The long awaited F1 Delta Time crate sale has finally arrived. The details are distributed among several articles, so I figured I’d give a simplified explanation to make it easier for anyone to participate.
What is F1 Delta Time?
F1DT is an upcoming blockchain based collectible/racing game. Players will collect cars, drivers, parts and equipment and then challenge other racers in a skill based game. The game is not ready yet, but they’ve told us some teasers as well as a tentative schedule on the discord channel.
We also have a tentative schedule of what to expect this year. I want to emphasize, this is NOT an official schedule. It is subject to change.
The workshop and the time trial will be our first chance to put our cars to use. This will not be an interactive game, you will simply assemble the best car you can for the race, but it is still a significant step towards the real game. It also is a chance to win prizes.
Following that is staking, which is basically getting paid to put your car in the “bank”. You will be able to passively earn in game currency (REV) so you can enter races and such for free. You can learn more about this from the official article.
Finally we will hopefully see the game in the summer!
How do I join?
Simply follow my referral link and follow the instructions. When you try and buy crates, the website will ask you to signup and link a wallet. If you don’t already have an Ethereum Wallet, you can sign up for one. If you already have a wallet, you can simply link it instead. If you need help, don’t hesitate to ask in the comments. I know that blockchain and cryptocurrency can be confusing, even intimidating, at times. Fortunately myself, and much of the community, are usually willing to help.
Wow, this seems expensive.
Those who are unfamiliar with Cryptocurrency and the blockchain may balk at the prices. Honestly, even those of us involved may experience a sense of sticker shock. I’m used to buying a brand new, major studio, computer game for between $50 and $100. In fact most games I get are bundled and far less than that.
In the crate sale , you could easily spend hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars. I’ve seen several people do so already. In the various auctions leading up to this sale, some one of a kind cars have sold for the price of a REAL car. Others would pay my mortgage for a month.
Don’t be scared off though! Think of it as a video game kickstarter with a twist. You truly own every digital item you get. If you get an amazing car or driver, you are free to sell it for real money without fearing the dreaded “ban hammer”.
If you just want to play, you can make do with 5 or 10 common crates. You might have to trade parts with people to get fully equipped, but that’s part of the fun.
If that’s not enough to easy your nerves, think about how much people spend on Candy Crush. Its worth spending at the time, but you don’t have anything to show for it at the end. Even worse, consider the thousands of dollars people spend on gatcha games like Fate Grand Order or many MMOs. You can spend a fortune only to have them take it away from you when the game is shutdown or you accidentally break a rule. You can’t take a blockchain game item away!
Do I just throw money at them?
While you could, there is no sense going into it blind. The first thing you need to ask yourself is, what type of player are you? Are you a collector? F1 Fan? Gambler? or a Gamer?
If you are a collector or fan you will need to dig much deeper in your wallet than a gamer would, and a gambler would likely be somewhere in the middle. In fact, if you are purely a collector you likely want to wait until the sale ends and directly buy what you want from opensea
What are my options?
There are four different crate rarities, common, rare, epic, and legendary.
The above chart was generated from two official articles, “Announcing the Crate Sale” and “Crate Pricing”
Each crate will have at least the distribution shown above. It is possible to find higher rarity items in a crate than listed, but you shouldn’t count on it. As Zeronium said in the discord channel, there are roughly 140 Epics and 40 Legendary items mixed into the 2500 common crates. That’s only about a 7% chance. Its also important to note these are ITEMS, not drivers or cars. Epic/Legendary Drivers and Cars are only available in Epic or Legendary crates.
As for the crates themselves, each crate will have one car or driver and four items. In order to be fully equipped you need a car, a driver, nine car parts, and four pieces of clothing. Not only that, you will want different tyres for different tracks and weather conditions. There are five types that I know of, soft, medium hard, intermediate and wet. There may even be a cool down period imposed on the tires in the future.
If you are looking to collect, your only real choice is to buy Epic or Legendary Crates. That is where you get real drivers and official cars. Lower rarity drivers and cars are created just for F1DT and are not based on real teams.
Is this pay to win?
Though the prices may seem like the game is pay to win, there are numerous things which mitigate that. Yes, having better parts does grant an advantage, but like a real race you need to be mindful of the conditions. On the right track, having a part with two crummy stats and one max stat can be more effective than having all high stats. Not only that, but rarity isn’t everything.
If you look at the suits above, two out of three stat for the common (white) one are better than the rare (green one). The remaining stat is also fairly close. With a bit of luck, or careful trading and shopping, you can find exactly what you need. In a given race, only one stat may matter, and a common could be better than an epic.
You will get to experience this first hand when they release the time trials before the main game. Also, once they release the main game, the devs assure us that matchmaking will help balance out opponents and arcade type skill will play a large role. As someone who is in it for the game, I bought 10 common crates and I expect I’ll hold my own once proper game play arrives.
The buying process
If you’ve read this far, hopefully I’ve convinced you to click my referral link (giving me 2.5% of your purchases), and buy a handful of crates.
The sale screen is straightforward, and one of the better designed interfaces I’ve encountered while “researching” blockchain games. You have the different crates with their counts and rarities on one side, an explanation of whatever crate you are highlighting in the center, and the purchase interface on the right.
The one confusing part is that the total price is listed in ETH, which is a cryptocurrency. If you don’t yet have a wallet, clicking buy now will let you create a wallet and help you purchase ETH. If you do have a wallet, you can simply link it when you are ready to buy. If you are new to cryptocurrency and get stuck, there is a FAQ on the F1DT site or you are welcome to reach out to me in the comments.
There are a few important notes before you click purchase:
- During the first week, you get 10% off of ALL purchases.
- Each crate you purchase gets you a raffle ticket, which will be emailed to you, for a chance to win a unique car. Similar cars have sold around 100ETH / over US$20,000.
- If you buy five of the same rarity crates, the fifth crate gets and extra 5% discount.
- The price in ETH will vary depending on the market value of ETH. It may take a few tries to purchase.
- When buying on the blockchain, you need to pay “gas”. Gas is basically a sales tax on transactions, where you can pay more to go faster. The blockchain is NOT instant. It may take a several minutes for a transaction to process.
- You can sell the crates you buy instead of opening them. They will appear as items in your wallet.
- Any crates which don’t sell will be destroyed, their contents forever lost. 2019 Season parts will never again be made after this sale.
After you buy, there will be a popup window showing your transaction processing and telling you when its complete. Then its simply a matter of heading to your garage and opening your crates (one at a time).
You will notice a surprising popup window asking about reducing the crate opening time. If you want to pay extra, you can click yes and speed up the process. I saw no reason to and played games on my tablet while I waited for it to open.
When it opens you will see a truck animation and then finally what’s inside. In every crate I opened, the car or driver was the first thing shown, and the rarest item the last.
That’s it! After opening your parts everything will be available in your garage and you will join the rest of us eagerly waiting for the game.
Thanks for taking the time to read this. Feel free to ask questions or let me know if you need any help, I am a mod on the discord channel, so I’ll hopefully be able to find what you need.
