The Game Litepaper 002: Tokenomics
Preamble
The Star Wolvez game will attempt to offer a balanced game economy while integrating web 2.5 principles in its design. The goal of the token economy and design choices enumerated below are:
- Encourage exciting, sustainable gameplay
- Reward early project supporters
- Attract and onboard new game participants
Balancing an ecosystem is the ‘grand’ challenge of P2E gaming. Axie Infinity NFTs once commanded significant value and created lucrative tokens. Since? Inflationary dynamics have taken their toll.
A similar dynamic has played out in countless P2E ecosystems.
Most game developers’ response to this is to create incredibly complex economic models and flowcharts. So complex that they can be beyond comprehensibility, both for game participants and, ultimately, for game developers themselves.
Some elegant charts may eventually find their way into our ecosystem, but achieving balance is an iterative exercise at its core. We won’t pretend to solve all challenges from the outset. As has proven inherent to our experience, flexibility, and adaptability will be most important.
However, setting out the core principles our Tokenomics will adhere to is equally important.
The following begins to set out principles, many of which will be familiar to the Star Wolvez family.
One final point worth noting is that, in reality, most Tokenomics plans are bootstrapping strategies designed to raise capital for developers while they look for a more sustainable business model.
In our case, we’re sufficiently capitalized. We intend to develop the game as a rewarding, fun, social experience for the NFT ecosystem, which importantly experiments with cross-collection integrations (more on that in gameplay).
Soft-staking
What is it: In the Star Wolvez universe, when your Wolvez are in your wallet, they’re staked. If your Wolvez leave your wallet or transfer to another wallet, they’re unstaked. That’s soft-staking — no additional transactions or transfers of NFT assets are required. (Note that you will need to hold them for 7 days for them to active start generating chests).
There are additional benefits to connecting your wallet to the pre-game dashboard, which is another layer of soft-staking in our ecosystem (requires you to connect your wallet but doesn’t charge a fee).
Why use it: Coinbase and FTX don’t run their order books on-chain; crypto wouldn’t be where it is today if every application tried to execute every transaction on Ethereum. Opportunities to leverage web 2.5 principles can be powerful for adoption and advancing the space. Expensive transactions and ownership transfers won’t onboard the next 100,000 users to web3 P2E games. We firmly believe soft-staking will appeal to traditional gamers without sacrificing security and web3 benefits inherent to putting NFT assets to work in P2E games.
$STARDUST
Total supply: 69,000,000 tokens
Why supply is capped: To control for hyperinflation, for one. Unlimited supply tokens run into the inflationary death spirals we described at the outset of this Litepaper, pretty much without fail. Capping supply forces us, as game developers, to be judicious with how supply is meted out. It’s a game development forcing function.
This also means earnings will likely scale down over time, lending advantages to early participation. On the flip side, the token cap challenges us to build up the player base without offering insane rewards as a dangling carrot, which often leads economies to break.
The main disadvantage of a capped coin is that it discourages spending. This is mitigated partly by the fact that the gameplay focuses on upgrading to more productive in-game assets, which requires token spending. The healthy tension of these dynamics is ultimately what should prove most potent, however.
Token Distribution
The below is a list of initial token distribution opportunities:
Initial airdrop: We’ve taken the discord XP snapshot to ensure that long-standing members of the pack are rewarded. We can also retake this snapshot right before token launch should the pack feel strongly. We will base a pre-game airdrop of $STARDUST on accrued XP in discord for all users who own at least one Star Wolves NFT.
Pre-game dashboard: Connecting a wallet with wolvez to the pre-game dashboard (soft-staking) and checking in daily will also grant early $STARDUST earnings opportunities.
In-game earnings:
- Genesis Wolvez: 50 $STARDUST daily
- Generative Wolvez: 5 $STARDUST daily
- Note: Generative Wolvez must be soft-staked for a full month to reach their maximum $STARDUST earning potential. Genesis wolvez are exempt from this requirement.
3. Full Squad Boost: 10% for 3 Wolvez in the same wallet
4. Missions: Successful missions may emit $STARDUST during gameplay. For more on missions, see here.
- Note: Daily earnings rates may change over time based on the game economy.
Bonuses: Top players on the game leaderboard may earn additional $STARDUST.
Token Sinks
Built-in burn mechanisms serve to not only incentivize players to use tokens in the game ecosystem (rather than selling them on the open market), but to provide a broader choice structure to reward players of all types (e.g., the “optimizers” [efficiency-driven], base builders [aesthetic driven], and PVP’ers [competitively driven]).
Initial Activation Costs
Central elements key to gameplay (e.g., activating a Homebase) will require a one-time $STARDUST outlay. This ensures game participants are invested in some capacity in the Star Wolvez ecosystem.
Game Upgrades & Missions
Upgrading machines in the game will cost both time, non-economic resources, and some will require $STARDUST. $STARDUST can also be used for short-term efficacy boosts for players’ squads in battles.
Conducting a Mission will also require players to pay a small amount of resources in order to conduct the Mission. If they fail the Mission, those resources will be forfeited.
Item Shop
Players can purchase both cosmetic and game-impacting items in the item shop.
- Cosmetic upgrades can be applied to nearly all aspects of the Homebase (Re-skinned versions of machines, elements of the ship, additions/decorations to ship, etc…)
- In-game items apply buffs to machinery and future mining/combat missions (i.e., to reduce maintenance costs, speed-up mining missions, or increase total yield)
We are tentatively considering a 95% burn / 5% future emissions schema for the treatment of tokens used in the item shop. We invite community feedback on questions such as these.
Marketplace
Items that aren’t immediately related to the Star Wolvez game progression but can be purchased with $STARDUST. Examples include:
- Physical merchandise (hoodies, lore book)
- Curated allow-list spots for other NFT projects within the Item Shop
- A date with FMC (just kidding… but maybe?)
- Longer-term roadmap: A peer-to-peer marketplace that will allow for the sale and transfer of in-game cosmetics, items and NFTs. Items will be bought and sold in $STARDUST with a percentage-based tax on each transaction that will be burned permanently.
All tokens used in the Marketplace are burned rather than re-entering circulation (pure burn).
Battle Pass
The Battle Pass is a seasonally recurring opportunity for players who want to accelerate and enhance their gameplay while deepening their exposure to $STARDUST. The first season’s Battle Pass will be capped at 500 and will tentatively cost 1000 Stardust (i.e. a Token Sink of 500,000 tokens). The Battle Pass also gives us a chance, as the developers, to build the pathway into our future roadmap (e.g. future collections).
For gameplay, owning the Battle Pass reduces upgrade times and costs and grants players enhanced likelihood of success in missions and RNG-style battles (hence “Battle Pass”).
To earn a battle pass, players must stake a minimum of 1,000 $STARDUST in the primary liquidity pool (more details on the liquidity pool coming soon). By virtue of this mechanism, Battle Pass holders will also accrue more $STARDUST, commensurate with LP reward rates.
For more on the Battle Pass, view our teaser video here.
The Broader Universe
Perhaps most importantly, there is much more planned for the Star Wolvez universe beyond the initial lore that accompanied initial NFT releases. There are many classes of game players. ‘Explorers’ are an important one, and, we believe, one of the core cohorts we’ve attracted to date.
‘Achievers’ who are interested in maximizing their gameplay within the initial ecosystem — likely creating economic value they can remunerate themselves with.
For long-term players and the ‘explorer’ minded set, $STARDUST will also act as a gateway to continue on the journey, whether in earlier access to future collections, community-created lore, and in-person events. Utility inevitably needs to stretch beyond the confines of a game for sustainability. There will be lots of social, creative, and community-based of the initial game that $STARDUST will enable privileged access to.
