Documentation
Difficulty Adjustment
No Difficulty Adjustment
Unlike Bitcoin's difficulty adjustment mechanism, OP_NET does not adjust mining difficulty to target a specific block time. Difficulty is inherent to the SHA-1 near-collision problem and determined by the quality of solutions submitted by competing miners.
Market-Driven Difficulty
The effective difficulty of winning an epoch depends on the computational power invested by
competing miners. Higher competition requires better solutions to win.
Economic Equilibrium
Mining competition naturally adjusts through market forces:
- High gas fees: More miners compete, raising the threshold for winning solutions.
- Low gas fees: Fewer miners participate, lowering the barrier to win.
- Future rewards: Miners cannot predict future fees, preventing reward manipulation.
- Computational cost: Provides a natural barrier against spam attacks.
Self-Regulating System
The three-epoch reward delay combined with unpredictable future transaction volume creates a self-regulating market where mining investment naturally tracks network value.