How to win Gas War with low cost when grabbing NFT?

Even if you are given two sets of methods, it cannot ensure the success of the transaction. You must stay awake when the Gas price changes.

This article is from Substack, the original author: BCheque, compiled by Odaily Planet Daily translator Katie Gu.

How to win Gas War with low cost when grabbing NFT?

On May 1st, Otherside triggered a nearly 3-hour Gas war (fee war). In a short period of time, the ETH Gas handling fee rose rapidly, even exceeding 8000 Gwei. Many buyers lost the transaction in this Gas war, and many buyers made transactions with a Gas fee of more than 2 ETH. Yuga Labs stated after the end of this round of sales that it would refund the Gas fee to users who failed to trade. This three-hour Gas War once again refreshed the transaction history of Ethereum . In the process of purchasing high-priced NFTs that are in short supply, the complex emotions of panic, anxiety and anger run through the entire transaction process.

This article will help you understand how to complete transactions faster on Ethereum through @thedigitalvee's tweets and my additional comments.

1. What is a transaction fee?

When you buy an NFT on Ethereum (EIP-1559 era), you have to pay a transaction fee to get the transaction approved.

This transaction fee is a combination of the following factors:

Base fee - set by the network itself;

Priority Fee - set by you to incentivize miners to validate your transactions.

Total Transaction Fee = Base Fee + Priority Fee.

2. How to set the basic fee and priority fee to make it easier to succeed in mint?

Open the advanced Gas settings in MetaMask .

MetaMask also now allows you to set a maximum fee, which is the most you are willing to pay on your transaction before proceeding.

Open the advanced Gas settings (see below).

3. What should I do after I click on "Mint"?

You will see the MetaMask popup below. You have to click "Edit" to change the gas settings, because if you stick to the gas fee settings suggested by the system and someone else increases the gas fee significantly, other people's transactions will take precedence over yours.

Let's get started: once you click on "MINT" via the project website, MetaMask will pop up with the default transaction settings.

4. What options do I have for editing maximum and priority charges?

Never modify the gas fee limit.

Notice:

Priority Fee = We offer to miners to prioritize our transactions;

Maximum fee = limit price, which is the gas fee we are willing to pay.

We have three methods:

(i) only increase the maximum fee

This is not very helpful as it allows the base fee to be increased, but the miner tip is the cap.

Scenario 1: You only increased the max fee.

This doesn't help much. This only accounts for the base fee increase, but your miner tip is still capped at the default value (usually 1.5-2 Gwei).

(ii) Only increase the priority fee

Miners will be more incentivized, but if the base fee increases, base fee + focus fee = more than the maximum fee, then the priority fee will be lowered to maintain the absolute limit (meaning your priority fee will not actually be what you want it to be) high).

Scenario 2: You only increase the priority fee.

It would be more helpful now that miners get some incentive, but there is a nuance here.

Remember the base fee + priority fee must stay at or below the maximum fee, if the base fee increases the priority fee will decrease to keep the absolute limit.

(iii) Increased maximum fees and priority fees

This approach ensures that you have accounted for miner incentives and base fee increases.

Scenario 3: You add top and priority fees to address the above issues.

You've factored in the base fee increase, which provides incentives for miners. So, how do you set these values? There are two methods below.

5. How much do I need to increase my top and priority fees?

(1) Conservative approach

Blockchain data platform Blocknative advises: “For predictable transaction settlement, current best practice is to set a maximum fee that is expected to increase from the base fee”. (If a lot of people are using the network at the same time as you, demand will spike, so will the base fee.)

Their gas estimator uses this simple heuristic: max fee = (2 * base fee) + priority fee

Blocknative Gas Estimator: Follow the "99% probability" guide of how to set up your gas, which is likely (but not guaranteed) to succeed.

So if you calculate the max fee by doubling the current base fee, it should ensure that your transaction remains transactable for 6 consecutive blocks.

Method 1: Go to blocknative.com/Gas-estimator

Using the 99% probability setting, its recommendations are based on:

Maximum Fee = (2 * Base Fee) + Highest Priority Fee

It keeps your transaction speed smooth for 6 consecutive blocks.

(2) Risky approach

Set a higher maximum fee and priority fee, same as maximum fee.

This means that once the base fee is deducted from the maximum fee, all remaining fees go to the miners to incentivize them to prioritize your transaction.

This is a very risky approach and you will likely pay more than "necessary" to secure access to your NFT. See the example below.

Example: I used this method in the MAYC airdrop before:

・Basic fee is 364

・Priority fee set to 700

・The maximum fee is set to 700

The transaction is confirmed instantly, total gas fee = 700 GWEI (0.12 ETH)

6. How to speed up the transaction?

If your transaction has not completed after a few seconds (or more), you can further increase the transaction fee by following the steps below.

When you do, you should keep an eye on the Blocknative Gas estimator so you can see how busy the network is.

Accelerate transactions:

Step 3: Click on "Activity" to view your pending transactions, if not passed soon, continue to the next step.

Step 4: Click "Speed Up", which will take you back to Step 2. Raise the price further.

If it still doesn't work, you can try again.

If your transaction is still not confirmed quickly, you need to increase the Gas fee, but the "accelerate" button does not appear at this step.

Step 5: Click on the top of the transaction to open a dialog. At the bottom you'll find another "speed up" button, repeating above.

Hope you find success in this process!

Summarize

I won Gas War through these steps, but be careful. It's never easy, and you have to stay sane through the process. I recommend getting hands-on and really understanding what games you're playing and how they work in order to win the next Gas War.