How to fairly launch an NFT using the Eden RPC
Eden Network has products for block producers, institutions, and traders with the Eden RPC and now Eden Rocket RPC.
But did you know that the Eden RPC can also be used by NFT projects to help ensure a fair launch?
In this post we will explain the problem / weakness with current NFT launches and how they can be upgraded and protected in a few clicks by launching the NFT ‘Go Live’ contract from the Eden RPC.
TL;DR
-Most NFT public sales are now botted which negatively affects the project’s community
-The bots are able to game the system to save on gas and get low cost-basis mints
-This can be simply eliminated by launching the Go Live contract via Eden RPC
A background on RPC endpoints
When submitting transactions to Ethereum, users submit through an “RPC endpoint” as denoted in web wallets like Meta Mask.
The default / standard course of action is to route transactions through the Ethereum Mainnet.
This endpoint broadcasts all submitted transactions to the Ethereum public waiting pool.
The benefit of this endpoint is that 100% of Ethereum miners participate in producing transactions sent to it. Transactions sent to the Ethereum public waiting pool are inherently as fast as possible because all block producers are participating.
The downside of the Mainnet endpoint is that it’s completely visible to those using specialized tools. As transactions are waiting around to be organized by base / priority fee and uptaken by block producers, they are visible to any third party that’s interested in viewing.
Visible details include sensitive/gameable transaction information, such as what the purpose of the transaction is, the base and priority fees used, and the nonce.
For those that are connecting the dots, this information is exactly what allows frontrunning bots to extract value from unsuspecting DEX traders.
The Problem: How this transparency affects NFT mints
When an NFT project uses the Ethereum Mainnet to launch their ‘Go Live’ minting contract, they expose themselves to being gamed by bots.
Specialized bots with the sole purpose of crawling/searching the Ethereum waiting pool for ‘Go Live’ contracts leverage this information to submit their own minting transactions immediately after the launch contract.
By doing so, bots are able to slip in cheaper, lower cost-basis NFT mints before the gas spike initiated by the general public on the next block.
This results in a bifurcated community where a small portion that run these bots are able to get notably cheaper mints than the everyone else.
With common sense we can see this is a suboptimal approach to launch an NFT.
On a play-by-play basis it works like this:
- The NFT project announces on twitter / social media the upcoming date/time of the NFT drop
- Bot owners see this date and prep their bots to start scanning the waiting pool around this time
- At the time of launch, the NFT project uses the Ethereum Mainnet to launch its ‘Go Live’ NFT minting contract
- After the transaction hits the public waiting pool (but before it’s published to a block), bots quickly analyze / sniff out the base and priority fee used in the transaction
- Bots then preemptively submit their own “Mint NFT” transactions, using a gas price one gwei slower than the “Go Live” contract
- This allows the bot to get their mints in immediately after the contract goes live and on the same block
- On the next block, the general public becomes aware that minting is now live, and they drive up the gas price as they mint
- The end result is that the bot gets a cheaper mint than public sale participants
- Because fees on Ethereum are high, minting fees have a meaningful impact on the cost-basis of the trader and their NFT collection
- Ultimately using the Mainnet RPC leads to an unhealthy / unfair launch dynamic
Sanity check — is this even a real problem?
Yes! Although whitelisting and private sales have helped reduce the impact of botting, the total number of bots have increased.
The result is that most public sales for NFTs, especially for anything hyped, will be botted if the project uses the Ethereum Mainnet.
NFT collector @EasusJ commented this:
Some projects have already started launching their NFTs with the Eden RPC:
Solution: How to privately launch with the Eden RPC
Thankfully, there is an easy way to get around this problem to provide a fair, un-gameable NFT launch.
The solution is to launch the “Go Live” minting contract through a private transaction service such as the Eden RPC.
With private transaction pools, transactions sent from users are forwarded to a “private” waiting pool that is not visible to third parties.
Instead, the transactions and their details remain effectively hidden until after they are already published to the Ethereum blockchain.
This helps eliminate the ability of bots to crawl and sniff out the transaction details of impending NFT contract launches.
How to set up the Eden RPC?
Setting the Eden RPC up is incredibly simple. While Eden Network currently offers two RPC endpoints, the Eden RPC and the Eden Rocket RPC, for this use case we recommend sticking with the classic Eden RPC as it has stronger guarantees.
To do so, just add a custom network from within your MetaMask and enter the details below.
Click here for a video tutorial on how to integrate the Eden RPC.
After the network is added, verify that it’s selected and you’re set! You can now launch the NFT contract as normal. Your transaction will be private and the public sale will be protected from snooping bots.
- Add the Eden RPC to your MetaMask
- Verify that ‘Eden RPC’ is selected as the default/active network in MetaMask
- Verify that the Eden RPC (and not Eden Rocket RPC) is selected. You can double check the RPC URL above
- Launch the Go Live contract normally
Questions? We’re here to help! Send us a DM on Discord!
