Gameplay Elements

General Concept

Gameplay is divided into four primary elements; the overworld, combat, base management, and visual novel sections. The overworld serves as a real-time, interactive geoscape section where you direct your echelons around the map in search of resources or quest targets, while avoiding or intercepting enemy forces that you find there. Combat is the turn-based tactical segment of the game, which occurs when one of your echelons on the overworld encounters an enemy or combat event. Base management involves spending resources to aquire new dolls, gear, and upgrades to the base which increase the player's capabilities, as well as managing the logistics trains which travel through the overworld to and from the base. The visual novel sections serve as unlockable story segments delving into the characters and their relationships with each other and the commander; each chapter will have specific requirements to unlock.

Overworld

The overworld consists of a map of the local region overlayed with interconnected nodes, exactly like mission maps in GFL. Unlike GFL, the overworld progresses with the in-game time rather than being turn-based. Echelons move around the world map from node to node, encountering enemies and events as they do so. The overworld is normally shrouded in fog of war, which is revealed by the sightlines of your echelons and also by capturable listening posts. Line of sight is modified by skills or items in the echelon, and is reduced at night. Like the geoscape from XCOM, time progresses just by having the geoscape open though at a very slow rate, and buttons will be used to pass time quickly.

Enemy units from both factions wander the overworld, spawning from multiple locations around the edge of the map, and can engage in sabatoge of the player's infrastructure or capture their listening posts. Most importantly for the player, they can ambush logistics trains and steal or destroy the transported goods, preventing the other bases on the front from receiving them and reducing the Commander's rating and compensation.

Logistics missions also take place on the overworld. Certain areas on the map like cities, towns, military bases, etc, will have nodes that can be searched by an echelon to find supplies to supplement the base's income. These nodes become exhausted after being searched and take time to recharge before they can be searched again.

Combat

Combat occurs when an echelon encounters an enemy unit, and takes place on a semi-randomized tactical map with an isometric perspective. Units are not bound to a grid, though map generation will make use of grids to make things easy. Each unit has a number of action points which can be freely spent on any actions, be it movement, firing a weapon, reloading, using an item, etc. Different weapons require different amount of action points to fire or reload, depending on their real-life statistics.

Firing a weapon creates a raycast projectile with a specified amount of energy that is expended as the projectile travels, and which has a chance of colliding with every obstruction it passes through; thin or narrow obstructions like trees or lamposts have a small chance to intercept projectiles, while solid obstructions like concrete barriers have a high chance. Colliding with an obstruction reduces the energy remaining in the projection depending on the HP and armor of the obstruction and imparts some deviation to the projectile, possibly changing its course. If a projectile has no energy remaining after impacting an obstruction, it won't pass through the barrier. Units have a chance to dodge projectiles that contact them based on their evasion stat, reduced by the accuracy stat of the firing unit (except in cases of friendly fire, where evasion is increased by accuracy).

A unit that is in close proximity to an obstruction takes cover behind it, increasing the cover objects chance to intercept enemy (and not ally) projectiles, but units can still be hit by bullets that penetrate the barrier or fired from a flanking angle so that they avoid passing through the cover object. Obstructions take damage as they intercept bullets, reducing their chance to intercept projectiles as they become more damaged.

Dolls that are destroyed in combat are lost until their body is replaced through an expensive purchase from IOP back at base. Dolls that have dummies assigned to them instead lose a dummy when they take fatal damage, and can then be redeployed in the same battle after a cooldown period. Dummies or dolls can be manually retreated from combat, resupplied, and redeployed, also following a cooldown period.

In combat, the Commander has access to a series of special abilities which can only be activated by spending 'Initiative', a resource that is gained at the start of combat and through actions like destroying enemies. These abilities should be primarily meta-gameplay effects, like adjusting the turn order. Spending initiative, however, gives initiative to the enemy, which can then be spent on abilities, though of a different sort than the Commanders. When Cleric or Purifier are on the field, they have unique initiative abilities representing their leadership over the local sangvis network.

Base Management

The base is in shoddy shape when first acquired by the commander, with multiple sections in urgent need of repair or outright nonfunctional. Resources need to be spent to get them back into working order, and many of the facilities in the base can be upgraded to provide benefits, like the dorms, which unlock additional echelon slots, or the repair bay, which allow more dolls to be repaired at once. Other facilities, like the cafe and training center, provide bonuses to the dolls living in the base. Dolls that are not currently deployed into the overworld slowly regain morale as they work and relax around the base, up to the cap that current base upgrades allow.

Dolls, dummies, and equipment are purchased, managed, and sold in this section of the game. Dolls can be assigned into 5-unit echelons, given equipment, attachments, upgrades, and consumables, and then deployed in the overworld. Dolls are purchased from IOP using rare doll prodution tickets and resources, whereas dummies can be purchased at any time with resources and assigned to any doll that has sufficient core upgrades to support them.

Lastly, the logistics trains, rails, and helicopters are managed in this section. The repair trains which fix damaged sections of track or clear blockages can be upgraded and deployed into the overworld alongside the rail running BTR, which is used to transport or resupply dolls quickly along the tracks. Helicopters can also transport dolls or supplies around the map quickly, but can be shot down by Javelin when flying through fog of war. Trains can be delayed past the scheduled delivery times if the player needs more time to make sure an area is clear, but doing so will affect the Commander's rating and compensation.

Visual Novel

All of the side stories will be presented in standard visual novel format, as chapters that can be unlocked by actions in the other segments and then viewed from base management. Each girl will have multiple chapters which depict a character development arc, with a final conclusion that resolves some fundamental problem or improves their life in some way, with romancable characters receiving h-scenes. Additionally, any side stories or interactions that aren't a part of the main story will be presented as chapters here. Although the part of the game with the least gameplay elements, it will end up being the most important for driving character development and investment.

Inventory

Each doll has a combat inventory which includes reloads for her gun, grenades, repair items, and specialty tools, which determines what she has access to in combat missions. The more wieght a doll carries, the more their movement and evasion stats are impacted; dolls with lighter weapon systems can carry a larger equivilent weight in supplies before being slowed down as much. Dolls can also carry ammunition and equipment for other dolls; this is useful when fielding dolls with heavy ammunition or ones that go through it quickly, like Lahti L-39 and Vickers, or dolls that use heavy consumable equipment, like the replacable shields of shotgun dolls.

Each echelon has a separate inventory which is used to carry MREs, munitions, and also loot found out in the world. MREs are consumed over time as dolls travel, while munitions are used to refill doll inventories as they expend ammo and items. Echelon inventory weight affects the overworld travel speed of an echelon, while the individual carrying capacity of all the dolls in an echelon determines how much they are slowed down by a particular amount of weight.

Items

Consumable items like grenades are single-use per combat but not permanently lost when used, similar to XCOM. However, expended grenades and magazines are not automatically recharged after a fight, but are only refilled when an appropriate amount of munitions are spent to do so. After each fight, munitions are subtracted from the echelon inventory and used to refill the expended combat inventory items of the dolls. Some items can only be carried in the echelon inventory and not in doll inventories, like munitions, MREs, logistics quest items, and morale restoration items like sweets.