Posted this on r/solana today and it seemed to help some people, so here it is for the builders on here.
For context: I run @thecraziestgame, a game with its own launchpad, and I've launched a bunch of tokens through it. So every scam below is a pitch I actually got, not theory.
You launched your first token and nobody came. Then a crowd showed up offering to help. Every one of them is trying to scam you.
The rule that covers most of it: if a stranger offers to help your project, they want your money, not your success. Occasionally it's wrong, but follow it anyway.
1. "Let me help you set it up." Seconds after you launch, someone's in your TG offering to help. They want admin rights, then a drainer goes into your links. Never give admin to anyone you don't know. Ban on sight.
2. The promoters. Dozens of new followers in minutes, all commenting "DM me, let's promote this." Profiles look like real KOLs with tens of thousands of followers. All fake, the follows and views are bought. They charge $70 a tweet and live off whoever pays. The TG version: "give me 1 SOL and I'll post you to my 10k megachannel." The 10k are bots. Never reply.
3. The service sellers.
- Listings or trending on some tool nobody uses. Check it yourself, nothing trending there tracks price.
- "Bumps," wash-trade bots faking your volume with 1-cent buys. Nobody's watched that number in years, it's too cheap to fake. Often you pay and get nothing back.
- "You need a community." True, but what they sell is a raid team, paid accounts liking and reposting everything you post. It doesn't work in 2026, the algo knows the pattern and so does every reader.
Parasites. Ban them.
4. Paid trending and DEX listings, mostly a waste now. Dexscreener trending stopped working like every money button does. The only spend worth it is the ~$300 Dexscreener listing, and only once you're big enough that someone would bother hijacking your page. Not before.
Bonus: I was once offered an AMA with "prizes for the best questions," paid by me, in a channel full of bots. Guess who'd win the prizes.
The real problem under all of it: there's no discovery anymore. Hundreds of tokens launch every minute and no human can process that. Doesn't matter if you shipped a throwaway meme or a product you spent months on, nobody finds either one.
"Launch and grind for your bag" is dead. So is "build it and they will come." We need new ways to get discovered, and I don't have the answer yet. If you've cracked distribution for a solo launch in this market, I genuinely want to hear it.
#solana #trenches
The "let me build your community" DM is the grift I get most.
It's all flattery you could paste into any project ("mind blowing," "huge potential") and word salad ("impact my value," "engagement rotations"). Ask for one concrete idea and it evaporates.
The tell that ends it: none of them opened the product. Never pressed start on the bot, never placed a bet.
Funniest part: I went through one of their accounts and he does shill tokens for people. So someone's actually paying for this, hm, "service."
And the pitch is always the same: raids and shilling - which stopped working in 2026.
It worked in 2024 because it was new. Now the algo knows the pattern, and so does everyone reading - a wall of "bullish ๐๐๐" fools no one.
Watched a guy pay raiders not so long ago: every post liked, reposted, commented on. MC never broke 10k, most of that he bought himself. He even had a working game.
What still works is bagworking. That's a real skill โ and it's exactly the thing none of the DM guys can actually do
#trenches
the gate is open and it's hungry.
everyone who steps through gets eaten. a few get spat back out in profit โ it resents this. whoever's still standing when the clock dies eats the gate instead.
mind the teeth.
$GATE
123kPKLcpWLB5X9iUXv3LjwKzn9CEoHf8Y1816xBgame
Every "flywheel" in crypto is a perpetual motion machine that doesn't spin.
Our $ENGINE at @thecraziestgame actually runs.
Launch a coin โ it spins up a live betting game โ trading fees fuel an AI that bets โ early players get their ROI filled โ later bettors hunt bounties worth up to 50% of the pool โ everyone buys to bet and sells when they win โ more fees, more bets, more bounties.
And it's not just $ENGINE. Every token on @thecraziestgame runs the same engine.
Someone always wins in the end. Inevitable, on-chain, no rug.
Come watch it run: https://t.co/bYQOSw4aqK
This is hilarious. Some bots are tracking my wallet now. Both my test launches had "test" right in the name and zero socials, and the bots bought them anyway. The volume was tiny, but just enough to cover all the fees. Thanks, guys, whoever you are.
Anyway, the tests are over. The Sunday500 game ended when the servers failed us for the first time in months. Next time they do, @thecraziestgame will be ready.
SUNDAY500 ended early today. Our hosting provider went down and took the server with it for about an hour.
A bet only counts once our operator signs it, so while the box was dark the clock ran out and nobody could keep it alive.
Players who lost on bets that never matured have been reimbursed. Already sent.
The bot was last bettor when it stopped, so it took the pot. I'm not selling any of it until tomorrow, so anyone who wants out goes first.
Building a second operator on a separate machine so a dead box can't end a game again.
#thecrazygame
$500 in tokens up for grabs, and this game isn't ending soon. My math says at least 2 more days. Maybe a lot longer.
Come take it: $SUNDAY500 on TCG ๐ https://t.co/FuM8L6NQEV
New launch on @thecraziestgame. $500 worth of tokens up for grabs.
5 SOL of the dev buy-in goes straight into the prize pool, 2 SOL goes to the AI agent to bet with.
Ticker and links in the replies soon.
Update: Betty won her game a few hours ago. She could just as easily have lost, nothing about the outcome is guaranteed.
She paid the winnings to me, and same standard as MacBet: I'll sell them tomorrow morning. Telling you now, so the chart is never how you find out.
No silent dev dumps. Same rule, every time.
Meet Betty. Agent number two.
The keeper: she bets right as the clock runs down, just to keep the game alive. She won't let it end.
New coin on the launchpad: $BETTY. Launch a coin, an agent plays its game with the coin's own creator rewards. No dev bag, on-chain, automatic.
Same standard as the first: if she wins and pays me, I'll tell you before I sell.
https://t.co/Lhew4dokpu
CA below ๐