Doomsday: Settlers of the Wasteland — Season 3
The last few months in the Wasteland have seen the long cycles of expansion and attrition as Renaissances gave way to Dark Ages. The prize for Season 1 got as high as 295 ETH, which one lone player managed to take home following an extraordinary series of events at the end of that round.
Season 2 saw the redeployment of game contracts, with some added features to improve Abandon payouts in the Dark Age, improved minting mechanics, and a more player-focused Disaster confirmation system.
As we enter Season 3, we’ve made further improvements to the game’s economics as well as a few other adjustments intended to improve the experience for all players.
In this article, I’m going to cover all the improvements made to Doomsday: Settlers of the Wasteland since the game launched and the original article was published.
Renaissance
The first two seasons of Settlers revealed a lot about player behaviour and expectations which have influenced improvements in Renaissance mechanics and economics.
Multi-Settlement Mint
The Settlement mining system proved to be an effective mechanism for limiting buy-in and creating token scarcity. However, the rapid growth of interest in the project meant that demand grew faster than the mechanism could effectively allow for.
For this reason, in Season 2 we introduced the ability for players to mint up to 20 Settlements at once if they found a Location. This preserved the mining-scarcity model, while increasing the speed at which the supply can adjust to demand.
Doubled Settlement ETH Earnings
To match this increase mint-rate, starting in Season 3 we have doubled the amount of ETH all Settlements earn from each subsequent mint. The ETH accumulated in a Settlement will be twice as high starting in Season 3, meaning the Abandon payouts will also be twice as high at any point in the game.
Faster Technological Development
In order to complement the increased Settlement ETH earnings, we have lowered the benchmarks required to unlock more advanced Settlements — ie, Settlements with higher earning Primary Industries.
Previously, a new Primary Industry would unlock every time the total supply of Settlements increased by 1000 Settlements. We have reduced this to 450, meaning that as well as all Primary Industries earning more ETH per mint, higher earning Industries will be easier to unlock.
Faster Collapse Timer
To balance out the advantage of faster growing, higher earning Settlements, we have increased the amount by which the Collapse Timer decreases per mint. This means that in the event that minting stops, the Collapse will occur much more quickly, starting the Dark Age faster.
Referrals and $DOOM Airdrop
FFG have announced an upcoming airdrop of the $DOOM token. This airdrop will be awarded to players based on their participation in Doomsday: Settlers of the Wasteland, with more mints and Reinforcements leading to greater rewards.
Players can see their Airdrop multiplier on the Empire tab. Players can also earn additional $DOOM by referring players who later mint Settlements.
Dark Age
The Dark Age has seen a number of economic improvements since Season 1, designed to reduce player costs and increase payouts.
Cheaper Reinforcements
The DESTRUCTION_FEE (0.01 ETH) for each Reinforcement has been decreased to a DAMAGE_FEE of 0.008 ETH. This is made possible by GAS savings which lower the average cost of a confirmDisaster transaction by 20%. This means the cost of Reinforcements is 0.002 ETH cheaper per-level, per-type.
Improved Abandon Payouts
Starting from Season 2, we have improved the ETH payouts for Settlements that Abandon during the Dark Age. The new payout system is designed to bias players who survive the longest, meaning a player who Abandons the second-last Settlement will receive double the ETH that they would have previously received.
Unfortunately, due misplaced trust in the quality of audits by Quantstamp, (the independent smart contract auditing firm we employed to audit the game contracts), the Season 2 contracts had a small bug which meant payouts didn’t properly follow this pattern.
To address this, the game creators have refunded the difference between ETH received by players and the intended amount for all Abandons during the Season 2 Dark Age. We will also not be enlisting Quantstamp’s services for future audits.
Disaster Confirmation Priority
Starting in Season 2, Settlement holders are given priority when confirming Disasters on their own Settlements. This means that any active player will receive the DESTRUCTION_FEE or DAMAGE_FEE back when executing this transaction.
Starting from Season 3, the game creators will have secondary priority after the Settlement owner. This is in response to the Confirmation process being largely controlled by bots, which is not an effective use of surplus confirmation fees. All players will still have first priority to confirm their own Disasters, but if they forego this opportunity, the game creators will have second priority.
If we fail to, or choose not to use this opportunity, it will then revert to the larger pool of users, guaranteeing that Disasters will continue to be confirmed regardless. However, users expressed that as Game creators we could more effectively use any extra ETH from confirmation fees to improve the game experience, rather than handing it to bots.
To complement this added feature, we have added the ability to send ETH to the game contract, which will add it to the prize pool. This ETH will then be included in both Abandon calculations, as well as the final winner’s payout. Use of this function will be left to the discretion of the game creators.
Alliances
Season 1 saw a large player group in the form of the Wasteland DAO, a group of players who publicly fund-raised ETH to play the game using a multi-sig wallet.
Although their efforts were noble, they ultimately failed due to the forced visibility of their position, as well as the slow nature of a multi-sig wallet.
To address this, starting from Season 3 we have introduced Alliances. Alliances are special contracts that can be deployed by players for the specific purpose of pooling resources and playing Doomsday: Settlers of the Wasteland.
Alliances are designed to allow groups of players with limited resources to compete with those who they perceive to be Whales.
Every Alliance has its own site, which is an interface allowing players to contribute resources, and execute functions on behalf of the Alliance.
Shares in Alliances are allocated to players who contribute funds or Settlements. Alliance shares are ERC-20 tokens, allowing stakeholders to leverage the success of their Alliance as the game progresses.
Alliances are designed to be more efficient than multi-sig solutions, allowing for play styles that more properly account for the fog of war necessary in a game like Settlers. However, this is done at the expense of being a fully trustless solution, meaning players must take extra care when trusting Alliance members.
Off-Chain Improvements
Beyond contract and on-chain improvements, we have made a number of small improvements to the game experience for players.
Communications Tab
The site now contains a live chat for players to communicate anonymously with other Settlers players on the site. Each Alliance also has its own communications channel, so that they can communicate directly about Alliance issues without needing to dox themselves.
Advanced Token Search
Players can now search and filter tokens based on specific properties. This was introduced because third party marketplaces such as Opensea do not allow for up-to-date token metadata.
Improved Wasteland Map
The wasteland map has been completely remade from the ground up, allowing for a much smoother user experience. Players can navigate the map with no expected load-time or lag. Players can also easily filter which Settlements are displayed, and their own Settlements are highlighted.
Wasteland Telegram Bot
The Wasteland bot, which posts all Doomsday: Settlers of the Wasteland events to Discord, now also posts them to a Telegram channel. Players who prefer not to use Discord can subscribe to this channel to stay up to date with the game.
Season 3 Begins!
With two seasons of data and feedback for improvements, Season 3 promises a greater user experience, with higher payouts for players, and potentially an even higher final prize. We will continue to iterate and improve as the game unfolds to create the best possible game for our players.
Season 3 will begin on Tuesday, September 12th at 10am GMT
Good luck in the Wasteland!
