Current process

The package version is automatically detected via com.palantir.git-version:

take the latest tag as package version
if the branch is not master or another release branch, or the current commit is not a tag, append the -SNAPSHOT suffix

In my opinion, this is sub-optimal:

you need the release tag before developing on the new version
if there are multiple releases branches, e.g. updated "old" versions, there may be a newer tag than the "latest" release, which may result in confusion

Proposal for improvement

configure the version in gradle.properties when development on a new version begins
each commit will create a snapshot build and publish to snapshot repository
when you want to create a new release...
1. create a detached checkout of the release branch (master)
2. remove snapshot suffix and set maven repo to release --> will be release
3. commit the change and create a tag from that
4. push the tag (its ancestor will be the last commit of the master branch, but following commits to master will ignore it)
5. build and publish release