Hello all!
We’ve had quite a bit of movement in recent weeks and so I thought today would be a good day to check in with some updates on the progress of Zedx.
I’ve had a couple of DM’s from stables asking how best to climb the leaderboard so I thought I’d also include some tips on how to do that in this post.

To kick off, if you missed the announcement Alpha/closed Beta sign up is now open for the first Zedx player tests.
From what I understand the team will only be including a handful of participants.
If you would like to throw your name in the hat for a chance to be one of the first to test the new game you can do so via this form HERE

– What’s in the rewards chests? –

We’ve all been wondering and speculating about what’s in the Zedx rewards chests and now we know!
Chests will be filled with Gen Zero race horses, Gen 0 breed horses and Zed Tokens.
Armed with this new information everyone can now decide the best strategy for their stable/s.

Of note, we will be retaining the Nakamoto/Szabo/Finney/Buterin bloodlines in the new game.
This brought a smile to my face!

If you would like to check out what’s in each tier of the rewards chests for yourself you can do so HERE

– How can I move up the leaderboard? –

Now that we know what’s in the chests, different stables will have different strategies on how they allocate their rewards points.
Some will be chasing more tokens while others will be chasing horses.
Some stables might want a quantity of horses and some may want a smaller amount of quality horses such as Nakamoto and Szabo.

This could lead to the bigger stables splitting their rewards over two or more stables in order to grab more chests.
For most of us though, it is going to be a case of moving as high up the leaderboard as possible.
So how can that be done?

1) The most obvious but least cost effective way to gain points is to race and breed more horses.
This will add points to your score but unless your breeding in large amounts your spend vs points acquired isn’t going to move you far up the leaderboard.

2) A quick way to gain some points is classing up your horses as horses in higher classes are rewarded with more collector points.
Unless you have hundreds of horses this won’t have a huge effect on your board standings but it is free.
Simply class up any C3 and C2 horses you have to C2 and C1.

3) Another way to add points to your total score  in a cost effective way is to buy cheap floor horses.
Check out the points formula HERE to see what points value different horses have and keep an eye on Opensea for any bargains.
From what I hear anything around $0.30USD per point is a good buy.

4) Lastly and probably the most cost effective way to move up the leaderboard is to hold Zed Token.
If you have zero token a purchase of between $200 and $300 USD worth of token can take your multiplier up to 1.5x.
This will increase your total score by 50%!
(Keep in mind that with the way the formula works this becomes much less cost effective as you move past the 1.5x multiplier)

Using a combination of all 4 of these ideas can help increase your standing on the leaderboard and move you toward the highest place possible.
Personally I’m sitting on a Rare Chest and will be using these strategies to move up to Super Rare so I can ensure I have some Nakamoto horses and plenty of Zed Tokens when we transition in to the new game.

– High Level roadmap –

Also released in recent days was the “Zedx High Level Roadmap”.
Personally I think this news went a bit under the radar as it’s something that the community has been asking for since the announcement of Zedx.

As you can see above the map has been broken down in to 3 sections; “In development”, “Up next” and “Concept”.
This format should work really well in combination with the bi weekly AMA’s as we can heavily discuss the current “in development” items while the team are most focused on them.
As we will know what the team is currently working on we can offer questions and feedback accordingly and keep tabs on each items progress.
I’m looking forward to following along this visual map as we journey through each step with Nick.

The current development items are Seasons, Marketplace and Branding.
While Race Visuals, Zed Picks and in game Economy are in the works and scheduled to be ongoing until launch as they are major tasks.

Much of this was touched on in todays AMA and I will highlight what was discussed there in bullet points below:

  • Rebranding.
    The rebranding of Zed to Zedx is being taken very seriously and has taken longer than projected as it is something the team don’t want to rush.
    They have partnered with an outside agency and are making good progress.
    We will see some of the updates, images and details soon.
  • Race visuals.
    The team are working with an external studio on the race visuals.
    They are not just an upgrade but a significant upgrade to the Zed experience.
    The team are spending a lot of time and energy on this and want the visuals to be exciting down to the last second of each race.
    Leaks coming soon including what the different tracks are.
  • Zed Picks mobile app.
    The team were talking to different studios about the best way to implement the Zed Picks project.
    They have selected an external studio and work on the app is officially underway.
    More details as we get closer to launch.
    The mobile app will be much different to the usual web3 experience and will be intended to appeal to people that are not involved in crypto.
  • Zed token – Tokenomics/Locked tokens/Economy.
    There has been much discussion in the community regarding how the rewards tokens will be released and how the tokenomics and in game economy will work.
    Like many of you I have made suggestions and had questions about this.
    Unfortunately for those of us with questions Nick admittedly ducked this question during the AMA.
    That said he did go on to make sure we know he understands that it is a critical aspect and core component of web3 games and not just a feature.
    He told us the team have technical details to work out regarding the token and that they have hired a new head of legal who is working on the all the processes of the token release and in game economy so they get the framework right.
    Nick told us there will be a future AMA specifically about the Tokenomics and that we will dive into the weeds of it once the legal aspects are ironed out.
    He was able to share some breadcrumbs IE there will be a token time lock mechanism upon release, to unlock tokens you will need to play the game which in turn can also unlock more rewards.
  • Gen 0 horses.
    We learnt that Gen 0 horses will have more free breeding slots than other generation horses.
    As you progress down the line Gen 1, Gen 2, Gen 3 etc you will have less free breeding slots per horse.
    OF NOTE; Gen 0 have more free breeding slots but they WILL NOT have better breeding capabilities than future generations.
    In regards to racing, Gen 0 horses will not have a capability advantage over future bred horses.
  • Bloodlines.
    On average all bloodlines have a different chance of being a top racer and having top level speed.
    IE a Nakamoto has a better chance of being a champion than a Buterin, though a Buterin can still be a champion.
    The floor speed for a higher bloodline is faster than the floor speed of a lower bloodline.
  • A message from Caroline.
    Caroline emphasized that there is a lot of work going on between the core Zed team and the partner studios and she is confident that once the team are able to share some of the visuals, branding and Zed Picks progress it is going to build a lot more confidence in what the team are doing.
    She told us the core and extended team are working hard to build the best possible game they can.

    For those of you with limited time I hope these updates are helpful but for those of you with some free time I would suggest listening to a recording of the AMA as there is more nuance and detail involved.
    You can listen to the most recent AMA HERE
    Or to catch up with the latest in ZedX over the last few months check out some of my other posts  HERE