A recap of the ask me anything by Jamie Thomson (CEO)
AMA 17 June 2022
Jamie answered the questions on the stream. You can watch the video here:
Manos (Lead game designer) and Jaap (Nobody knows) answered all questions in detail. We decided to publish the questions and answers as this might be valuable.
Casperbar
Q: Will we be able to stake lvl 3 land as soon as they are done sowing? Or is there a set date when lvl 3 staking starts?
A: Level 3 staking will go live before the god-buffed plots (like Hermes) are ready sowing.
Defender
Q: stable coins and new chain release date or release window?
A: Sorry, not going to make any promises. Even a window is not possible right now.
Q: Vulcan wallet 2fa- can I use the physical security key (Yubikey)?
A: I don’t know Yubikey. I guess this is compatible as all 2FA generators are doing the same.
Q: Is it possible to visit your new office this summer for a few mins?
A: No. I think you will understand our productivity levels would lower significantly if we have community members visiting us every single day.
Fresher54
Q: Any updates on the new foraging system, either details or timeline? Super excited to hear about it.
A: New foraging is going to add more elements to the game, setting up for more complicated features according to the Game Design team. It will seem simple at first but will add more depth. No ETAs will be announced though.
Acadian:
Q: Are gods going to have effects on sowing time?
A: Yes! Trying to implement most of them before the sowing starts.
NicksVV:
Q: With Metascapes coming, why would people want to buy/own Troy Land? What will be the USPs for Troy? As I thought that was meant to be an affordable way to own land and build/terramorph etc.
A: Troy is an extension for VV. With loads of new features. It’s a completely different product compared to Metascapes.
AweSumOne:
Q: Kind of a Devil’s advocate question this, but how does partnering with a mining company for the stable coin go together with the eco-friendly image that’s been built for the Elysium chain?
A: We are not partnering with a mining company. Loads of eco-friendly projects will be hosted on Elysium though. It will be a leading green blockchain.
Foreverpain
Q: Wen hide & seek
A: We will have to re-evaluate this event. After listening to the community the need for this event is not that high. We do not want to organize events the community dislikes.
Nhinestreams
Q: ~30 minutes a day gets you around 250–300 exp doing the landmark run and foraging. After that, the drop-off is very inefficient. Are there more reasonable exp methods coming in the near future or will there be any consideration to scaling avatar level requires past 3 to not jump so drastically?
A: Yes, we will add many more ways to earn XP. (frenzy, Vulcan runner, TD, Berserk, Tartarus) Please understand Vulcan Verse just started development. We are early! Also, features that extend that daily loop have been designed and need some more internal work before we can expand on details.
Hypernova:
Q: When will nighttime return in-game?
A: The team is mainly working on other aspects, it has however not been forgotten and will come back.
Q: Will we be able to level up our Gods in myforge in time for lvl3 staking?
A: No, but we will allow god upgrades of course. But not before the lvl3 staking. To many things under development now. Even Vulcan has its limits!
Safety guy:
Q: I love the idea of a commodities/precious-metal-based stable coin, as long as it is 100% backed?
A: Yes. Between 90 and 110%. As it is almost impossible to control the volatility 24 hours a day. Normally over 100%.
Nils:
Q: Will themis buffs be ready in time for lvl 3 lands?
A: This is the goal. But no guarantee.
Q: What is the future schedule for lvl 4, 5, 6, and 7 lands? Will the XP requirements be known far in advance?
A: We are actually discussing the avatar leveling system. And the amount of XP you need. For now, it’s. lvl4 40K, lvl5 50K, lvl6 60K etc.
Nils:
Q: When will we see the marketplace reduction buff for gods?
A: As soon as the god upgrade system will be active. no ETA.
SlowViolinist:
Q: Will all God buffs be automatically active or will we only have a limited number of buffs we can enable? Asking as the visual God buffs for the avatar would overlap (like thunder, fire, stars..)
A: Overlapping gods cannot be active at the same time. You can ‘configure’ your god buffs using Myforge.
Q: Will holding more than 1 fishing rod for one quadrant have an advantage like fishing with all rods until cooldown?
A: Having multiple rods means that you can fish that many times before cooldown. These rods have separate cooldown timers, depending on when they were used.
ggcryptGL
Q: Are there any plans to rework the land sowing and rewards structure?
A: No
Slowviolinist
Q: Is there news for the 2 achievements (resilience and outage) troy raffle/reward?
A: Yes, we know this takes some time. But it’s been on our priority list for some time now.
Greenhorn
Q: What was your favorite part of Vulcon
A: Jaap -> the fact I was able to meet loads of people! (Jamie agreed)
Spit_Fire
Q: What is roadmap for Troy and is the recently announced GSP metal-backed stable coin related to Troy (if yes, how ?)?
A: GSP is not related to Troy. The Troy roadmap will be announced when we are ready.
Natsu
Q: Can the next vulcon be in the month of July as June is exam season and I don’t want to miss out next year
A: Everything is possible. The Vulcan gods will decide this. We have no vote. Jamie did mention Vulcon3 will be hosted in the USA.
Slowviolinist
Q: Will we see another opportunity to get boreas and notus fishing rods before fishing will be enabled? Only a few have been minted until now it seems.
A: These can be found inside the verse when the new foraging system will be activated. If you find a key inside VV the treasure chest could contain rods.
Q: On the VF website on the vulcanites page we see placeholders for some level 2 and 3 vulcanites. Can we expect new vulcanite reveals the next time?
A: We would love to release all our massive ideas tomorrow. But we cant. The new Vulcanites will be released ‘reasonable soon’ though.
Q: As it’s the remaining vulcanite statistic, are there plans to make use of espionage soon?
A: Since the existing design does not add sufficient gameplay value from our perspective we changed this mechanism. New massive features are ahead. Spying will be more entertaining but it will take some time to implement.
Cryptui
Q: But will it in the future be possible to mint and trade our own VV NFTs on Elysium?
A: Agora will run on Elysium. The answer is yes.
Scott Whale $PYR
Q: VULCAN RADIO, WEN? Been waiting for a long time
A: Apply as Vulcan Radio project owner and get this fixed sir.
Sheikens
Q: Compliments for the great event and genuinely passionate team and community members. One of the many great properties of this project
A: Thanks! Much appreciated
Q: Any thoughts on the location of vulcon3?
A: yes, the USA!
Q: at Vulcon there was no mention of Troy in your talks. When will there be more info on that?
A: Troy is under development right now. It will basically be the 5th quadrant for Vulcan Verse with exciting new features.
Q: who will be the main projected users of metascape? People, who just like to build and show (Minecraft demographic) or more “professional” metaverse companies?
A: Both!
TwistedTinker
Q: What is the point of a stable coin on Elysium? what does it have to do with a gaming company
A: Nothing. But if you are creative (we are!) you can probably think about the possibilities. Like foraging real gold in VulcanVerse for example. Elysium is a blockchain and will accept any solid project though. Doesn’t have to be gaming perse.
Q: When NPC vendors in-game
A: Vendors indicate that some currency is being used in exchange. The closest thing to this will be the Fishmongers for fishing and the Goblin Banker for the $Lava Bank.
Miersha
Q: When will we get an updated roadmap with all of the announcements from vulcon added to them?
A: We do not work with roadmaps in public except for the Vulcan Verse one. (without dates)
Q: When will LAVA ledger be implemented?
A: This one is actually close to completion. Almost!
Elroy
Q: When other games are “on hold” does this mean there is no development at all or just no focus on it? Phalanx wasn’t mentioned during vulcon speech, is it a game currently focussed on?
A: Phalanx is not a sidegame. It is important! As for the other games. They are finished and will be supported but not upgraded with new features all the time. We will focus on the main games.
itsmass
Q: Will you also have a stable coin like USD? If not, is it in your plans
A: No, not in the plans for now.
Q: Will DKNY be verified on Elysium
A: yes
Lox
Q: With level 3 around the corner…do we have a timeline on when the bugged level 2 assets will be fixed?
A: We are currently running a huge bug fix and overhaul project with a separate team. We are quite happy about this. They are fixing stuff fast now. But I don’t know anything regarding specific bugs and the time 2 fixes them.
BakugoPYR
Q: From a technical point is it possible to introduce PvE within VV e.g little monster we can bash around whilst exploring and doing land runs etc
A: “Due to my late arrival on the team, the feasibility for PvE is something that has bothered me for months. It would be a shame to implement PvE with this simplistic battle system, then rework it ending up with double or triple work. However, we have great designs and plans for the introduction of PvE along with the battle system rework. Not going to be soon, but it’s going to be there.”
Cryptui
Q: There are still lots of empty plots. Will there be an incentive (XP, lava) to build those plots?
A: We are going to move to Elysium soon. The plots are NFTs so these will have to move also. The Vulcan Verse art department will take care of the empty plots until they are claimed. (this is actually something nobody knew yet!) Great question.
Q: Can we implement something like hunting within VV game so like fishing we can go hunting too?
A: The main problem our developers are facing when we’re proposing new features like these, is that only a small percentage of land is reserved. Therefore, map activities are tough to balance and think of. Anything can be made though, so while I can’t say yes, it’s not a no either.
IGN
Q: For mass adoption, you guys need a mobile phone app that actually works and is available on the app store, any plan?
A: Yes. We have great plans for mass adoption! Don’t worry.
PermissionIO
Q: Can we please prevent the ability to dig such deep holes into the ground that makes it practically impossible or very difficult to jump out of? sufficient number of these traps by land owners can ruin gameplay quite significantly (noting that some people use weaker PCs that make it even harder to navigate out of these traps)
A: There is no way to prevent that from a code perspective without hurting the legitimate and creative plots as well. The best solution is not to go near them, maybe report them to a mod and if it’s that big of a problem our devs will manually fix it.
But no, it sadly cannot be prevented.
Eylradius
Q: When article 4/4 of Elysium nodes?
A: Probably next week.
Ryan M
Q: Are Vulcan looking to hold competitions for projects in specific categories to win funding for development? Similar to Hackathons on other blockchains to promote Elysium usage and partnerships
A: No plans for this. We are busy building the base systems. But why not?
Fdjizm
Q: Will there be any battle perks related to owning NFT Vulcanities over starter non-NFT vulcanites?
A: The perks are already here. Their stats, their appearance, their uniqueness. No perks over non-NFT vulcanites are planned.
Q: Is showing battle damage numbers going to return to Vulcanite battles?
A: It is planned to return, maybe not in the same way, but it’ll return.
Ryan M
Q: How many players do we want to see in Troy simultaneously? e.g. 10,000 plots so with Cedalions included at a ratio of 10 per plot as a maximum, is the aim for a 100k cap?
A: As many as possible and the infrastructure can cope with.
Q: Will the Cedalion system within Troy work in a similar way to VV land, e.g. 50/50 earning split or a PYR payment?
A: TBA
Q: How many Tier 1, Tier 2, and Tier 3 plots as a breakdown?
A: The totals are known internally. TBA.
Q: Will Gold/Silver and Platinum be foraged/mined within Troy, VV, or both?
A: The precious metal announcement is still fresh. Please allow us some time to integrate some ideas into the game design document first.
Q: Will Troy has its own unique Fishing spot, e.g. Troy Rod NFT?
A: It will have its own fishing, yes.
Q: How far is Troy in terms of development? What is the immediate short-term focus?
A: Many of the art aspects that fit the design have been completed. Development is still at an early stage since, again, it will be an extension of VulcanVerse and most mechanics affect both.
Q: Will it be similar to VV in terms of play, or will it have proper grind mechanics. I note crafting etc is incoming, will items be locked behind leveling systems, similar to the likes of Runescape as a grind MMO.
A: VulcanVerse is looking to make a gradual transition to a more standard MMORPG game. There are many ideas for these systems, the most critical and important factor is whether the community wants to shift in that direction or not. Again, if it’s affecting VulcanVerse, it’s also affecting Troy.
CapGodofThunder
Q: Could the team consider implementing in-game instantaneous portaling back to owned/rented plots?
A: It’s being considered, it’s not a difficult implementation if that’s something the community wants/needs. We could start a poll for this.
PersimmonIO
Q: One school of thought for P2E and GameFi is for games to first be just games — appealing to non-crypto gamers, before overlaying the crypto element. Would VF as a game studio at heart at least consider that approach to the next couple of games?
A: Our goal is to make VulcanVerse appealing to both crypto and non-crypto gamers.
About Vulcan Forged
Vulcan Forged is a blockchain game studio, NFT marketplace, and NFT minting engine. Vulcan Forged is the creator of VulcanVerse and Berserk, and many other games. The ecosystem is expanding rapidly, and many games are being enabled within the play to earn economy.
The native token used within the ecosystem is $PYR. The secondary token $LAVA acts as a play to earn tokens. This dual token economy structure is ideal for play to earn. Scholars will earn $LAVA while playing the Vulcan Forged games and will be able to forage special NFTs while in-game. These can be sold on the Vulcan Marketplace for $PYR.