[ANN][MOTO] Motocoin

[e1ghtSpace]

add some sort of simple captcha when ya hit play maybe? *shrugs*

Bots can solve captchas also
Also , how do you plan on doing the check?

It was a project about a coin that required captchas to solve blocks but .. people realized it was such a pain that it got abandoned.

Hi not too sure but some kind of randomised captcha within the program might not be as easily botted like html stuff

How would it be validated? Someone could just bypass it.

[ivanlabrie]

 

Not to mention my own direct opportunity cost

lol, that's exactly what botters take from human miners.

I'm pretty sure that we only remove indirect opportunity costs... that person is going to be spending that time playing that game whether we are in the scenario or not.

Profit (again, to me) means above breaking even.  The cost to bot Motocoins is lower then the cost for a human to mine.

The energy cost is probably much higher, brains are very energy efficient and food is cheap.

The time cost is probably the real factor, eventually, but not yet.  My bots currently average a block every couple of minutes - on par with what a dedicated, skilled player could do.  However my bots can run 24/7 where a most dedicated human can probably only mine about 16/6 or so, realistically. (And still stay sane.)

As difficulty continues to increase, I'm sure the bots will soon be mining much faster, and will overtake humans on "time efficiency" of mining....

This brings to mind an interesting point: perhaps the "real" problem here is the level reset on new blocks.  I suspect we could find a way to allow players to continue working on their current map indefinitely, and submit their "win" if/whenever they do happen to find it.  In this way, bots could quietly mine away "in the background" and would still compete with players (via TargetTime) but wouldn't disrupt those players.  I have a rough idea of how this might be able to work: when you start a map you create a tx announcing your intent to play and your game doesn't start until your tx is mined and then seeds the map with the block in which your tx was mined.  When you submit your PoW it must reference your tx hash to be valid.  The initiation TX could even be given a fixed fee (like Huntercoin) which would help to create demand for the coin. (Since you'd need one to start a game.)  This model would be similar to what has already worked well for HUC I think.

Now we're talking...I think it's a sound idea.

Dev?

[e1ghtSpace]

 

Not to mention my own direct opportunity cost

lol, that's exactly what botters take from human miners.

I'm pretty sure that we only remove indirect opportunity costs... that person is going to be spending that time playing that game whether we are in the scenario or not.

Profit (again, to me) means above breaking even.  The cost to bot Motocoins is lower then the cost for a human to mine.

The energy cost is probably much higher, brains are very energy efficient and food is cheap.

The time cost is probably the real factor, eventually, but not yet.  My bots currently average a block every couple of minutes - on par with what a dedicated, skilled player could do.  However my bots can run 24/7 where a most dedicated human can probably only mine about 16/6 or so, realistically. (And still stay sane.)

As difficulty continues to increase, I'm sure the bots will soon be mining much faster, and will overtake humans on "time efficiency" of mining....

This brings to mind an interesting point: perhaps the "real" problem here is the level reset on new blocks.  I suspect we could find a way to allow players to continue working on their current map indefinitely, and submit their "win" if/whenever they do happen to find it.  In this way, bots could quietly mine away "in the background" and would still compete with players (via TargetTime) but wouldn't disrupt those players.  I have a rough idea of how this might be able to work: when you start a map you create a tx announcing your intent to play and your game doesn't start until your tx is mined and then seeds the map with the block in which your tx was mined.  When you submit your PoW it must reference your tx hash to be valid.  The initiation TX could even be given a fixed fee (like Huntercoin) which would help to create demand for the coin. (Since you'd need one to start a game.)  This model would be similar to what has already worked well for HUC I think.

Now we're talking...I think it's a sound idea.

Dev?

Ah good idea. This is how I thought the game worked until it actually launched.

This could actually work quite well if you need MOTO to start a game with the TX thing. Now I'm not sure how bots decide what levels to complete but if it has to keep generating new levels a lot to find a good one, it will use up quite a bit of MOTO in the process.

[HunterMinerCrafter]

This could actually work quite well if you need MOTO to start a game with the TX thing. Now I'm not sure how bots decide what levels to complete but if it has to keep generating new levels a lot to find a good one, it will use up quite a bit of MOTO in the process.

Keep in mind that currently each block you get a *large* set of maps (a full 32 bits of search space!) to choose from for your "level."  Basically, 1MOTO would buy you one nonce's worth of individual maps... however big the nonce is would determine how many maps that is.  A full 32 bits might be too large, but it should be left sufficiently large so you don't end up paying for a set of maps that are all entirely unplayable, etc.  Maybe 8 bits? 256 maps?  (Plus there's something cool and retro about it being 8bit, yah?)  I dunno, that might be too few.... there are some other things to consider.

You shouldn't have to "use up" MOTO to mine (human or bot) as this deters mining in general, and remember we want to give incentive to mining!  But yes, otherwise you are right, the idea is that the player (bot or human) should stake something to the network for their attempted play.  In HUC you stake 1 coin to join a new army to the map, and when your team is dead that coin goes back into the network.

Oh, and to all of the people suggesting captchas; even if some very fancy new multiparty computation stuff was used to securely generate/verify the captchas (as has been suggested elsewhere) captchas themselves are basically ineffective these days to people willing to burn some electricity to solve them.  (They are still effective in many cases because most attackers simply wouldn't do the necessary energy spend.  Coin miners with direct incentive, on the other hand, probably would.)  It would still be machine hashed and ultimately bot dominated.... just like every blockchain probably will be eventually. 

[e1ghtSpace]

You shouldn't have to "use up" MOTO to mine (human or bot)

I didn't mean that the coins should be deleted, they should just go back into the next block reward.
But then there would be a problem of people only submitting their replay when the block reward had a lot of extra coins from other people's attempts.

[HunterMinerCrafter]

You shouldn't have to "use up" MOTO to mine (human or bot)

I didn't mean that the coins should be deleted, they should just go back into the next block reward.
But then there would be a problem of people only submitting their replay when the block reward had a lot of extra coins from other people's attempts.

Yes, I hadn't much considered replay withholding which would indeed be a bit of a big problem.  Even without a cost to play, replays could be withheld waiting for some high-tx-fee block, or a large collection of replays could be built up to force forks and double-spend.

However, I think I've realized that there are some even bigger problems with my proposal, and I think it would not effectively serve to secure transactions as described without additional side-band hashing strength, like HUC has.

I'll keep thinking on it, but I think eliminating the map reset would not be as easy/straightforward as I first thought. 

[domob]

In general, I think that the idea to have a coin like this (or even Primecoin) to "fund AI research" is nice.  But one has to keep in mind that the actual use of PoW in blockchains is to make them secure against 51% attacks.  So if the "AI thing" is used as the main PoW (as opposed to Huntercoin, for instance, where the security comes from hardware PoW and the "human-mining" is just an extra for "fun"), then I see a big problem here:  When someone makes a "break through" in research of bot strategies (or mathematics backing prime numbers in some way for XPM), then they may very well be in a position to easily 51% or even 99% attack the network (as HMC has stated above for himself).  I. e., I don't think that it makes sense to use such mining techniques for PoW in a blockchain - at least, if it is not just about the fun of it but also to create an actually secure crypto-currency.

[myhoho]

 I think we should urgently switch to POS mining (tx fees only) to discourage bot rush...

[newbiefx]

Timer for F6 allowed it's OK

[e1ghtSpace]

Timer for F6 allowed it's OK

YES YES YE...no.
How can we validate that the "human" has actually waited the time?

[WilliamLie2]

This brings to mind an interesting point: perhaps the "real" problem here is the level reset on new blocks.  I suspect we could find a way to allow players to continue working on their current map indefinitely, and submit their "win" if/whenever they do happen to find it.  In this way, bots could quietly mine away "in the background" and would still compete with players (via TargetTime) but wouldn't disrupt those players.  I have a rough idea of how this might be able to work: when you start a map you create a tx announcing your intent to play and your game doesn't start until your tx is mined and then seeds the map with the block in which your tx was mined.  When you submit your PoW it must reference your tx hash to be valid.  The initiation TX could even be given a fixed fee (like Huntercoin) which would help to create demand for the coin. (Since you'd need one to start a game.)  This model would be similar to what has already worked well for HUC I think.

How blocks will be mined? You seed the map only with already mined blocks but how will you be able to mine new ones?

Keep in mind that currently each block you get a *large* set of maps (a full 32 bits of search space!) to choose from for your "level."  Basically, 1MOTO would buy you one nonce's worth of individual maps... however big the nonce is would determine how many maps that is.  A full 32 bits might be too large, but it should be left sufficiently large so you don't end up paying for a set of maps that are all entirely unplayable, etc.  Maybe 8 bits? 256 maps?  (Plus there's something cool and retro about it being 8bit, yah?)  I dunno, that might be too few.... there are some other things to consider.

Currently, each block gives you infinite set of maps, not 2^32 but infinite. You propose to add some other method for actually mining blocks and leave game just for fun and for generating/distributing coins?

[PonyBoy]

I like the idea of paying for blocks of maps. This would create a market for motocoins and end the F6 spamming. Set the limit low and make the maps expire with each block found. I think 1moto for 16-32 maps sounds about right. Put the coins right back into the network by adding them to the block as tx fees.

[e1ghtSpace]

"Now dominated by bots" in ANN title. It's a shame really.
Right before dump I suspected bots when a block I was trying to mine skipped after 10 seconds and the replay was actually more than 20 seconds. But I thought it must have been because they made their time increase really fast. Silly me, it would have been super hard to play this way.
Well that was a load of time wasted. I feel sorry for the guy who played and spent a day mining 75000 coins.

[e1ghtSpace]

I like the idea of paying for blocks of maps. This would create a market for motocoins and end the F6 spamming. Set the limit low and make the maps expire with each block found. I think 1moto for 16-32 maps sounds about right. Put the coins right back into the network by adding them to the block as tx fees.

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THIS is a good idea. Relaunch needed. Maybe Devs could premine and trade old coins for new coins to a max of 10000 coins for each person.

[WilliamLie2]

I like the idea of paying for blocks of maps. This would create a market for motocoins and end the F6 spamming. Set the limit low and make the maps expire with each block found. I think 1moto for 16-32 maps sounds about right. Put the coins right back into the network by adding them to the block as tx fees.

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THIS is a good idea. Relaunch needed. Maybe Devs could premine and trade old coins for new coins to a max of 10000 coins for each person.

But if playing will be just for fun, how will we generate new blocks? Adding hardware mining or using PoS?

[PonyBoy]

I like the idea of paying for blocks of maps. This would create a market for motocoins and end the F6 spamming. Set the limit low and make the maps expire with each block found. I think 1moto for 16-32 maps sounds about right. Put the coins right back into the network by adding them to the block as tx fees.

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THIS is a good idea. Relaunch needed. Maybe Devs could premine and trade old coins for new coins to a max of 10000 coins for each person.

But if playing will be just for fun, how will we generate new blocks? Adding hardware mining or using PoS?

Its good the way it is. I suspect most of these botting programs are going through hundreds if not thousands of maps looking for the optimal one and then brute forcing it, they might have even modified the game so that it goes really really fast, like faster than you can adjust the game normally.

By charging 1moto for a set of maps, or charging per play, like how an arcade game used to charge 25cents per play, you could make it very hard for bots. For 1moto they get 16 presses of f6 and/or a turn. This means the bots have to pay for all the maps they blow through in seconds. If the idea was refined I think it could make bots unprofitable.

[coelto]

My be add several coins? Each player must collect of this coins. And difficalty will be depend on not only time, but number of coins.

[Spiky]

Just make reward 100-nonce*10 (in other words decrease reward each time player presses F6)

[NoxX]

Just make reward 100-nonce*10 (in other words decrease reward each time player presses F6)

Yeah, I proposed that a long time ago, I still like the idea...

[WilliamLie2]

I like the idea of paying for blocks of maps. This would create a market for motocoins and end the F6 spamming. Set the limit low and make the maps expire with each block found. I think 1moto for 16-32 maps sounds about right. Put the coins right back into the network by adding them to the block as tx fees.

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THIS is a good idea. Relaunch needed. Maybe Devs could premine and trade old coins for new coins to a max of 10000 coins for each person.

But if playing will be just for fun, how will we generate new blocks? Adding hardware mining or using PoS?

Its good the way it is. I suspect most of these botting programs are going through hundreds if not thousands of maps looking for the optimal one and then brute forcing it, they might have even modified the game so that it goes really really fast, like faster than you can adjust the game normally.

By charging 1moto for a set of maps, or charging per play, like how an arcade game used to charge 25cents per play, you could make it very hard for bots. For 1moto they get 16 presses of f6 and/or a turn. This means the bots have to pay for all the maps they blow through in seconds. If the idea was refined I think it could make bots unprofitable.

You contradict to yourself, you say that it is good the way it is but propose to make fundamental changes. If map is not depended on transactions in block (to limit generation of new maps) then we need to mine blocks in some other way.

Just make reward 100-nonce*10 (in other words decrease reward each time player presses F6)

Yeah, I proposed that a long time ago, I still like the idea...

You can just change transaction in block to generate new map and always use nonce=0.