Introduction to Polygon and MATIC
While ships are minted on Ethereum mainnet (layer 1) so they are available for trading on popular NFT exchanges like OpenSea, all actual gameplay and governance takes place on Polygon (formerly called Matic), an Ethereum sidechain (layer 2). The advantage of Polygon is that transactions are fast and cheap compared to Ethereum mainnet. This means the focus can be on having fun and participating without sweating major gas fees.
While gas fees are very low on Polygon, you will need to load your wallet with a small amount of MATIC in order to play the game and participate in the DAO. MATIC is the native token for the Polygon network that is used to pay for transactions.
How do I buy MATIC?
How much will each basic game transaction cost?
The most expensive transactions will not be any more than 0.05 MATIC at 100 Gwei gas. Most transactions will be somewhere between 0.01 - 0.02 MATIC.
How much MATIC do you recommend starting out with?
10-15 MATIC should be more than enough for a month of play with an active play style.
How do I switch between Polygon and Ethereum networks on MetaMask?
In order to play the game and view your bridged assets you will have to switch your wallet to the Polygon network. In MetaMask, you can switch networks any time by clicking on the name of the network at the top of the window.
To be able to switch to the Polygon network, it has to be added to MetaMask. If you haven't added Polygon yet:
See: How to Add Polygon to MetaMask
Why was Polygon chosen over Layer 2 solutions?
Polygon is the most mature Layer 2 solution available and has the best track record as far as security and dependability are concerned. At the moment, it is both cheaper and faster than other options (especially when it comes to bridging). It was convenient to work with and met our needs really well for what we wanted to accomplish.
The way the contracts are written, it would be possible to switch to another Layer 2 down the road if there were clear cut advantages to doing so.