Squad News

Hello squaddies,

Welcome to the October edition of The Wrench, if you are just joining us since we launched Squad then you should know that The Wrench is a highlight of just some of the amazing work that modders are creating using the Squad SDK.

If perhaps you’re interested in getting involved with modding within Squad, you may want to join the Squad Modding Discord, and if you are already working on a new mod and want the community to learn more about it, consider submitting it through this form so we can showcase it in a future Wrench article.

Without further ado, let’s get into showcasing these fantastic modifications:

[h2]Springbok - South African Border War: Operation Savannah[/h2]



Some more progress on Springbok's Buffel for the South African Border War: Operation Savannah mod. This asset will also be re-used for the African Union faction mod being developed simultaneously by Springbok as many assets between the two are interchangeable.

The South African Defence Force Buffel entered service in the SADF in 1978 as a countermeasure to SWAPO's mine warfare. This was one of the first effective mine-protected vehicles to enter the service of the South African Army during the Border War. It can fit 11 troops inside including the driver.



The Buffel was often armed with a single M1919 pintle-mounted machinegun or an FN MAG facing forwards. There was also the option to have a second machinegun mounted facing the rear. The African Union Buffel will be painted white with AU inscribed in black on the sides and rear. It will also have a DSHK mounted instead of an M1919. The South African National Defence Force (SANDF) the post-Apartheid SA Army will not have the Buffel as it was phased out in the early 90's to be replaced with the Mamba mine-protected vehicle which is a vast improvement over the Buffel.



The low poly textured Buffel model is missing the OM352 Mercedes engine, spare tire, and more. The high polygon model has them included but I have not yet made the low polygon versions of them in time to be included in this Wrench.

[h2]TheColdEye - Topographical/Contour Maps are Here![/h2]

Do you want to place the perfect TOW fob on a mountain peak in Kohat Toi, and rain hell across the map, but you can't find a peak on the map? Or perhaps you want to place a sneaky radio & HAB in a small ditch near the objective but don’t know where to drive to?

* Queue “Billy Mays Here!” *

If this sounds like you, then these detailed contour maps will solve your planning problems instantly.

These contour maps provide elevation data in an easily readable format. Each map contains contour lines (aka: elevation lines) that show the height differences of the map in 1-meter increments. The dark brown lines have the elevation readings of the line inside them; while, the lighter lines depict the 1-meter increments between the dark-colored lines. For easier and faster designation, the elevations are color-coded as well. And if you zoom in quite a lot, you will also notice that the terrain is shaded, so that you may easily see the small peaks and dips of every sand dune on Al Basrah. But the shaded terrain also allows you to quickly identify the steep mountainsides of Lashkar Valley.

For an added tip, the elevation readings on the dark contour lines, point their "hats" in the direction of the increasing slope. Download the maps with the links below. They are .png format so you’ll be able to open them up in any photo viewing software.
Psssst, the images take a few seconds to clear up when zoomed in so make sure you have them open and ready in the background before the start of the match. Happy planning!

Links:

Download links with grid
LINK LINK LINK

Download links without grid
LINK LINK LINK

[h2]Tactical Collective Modding - French Foreign Legion Mod[/h2]



For those who haven’t seen it, here are two videos on the French Foreign Legion Mod made by Typex on the French side & MoiDawg for the English side of it.
We speak about the current state of the mod and what we plan in the future.

Our level design team is currently focusing on the French map’s flora as well as the urban areas as you can see.



FRF2 Sniper rifle is now ready to see some action.

Our discord with the FAQ Our updates

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwD0oUlP17Y
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKPSrZrrphY&t
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1si7OPYoJjM&t

[h2]Swiss Modding Team - Swiss Armed Forces Faction[/h2]



A new faction, a rare faction, a neutral faction! The Swiss are putting together what little manpower they have to try and provide Squad with yet another faction. We are few and lack experience, hoping The Wrench would attract some people to help, however, we have some people with experience with the real deal, along with access to the official manuals for reference. As you can see by the screenshots things are very crude at the moment, but we have set ourselves some sort of roadmap and a list of things to do. Anybody is welcome to help with this huge project. I'll likely post in the recruitment channel once The Wrench has been published. Name and logo subject to change.



[h2]LaughingJack - Squad_JO[/h2]



Squad_JO is a Gameplay modification for Squad - "western democratic" coalition forces versus "rebellious anti-western" allies.

It retains Squads' structure & communications but removes much of the harder-core role-playing elements required by players, allowing for a more accessible playing style that highlights 'playing the objective'

The Mod includes Multi-faction teams, modified Gamemodes for AAS, PAAS & TKOTH, and many new assets. Changes to numerous gameplay mechanics; all changes can be found in the latest changelog on Steam. It also includes numerous gameplay layers for a bunch of Squad-vanilla maps as well as two classic Joint Operations maps; Black Rock Beach and Dormant Volcano Isle.

We are currently at the testing stage and mostly finished but with a little more work to do: More layers for vanilla maps and more factions, when available, and hopefully, fixes for some UI things, still to come. Development videos can be found by going to my YouTube, via the Workshop page video.

WORKSHOP LINK

[h2]Squad: Vietnam[/h2]



Set deep within the jungles and paddies of the Vietnam war. Squad: Vietnam will bring you the immersion of being amongst the ranks of proud US soldiers in the year 1969, or arms with communist North Vietnam with entirely new models, animations, and gameplay.

Squad VN will include some of the most famous weapons and vehicles from the 1960s. You can expect to see anything, ranging from fully functional and drivable M113 APC, M35 logistic vehicles and guns trucks, UH-1 “Hueys,” and many more (mind, realism is our goal, but the gameplay is our priority).



Our project will include new mechanics added to Squad; that being, dismemberment and gore, scout helicopters, and so on. More information and leaks will come along with those currently provided.

We hope to get V1 to you by the early months of this upcoming year, along with playtesting before the end of 2020! But I digress, this mod may be our main project, but many of the developers still must handle school and outside jobs, sadly hindering our progress.

Discord Youtube

Picture Details:
M16A1/XM177: By Hoover
M29-Props: By MangoOrPapaya
US-Riflemen: By Simcardo

Hello Squaddies,

OWI_Jenny here. I’m the Server Licensing Manager at OWI and welcome to the first edition of the Server Spotlight. This feature will be the place where we highlight some of the community servers that we think you may want to check out, share information about them, and show what they are up to or what they excel at.

Whether they are old or new, it’s always good to highlight the fantastic stuff our established Server owners are doing every day.

[h3]★★★ SQUAD EUROPE ★★★[/h3]



Squad Europe Community Server started as a collaboration of European Squad clans nearly 3 years ago.

Squad Europe was the first Pan-European group Community Server and was launched at the beginning of 2018. We have multiple groups cooperating and having a huge variety of nationalities in our community. The best possible squad experience for all players is our main objective. We also want to have the toughest combat and closest rounds for the fun of our members.

We have nearly 500 Players in our Community (from Partner Clans), 82021 unique Players enjoying our Server, and over 2.600 active Bans ;)

Our Partner Clans are: [FC.] Full Contact - [OMBD] Old Men Bring Death, |HSR| Husaria and ~SRA~ Squad Runs Alot

Besides playing, we put a lot of effort in administering our servers and have implemented a ticket system (responding to player reports or complaints on our Discord), Mapvote, and statistics already in 2019. Every Thursday Night, we have a Clan Night. We try to gather as many Clan players as possible and make intense and competitive fights like i.e., CCFN.

Discord link: https://discord.com/invite/hhwcFhD

Jenny’s Notes: I recently visited their server and found how friendly and inviting their admin teams were. They cater to players that speak English alongside other languages. I watched how they support players of different languages by responding to them in their mother tongue.

Next up, we have a new community on the block:

[h3]Echo Fire Team[/h3]



It started with an idea I had because we wanted everyone to be treated fair & drama-free, so you could just come along and have fun and not have to worry about anything but know you are being treated fairly. But we also wanted more things to work towards like ranks, Courses, Events & tournaments. We wanted to bring a sense of teamwork & realistic to the people who wanted more than just fun & have a place they can go to & make friends, enjoy squad with a team, work on tactics, & feel that sense of belonging something. We are a new community, but if you have a dream, you must try to make that dream come true & this is my dream with ECHO. I want to see people happy.

I enjoy Squad because it teaches you how to deal with stressful situations that come with every game,  like losing or pushing an objective. Also its the sense of teamwork & tactics that you can use or work as a team that some people do that can make or break the round/game some time, you can win a lot of games, but you can lose a lot of games to and that's the best part of the game because when you lose a game, you can look back and learn from what you did wrong and work on that on the training ranges squad if you wanted. You also learn a lot about the military in a way, like how the vehicles work & shoot, Map reading, Tactics, Teamwork, Leadership; I could go on forever, but Squad is a good game, and I would recommend it to anyone who likes FPS shooters as well any ex-service personnel for them to enjoy that side or to help them with mental problems like PTSD or others.

Discord link: https://discord.gg/gccftj

Jenny’s Notes: I would recommend visiting their discord and joining them on their server soon!

And the final community recommendation:

[h3]**Squad+**[/h3]



**Squad+** is a community that was recently founded by a couple of like-minded individuals. We played Squad for years, played at a competitive level, and some of us cast competitive tournaments. We noticed a lack of experienced player servers. We want to offer a platform for experienced players who have been around for a long time. That way, we can all enjoy evenly balanced rounds with proper teamwork and communication. With server feedback channels on discord and direct channels to the server admins, we encourage a somewhat 'professional' environment to develop a better community and server further.

Clans and competitive teams are welcomed, but we also want to invite players who are struggling to find the environment to play publicly with a team that focuses on winning the match. Our main focus lies in getting great Squad leaders in our teams. Because with great Squad leaders come even greater squad rounds. We actively will try to keep the round balanced with a team of active admins and SL's. Our Admin team is mainly composed of well-known players from the community but is still growing.

We hope you all give our server a try, and perhaps you'll stick around.

Discord link: https://discord.io/SquadPlus 

Jenny’s Notes: While I was playing on the server, I could see that it was no BS server; they keep players focused on the game, which brings a higher standard of gameplay to the server family. If you are looking for a more competitive server, this is definitely worth having a look at.

Suppose you run a server and want to put it forward then by Direct Messaging me with your discord link, logo, and some background information about your community. What do you do that is special?

We appreciate all the hard work our server owners and their admin teams are putting into creating amazing environments for players from around the world!

Happy hunting
Jenny
Licensing Manager
OWI Hosting Discord: https://discord.gg/ZQyT5Zh 

Hey Squaddies,

Today is a big day for our friends at Redstone Interactive, as Beyond The Wire, their new World War 1 shooter is now available to purchase.

Heading into Early Access with a plethora of features and options for gameplay, Beyond The Wire aims to deliver a new WW1 experience concentrating on immersion, action, and strategy. Whether leading the charge as an assault troop or guiding fire missions with the artillery detachment BTW has a role for everyone.

For a full rundown of their launch, check out their blog post here

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1058650/Beyond_The_Wire/

From all of us at OWI, congratulations on the launch Redstone, we'll see you in the trenches.

Offworld Out!

Hey squaddies,

Today we are releasing a minor patch to address several issues that we have discovered since we released v1.0 last week. Thank you to everyone who helped uncover these bugs and reported them in a timely fashion. Please continue to report issues and feedback in our Squad Discord channels.

Unfortunately with this minor patch, we will be removing the Experimental Graphics Settings menu options, though they will be returning in a later build. We thank everyone so far who has been helping to test out these new settings and provide feedback.

[h2]Fixes[/h2]

• Added a fix to address a crash that was occurring when the map was switching at the end of a round.
  
• Added a new option for server admins: server queue limit to prevent very high queues that may have been causing server performance issues. [thanks for the assist in testing this shroud :) ] Note:  setting PublicQueueLimit will currently prevent public(non-reserved) users to be unable to join when set to 0.
  
• Fixed an issue that was causing server crashes related to the Steam Inventory.
  
• Fixed a command that would allow Squad Leaders to deploy infinite Rally Points and remove the need to resupply.
  
• Fixed a spawn issue with HAB’s that was preventing players from spawning in certain circumstances.
  

Hey squaddies,

It’s been a very busy time at OWI, with Squad finally hitting Version 1.0 and releasing out of Early Access. We just want to say a massive thank you again to everyone who joined us over the launch week. Whether you are a new player or have been with us since the days of Kickstarter, we appreciate all of you for joining us in the celebrations.

One of the essential values the team is incredibly passionate about is providing updates and support to the Squad experience. Before v1 was released, we made significant updates to our roadmap, changing it to a “Living Roadmap” to better represent the fluid decisions that can occur in a development environment and accommodate any road blockers we may encounter.

It didn’t take long for changes to start occurring. Three days after we unveiled the new, living roadmap, we ran into a technical issue with our build machines, which impacted development time. An unforeseen circumstance but one we were now prepared to communicate and help the players understand why a new update wasn’t arriving on schedule.

Over that time, it’s also safe to say that our original envisioning for the 2020 roadmap was too ambitious, most certainly with an Early Access release goal internally. The team has been working hard, listening to your feedback, making sure that we could provide the best release of v1.0launch for Squad, especially while observing new procedures and struggles while we all we are all cope with the COVID-19 pandemic.

With the v1.0 launch wrapping up, we are focusing on the road ahead and what we want to accomplish over the next couple of months. More importantly, we want to show what we can realistically achieve in a stable manner, which has led to some system changes and content being pushed back while some other pieces have been brought forward. As a team, and as game players ourselves, we also want to ensure that we provide you with fresh content and stable releases, as consistently as possible, without the need for course-correcting.

Most notably, the planned End of September Release has been pushed back to November. The planned October release with Australian Forces has been moved to 2021. This is mostly in part to the delays we have experienced getting Squad v1.0 out the door and also allows some time off that would have been our Company Retreat. Though the team won’t be taking the usual Company retreat due to the pandemic situation, it’s vital for our employees’ health to separate the balance of work and home, even more so after a critical time like a big release. We are committed to bringing great consistent updates this year and next, and we are also settling into the fact that we won’t be able to return to work in our office until at least the latter half of 2021.

Please check here for the updated roadmap.