By Pixisu
Gâday!
Last week, we revealed our release date, and we shared some of our docs. This week we want to talk about: (1) WL and mint, (2) the Lilypad Launchpad, and (3) the future.
First off, last time we put out some figures. You all had time to mull those over, and we have done what a good project ought toâ weâve listened. We are dropping the mint price to 2 SOL. For those who are worried about how this will affect the project financiallyâ I want to say a few points:
1. Because of the support you have all given us with pathSOL, and prior to the mint even taking place, our pathSOL Treasury alone has provided us with enough runway to support our team for 12+ months.
2. We have a strong, well-capitalized patron in the space in the form of Sanctum.
pathSOL is a fantastic conduit for us to use to get funds, and we are looking into various approaches that can perhaps increase and optimize the yield we receive for the project. This is all before we get to our releasesâŚ
I would highlight that Pathfinder 10K NFTs will provide us both with yield AND royalties; that Lilypad will implement some platform fees, and that we have already secured one grant this week from SuperteamUK, with more on the way.
Lastly, this is a passion project for me above all else, and I am the ultimate backstop.
Put another way, we are here to stay, no matter what!
With that out of the wayâ- Letâs briefly talk about WHITELIST.
So last time we ran through the PREQUEL/WL Collection Airdrop. That is coming very, very soon. On that front, I want to stress three things.
First off, if you havenât already done so: GO AND VERIFY IF YOU WANT YOUR ALLOCATION. Everyone who wants to receive WL token allocations needs to do this. The wallet you are inputting is the wallet that you hold pathSOL inâ you will receive NFTs to that wallet, but you can always transfer them to any wallet you would like to mint with.
Our CMs will point you to the right channel. Tea Raffle WL winners have another channel to go to. If you were lucky enough to win WL, and have the WL role, you can go to #community-WL. Go and put any wallet in thereâ goes without saying that if you won, we donât need to verify your wallet for that token, but we still need to know somewhere to send it!
Second, when you do eventually receive your WL NFT, donât get too trigger happy and burn it. You might be wondering how you can verify that the airdrop is legitimate. One way will be on Tensor where the collection will be listed: you will be able to connect, look at your NFTs, and if itâs legit you will see it in the collection. We will also provide all relevant token details for folks to manually verify in our Announcements Channel in the Discord, and on our Twitter.
Third, and I guess this is important⌠If you have a WL token, donât forget to mint on the 27th August. You have 24 hours from the start timeâ check the info, and stay up to date with announcements as we make âem.
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Our WL tokens have function, tick. But I hope you all really, really enjoy the art too!
If you do, please do take the time to follow and show support to the artists who helped us. Their handles are on the page above, and half of all royalties will go directly to them.
The royalties rate will be 5% for all of these WL/PREQUEL NFTs.
Moving swiftly on, letâs talk about the other mint logistics for the 27th. Last time, we went through the phased approach, but I want to run through where you go and what you get when you mint.
To start with, where do you go? Lilypad Launchpad is brand new and the site will go live in the coming days for you to explore. As part of our launch process we did a brand review and upgraded our logo.
We asked the secretive F50, a little group of testers for their opinions and they liked this one most of all. We hope you like it too.
Next, what you get is what we call a TOTEM. This is the unborn Pathfinder. Think about unrevealed NFTs and you are thinking along the right lines.
The graphic above is what all Pathfinder 10K NFTs will look like to begin with. Itâs a curious thing being not yet bornâ but I am sure the white sand and blue skies will tempt you on⌠If not that, well, thereâs always the chance to experience our Storybook Experience, get cool traits, and even a 1-of-1 to look forward to.
Lilypad will be our second deliverable this month, and we couldnât have done it without our friends at Phase Labs.
BUT, aside from this first mint, you are probably wondering about what Lilypad means for Pathfinders, and the 10K more broadlyâŚ
The question on your mind is likely⌠âwhy should I care?â and âwhatâs in it for me?â
I want to start by stressing an abstract idea about where we see the 10K as being situated. We want our 10K collection to persist, and we see it as a linking point between our broader Pathfinders IP and the Lilypad Launchpad (and services).
Give us some credit where it is due⌠This month we are executing on four fairly massive deliverables. But if I stress that we are exploring ways to give our 10K holders benefits or perks on Lilypad, that should not be dismissed.
To those of you who worry about the viability of âunruggable mintsâ in our ecosystem, I want to stress a couple of points to you about our launchpad.
First, we recognize that there are only a happy few which will want to be as generous up-front as we are planning to be. Mint-to-raise projects will struggle to get started with 100% insured mints. We admit that.
But, the world doesnât need to exist in absolutes, and the smart contracts that we intend to deploy allow for a lot of configurability. Our plan is to make the first viable âinsured mintsâ launchpad on SOL, but that does not always need to be set to 100%.
For example, we could allow some projects that do need some funds up front to take 25% of the proceeds and let 75% to be locked up.
Think about this for a moment, this is still infinitely better than the current meta for anyone minting.
Also, for those who worry about the risk of up-front supply destruction of a collection, we can also configure a minimum lock-up time for NFTs before they can make use of the dissolve feature.
To summarize, we can improve the space and work with partners to accomplish whatâs right for them.
We have broader aspirations for the functionality on Lilypad. Our plans are to allow projects, and creators to make use of validator yield in various ways. Sometimes, that yield might be targeted at an NFT project before mint to help give them a jumping startâ a Lilypad Jumpstart perhaps. đ¸
Putting on a business hats for a second. I believe that the starting gun has been fired on a race for systems that allow for the targeting of LST yield at projects. This can come in a number of forms, but we hope that our launchpad helps us make use of what is the only free lunch on Solana to help the cultural space, and NFTs more generally.
And⌠Our 10K collection will always have that persistent and âspecial relationshipâ with Lilypad into the future. So make of that what you will.
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Everything Iâve said so far doesnât even get to the real reason that I am excited to do more with Lilypad. We think we see a future for lock-to-play NFTs, and NFTs as cost-neutral experiencesâ- this applies to projects AND minters.
LST yield isnât always very much, but itâs enough to concentrate into a bundle, which can then be fired at an individual in a community for a specific purpose. Even better, over time those prizes can be replenished and tossed out again.
This is the essence of what was missing from NFT projects in 2021 and 2022: what am I talking about? A reason to exist, a function.
We want to make LST-NFT experiences that have an automatic function: good art, an experience, and a prize, or prizes to be given out.
Think about thisâŚ
Perhaps we will see spin-offs of your favourite high-in-culture, low-in-liquidity IPs. Think of a âwho-dunnitâ murder mystery with a cash prize. Or, an NFT tied to a story that is delivered, like our Storybook Experience, with a fixed lock-up time, guaranteed yield for the creator, and a firm end date.
To return to our 10K collection once more, we see the great strength of an NFT community in being the real-time relationship that allows it to shape the direction of a project.
The 10Kâs first great value offering is helping to shape our Storybook over its first SEVEN chapters. We will want feedback, we will want your guidance and ideas. In turn, you will own a piece of foundational content from our IP: experience and art.
This isnât such a bad offering, right?
But to settle your fears⌠There is more to the Pathfinders universe coming down the tracks. We will be making first party experiences, and holding NFTs from the 10K will be one way to get WL (or access) to those experiences.
I mentioned in the FAQs the notion that our IP is composable. We can use our art and ideas in many forms, many mediums and many places. Our launchpad can function as our very own variant on a Kickstarter when we need it toâ and we want to give you the choice to be able to back the ideas that you want us to follow.
Project Pathfinders is just getting started.
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So to wrap this up: if you want to be the force that helps make a richer, more vibrant, functional, and fun NFT ecosystemâ mint a Pathfinder.
If you want access to a project that believes in exploring every possible avenue of what NFTs can really doâ mint a Pathfinder.
If you value a project which builds entertainment-based experiences on SOL, mint a Pathfinder.
If you want to see a more secure, more relaxed, softer and more profitable space for all, mint a Pathfinder.
And if you just really want to help shape a Web3 native IP with potentialâŚ
You know what to do.
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Thanks for your attention. <3