Companions? The only way new Companions get created is via the summoning function that uses a soulbound resource called Shards (obtained from staking Cores) to mint new Companion NFT with a procedurally generated set of traits to the collection. *when* to summon is a little minigame involving maximizing yield against fluctuating supply and demand - shard prices are on a VGRDA targeting a slow constant issuance rate. Factors include Staking cooldown, demand (FP) for Cores, demand (FP) for Companions, Summon cooldown, the VGRDA parameters, etc.

Every Companion Unique

    {
        "archetype": Archetype.Wyvern,
        "name": "R'gur the Destroyer",
        "backstory": "???",
        "heritage_index": 86.243,
        "personality": {
            "reserved_sociable": 23,
            "follower_rebellious": 77,
            "patient_active": 45
        },
        "current_lifespan": 2350,
        "goldrush_perks": ["fleet_of_foot", "collector"],
        "catchphrase": "pika!"
    },

Because each companion is a nonfungible token given new life onchain on mint, a crucial requirement is that they have a variety of interesting, procedurally generated traits. These Companion traits ideally should be cross-applicable across all Cambria game modes & portable across the ecosystem, allowing us to implement Companions across a variety of current and future products - Duel Arena, Gold Rush, etc. Here are a few of the traits we're planning...

(1.0) Archetype

The companion archetype is the most obvious trait - currently, new summons can roll into any of the 7 initial archetypes - Male Citizen, Female Citizen, Canine, Feline, Griffin, Wyvern, and Faerie (each with their own configured Rarity Index that dictates the likelihood of new summons rolling to the archetype). The difference in Archetype is currently cosmetic only, though we won’t rule out giving Citizens more chat interactivity modules (each Citizen has its own AI agent?) in the future - talking cats though may be too jarring 🤣

(2.0) Name & Backstory

Companion names is another obvious one - each Companion starts off as unnamed ("Wyvern") and can be named by their owner, with name changes becoming more and more expensive each time. Note: we will probably have to censor these on our game frontend haha, although you can put whatever you want onchain. Companion backstories can also be set or generated as metadata by players - feel free to wax poetic about the long-lost noble origins of your common house cat.

(3.0) Personality

This personality matrix defines behavioral quirks for each Companion, impacting how they interact with the world and the player. e.g.

• reserved <> sociable - frequency of dialog popups or commentary during idle time or events. determines interaction with other players' pets (e.g., growls, antisocial disappears in crowded areas). sociable may interact with other players or pets.
• follower <> rebellious - affects certain dynamic follow behaviors (e.g., restlessness, chance to suddenly abandon - cannot be summoned for a period, frequency of idle animation playing, etc.)
• active <> measured - impacts how closely the pet follows the player and its position (e.g., "Quick" stays closer; "Slow" lags behind). affects exact follow position - e.g. directly behind (hiding), behind to the right / left

Certain personality scale values can also lead to unique options with Companion dialogs, with Companion interactivity that will be extended in v2.

4) Catchphrase

Catchphrases are expressions (e.g. "pika!!") that the Companion will utter in certain game situations and also on interaction by other players. These are are procedurally generated from a combination bank that incorporates the values of other Traits on summon, with the potential to generate unique ones for collectability. Catchphrases are rare, as most glitch out on summon, generating unintelligible output or empty space. We see certain catchphrases as potentially rare as they can be spammed to bm or otherwise.

5) Heritage Index

Each Companion has a "Heritage Index" that is essentially a rarity score of sorts. This index has a log normal distribution skewed slightly below 50, with very low chances of hitting high indexes on each Companion summon (5% chance above 75, 0.5% chance above 95, etc.)

Certain cosmetic skins or visual enhancements require (or are enhanced) with this Heritage Index value (e.g. 95+ index to use a legendary companion skin). Certain exclusive locations may also require a pet above certain indexes as well on entry.

6) Perks System

Specific to Gold Rush, perks allow power players to save time and effort to get to the best parts of gameplay. Some perks are enabled if any companion NFT is owned, namely:

• Expanded Bank Space
• Bank Tabs
• Presets / Loadouts Usage
• Faster Focus Point Regen

Others can only be activated when the player has a Companion with the corresponding Perk in their traits. A few of the possible perks include:

• Auto Loot Collection (certain limitations apply)
• Auto-Bank (when near bank)
• Pathfinding Assistance
• Birds-eye View / Scouting
• Off-screen Tracking Indicators
• Companion Interactions with other Players (non-gameplay impacting)

Companions can have between 1 to 7 perks. New Perks may be added throughout the lifetime of the collection, and can only be rolled into by Companions summoned afterwards.

TL;DR

In summary, we’re combining:

• Player (market) control over distribution, pricing, rarity
• Random generation of unique traits
• Collectibility of that randomness
• Utility of the asset in game
• Dynamic Interactivity

in v1 to create UNIQUELY collectable companions.

Next Devlog - Companion Interactions, Skins, & Progression