As more and more consumer apps launch (yay!), it’s been difficult to spend a consistent amount of time using any single app over a longer period of time. One of the few that have made the cut for me has been Fantasy Top, a SocialFi app that combines fantasy sports, social stats, and trading influencer cards. If you want to dig deeper into the product itself, catch up with my previous pieces on the app here:
#297: Observations on Fantasy Top and its Impact
#305: Fantasy Top Launches Tactics and Scoop Launches on Farcaster
As the initial wave of excitement and hype over Fantasy Top has waned (partially due to the fact that Fantasy Top is on Blast, so increased activity helped users earn a larger Blast airdrop), Fantasy Top continues to push out new features and games on the app.
June 3: Burn - Players can burn 2 cards for a new one of the same or higher rarity. This mechanic serves as an additional lever to manage the Hero economy while satisfying some players’ risk-taking tendencies.
June 7: Leagues - Fantasy Top introduces Leagues, providing more competitiveness and fairness to the game, especially for players who have a smaller portfolio. Tournaments are broken out into 4 leagues (Elite, Gold, Silver, Bronze) and each league has a set parameters around the rarity of cards that can be played and a star cap limit (indicating how strong a Hero is). Higher leagues have better prizes.
June 18: Tactics - This game was inspired by the Draftkings daily betting feature, and doesn’t require players to hold any Hero cards.
Yesterday the team introduced a new feature, Heroes Vote Out. How does it work?
During Vote Out events, 5 Heroes will be removed from the Hero roster and players holding these Hero cards will have them swapped out for a similarly ranked hero
Players use their FAN points (earned by participating in tournaments and tactics) to vote on the Heroes they want to kick off the app, Survivor style
This new feature is intended to reward active Heroes and create more opportunities for new Heroes recently onboarded onto Fantasy Top
The general premise of this feature makes sense:
Another feature that encourages increased player engagement and creates a new player engagement loop
Provides utility for FAN points (before they are potentially converted into a token)
Give holders of inactive Heroes another way to ‘exit’, on top of burning or selling the card
Encourages Heroes to be more active on X and engage with their holder base
So if the Vote Out works as intended, 5 inactive Heroes will be removed from the app and holders will have their cards replaced. Easy peasy.
However, one of the certainties in this space is to expect the unexpected. And that’s certainly playing out with Vote Out.
There’s still a week left in the first Vote Out event, so we’ll see how things shake up. We can see that voting is working out in a way that reveals a lot more about the game theory and competitive nature of the app. Breaking down the top 5 vote-getters on the chopping block:
Pancakesbrah: Score of 0, Rank 174
greg: Score of 996, Rank 1
Levi: Score of 0, Rank 174
Ansem: Score of 935, Rank 3
Pranksy: Score of 89, Rank 166
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All the features that Fantasy Top has released so far have been relatively straightforward. They are P2P, top players receive rewards in the form of Blast Gold, FAN points, ETH, and Hero Cards, and poor-performing players don’t win anything (they don’t lose anything either).
Hero Vote Out changes the PVP dynamic in a way where player actions (vote) can directly impact other player’s decks and by extension, their performance and by extension, their rewards.
By voting out the top Heroes, players who don’t hold them have a better chance of placing higher in tournaments and earning more rewards while simultaneously sabotaging their competition. Who doesn’t love a good 2-for-1 deal?!
Despite the backstop that heroes who are voted out will be replaced with similarly ranked heroes, any Greg or Ansem holder would be justifiably upset at that prospect, as both Heroes have consistently ranked in the top 5 over the past few months.
In hot meme of the week form:
Vote Out is working as designed, just not in the way that the Fantasy Top team expected in its entirety.
There are two silver linings with the hiccup:
Data: The Fantasy Top team can understand who is voting for the top Heroes. Are they holders of other top Heroes who are looking to gain a leg up on the competition? Are they smaller players who are simply following the herd since their vote won’t make an impact if they vote for anyone else? Is there a way to parse out coordinated voting?
Adjusting parameters: This isn’t a ‘one-way door’ decision, especially since this isn’t done onchain. The team can make adjustments that align with the goals and since this unexpected emergent behavior has popped up, the team made it clear in the Telegram chat that they would not let top Heroes be voted out.
What the adjustments will look like will remain to be seen (IMO it’ll be something like immunity will be applied to certain Heroes), as there’s still a week left before the inaugural Vote Out event concludes. That said, we’re seeing a new variation of governance (not quite onchain, not quite offchain) that feels like a reality show with audience participation.
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Check out @tpan’s latest blog post where they dive deep into the innovative features of Fantasy Top. From burning cards to competitive leagues and the new Heroes Vote Out event, this SocialFi app keeps evolving. Read how these updates keep players engaged and shake up the game dynamics!