RSOP (2)
A Community Newsletter — September Review
by @jvn_xyz; 10/2/2022
The Crown Jewels were safe, but a more important battle was about to begin.
GM Royals,
A herald has returned from the battlefield with another gruesome report; although the knights of the Red King had secured a victory, the collateral damage measured beyond count. Tales of the 1600 would pass into legend, chronicling their heroic efforts in service of their King, but the war had just begun.
Welcome to the Royal Society of Players’ Royal Game of Thrones (RGOT) and the race to secure the last free Joker in the Kingdom. With the completion of Quest #2: A Battle Begins the path to the emancipation of the joker turned dark, twisting its way through horror and madness until a champion arose into the light going by the name @bucs4Life_99 and his victory was sweet.
Enjoying a pint of ale as he sat at the elongated oaken bar, he peered up at the leader board, mouthing the finalists names under his breath as studied the list. There was @Elmwood, @Stublufan, @JHWrecker, @1CentCollector, all competitors he would face in the final round, but something didn’t add up, he rechecked the names and the mission details, alas only five finalists were named, but six Golden Tickets claimed. A double Royal Stamped ticket revealed the mystery, @Elmwood led the way with two accomplished missions under his belt.
Leaning back from the bar, the victor took another slug of ale as he reviewed the past missions and scratched his head at a surprising revelation. Aside from the myriad of fallen knights, none of the listed names belonged to the legion whom everyone aspired, the Jokers. Nothing among the ashes or carnage showed sign of a joker presence. Were they plotting a stealth attack? Did he miss the Secret Council meeting? Or had they fallen victim to Siren songs from afar quelling their desire to complete the one true 52-card deck in the kingdom?
Meanwhile, on the other side of the kingdom another conflict came to an end as the…ahem… “Royal Rumble” reached its conclusion and the September Competitive Staking final scores were posted as follows:
1) House of Diamonds with 1165 RLP;
2) House of Clubs with 845 RLP;
3) House of Spades with 735 RLP; and
4) House of Hearts with 475 RLP.
This was the first TEAM competition on the RSOP ROYAL platform, but given its popularity unlikely the last, especially as the news of the Marketplace auctions and drawings spreads to the four corners of the kingdom. And with the strength of the multipliers kicking in, members partaking in the competitive staking of their RSOP cards and having verified before the deadline will receive a multiplier addition to their personal monthly number according to the House they were randomly assigned. The multipliers were quite generous as well with First place — House of Diamonds members receiving a 16x multiplier to their staked NFTs, Second place — House of Clubs receiving a 12x multiplier to their staked NFTs, Third place — House of Spades receiving an 8x multiplier, and Fourth place — House of Hearts receiving a 4x multiplier.
If you’re new to RSOP or didn’t see the sign up announcement and deadlines, the upcoming October Competitive Staking signup schedule is as follows October 1st to October 4th, after that you’ll miss any opportunity to get a team multiple. #STAYROYAL
Cryptocurrency and NFT news
As the bear market continued to flash its claws during September, first post the continued hawkish FED stance and its 75bps hike, then during last week’s UK turmoil as the Sterling (British Pound) dropped to near parity with the Greenback (USD), sparked by a tax cut announcement and a spiraling bond market, which some say may have been orchestrated by bad actors unhappy with the way the UK administration was handling the economy in the face of spike in energy prices. This coupled with the geopolitical situations unfolding between the West and Russia over Ukraine and the ongoing tensions in North Asia continues to make for shaky conditions into the yearend.
From Lac Leman to the Malacca Strait, cryptocurrency traders moved on the global macro downturn, accelerating their pivots post the Jackson Hole signal when many had fallen to the seduction of Wall Street economists and their insights into the quasi-government institution. Moving through the month cryptocurrencies began to stabilize with BTC hovering around the US$19,000 level and ETH holding the 2017 peak of 1300 level on better-than-average volumes.
With global financial markets and geopolitical situations crawling along the edge of a straight razor (thanks Brando), anything is possible at anytime and hedging one’s bets by moving into stablecoins (USDT, USDC) or a mixture of precious metals, stablecoins, and blue chip NFT projects, for the long-term degen, may be the best move. That said, given the rising rhetoric from the SEC Chairman, Gary Gensler, and his view cryptocurrency markets it may move one to exit the space altogether.
And then there was the MERGE. On September 15th, Ethereum completed its hard fork to Ethereum 2.0 now powered by the Proof-of-Stake (PoS) consensus mechanism. This choice makes a lot of sense for the amount of trading volume that was going through the network and sapping power grids across the world. With impeccable timing the management team has managed to complete the transition before the Russian energy embargo on the West kicks into full swing and the attack on the Nordstream pipeline, which is bound to have repercussions for Europe, just in time for winter.
(Source: Bloomberg, Tradingview, WSJ)
Discalimer: NFA, DYOR.
Joker’s Lounge
An Interview with Joker#12 — afs#2407
Q1: How’d you find your way into the NFT space?
A1: I still remember the first time NFTs started to make an impression on me. I was sitting on my buddy Joker4's sofa, and he was bidding on a Cryptopunk, I think it was $50 or $75k at the time. All I can say is when someone you respect that much is paying over $50k for jpeg, your brain starts to take notice. Clearly I wasn’t ready to spend anywhere near that kind of money, but all of a sudden my mind started paying attention to global headlines (Christies’ sale of a collection of Punks, Beeples record sale…) and I owned ZERO crypto and had no wallet.
Shortly after my buddy bought a Meetbit and I saw these as a much cheaper way into NFTS, but I could see these as Metaverse identities for our children. Tbh, I started to realise how little I knew , how important this would be for our children’s lives, and I needed to fill that gap of knowledge for my self and my family.
Q2: What do you value most in the NFT space, Art or Community? Why?
A2: My quick answer — I was drawn in for the tech, stayed for the community, and am now learning about the ART.
Tech fascinates me and was what motivated me to learn and dig in. I truly see we are in a new era of technological innovation. The years that Ethereum / smart contracts and DeFi have been building under the hood passed me by. We are now seeing real usage of smart contracts in finance in small pockets but the potential in some many fields is revolutionary.
Community — to me this was the big surprise, but was a major reason why I joined RSOP, tbh. I was told it was going to be the NFT/IRL crossover and a place to meet and learn from many great people, which tbh, it has delivered on and continues to connect me to people around the world. In a world where national governments are throwing up barriers, NFT/Web3 communities are breaking them down, globally.
NFTs are enabling people who identify with certain things in life to connect, grow, and build together. This is a powerful force and will continue to be for years to come. NFTs are the intersection of tech, gaming, finance, and art culture. Diversity is a breeding ground for ideas and ideas solve problems. No matter what form tech and web3 take, the change and progress happens in the community. Its really my favorite part of the space. I’ve met some truly awesome people in NFTs, especially in RSOP.
I’ve never really understood all the dimensions of ART, THERE ARE ABSOLUTELY A FEW personal favourite artists that I can really appreciate (Kandinsky / Wharhol / Keith Harring Magrite to name a few) but the breadth of exposure to creativity I get from my living room is awesome. I still don’t spend enough time on the art side of NFTs, but am genuinely starting to appreciate many collections (I would love a Chromie Squiggle now where this time last year I just thought paying that much for a cool coloured squiggle was a scam! (Apologies — SnowFro — I have changed my mind).
Q3: In terms of crypto, 2022 has been a whirlwind of turmoil. Everything from the implosion of Luna to the defaulting of Celsius and other platforms. Has this endangered the NFT space, especially given the focus of the SEC chairman and his thoughts around NFTs’ similarities to securities, exacerbated by the growing popularity of staking?
A3: If it doesn’t kill you, it makes you stronger. In reality, innovation comes with a huge amount of trial and error, and when you throw money into the mix, scam artists are bound to show up.
Regulating innovation is one of the hardest things to do as you need things to find their way, but protect the public by minimizing turmoil. The SEC struggles to understand current financial markets, let alone try to regulate NFTs. It’s a balancing act of protecting individuals while enabling innovation. I think NFTs provide an advantage over the ICO boom, which cost lots of people money through its pump and dump scam cycles.
In reality, for NFTs to stabilize and find their footing, we need shakeouts. There’s a tiny amount of the world’s population active in the NFT space, and many of them are here to stay, but not all of them.
Global brands are entering the NFT space (Gucci/ Puma / LV …to name a few) and yet they didn’t launch ICOs. So NFTs for me, are here to stay and will continue to grow. Powering through the blow-ups along the way will be learning experiences. And I am sure there will be plenty more to come.
Q4: Is there anything you’d like to say to the community and team?
A4: Grahambo, another RSOP joker and someone I admire, once shared his journey into crypto and NFTs with me. He’d arrived in crypto many years ago the when everything blew up, he lost interest, then missed the beginning of the next big run and the start of NFTs. He said he wouldn’t make that mistake again.
Its a tough space, and with the recent bear market not only shaking out founders and projects but also investors. A lot of money has been made and lost in the blink of an eye. But in 10 and 20 years, you’ll be able to tell people you were part of the 2021 NFT madness.
There’s so much more to come, and we are early. Manage your exposure, but ensure you stick around. Find the communities that are fun and add value to your life, and I’m sure opportunities in NFTs and your real world life will come from this space and the people you meet.
Global Royal Session
As our global community continued to expand in September, we wanted to highlight a couple of initiatives going on domestically, and around the world. Driving these initiatives are two amazing groups of humans from RemarkableBee and Joker#12 on the international scene to DiamondDoll and Tony Bravado on the ground in North Carolina, Atlanta, and pretty much wherever their Web3 Education Series takes them.
During the month of September, Diamond Doll and Tony Bravado were on hand to attend the HBCU donations from the Painted House’s Black is Beautiful Collection along with RSOP founder ZK85 and JaRule, which you can find on Twitter. Not stopping there, they’ve also held major events in Atlanta and New York while stopping by MidwestCon along the way.
Meanwhile, across Hong Kong and the UAE, another power couple (RemarkableBee and Joker#12) continued driving home the point that education and IRL meetups are essential to pushing through our current bear market. (October Review should be quite interesting.)
Aside from holding events and managing partnerships, RemarkableBee continued her recruiting drive and not only added several members, who’ve used the opportunity to add quite a few cards to their wallets but also an especially talented foodie, Gemnoms. (If you want to learn more what’s cookin’ (pun intended) hop over to the House of First server and open notifications for the #House-kitchen channel, you’ll be glad you did.)
Royal Treasury
It’s official, we have our Community Treasurers. If you didn’t see the voting results announcement you can check out the #community-proposals channel posting on 9/15 naming @WallyMcWalface (Joker#16), @bearcat5| Gilded Guild, @ToweringAGATE3, @baz9707 @Woodbury, and @PhenomJones as our inagural Royal Treasurers. Their term will run through the end of December 2022.
“We thank you for your trust and we have already begun our analysis and strengthening of the treasury in anticipation of the RSOP marketplace and other future endeavors. This is a community treasury, and thus, we would like to hear the community’s thoughts, proposals, and comments.” — @PhenomJones
An update from the RSOP team on the state of the Royal Treasury as of 10/1/22, shows a treasury in transition. The team uses the WGMI.io to gauge the valuations of all assets in the treasury wallets, but sometimes there are discrepancies that can lead to miscalculations. Some of these errors have been raised and amended, but if anyone has questions, please direct them to the #community-proposals channel for clarification.
According to the most recent Treasury Report posted in the #treasury-updates channel on the discord, the combined wallets have ETH equivalents of 436.00 (-11.01%M/M). And if you look through the line items, aside from the additional OnChainMonkeys there are several other interesting additions including Notorious frogs, Zed horses, and 10KTF.
The Community Treasurers were called into action to help make some fast decisions in fast markets and consolidate and restructure the existing Royal Treasury, but are always open to suggestions from the community. Once the market volumes return to normal, or there’s another discord shuffle we may find a more structured approach for sharing trading ideas, but for now, please post them in the #community-proposals channel on the discord.
RSOP ZED Stable Report
After a period of RSOP Team management of the stables, a recent call to the community found our new stable master — HEROin. Embracing the responsibility with enthusiasm, he’s worked along side PeaceFrog during September to reorganize and keep track of breeding and racing opportunities.
As a result of the breeding program in September, the stables welcomed three colts and three fillies. HEROin indicated the reasoning behind the pairings were based on a distance preference of the parents.
Following the breeding update from the stable master, a further update on Monday’s Maiden continued the update. A random selection of two horses from their breeding cycle resulted in a less than ideal conclusion. Perhaps the fact that House of Clubs Mare#484461 didn’t catch a single flame in almost any of the distances played a role in the result, but HEROin is set to try her for a few more races. That said, if performance doesn’t improve a one-way trip to the glue factory, I mean trip to retirement farm in upstate New York, may be in the offing.
A snapshot of House of Diamond’s #484463 race discovery was messy with flame in 1600/2400, based on their parents, which should help the horse sprint the funnel, but mis-flamed for all sprint races. Perhaps, given the pedigree a few more races before visiting her friend “upstate.”
On the racing front, the stable master ran the Society’s horses Royal King and House of Spades (House of Hearts retired early to the stables). Royal King has been looking very promising, with the stable master down-classing whenever possible to qualify for the tourney. The mighty House of Spades did well also with HEROin foreseeing tournaments in its future if he can stay in the C2/3 range.
Please join me in thanking the Community Action Groups, the Community Treasurers and the Stable Master for their time and deliberations with the RSOP team as we move forward together into our second year.
#STAYROYAL
Disclaimer: NFA (Not Financial Advice), DYOR (Do Your Own Research).