Homeland Land Team AMA #1
Toward a More Rewarding, Engaging and Diverse Game Experience
Welcome to the first Homeland Land Team AMA! This AMA is the first in a series that will provide the community with specific and detailed answers to questions of most importance to the community.
Comments on AMA from Land Working Group
The Land Working Group collaborated with Sky Mavis to bring this series of AMAs to life in an effort to improve communication and provide the community with valuable information they can use to make short- medium- and long-term decisions about Homeland engagement and play. Questions were selected using the results of a LWG-produced survey where community members indicated topics of most interest to them. This AMA focuses on a number of key development priorities. We have highlighted some of the most important ones (based on our analysis of AMA responses) below.
What’s Next: Additional AMAs, Surveys and Ongoing Engagement
This first AMA is only one part of the LWG’s ongoing engagement and collaboration with the Homeland Team. For example, to improve understanding of how community members are reacting to planned and upcoming game features, we will soon release a community sentiment and feedback survey. This research will be used to provide community input on Homeland development priorities and decision-making. We will also be engaging regularly with the Land Team around development priorities identified in this AMA, assisting with the development of future AMAs and more. Reports on LWG activities will be featured in future editions of the Homeland Herald.
Stay up-to-date by subscribing to the Homeland Herald.
- Land Working Group
Land Team AMA #1
Introduction
What is the current vision for Homeland, and how has it evolved from the original vision?
From the early days of Axie Infinity, we envisioned Lunacia, and the Homeland first-party experience as a central gaming platform for the ecosystem. While today, Homeland plays much like a strategy and land management game, we continue to be committed to developing Homeland in various phases over time, each of those phases will bring a different focus on gameplay that are distinct and interrelated with the ones you’re experiencing today. Embedded within Lunacia is a story of the world, and how it progresses which will unfold as a byproduct of these phases, and through various events and player actions over time. We also envision other distinct games within the ecosystem “putting one foot” into Homeland over time, and we have a lot of exciting ideas about how that integration will occur.
Of course, we’ve learned an incredible amount since we launched our very first Land prototype back in 2020. We want to be flexible so that we can take advantage of the lessons we’ve learned and will continue to learn along the way. We intend to develop most of the original concepts outlined in the original vision for land play. However, they can and will look different than you might anticipate because of the nature of our iterative development process.
For example, there was a time where we imagined all assets inside of Land as potentially on-chain tokens. We’ve learned through the Smooth Love Potion and V2/Origins scaling experiences, the important tradeoffs to consider when attempting to both balance and scale economies and are perhaps more realistic in our thinking around on-chain assets for Homeland today (more on this later). Another aspect that has been reconsidered and re-imagined is the vision of the Lunacia SDK. While we have indeed created tools and guides for building Axie experiences seamlessly, this has so far been disconnected from Land and we are still unsure of the feasibility of this original idea although we are interested in exploring cross-game connections and rewards systems that play into the original spirit of this idea.
Overall, we are committed to Homeland, and building iteratively with our community a game that maintains the magic of the original vision with the capacity for evolution based on live product, learned lessons, data, and player feedback.
Transition to In-Game Rewards: Overall Strategy
What is Sky Mavis' and the Land Team's strategy for pursuing an orderly, fair and well-supported transition from staking rewards to in-game play?
With Homeland, we are committed to creating a game that’s both incredibly immersive and fun by collaborating with our community to iterate and test various game mechanics. We ultimately believe that as Homeland gameplay evolves, players will face difficult decisions between earning rewards or investing those “earnings” back into gameplay. Regarding AXS, we anticipate the token reward loops to be diverse, and significantly less linear than what players have available to them today.
We initiated passive staking rewards on land plots because we wanted to reward early believers in Lunacia while creating the space for community experimentation. While it was always intended as a time-limited benefit, we want to ensure a fairly smooth transition from land staking to active rewards. This is why, based on community-feedback and data we’ve collected, we will pair further transitioning of staking rewards with significant updates to gameplay and delegation experiences.
To be clear, here are the ways that AXS emissions will be evaluated over time:
Treasury fees accrued based on land volume + game loops
The amount of land-based AXS emissions held vs. sold by land owners
The utility of the AXS token (emission may be able to be higher in times of increased market demand due to market cycles OR traction of Axie-based experiences causing more reasons to hold the AXS token for its intended benefit: ownership of the Axie universe vs. something to be farmed and sold for expenses).
The number of users and the value that those users bring to the rest of the ecosystem
This is one way to say that AXS token emissions must be efficient and seen as a way to pour oil onto experiences that are prepared for further growth and resource investment.
Transition to In-Game Rewards: Tempo
What is the team's position on taking a more measured approach toward transitioning to in-game rewards (meaning allocating fewer tokens to in-game rewards as loops are experimented with and feedback is gathered)?
With Homeland, and other games in the Axie Infinity universe, we have committed to an upfront “seed” investment for in-game AXS rewards, and depending upon the success of the game, can evolve those rewards accordingly based upon revenues that the game generates over time. From the onset, the goal of these rewards is to further delight and entice players to engage the game in deeper ways.
While today, the rewards might feel more like a payment to do “work” and “grind” aspects of the game repeatedly, this phase won’t last long. Over time, we will leverage user feedback to reward fun mechanics, and revamp or even remove less interesting mechanics.
As it relates to the transition from passive to active staking rewards, we want to balance a sense of urgency for winding down staking with the need to make sure these rewards are being used as efficiently as possible while creating an immersive experience for players.
Transition to In-Game Rewards: Unused Staking Rewards
What is Sky Mavis' and the Land Team's strategy for allocating unused AXS staking rewards in-game?
We want to make sure that rewards we’ve allocated to players are administered fairly and routinely in ways that ideally create anticipation and excitement. We have a number of ideas we’d like to experiment with. For example, we are working on a “progressive jackpot” system that will continue to pool daily unearned AXS into a daily jackpot lottery system that players can earn entries for based upon activities they complete, kind of like a raffle. We anticipate having some form of this mechanic in place before we reach Beta.
Additionally, we have a number of other ideas we are keen to experiment with. For example, imagine mechanics where Chimera roam throughout Lunacia and steal a plot’s excess AXS, and hide within public dungeons. The more that gets stolen, the denser the chimera inside, and the bigger the reward is for clearing the dungeon! These unearned rewards could also be used as an incentive to draw non-NFT players in to help farm the land alongside owners.
We have a growing list of additional mechanics on the drawing board, and as with all of these ideas, we intend to keep experimenting until we find loops that appeal to our playerbase.
Transition to In-Game Rewards: Upcoming Land Token
In previous communications it was clear that AXS was not meant to be the primary in-game rewards token in Homeland. Please provide information about the upcoming Land Token, including its use in-game, potential tokenomics and timeline for implementation.
In the past, we’ve mentioned the potential inclusion of a Homeland specific on-chain token. While we remain open to this possibility in the future, we have considerable work to do to build off-chain asset loops that are balanced and have the long term potential to support a broad assortment of almost limitless gaming mechanics inside Homeland that users increasingly co-create alongside us. We need to enable this level of flexibility without breaking the economy. By off-chain assets, we mean resources like gold that are earned in-game to fund building development, purchase of crafted items, etc.
Our immediate plans therefore are to further develop additional off-chain assets inside Homeland, and tie on-chain rewards such as AXS to the exchange of these off-chain assets (ie, through the Auction House).
For example, imagine that in addition to gold, we will create other assets players can earn like gems or other precious metals that have different rarities and have globally fixed supplies inside the game world. What’s different from the current gems, minerals, etc. is that a variety of in-game assets will ultimately be exchanged for on-chain assets (e.g., AXS) in the future.
By interrelating both inflationary and non-inflationary off-chain assets inside the game to on-chain assets, we open considerable new opportunities to balance rewards, introduce new gaming revenue streams, etc. We want to get these loops working effectively before adding additional complexity.
Transition to In-Game Rewards: Delegation
Successfully transitioning to in-game rewards requires a strong, tested and robust land delegation system. However, the team has devoted a significant amount of staking rewards to in-game play without strengthening the delegation system in a number of areas, including enabling:
-Staking and delegation at the same time, which could potentially make it less risky for land owers to delegate plots as rewards loops are figured out
-Streamlined system for land owers and stewards to connect re: plot management, including allowing land owners to ask stewards to apply for land, etc.
-Splitting up rewards so that land owners and stewards can set allocations and have rewards distributed automatically to their respective wallets
Please explain:
-Whether or not delegation improvements are being prioritized by the land team
-Rationale for not implementing staking + delegation
-Any blockers (engineering resources, etc.) related to land delegation system development the community should be aware of
-Strategy for delegation system implementation, testing and feedback
-Timeline for additional delegation functionality delivery
We see delegation as a fundamentally important feature to Homeland, especially in this early stage of the game’s development, as more players, and more active gameplay leads to more user feedback to harvest from and higher quality iterations going forward. Given that passive staking rewards and plot delegation are distinct but interrelated features at this stage, we recognize the trouble the current delegation functionality might create for land owners. So, we’re ramping up efforts on adding key features to delegation as we speak. In short, we will release an improved version of delegation by the release of beta, and have committed to a pipeline of features for delegation that will be completed as time allows. Here’s a brief summary of new features to expect for the beta, and other features which might or might not get included by the next release (in order of priority):
Two-way approval: a system where delegations require approvals from both the land owner and the steward to finalize the “contract”
Rewards distribution settings: Owners will be able to set the percentage of earnings they want to split with land stewards
In-game reward distribution: owners will be able to decide how to share other assets such as seasonal achievement points, leaderboard points, etc.
Steward salaries: owners will have the option to reward stewards with a fixed reward over time vs. splitting the rewards by some percentage
Steward privileges: owners can decide what actions stewards are allowed to perform within a plot (ie, destroy or create new buildings)
Land rentals: owners will have the ability to rent a given plot to another player
Land Steward Marketplace: both owners and stewards will be able to post their availability and negotiate partnerships on an open marketplace. This will include rating systems for both the owner and the steward (some of which are based upon objective historical gameplay data).
Transition to In-Game Rewards: Transitioning from Rewarding Micro-Actions to Improving the Game World
The current rewards structure does not incentivize game play activities beyond resource gathering, item production and micro-actions. How is the team creating mechanics where rewards can be earned both actively and 'passively', e.g., certain high-value, high-difficulty buildings or items receive token rewards, rewards based on overall player activity (e.g., entering dungeons, etc.)? What are the specific actions the Land Team is taking toward rewarding different styles of play and their timeline for implementation?
Homeland’s current earning mechanics are early, and underdeveloped. We recognize that linking rewards to the current core gameplay might make earning rewards feel repetitive and less fun. As part of our incremental development process, we wanted to begin testing the underlying tech for earning while we continue to build additional game mechanics into Homeland. We want to assure everyone that the future will include distinctly more social game play, including co-op, raids, guilds, and other social events. To give you an idea of some ideas on the drawing board we’re planning for future releases:
Adding co-op parties for passive adventures
Job boards and expeditions
Creation of “public” structures where players propose parks, or other community destinations for development on public land (think pink nodes etc.) which are voted on by community and require communal resource gathering
Neighborhood “arcade” where players can queue in line to play old school games and compete against neighbors for high scores
Community events (eg, movie theaters or other social events) where players can convene and co-participate in real time
Spies and PVP land plot sabotage/raids
We see all of these and other planned game mechanics as opportunities that link to in-game rewards. We also intend to link more complex mechanics that require greater skill or greater social coordination with higher quality rewards.
Improving Land Play Mechanics: Moving Away from Templated Land Play
The community has provided a great deal of feedback about the current land game mainly revolving around making gameplay less templated and playing to the strengths and diversity of land types. How will this be improved in the short-term? Please provide specifics about upcoming and planned features in this area.
Our plan for some time has been to create numerous distinctions between the different plot types in Homeland. Not only will each land type ultimately have unique core resources to harvest, but they will also host unique skill and research trees, and other more complex properties.
We are steadily working behind the scenes to build out this content, which of course is multiplied by the number of distinct land types. We want to release these features across all land types simultaneously, so thanks for your patience as we work through this development process.
Improving Land Play Mechanics: Less Reliance on Micro-Actions
Many players are looking for casual, less time-intensive gaming sessions where a lot can be accomplished in a shorter period of time. Reliance on micro-actions and constant plot maintenance is current play focus. Players also want to be rewarded for high-value, less time intensive activities, rather than having to constantly be on-call for resource gathering. What is the team's response to this feedback and how will this aspect of game play be improved in the short-term? Please provide specifics about upcoming and planned features in this area.
For a variety of reasons, players being able to leverage their collection of NFT Axies has been among the most highly requested features in the game. One of the many features NFT axies will unlock is skill-based automated activities. In short, depending upon the Axie types you bring to the game, they can be utilized to perform specific automated tasks.
For example, if you own a plant axie, it can be sent to a lumberjack building to automatically gather wood within a defined radius, etc.
Additionally, once Homeland is open to all players beyond land owners, the job board can be used to post jobs for hire where players new to Homeland can be “hired” to take on resource gathering or other micro actions similar to workers. We see game mechanics like these to be important foundations to more complex economies within the game.
Improving Land Play Mechanics: More Cooperative Game Play
There are many opportunities for more imaginative, engaging cooperative game play in Homelands, including in the area of the auction house, collaborating around resource gathering and more. How is the Land Team planning on making play more collaborative in the short-term? Please provide specifics about upcoming and planned features in this area.
We totally agree and see how much our community loves in-game social interactions between players within the community. We’ve actually got lots of ideas on ways in which we can make this a more central theme of Homeland. Some examples that are perhaps further along in their development, to give you all some more specific ideas:
Cooperative passive adventuring: team up with your friends and plot neighbors to build a party that can work together to advance to deeper levels in the passive adventure mode, and share collectively in the spoils.
Boss battles: players working together to defeat bigger enemies and defend Lunacia
Cooperative events: as we build more sophistication into Homeland events, many of these events can only be completed through cooperation with others!
As mentioned in a previous question, there are lots of other cooperative features planned such as guild-based gameplay and public building/utility construction projects as well.
Improving Land Play Mechanics: Making Multi-Plot Ownership Matter
Land Play was originally promoted as an opportunity for players to benefit from, and take advantage of having 'estates', connected plots that would deliver specific benefits to both owners and players. The Land Team has mentioned providing multi-plot owners with specific gameplay features and benefits in the past, but provided little information. Please provide specifics about upcoming and planned multi-plot / connected plot features over the short term.
We have considerable plans in store for connected plots, but the feature set is large enough to where mechanics for adjacent plots will need to be rolled out in phases. Since you asked for specifics, here is our current thinking around the various phases on our roadmap:
Phase 1: Provide straight buffs to plots that are connected with one another, and depending upon the combination of plot types that are connected, different combinations of buffs will apply.
Phase 2: Adding mechanics that leverage connected plots such as shared storage, tasks, etc Some of these mechanics will begin to leverage the combined geometries of connected plots as well.
Phase 3: Enable new building types that have connected plots as a prerequisite for building
Improving Land Play Mechanics: Making Land Types Matter
With a wide array of land types, land items and environments, land is built on a foundation where plot types can be differentiated and provide a variety of gameplay experiences to players. However, the functionality of land types is largely the same, how will this be addressed in the short-term? Please provide specifics about upcoming and planned features in this area.
As we mentioned previously, we are putting significant engineering effort into building out distinct content for each land type. In the short term however, the most likely feature that will be released is new, harvestable resources that are distinct to particular land types. Those resources of course can be leveraged in various ways in the building and trading game mechanics which will multiply the various ways players can create unique value chains within the larger Homeland experience.