Author: FaultProofBen

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Gm!

Your eyes are not deceiving you…the market is pumping!!

Although we are still down horrendously from the glory days of 2021, it’s great to see some green after months of down-only chop.

Us all getting a little bit richer is nice, but today, we’re going to focus on wealth accumulation of a different sort.

Or rather, the pursuit of $PAPER in Roll Your Own.

Roll Your Own (RYO) is a crime-themed, turn-based strategy game live on Starknet.

Built in Dojo by the Cartridge and Dope Wars teams, the game is inspired by Drug Wars, a PC title from 1984.

Set in a fictional recreation of NYC, in RYO your objective is to channel your inner Gus Fring by flipping drugs, accumulating profits, and topping the in-game leaderboard.

Right now, RYO is one of two major Starknet games (the other being Loot Survivor) with a global ranking system of this kind.

As you probably know by now, my track record of onchain gaming success is….shall we say, spotty at best.

Nonetheless, over the weekend, I set a goal to have myself (or at least someone rocking a [WASD] tag) at the #1 spot on BOTH leaderboards.

Because I like to create dramatic names, I deemed this the “Quest for Starknet Supremacy.”

Today, I’ll cue you on how it has begun to unfold by walking you through my experience playing RYO.

This includes both the highs (pun intended) and lows (Hint: There are a lot more of these) I experienced in this epic battle for onchain glory.

As always, the following is based on my interpretation of a series of transactions.

It may or may not be correct, you’ll have to check the chain to see for yourself ;)

Roll Your Own 101

Before I dive into my attempt to become an RYO kingpin, let’s get some context on the game’s mechanics so you all can understand wtf I’m talking about.

As previously mentioned, your aim in RYO is to maximize profit (denominated in Dope Wars native currency, $PAPER) by trading different drugs.

There are six substances (Yes, I know it’s boomer to use the word ‘substance’) that players can choose to traffic to achieve this goal:

• Cocaine

• Heroin

• Acid

• Weed

• Speed

• Ludes

These all trade at different prices in each of this version of NYC’s six boroughs, which are:

• The Bronx

• Queens

• Central Park

• Brooklyn

• Coney Island

• Jersey City

I know it’s a fictional world, but as someone who grew up in New York, it drives me INSANE to see Jersey City be considered a part of New York.

New Jersey and New York SHOULD NOT be conflated!!!

Anyways, to generate $PAPER, you’ll have to buy a drug low in one borough and sell it high in another.

This means that the core game loop of RYO consists of finding good old-fashioned arbitrage opportunities between these different drugs and regions.

You’ll have ten turns (known as Days) to do so. During each, you can:

• Buy/sell any combination of the 6 drugs (You can carry up to 100 units of them)

• Travel from one borough to another

However…raking in $PAPER is far easier said than done.

For starters, like an AMM, you’ll incur slippage every time you make a trade.

This not only impacts your execution but changes the price of drugs across all the different boroughs.

Furthermore, you’ll often be stopped by Cops or Gangs when traveling.

Upon facing either group, you’ll have two choices:

1. Attempt To Flee

If you try to run away, you may escape unscathed and be transported to a random borough.

Or, you’ll incur damage and lose health points (HP). Players get 100 HP to start a game; your game will end if you lose all of them from encounters.

2. Bribe the Cops or Gangs.

While you won’t lose any HP, you’ll pay a price with your wallet. Cops demand a 20% cut of any drugs you hold, and Gangs a 50% share of your $PAPER.

These dynamics add another element of strategy to RYO, as you’ll have to determine which option to choose based on your position, health, and stage in the game.

The Gameplan

Now that we understand the basics of Roll Your Own let’s see how I fared.

I had spent some with RYO in the past before my “official” playthrough over the weekend.

My highest score was $334,000 (I’ll be using $ signs to represent PAPER from here on out), which is good for 133rd out of 833 total attempts.

I didn’t remember all the details from this previous go around, but I recalled doing a lot of arbs with Heroin.

Heroin is the second most expensive drug in the game, behind Coke.

Successfully arbing Heroin and Coke is critical to success in the later stage of an RYO game, as eventually, your bankroll will grow large enough to where you’ll be priced out of trading in all of the other, lower-cost drugs.

So, heading into the weekend, I decided my best course was to try and replicate this “success” by centering my strategy around this.

I also planned to use some advice I’d gotten from my friend For Fully Onchain Games (FFOCG), who is responsible for the 4th highest-scoring performance in RYO to date.

A few weeks back, FFOCG had told me I should only proceed with a game when prices were favorable.

Drug prices in each borough are randomly generated at the start of a RYO round, so I interpreted their words of wisdom to mean that I should play when opportunities for large-scale arbs are present from the start.

I didn’t quite know what the “best” opportunity would look like, so I decided to eyeball it and wait until I got a game with a ~3x difference between the lowest and highest prices for Heroin.

The (Lack Of) Execution

I had my plan…now it was time to implement it.

So, I opened the RYO site and was ready to go.

Right away, I was greeted with the amazing score from Casey Wescott.

As I said when I covered RYO for The WASD Weekly Game Spotlight a few weeks back, I think RYO has the best soundtrack of any onchain game. In particular, I love the song NightDrive, and I think its synths fit perfectly with the retro and renegade vibes of the game.

I was also reminded of how easy it is to onboard into RYO, as I simply had to click “create burner” to generate a burner wallet.

No bridging or third-party wallet connection is required to play, which makes onboarding incredibly easy and indistinguishable from a Web2 browser game. This also helps RYO’s overall UX by making the game signature and gas-free.

Anyways, after creating the burner, I clicked “hustle” and got going.

I thankfully remembered FFOCG’s advice, so I kept starting and quitting games until I had that ~3x difference in Heroin prices.

After about 10 attempts, I eventually got a slate of prices where Heroin traded for as low as ~$1200 in Coney Island and $4000 in Jersey City.

I also noticed that Acid was trading about 3x higher in Coney relative to Jersey, meaning that I could do a secondary arb to compliment the “main” Heroin one.

Given the above prices/locations, per the gameplan, this meant my overarching strategy would be to:

1. Buy Heroin in Coney Island

2. Sell it higher in Jersey City

3. Use these profits to buy Acid in Jersey City

4. Travel back to Coney Island

5. Sell Acid in Coney Island

6. Repeat Steps 1-5

Players begin games of RYO with $2000, so I could only buy one unit of Heroin to start this off.

In hindsight, this was an early mistake (and a sign of things to come) as it meant I left PAPER on the table and failed to maximize my profits in the first turns of the game.

Nonetheless, I successfully traveled from Coney Island to Jersey City and sold the Heroin for a ~3x (If only my IRL trades were this successful) to successfully complete the arb.

So far, so good. All was going according to plan.

It was Day 2, and per said plan, I then rolled my profits into Jersey City Acid to sell once I completed the trip back to Coney Island.

However, my early luck ran out, as mid-travel I was stopped by the Cops.

I had all my HP and didn’t want to give up any of my Acid, so I decided to try and flee.

Unfortunately, I must’ve tripped over my digital feet – I failed to escape and lost 14 HP.

I’m stubborn, so I tried to escape again. This time…

…I succeeded!

However, I did not arrive in Coney Island…but instead was randomly transported to The Bronx.

I hadn’t remembered this from my first playthrough, but it turns out that if you escape from the Cops, you’re automatically routed to a random location rather than your intended one.

This is a good way to spice up gameplay, force players to think on their feet and make arbs more difficult.

But man…it was a curveball, and in typical FaultProofBen fashion, things began to spiral from there.

Flustered and caught off guard by this deviation from my plan, I had a patented fat-finger moment, where I accidentally traveled back to Jersey City instead of Coney Island!

I had now wasted an ENTIRE turn, as I couldn’t purchase Heroin for cheap to execute the arb.

Instead, I had to go back to Coney Island, purchase some Heroin, and then go back again to Jersey City, all while hoping I avoided shakedowns from the Cops and Gangs.

This mistake may seem small, but it was lethal for my first-place ambitions.

While I managed to execute my much-desired Heroin arb once or twice throughout the remainder of the game, my momentum had been derailed. I was also stopped periodically in my final turns, losing considerable amounts of $PAPER and drugs.

This ruined any chances I had of a comeback, as I managed to scrounge together a meager $102,042 – Good for just 402nd in the leaderboard.

Now, you may be wondering: Didn’t you try again? And if so, wouldn’t it go better?

Unfortunately, I tried several times after this, but the results were largely the same, as I placed no higher than 243rd.

I chose to focus on this first attempt (and self-rugging) because it was the most memorable (and funny) moment in what was otherwise, from a competitive point of view, an L-filled weekend.

Send in the [WASD]

As you can see, I did not come particularly close to finishing first in RYO.

I think it’s fair to say that from a performance POV, my quest for Starknet Supremacy has so far not gone as planned.

My strategy certainly needs more work (I should spreadsheet it all out to find optimal arbs for my next go around).

But overall, I had a lot of fun with Roll Your Own.

The core gameplay is fun (I wouldn’t rage like I did above if it weren’t) and well-designed, with numerous obstacles preventing players from spamming one arb repeatedly

I also am a huge fan of the crime IP and soundtrack.

With that said, this experience made it clear to me that for WASD to achieve Starknet Supremacy, I’ll need some help.

It can’t just be me.

Other, more skilled gamers, should be able to rock the [WASD] tag in this (and all) leaderboards.

That will be possible starting tomorrow with the launch of [WASD].

Get ready.

And keep your eyes onchain and on X ;)

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