Detailed explanation of Orbital pledge: How the Internet rewards users

How will the pledge mechanism work after the launch of NPoS on the Orchid main network?

The current search results on the Internet about this network pledge are full of various speculations. Some pages describe the rewards as if they were already up and running; others confuse testnet activities with mainnet plans. The truth is actually simpler: the team released a clear pledge model, but it was just a future plan, not a currently running product. This Orbital Pledge Guide is based only on official documents to gradually sort out the plan and clearly distinguish what has been confirmed and what is still pending.

Key Points

• Pledge plans are implemented on the mainnet: Current test nets use a licensed validator set with no token lock-in, no nominations and no penalty mechanism.
• Reward pool size: 300 million ORB tokens (accounting for 30% of the total supply) are reserved as pledge rewards, which will be gradually released by block over a period of about ten years.
• Risk sharing: Nominators share the rewards, but if the validators they support are punished (Slashing), the nominees will also share the corresponding losses.

What is the Orchid Network?

Orbital is a blockchain focused on privacy protection. It combines zero-knowledge cryptography with fully compatible Ethereum features. The chain is built on Substrate's FRAME framework and integrates Frontier modules.

The project aims to solve a common problem: public blockchains permanently expose the details of every transaction, allowing activities to be traced and correlated. Orbinum builds privacy protection into the underlying architecture through the protocol's own cryptographic commitment and zero-knowledge proof.

In practice, this is achieved through a "shielded pool." Value is stored in "notes", which are hidden promises that observers cannot know who owns what. Notes for all assets share the same pool, so private transfers are integrated into a larger group, concealing identities.

Privacy does not come at the expense of familiarity. Solidity contracts can be deployed without modification, and tools such as MetaMask, Hardhat, and Remix work normally. The original assets are ORB tokens, with a fixed supply of 1 billion coins.

There are two core components to keep the chain running: Aura produces a block every six seconds, and GRANDPA determines the finality of a block in approximately twelve seconds. Both are critical to subsequent verifiers, who need to register keys for both.

What is Orbital Pledge?

Pledge refers to locking tokens to help blockchain remain safe and honest. Participants are rewarded for their contributions, while those who misbehave may lose some of their locked tokens.

Orbital network pledge is a plan for ORB holders to help ensure network security after the launch of the main network. The network will adopt Nominated Proof of Stake (NPoS)model. In this model, verifiers run nodes and generate blocks, while ORB holders can support verifiers they trust. Both parties share the reward.

The model also allows holders to participate without running any hardware, so security does not depend on how many people are able to operate the infrastructure. Any ORB holder can contribute.

One point that needs to be clear from the beginning is: Orbital Pledge is not yet online. Current test nets use a set of license verifiers, while pledge is the target model for the main net. Consensus will continue to run on Aura (for block generation) and GRANDPA (for finalization).

How does Orbital pledge work?

The process follows a simple chain of roles: verifiers invest their own ORBs and take risks to run the network; nominees add their pledges to the back of verifiers they trust; and the network pays everyone from a shared reward pool.

ORB holders-Nominated-丨 Verifier-Generating blocks-丨 Cybersecurity      ▲                                      │      ─ ─ ─ ─ ── Allocate rewards based on epoch points + total pledge amount 
 Dimension Validators Nominators  Main Responsibilities  Run all nodes, generate blocks, and verify that transactions support the validators they trust  Pledge method  Lock in your own ORB and use ORB for nomination at risk  Benefits Block rewards plus a portion of the handling fee are shared proportionately to the verifier rewards  Main risks  Slashing penalties (if the verifier it supports misbehaves) Before the verifier can generate a block, the Aura and GRANDPA session keys must be registered. 
 Rewards are paid according to Era (a fixed period of network activity). The amount of each payment is determined by two factors: 
1.  Era points:  comes from generating blocks and performing verification tasks. 
2.  Total stake:  includes the binding amount of the verifier itself and all nominations behind it. 
 Therefore, the rewards of validators are based on their performance and support, and each nominee receives a prorated share. 

 Detailed explanation of Orbital pledge rewards 
 The reward system has two sources of revenue: block issuance and transaction fees. 


 300 million ORB reward pool 
 300 million ORBs, accounting for 30% of the total supply, are used to fund pledge rewards. This pool is not pre-allocated. As the network was secured, tokens were issued on a block basis and gradually entered circulation in about ten years. Readers who want to understand the complete supply situation can refer to the Orbital token economics analysis, because this issuance directly affects the long-term circulation supply. 


 Transaction fees 
 Fees will be allocated between the verifier and the Treasury. The specific allocation ratio has not yet been set. 
Currently, users declare fees internally in certification and enforce a minimum MinRelayFee at runtime. The default value is 0.001 ORB, which serves as the bottom line for preventing spam. Administrators (Sudo) can increase this value up to a hard upper limit of 1 ORB. Whether the main network will retain fixed fees or a bottom line with user autonomy remains undecided. 

 An honest and open question 
 The document clearly states that it is unclear whether fee income will ensure network security once the pledge pool is exhausted. The Noprivacy Network has not yet demonstrated fee revenue at this level, and the team said it does not assume that Orbital will be the first project to encounter this. This honesty is noteworthy. 


 Orchid Pledge APY: Known information 
 No APY (annualized rate of return) has been announced yet.  This is not a research gap because these numbers do not yet exist. 
 The document lists the following undefined items: 
 Issuance schedule for each era of the 300 million reward pool 
 Decay curve 
 Target pledge ratio 
 Minimum verifier self-pledge amount 
 Fee allocation ratio between verifier and treasury 
 Relationship between circulation and fee income 
 The team said they were addressing these issues through an external economic review before the launch of the main network. Until then, any specific percentage was a guess. 


 Punishment mechanism: What can go wrong? 
Under NPoS, improper behavior can lead to loss of pledge. The three behaviors in the plan that trigger penalties include: 
 Equivocation:  Signing duplicate blocks or conflicting final votes. 
 Invalid block production:  An invalid state conversion was attempted. 
 Extended offline:  Excessive offline time harms network activity. 
 Confiscated funds will be deducted from the validator and the nominees behind them. 
 This joint exposure is deliberate. It gives nominees direct motivation to study their chosen validators rather than blindly chasing the highest advertising return. 

 How to participate in pledge? 
 Today: On the test website 
 Currently, ORBs cannot pledge. The Orchid testnet runs a collection of license validators. Operators are evaluated offline and added directly by Sudo. There are no on-chain candidacies, no bindings, no nominations and no penalties. 
 People interested in running nodes can start with the "Run Nodes" and "Become Verifier" pages in the official documentation. The Common RPC Node page covers day-to-day maintenance. 

 Future: On the mainnet 
 Once the Orbinum mainnet is launched with NPoS, the steps are expected to be as follows: 
 The validator binds its ORB and registers Aura and GRANDPA session keys. 
 The minimum self-pledge will replace governance approval as the entry threshold.
 ORB holders who are not running nodes can nominate validators and share the rewards. 
 The specific amount of the minimum self-pledge has not yet been announced. 


 What happens after the pledge starts? 
 Once the system is online, the following things will continue to happen in the background: 
 Verifiers generate blocks and earn Time Points for their work. 
 At the end of each era, rewards are allocated based on era points and total pledged amount. 
 Fees are distributed between the verifier and the treasury. 
 Misconduct triggers punishment for verifiers and their nominees. 
 These cycles reinforce each other. Good performance brings more benefits, while poor performance will pay real pledge costs. 


 Benefits of Orbital Pledge (in Plan)
ORB holders can make gains without running any hardware. 
 Revenue comes from two sources: block issuance and fees. 
 Both verifiers and nominees have pledges at risk, so everyone has a reason to act honestly. 
 Circulation is phased over about a decade, rather than being released in a one-time manner. 
 The verifier set is designed to be open over time, rather than remaining closed. 
 The path to open authentication 
 The license set is an enabling measure, not a final design.  Orchid Roadmap 包含阶段性开放，以便在下一步开始之前验证每一步。

阶段谁可以验证提名惩罚今天Sudo 在链下审核后添加每个操作员无无下一步治理批准，质押决定活跃集合有有然后满足客观要求的任何候选人有有目标完全开放的 NPoS，仅由质押决定有有 测试网 vs 主网概览
特性测试网（当前）主网（计划中）验证者准入Sudo 批准最小自我质押绑定无需要提名不可用可用惩罚无活跃奖励不适用3 亿 ORB 池加手续费分成 结语
质押设计经过深思熟虑，团队也公开承认了未完成的部分。奖励池庞大，惩罚机制清晰，通往开放验证的道路是分阶段进行的。
在缺失的参数公布之前，最安全的做法是关注官方渠道，并对来自其他来源的任何早期质押报价保持警惕。