The Underground: the NFT staking game that doesn’t pull its punches
Do you have what it takes in The Underground?
Join us for a new strategy game that merges stake-to-earn defi tokenomics with slick hand drawn generative anime artwork.
Wolf.Game and Wizards and Dragons have radically shifted the NFT landscape, and undoubtedly for the better. The incorporation of sophisticated and immersive tokenomics with popular game mechanics has brought new and much needed utility to the space. We welcome their success. But like any modernisers we are sure they will agree that innovation must breed further innovation. That is where The Underground steps in.
We love pixel art but felt it was possible to combine beautiful bespoke anime that can be used as PFP avatars with a successful, innovative community-led staking game: so that our holders gain extra utility with their NFTs.
Our new fighting mechanics innovate within the sphere of staking games. Rather than a simple uniformity of Sheep/Wizards, who earn currency, and hierarchy of Wolves/Dragons, who steal it, we wanted to add more complexity so that every user can earn different rewards. Our currency can be used in a range of different ways: to upgrade Fighters, purchase other valuable in-game items (more on these to follow), or simply be saved up and accumulated. The beauty of our game will be in the power it gives to users — countless different strategies can be pursued, the challenge will be in finding the best strategy to get ahead of your fellow players, and reap the rewards…
And thirdly: no gas fees! The scourge of many a stake-to-earn game has ultimately been the fees involved with playing it. It has soured user experience considerably, and frankly, unnecessarily. We have made the decision to prioritise our holders - and embrace progress - by launching on Avalanche. We feel this pioneering and exciting platform is ideal for The Underground and we look forward to continuing to work closely with the Avalanche team as we move forward.
As alluded to above community is important to our project and we also want to involve it in helping to shape our direction. For example, soon after launch we will ask holders to help vote on the outcome of a ‘fight to the death’ which has the potential to make our collection deflationary too if our community wishes. This is only the start: we want to involve you in every step of our decision making as you’re the reason why we do this!
Lastly, a note on our experience. Many of these staking games have so far been exploited and have even had to migrate collections to new contracts. Our devs have a history of staking mechanics and smooth launches — they’re building the fighting mechanics from scratch rather than forking any existing projects, are aware of all the known vulnerabilities (including even more recent ones that affected WND), and are working with upgradeable contracts so that they have the flexibility to react quickly in the future. All contracts will be verified before launch and we are confident that our staking tokenomics are safe, enjoyable, and rewarding for our community.
The Underground game overview
The Underground is a fight club where Fighters and Yakuza NFTs battle for $BLOOD. Fighters can only earn $BLOOD by entering regular bouts, while the Yakuza run the arena and have more underhand $BLOOD earning methods…
$BLOOD buys Gen 1 NFTs and upgrades existing Fighters. The more NFTs - and the more they’re upgraded - the more $BLOOD earned. But note that Fighters will level down after 7 days if not upgraded, thereby rewarding active players while punishing long-term inactivity.
The ultimate reward in The Underground is to earn $GOLD. This will only be achieved by the most dedicated and successful players. One $GOLD will cost 1m $BLOOD.
Game roadmap
— Fight club opens on day of mint. Stake your Fighters and Yakuza to earn $BLOOD and GOLD
— Buy Gen1 NFTs and upgrade Fighters with earned $BLOOD. Gen1 NFTs will be sold using adaptive pricing: when a Gen1 NFT is bought the price is automatically increased, and conversely the price will gradually drop the longer one is not bought.
— Fight to the death enabled. This will be a deflationary mechanism or winner takes all, the choice will be yours
— The ecosystem expands and Rings and Amulets become available. Holding a Ring in your wallet will increase each of your Fighters’ powers. Amulets will be a crucial asset later in the game when levelling up your Fighters becomes more difficult. Rings and Amulets pricing will also be set adaptively.
— Full PvP play to earn game released Q1 2022
Fighters
Fighters compete in bouts in The Underground arena to earn $BLOOD.
Minting: Fighters are the most common character. They have a 90% chance of being minted. Minted Fighters will start off either as Level 0, 1, 2, or 3.
Staking: Fighters compete in the arena to earn $BLOOD. The higher your Fighter’s level the more $BLOOD they earn. You can upgrade your Fighter’s level by spending $BLOOD on training them. Level 0 Fighters earn 500 $BLOOD per day. For every level-up Fighters will earn 1,000 extra $BLOOD per day.
Fight to the death: Players can also raise the stakes and fight to the death. We will ask our holders to vote on what the outcome of these risky fights should be: whether the winner takes the loser’s fighter, or the loser’s fighter is killed and the loser loses their unclaimed $BLOOD, creating a deflationary mechanism.
Claiming: If a Fighter wants to claim their new $BLOOD they must pay a 20% protection fee to the Yakuza, and they must then stay staked for at least 24 hours after claiming.
Unstaking: Leaving the arena is dangerous. When unstaking there is a 50% chance the Yakuza steal all your unclaimed $BLOOD because, well, they’re the Yakuza.
Yakuza
Yakuza collect $BLOOD from fighters and also steal mints from other players.
Like any good crime organisation, they are ranked based on their status:
- Oyabun (Boss) — Lvl. 8
- Wakagashira (Lieutenant) — Lvl. 7
- Kyodai (Big Brothers) — Lvl. 6
- Shatei (Little Brothers) — Lvl. 5
Example:
An Oyabun (Lvl. 8) and a Shatei (Lvl. 5) are both staked.
— If 130,000 $BLOOD have been accumulated in protection fees, the Oyabun will be able to claim 80,000 $BLOOD and the Shatei will be able to claim 50,000 $BLOOD
— If a newly minted Fighter or Yakuza is stolen, the Oyabun has a 62% chance of receiving it and the Shatei has a 38% chance of receiving it
Minting: Yakuza are rare. They have a 10% chance of being minted.
Staking: Yakuzas have four ways of earning:
— Yakuza earn 20% of $BLOOD claimed by staked Fighters.
— They earn $BLOOD from 50% of Fighters who unstake.
— They also steal 10% of new mints.
Fight to the death: Like Fighters the Yakuza can also fight to the death. And as above we will ask our holders to vote on what the outcome of these risky fights should be.
Claiming: Collect 100% of earned $BLOOD.
Unstaking: Collect 100% of earned $BLOOD.
$BLOOD token
The $BLOOD token is the primary in-game currency. $BLOOD is an ERC-20 token.
$BLOOD allows you to mint NFTs, upgrade Fighters, and will allow you to mint other valuable game assets. Earn $BLOOD by staking your Fighters and Yakuza.
And crucially $BLOOD can be exchanged for The Underground’s ultimate reward: $GOLD. 1 $GOLD costs 1m $BLOOD.
Minting
There is a 90% chance of minting a Fighter and 10% chance of minting a Yakuza.
Gen0 mints cannot be stolen by Yakuza. However, there is a 10% chance of a Yakuza stealing a Gen1 mint.
Tokenomics
Sustainable P2E economies do not happen ‘by accident’. Token supply is crucial. If you know what makes a good economy then the diagram above may be familiar to you.
A successful game economy cannot ‘endlessly reward’ its players, it must also ‘take away’ when they play badly. Often this involves dying, but for us it involves levelling down, and not enjoying the rewards of item accumulation, namely: $BLOOD, RING, AMULET, GOLD and Fighters/Yakuza.
This is a mistake that many other P2Es have made. Tokens endlessly accumulate (with little to sustainably spend them on) and when supply goes up endlessly we all know what happens to prices!
We have created a myriad of items and options to burn $BLOOD on, as described above. This makes for immersive gameplay of course, but also crucially this is how a self-sustaining economy is created, and how organic in-game item value growth can happen. We have prioritised deflationary mechanisms, rewarding game play, and the opportunity to increase the value of in-game items — just imagine the value of a $BLOOD amassing Level 99 Fighter…
We look forward to seeing you all in the arena soon, and in the many battles to come. May the games commence!
