DFK Matchmaker Re-Submission

Description

One of the core elements that makes Defi Kingdoms truly unique is the Hero Summoning mechanics. This mechanism mimicks the principle of genetic reproduction to determine a summoned hero’s Classes and Skills which results in a deceptively complex gameplay. To aid players in buying or hiring heroes to summon with, I’ve created a matchmaking webapp.

The webapp, DFKmatchmaker (dfkmatchmaker.herokuapp.com) has been live since late March and has been regularly used by players. In the current iteration it’s a simple tool where the player enters a Search Hero ID (or enters their wallet and selects a hero they own) to return a table of heroes in the Auction Houses to either buy or hire. The table includes attribute ‘scores’ (e.g. class or skill) where players can sort and select. For example, the highest Class ‘score’ is the hero that when summoned with the Search Hero will have the highest (out of all heroes listed in the Auction House) chance of summoning a hero with higher tier class (e.g. Wizard and Priest summoning a Summoner). Players then can click on that hero to view the likely resulting hero attributes and the respective likelihood (essentially the output of the /match discord bot).

As the game expands and the pool of heroes (and players) grows, there is an opportunity to expand by:

  • providing more advanced tools to look for heroes to buy or hire, including but not limited to :
    • Manual Stats, Gene and Level filtering
    • User generated custom scoring based priority ranking (i.e. class mutation first, Passive 1 second, etc)
    • Implementation of a table of candidate heroes and a matches table where users can generate and compare multiple match results
  • enabling more proactive approach to finding heroes, where user can submit alert request on when a hero is listed for sale or matching a specific set of criteria
  • applying statistical modelling and machine learning techniques to support summoning.

Grant Rationale

This Grant will enable expansion of DFKmatchmaker by covering the development and hosting costs.

While there are plans in the Milestone 3 (see Deliverables) to monetize via premium subscription, the grant will ensure that users can still access all services for free at a limited capacity.

Specifically, the grant will fund the following:

  • upgraded Heroku Server tier, Databases tier and add-ons to support expansion
  • subsidise the time spent and time that will be spent on expansion
  • obtain a better domain name than the free heroku domain name

Grant Amount

The hope is to receive the 10K USD grant, as this will be sufficient to cover the cost listed above and sustain the webapp for free use for the foreseeable future (2+ years).

Team Information

Team Lead - David Wu

The webapp (frontend and backend) was developed by myself. My name is David Wu and I was a Systems Engineer by trade in Australia. After 10 years in the Defence industry I am currently a full time dad and transitioning into software development (studying a Masters in Machine Learning) as this has always been my passion.

Requests from DFK Team

Currently, the webapp interacts with Harmony API and DFK community API gateway for hero and auction data. For future expansions to other blockchains and/or new features, API access will be requested

Connection to DFK Game and DFK Blockchain

The current system makes the following API calls:

  • Wallet data from Harmony blockchain (pull list of heroes the wallet owns for selection)
  • Hero and Auction house data using GraphQL API

Deliverables
Deliverables

Milestone 1 (completed) -

Current App - Features:

  • Hero Match (User enters a hero ID or Wallet Address to find optimal hero for summoning)
  • Manual Match (User enters two IDs to calculate genetic likelihood)

In this milestone, the core matching and search backend has been also developed where a custom database is maintained for all Auction House heroes. This was developed to enable scaling to cover all heroes (~200K vs Auction House’s ~12K sale and rent combined). The proof of concept scoring system employs space-time tradeoff to enable scoring matches through look-up tables rather than calculations (i.e. calculate match probabilities, score and rank of every hero in the auction houses). This is done through a SQL table with a row for each hero in the Auction House (updated every 10 minutes) and a very large number of columns (1 for each possible genetic trait) and the search algorithm looks up the input hero specific columns, sum them to calculate the score.

With this core engine, the much more complex stats scoring and the larger search pool of all heroes can be implemented in Milestone 2.

For those interested, I published a guide/article documenting the scoring system and space-time tradeoff algorithm for this project:

Milestone 2

Additional Matchmaking Functions - Features:

  • Optimal chance of purple, blue, green stats matching hero class (i.e. optimal chance if a warrior is summoned, it’ll also have Str and End as its stat boost), QoL improvements and mobile support.
  • Advanced Class and Ability scoring algorithm which will result in a more accurate ranked return.
  • Advanced Results filter, Auction House visualisation, price distribution.
  • Free Match mode. Enable creation of a table of target heroes and users can freely match against Auction House heroes. Match results can be added to a third match table with all the results for comparison selected possible matches.

Estimated Completion by the 31 Jul 22.

Milestone 3

Matchmaking Services - Features:

Auction Listing Alert - Search all heroes (not just what’s listed in Auction Houses) and allow users to sign up for alerts on when that hero is listed.

Match Alert - Submit heroes to be on a search list and scoring threshold and alert user when a hero is listed that matches the threshold

At this milestone, monetization could be implemented but rather than a direct subscription model, the plan is to make all functionalities free with limits and offer a premium service. As an example, in Free mode each unique wallet is allowed to submit up to 5 heroes each for Auction Listing Alert and Match Alert. Premium model may allow much higher capped submissions for each alert subscription.

Estimated Completion by 30 September 22 (on assumption that no new developer is added to the team).

Milestone 4

Advanced Functions - Features:

Auction Price Guide - Using Machine Learning techniques to predict the value of specific genes (dominant and recessive) so a user can value heroes. This will be possible provided sufficient number of transactions has been conducted since the latest major change (e.g. introduction of PvP will change value of genes and value of impacted genes will need to be adjusted). In theory this will provide a much more accurate estimation.

Multi-generational matching (stretch goal) - User provides multiple heroes (4, 8, 16) to optimise 2nd, 3rd, 4th generational likelihood. Like the simple matchmaking, users can provide 1 or more heroes and the Auction House will be searched to identify the optimal set of heroes for a full set of summoning. For example, an user could provide 2 heroes and the tool to calculate a list of potential pairs of heroes to match with that will summon the optimal set of 2 heroes that will in turn summon the optimum 2nd generation (i.e. best chance to summon Sages or Dragoon or heroes with Transcendent skills). Further statistical modelling is required to confirm the viability of this stretch goal as potentially the computation cost might be too much to be used (it’ll take too long to search and rank).

Stats Optimization Score (stretch goal) - A complex scoring algorithm that maximises chances of summoning an optimal hero with Class matching Profession as well Stat traits that also matches both the Class and Profession (e.g. a Paladin with Str and End Stat trait that also is a Miner). Viability of this goal is also to be confirmed as this might also be too computationally costly.

Estimated Completion by the 31 December 22

Payment Schedule

Milestone 1 - $2,500

Milestone 2 - $2,500

Milestone 3 - $2,500

Milestone 4 - $2,500

Timeline with Milestones

Milestone 1 - Upon Grant Approval

Milestone 2 - 31 Jul 22

Milestone 3 - 30 Sep 22

Milestone 4 - 31 Dec 22

Long Term Plan

Upon completion of the Milestone 4, it is envisaged that I will maintain the service with periodic feature improvements/additions and implement the service in new blockchains brought online by DFK.

Post Milestone 4, it is envisaged that proceeds from the premium subscription service would be sufficient to sustain the free service (ongoing server cost and maintenance of the implemented functionalities). The intent has always been to make as much of the service free as possible and to this extent, all functionalities would be free to use with restrictions only placed on the volume of usage (i.e. restricts the number of heroes a player/wallet can subscribe for alerts rather than limiting that function to a premium tier).

While the plan is to implement the scope as defined in this grant by myself, I am also open to collaboration with other interested developers to explore other functions/tools to help Defi Kingdoms players.

Other ideas (not part of the grant submission) include:

  • Indirect buy-offer mechanism where:
    • User identify a good match hero that not for sale and if its owner is registered to receive offer, then
    • A Price offer is communicated (automated email or scripted DM)) to the owner
    • If the owner is interested, they can log on to see the offer (app can gather similar recently sold prices for guidance) and if the owner agree to sell, they are instructed to list on Auction House the hero at the offered price
    • App will monitor Auction House for this listing and alert the User who made the offer of the listing
    • This will avoid the need to interact directly with the blockchain (in keeping with the app’s original principle of being a tool only and not becoming part of the main game itself)
  • A tinder/bumble like front end mobile app for users to swipe to match with their heroes

External Links

Product: https://dfkmatchmaker.herokuapp.com/

Twitter handle: https://twitter.com/DfkMatchmaker/

File Uploads

I like the site but there are several hero matching apps out there including the one in Discord’s bot commands. IMO, if you want to be the go to hero match app, the key will be to provide all the data in the most user-friendly manner. There’s no app currently that incorporates all the hero’s gene info which includes cosmetics (e.g. hair style, hair color, back appendage, etc.). I know it’s a lot of data but the app that gets all of that first, is aesthetically pleasing and mobile friendly, will probably be the one that gets the grant first. You need an angle that makes yours unique in comparison the others out there. I’m not sure what other matching sites out there are applying for a grant but I think the community will only support one. It could turn into a popularity contest, I’m not sure. They could vote to progress more than one. The player base is large enough to support it, I think. Good luck with your proposal. I just wanted to give some feedback. Hopefully it’s useful.

1 Like

Thanks for the feedback, you’re right there’s quite a few sites out there with the /match functions and on hindsight the name of the site might of been confusing.

The purpose of the site is to help people find the best heroes to summon against that will result in the highest likelihood of a mutation (and later on much more). Summoning is a relatively big decision noting the jewel cost, so I hope this will be a good tool for user see the best possible matches for sale that will give them that extra few percentage points of mutation chances. Therefore the extra edge that this site will hopefully have against the others is the search and rank algorithms that generate the potential matches rather than the /match function itself (its more appropriate to probably call it a summoning finder, matchmaker was meant to be as in “playing match maker, finding a partner”, Fiddler on the Roof kind of analogy )

Having said that, the whole cosmetic genes is a great idea, I never implemented it to avoid clutter when displaying matching data. I figured no one at the moment really cared about maximizing chances for those genes, but having a look through twitter, there might be a demand for it.

1 Like

Great site, I use it daily. The Partner search function is unique and invaluable to any serious summoners. Looking forward to the more advanced features like EV calculation etc. Summoning will be the backbone of DFK economy’s growth and sites like this deserves all the support it can get!

2 Likes

Good to hear there’s regular users, doing an update push tonight (Australian time) with more accurate search-ranking (see Advanced Search in the medium article here)

1 Like

I love the site, I use it frequently. The main thing missing is some kind of priority list. Some people put more emphasis on the odds of legendary/mythic chance summons that an advanced skill for PvP or for example if you really want to summon a fishing NINJA.

Basically there is now a fixed priority list selected for the user. But a future feature could be to let the user give a score for the summon (for example fishing Prof = 10 points (input by user) => 50% chance = 5 points rewarded in total summon score, ST2 = LUCK/AGI = 5 points (input by user => he indicated that fishing profession is more important than the genes but he also indicated he prefers LUCK/AGI SB2 gene). This way people can optimize their summons on how they would like it (e.g. max odds of legendary/mythic NINJA fishing with matching genes whilst not emphasizing advanced PvP abilities). Other people might prefer better subclass over genes and would put emphasis on subclass (NINJA/thief).

Hope I made some sense. This is the only criticism I have on the website thus far whilst continuously using it.

1 Like

Glad you love the site and thankyou for the feedback. User defined weighted score is definitely part of Milestone 2 todo list when more scoring metrics are going to be introduced.

What I envisaged by that stage is user can choose to use the ‘simple’ mode with no options or ‘advanced’ search where the input is the hero ID and a list of criteria numbers to maximize against. The backend was built with that in mind and its the frontend thats yet to be implemented.

1 Like

Hello… Here is the review for your re-submission. We should be able to go up for a vote soon. Thanks!
Grant Review - Resubmission

2 Likes

The DFK core team is currently reviewing this proposal to see if there are any concerns or questions.

2 Likes

I hope (s)he reads the “incorporates all” as not meaning that everything should be cramed into one page. Toggling what you want to search for would be good if (s)he starts implementing cosmetics for summoning match.

1 Like

I use your matchmaker when I summon and I like it. Would love to see the following implemented.

  1. Dark mode. Dear Gut in heaven bless my eyes with dark mode.

  2. “Non optimal” Matchmaking, for example I have a wizard miner that I would like to match with a knight/warrior/Berserker gardener/forager. What knight would give me the best chance to get a mining hero? Or what knight would get me the highest chance for a Knight/miner or wizard/forager/gardener. I think this would be a game changer that would put you ahead of other matchmaking sites/bots.

Good luck

Thanks for the feedback. Dark Mode has always been the QoL I’ve been putting off so I’ve added in an update just now. Frontend has always been my weaker skill set, so I’ll make progressive improvements in the coming days.

As for the non optimal search, this is actually part of the advanced mode I’ve been working on (milestone 2) but I might just bring that in first rather than a major update for milestone 2. Stay tuned, I should have it deployed in the next few days.

1 Like

Thank you so much for implementing the dark mode, really appriciate it!

And regarding non optimal searches, sounds awesome. Really looking forward to trying any potential iteration of non optimal searches and/or any other of the changes you will be working with.

Good luck with the grant proposal :slight_smile:

1 Like