[DAO:0393962] Community NFT TCG Framework

Governance
1

by 0xc24789c6f165329290ddd3fbeac3b6842a294003 (TheCryptoTrader)

Should the following $54,500 grant in the Platform category be approved?

Abstract

Through this grant, I am seeking funding to develop an open-source trading card game (TCG) framework that will allow users to create their own TCG in Decentraland (DCL). This tool will utilise blockchain technology, allowing users to create experiences where players can own and trade their own card collections. Users will be provided the functionality to be able to grow their card collection, customise their decks, and duel each other.

As per community feedback, this proposal has been broken into pieces to better represent deliverables. This grant covers the creation of the Framework (a tool for creating NFT TCGs in Decentraland) and a few sample cards (NOT the full game populated with assets, NFT cards, or events).

Grant size

54,500 USD in DAI

Project duration

3 months

Beneficiary address

0xC24789C6f165329290Ddd3fBEac3b6842a294003

Email address

thecryptotrader69@gmail.com

Description

Collectible card games are a famously popular genre of game where players compete against one another using custom decks composed of cards they have collected. This is a hobby (and profession) for millions of people across the globe. There are several extremely popular online TCGs (Hearthstone, Gwent, ESL), but they do not allow users to actively trade their cards or participate in an economy. By leveraging the immense popularity of this genre and utilising NFTs, we can offer a novel solution that empowers users to own and trade their cards, leading to substantial growth on the platform.

This is a smaller part of a long-term project (spanning 9 months) that will see both the creation of an open-source TCG framework and a playable TCG built using that framework. Not only will we be providing the community with a powerful tool to create their own TCGs and creating a new experience in Decentraland, we’ve also developed a sustainability plan that should allow the project to have continual development past the grant’s endpoint without additional community funding.

The first phase of this project will be the creation of the TCG framework. This framework will empower creators by providing all the utilities and tools required to create their own TCG in Decentraland. This includes easy ways to create cards, define card effects/mechanics, manage decks, and duelling other players.

Users will be able to maintain collections of cards on the blockchain via NFTs. All cards will be viewable in Decentraland, displaying the actual card and its associated model/effects. Users will also be able to modify and save their decks, allowing them to use the same decks across multiple scenes.

Users can also battle each other by engaging in duels. In these fights users will need to use a strategic mindset to overcome their opponent’s deck. These battles will follow the standard TCG formula: players expend energy to play cards during their, command units to attack, and attempt to claim victory by expending their rival’s hit points. Cards will appear in their 2D form when in the player’s hand, but when played they will expand into a 3D character (much like the popular TV show Yu-Gi-Oh). Card characters have animations/effects that are triggered by certain interactions (attack, death, ability, etc.).

Upon the success of this grant, we are planning on requesting a future grant to fund the creation of a high-quality TCG built off this framework. After it has been fully developed, we will be hosting events (contests and tournaments)

As detailed before, all components of this grant and future grants for this project are going to be open-source, making everything produced free for the community to use and build upon. This also includes the cards and characters used in the TCG, as well as the management server used for storing player stats/data/game-play.

This grant only targets the first phase of the full project’s plan: the creation of the TCG Framework (not the game, NFTs, or assets). You can view the previous draft of the full proposal here

Roadmap and milestones

PHASE 0 - Viability

This phase has already been conducted. The team has been assembled and we’ve discussed the project thoroughly: everyone understands their roles and what is expected. Design documents outlining the systems and assets required for the module have been prepared.

PHASE 1 - TCG Framework Development (CURRENT PHASE)

Estimated Length - 3 months

During this stage we will be creating the TCG framework. This will be the underlying infrastructure of the project and will provide the following features:

  • maintain collections of cards on the blockchain via NFTs
  • manage card collections/decks in Decentraland
  • core card keyword actions/play effects & characters

PHASE 2 - TCG Development

Estimated Length - 4 months

During this stage the full DCL TCG (with 46 total cards) will be developed and deployed. This game will showcase the joint power of blockchain integration within Decentraland.

PHASE 3 - TCG Testing and Events

Estimated Length - 2 months

During this stage the Framework and TCG will be put to the test by the community! We’ll be hosting several community events to draw attention to the project and Decentraland!

PHASE 4 - Maintenance and Expansion

Estimated Length - continuous

After the Framework and TCG have been successfully developed and our grant period comes to an end, we will continue working on the project as funding allows. This includes polishing/adding content, expanding the framework, and hosting events.

Vote on this proposal on the Decentraland DAO

View this proposal on Snapshot

1 Like
2

I wanted to include a listing of a few of my previous projects, many of which are included in the Awesome Repository (an extensive listing of public resources to ask as examples/help developers).

  • Minesweeper: classic game of Minesweeper, fully rewritten using the new SDK7
  • Checkers: a basic board game showcasing how to properly implement authoritative peer to peer networking
  • Parkour: robust set of tools to create parkour maps
  • Card Game Kit: provides the tools to help in the creation of traditional card games, comes with a demo setup featuring several solitaire games
  • Tower Defense: an advanced module allowing users to create their own tower defense games, includes a massive array to interfaces and optimisations

I also wanted to thank everyone who joined the conversation around this proposal! Your feedback was invaluable and I am truly thankful to be part of this loving community! As always: feel free to reach out if you have more feedback or any questions.

1 Like
3

You build cool stuff, but that’s too much money.
I’d like to see community using what was already created before voting yes to more of those kits/framework.

1 Like
4

Hi, thanks for the response!

The budget is estimated around the number of hours per component, basically how long it would take to correctly implement and test each piece. This proposal is planned out to release a fully functional and tested TCG development tool and extensive documentation to make it as dumb-fire as possible (ex: step-by-step guides for setting it up in-scene, deploying the server, minting/linking cards NFTs, etc). As soon as we start cutting the budget down we will begin losing functionality. With that being said, I could break this grant down even further (ex: remove server, NFT integration, reduce card functionality), but that would reduce the overall utility of the framework and would decrease the likelihood of adoption.

I understand your point about the previous modules: one of the difficulties I’ve experienced with them is that most builders only use them as a stepping stone in their learning, so I rarely get to see them deployed out in the wild. I get a few dms every now and again about troubleshooting deployment or clarifications on certain pieces, but I rarely get to see them deployed. I think that is mostly due to the majority of developers in the space already being being part of active projects and the previous modules provide no direct ways to monetize the content. From what I can tell from past conversations, they are only looking to better their knowledge/how to create for the platform to be better at their current projects and are not interested in creating free public scenes.

This grant is the next logical step (in my mind at least) on how to remedy that issue: provide users with a tool that not only makes it easy to build cool stuff, but also provides ways to monetize the stuff they build (in this case a trading card game where they can easily link & sell NFTs without needing to know how to program).

Another thing to note: all the previous community modules were developed with SDK6, so they need to be migrated to SDK7 to remain relevant. I’ve been slowly working through the migration process for them in my spare time, but it is a slog. It is extremely time consuming because most of them were designed with OOP philosophy (extending entities and systems) and refactoring for the newly adopted DOP approach has been resulting in major rewrites.

1 Like
5

I’d love to hear more feedback!

There are a few votes up already, but not a lot of discussion around the proposal itself. Discourse of the subject would greatly help in not only help to make this proposal better, but would also make it easier when writing future ones.

What do you like about the proposal? What do you dislike?

Am I missing any key features? Do you have anything else you want added?

Should the budget be reduced (if so, what functionality should be prioritized and what should be trimmed)?

6

i really like this idea as personally i’m a big fan of TCG since i was a kid, plus @TheCryptoTrader69 has proven their ability to implement things here. I think what’s stopping me from voting yes is that you say this is a 9 month project but the first three months are 54k - what will the whole project cost?

1 Like
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Hi! Thanks for dropping by @dax :slight_smile:

Currently the full cost of the project is estimated at around $135k, but that is a fairly rough estimate that has a negative leaning to ensure everything can be produced (you can see a breakdown of the estimation in the rough draft of the full proposal here). Whenever I’m budgeting I start with a max cap based on estimates, then begin trimming down based on as each component is analyzed more closely/commitments are made. The real cost/total amount of funding requested via grants will likely be well below that as each required component is further analyzed (I haven’t bothered refining those estimates yet b.c they are not within the scope of the current grant).

For a refinement example, take the card unit assets (3D representation of cards on the game field) as an example: they are currently estimated at $18,400. That estimate was made based on the standard unit (animated character model) being about $400 per piece. From there I can start trimming to better reflect the actual requirements: each faction has roughly 7 units, 4 spells, and 1 field card; spells are going to be cheaper to produce than units. Another factor is the amount of overlap between assets (there are 4 factions planned, the 3D assets for each faction are going to be using a single texture atlas so that reduces the time/cost per piece as well).

This grant will be the most expensive because the framework itself is the most complex part (it’s literally the heart of the project). The current design includes both a server solution and a peer-to-peer solution. The server will provide features such as account stats & mirrored game logic (managing ongoing games) to make it difficult to cheat/spoof account progress, but require an active deployment (we’re planning on making the server hosted via the actual ‘game’ grant free to interact with). The peer-to-peer solution will be more lightweight (no account persistence), but will still provide the game logic for users host & play card games based on the local card defs (think of this as a test/custom mode). This is about as lean as I can make the current grant while maintaining the targeted functionality, but atm I’m considering the possibility of trimming the proposal further and removing the server from the scope.

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8

damn that sounds awesome :heart_eyes:

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I can 100% vouch for your previous work, having tested many of the modules you have created. However, I am personally a little unsure that a TCG will gain much popularity here. The other kits you have created were great but didn’t seem to get used by anyone. (I see the explanation for this above after writing this but still included it in my comment.)

I would love to see an sdk7 version with multiplayer for the card games kit so we can play games like hearts when hanging out with friends. I think the collaborative component is the most intriguing part of your proposal. Having more engaging multiplayer content in dcl would be great.

Overall, it’s a great concept and very thought out and I like that you included some events to increase awareness in this one.

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10

Thanks for the comment!

I feel like a decentralized TCG has the potential to become extremely successful. NFTs have been solving the ownership crisis that has been stifling the genre ever since it went digital and there is a proven market for it in the crypto-space. When the DCL community is paired with how easy it would be for new/existing projects or creators to build out custom cards/decks branded around their content (card image, character, and a minor append to the card-defs per-card), this could turn into a great source of constantly evolving multiplayer content.

I am currently working on updating all the previous community modules to SDK7. It is a fairly slow process and I’m starting with the older projects (because they really need some love). Most of them should be rolling out within the next couple of weeks. An expansion is still planned for the card game kit, but isn’t going to be included in the push for general migration. I’ll likely be adding networking to the kit in my spare time or make an ask for a small grant so I can commit better hours to it (most of the interfaces for P2P stayed the same or changed slightly, so not much to learn there ^_^).

11

I voted no, because as much as all the prev stuffs you’ve built are pretty cool, I haven’t actually seen much of it being widely used. In fact, the latest grant which I believe is the tower defense, was finished, but I’ve yet to see anyone other than, i’m assuming, yourself, publish it?

I’d love to see such works done, but definitely not at 50k a pop. Maybe a fraction, less than 10k, as a partial funding.

1 Like
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Thank you for the feedback!

I think one of the issues with the previous modules and why they are not more commonly deployed is they don’t factor for monetization. Hosting on DCL is expensive when compared to other sandbox platforms and, when viewed as an investment, there is little point to allocate in-scene resources to something not actively driving profit. Worlds has done wonders for accessibility, so hopefully after the migration work on the prev modules are done we’ll see them around more.

With a budget of 10k towards development I could put together what would equate to a demo: a basic scene with simplistic P2P networking where users can experience the base functionality. The demo would miss out on a lot of the features included in the current proposal, such as: less card keywords (the actual effects of cards), no NFT integration (allowing ownership of cards), no server (profiles, mirrored logic/anti-cheat, etc).

The feedback so far has been great and I’ve already started on an alternative proposal (refactoring for the removal of the server). I’ll readjust the project gantt’s chart for reduced features/hours and see what we can get done with a significantly lower budget. Even if it adds significant delays to the project due to voting periods, taking smaller steps would definitely provide more security to the community and let everyone get a better idea of what we are hoping to build for the community.

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@TheCryptoTrader69 work is incredible. If we had 30 developers like him we would be swimming in all kinds of experiences. Not only is he knowledgeable in the SDK, but his infrastructure work is amazing. I’ve had the pleasure of working with him extensively the last few months and he has been an enormous asset to Vroomway and other projects.

Respectfully, I don’t understand the comments about these previous modules not being used enough. Did we take a step back and think that maybe there aren’t a lot of developers out there because we keep turning down funding for great work? The direction we are headed with stuff like this is going to cripple us in the next bull run. Our biggest mistake as a DAO/community last year was not having enough built out for developers or creators or every day users. Building out the open source (not many projects open source) repo is never a negative thing. If someone is here, and as talented as @TheCryptoTrader69 is, why are we turning them away? They’re willing to build on this platform. Put full teams together to build on this platform. It only takes one creator being onboarded, seeing these open source games, and being inspired to use it to create an experience or integrate it with their brand. Especially in this category. It has the biggest budget. Why not use it on good talent?

One single game/experience/club is not what will make Decentraland successful or the next big thing. It’s the whole range and diversity that Decentraland could be if we continue to fund people like this developer. It’s the community and the tools we build. Arguably, a Trading Card Game could attract a ton of creators and NFT groups. It’s a very successful game genre and no matter what form it takes, it attracts users. I really urge those who have voted no to rethink the potential impact this could have.

2 Likes
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I’d say reject this proposal. It’s not clear what we’ll get out of it since it only covers a framework and a few sample cards, not a complete game. The funding seems insufficient, and there’s no solid plan for long-term sustainability. We need something more impactful and well-funded.

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@NikkiFuego Thank you for your support; you honour me!

@Skazi If you check out the full proposal here we do have a plan to develop a full-blown game with 46 cards across several factions & community events/contests (such as duelling tournaments). In that document I also outline our strategy to become self-sufficient through the marketing of the game & sales from NFT cards. I’ve split the proposal up to into smaller segments so the overall deliverables are more digestible (it is a large, complex project) and we get the benefit of having more time to refactor & take in community feedback between each phase.

Essentially, the framework is going to be delivered in a deploy-ready state: all anyone would have to do to host their card game is create their cards. This means all that would need to be done is:

1 - design assets (an image to be drawn on the 3D card and a 3D model to represent the character/effect of the card)
2 - define how the card functions (we have more than core 30 keywords planned, more for stretch if we can make them fit within the budget constraint)
3 - link your defined cards to NFTs (you can link single cards or card groups to any accessible NFT on the blockchain: if the owner owns that NFT they gain access to the linked cards)
4 - then host your server (planning on demoing through DigitalOcean, which provides a suite of affordable options to users).

You also have the option to disregard the server and just use the peer-to-peer netcode, if you are okay with not providing account persistence (profile levels, player stats, saved custom decks, etc) and the possibility of cheaters/spoofers. We plan on releasing a full guide for each step outlined above along-side the tool & we’re making the interfaces as plug-and-play/code-less as possible. If the future grant for the full game goes through, we are also planning on making our game server publicly accessible (so anyone hosting the game doesn’t need to set up their own) enabling cross-land/worlds profiles.

Not only would this provide more content for Decentraland, but it would also add an opportunity for creators to easily build their own card game and incentivise them to do so by enabling them to monetize their own cards (either selling new NFTs or linking them to existing ones). We’ll also be establishing a process for users to submit their cards to become part of the core set and the maintained server as well, whether that is in the form of flair (ex: say you own a Golfcraft NFT, you can change the skin on your character to have a golf-ball head) or a full newly designed card (ex: you design the card/earn from selling the NFT & we balance it to fit the game).

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Thank you for your clear response. It is a big goal to reach. I wish the best for the proposal.
After reading all again, I reconsidered.

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Supporting as there is a track record of helpful modules for the community that don’t directly benefit @thecryptotrader69 making a grant the sensible approach here.

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18

Community NFT TCG Framework

This proposal is now in status: PASSED.

Voting Results:

  • Yes 58% 4,965,021 VP (73 votes)
  • No 41% 3,560,320 VP (31 votes)
  • Abstain 1% 566 VP (3 votes)
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Community NFT TCG Framework

This proposal has been ENACTED by a DAO Committee Member (0x88013d7ed946dd8292268a6ff69165a97a89a639)

Vesting Contract Address: 0xe9d4c9A92A24818D76bE22ED45BF4d8D87E5dE08

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Dear Community,

The Grant Support Squad was created to support grantees in achieving their goals and managing the DAO treasury.

After a thorough review of this project, the Squad recommends extending the vesting contract to November 30th. Since we noted the last phase will end after the vesting contract’s original end date of October 31st. Therefore, we recommend that the DAO Committee (@HPrivakos @Tobik @rizk) make a modification to extend the vesting contract until November 30th.

Current Vesting Contract: https://vesting.decentraland.org/#/0xe9d4c9a92a24818d76be22ed45bf4d8d87e5de08

Thank you so much.

FIFI

1 Like