The final important piece to finishing your claim request for ODIN through our ODIN Claim Portal is “locking” your balance. We have touched on this subject through the soft-launch process, but as we’re officially launching the ODIN Claim Portal today we are finally releasing the information for you to understand what “locking” your balance really means, and what you should be aware of after finishing this step.

Claim Balance Locking

Locking your claim balance (“Claim”) is an expression we’ve used to refer to the process of confirming the maximum amount of ODIN you will be eligible to receive after the Obsidian Snapshot (“Snapshot”) occurs. Your Claim is a combination of your the Obsidian Address balance associated with your Claim and any bonuses modifying that number.

To lock your Claim, you will have had to complete the other two claim tasks: Adding Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) and Verifying a Mobile Phone number to associate with your ODIN Claim Account. Once all other claim tasks have been completed, you will be able to start the process to lock your balance on the Claim Tasks page.

The first step to locking is agreeing that you have read through this guide, or at least have an understanding of what the “Claim Balance Lock” means and what you should not do after locking your balance. After agreeing to that, the portal will fetch your latest Obsidian Address balance to ensure it has accurate data.

You will then see an overview of your Obsidian balance, any bonuses, and the total amount of ODIN you would currently be eligible to receive. Underneath this overview, you will see a list of important agreements you must accept before continuing. These are very standard terms ensuring that genuine Obsidian holders are eligible and that you understand that there is a limited window we are allowing for claim requests to be processed and ODIN to be withdrawn. Unlike the Obsidian crowdfund that occurred in July of 2017 with a seemingly open-ended withdraw date, ODIN will be only be distributed and claims will be processed during certain timeframes to adhere to our agile launch strategy. Once claim information is purged at the end of this window, we will be unable to restore any claim details.

After agreeing to these final terms your Claim will be locked and you will receive a message within the portal confirming this. Additionally, you will receive notifications based on your notification preferences, and an alternate Claim Dashboard highlighting your current locked claim amount and a live view of your Obsidian Claim Address balance. Do not be confused by this, it merely highlights if your claim address is below your locked Claim to ensure you resolve this before the Snapshot.

What exactly is getting locked?

The current amount of Obsidian held in the Obsidian Address you have associated with your Claim is being locked. If there is a balance discrepancy, such as you’ve recently sent more ODN to your address, please allow a few minutes/blocks for the blockexplorer to load that information.

What happens when I lock my balance?

When you lock your Obsidian Balance and ODIN Claim you are agreeing that by the time the Snapshot occurs, your Obsidian Address associated with your Claim will be at or above the amount you had agreed to. We say above here because you can continue staking your Obsidian as normal, but your staking rewards will no longer be counted towards your Claim. To make up for this, we will be giving everyone a bonus for registering (up until September 21, 2018) and for locking their Claim (up until September 14, 2018).

What can I do after I lock my balance?

Sit tight and follow any ODIN Blockchain social channels for launch/claim updates. Additionally, you can opt-in to receive notifications about your claim specifically or updates to the ODIN Claim Portal / Claim Process through the Notification Preferences page. We highly recommend you do not transact with your Obsidian Address associated with your Claim to ensure your balance is safe. Additionally, you can continue staking as you would normally to continue supporting the Obsidian network and receive stake rewards.

Can I transact with my wallet or Obsidian Claim Address?

In short, no. We highly suggest against transacting with the wallet that contains your Obsidian Claim Address or your Claim Address itself. This is because you will be risking adversely affecting your Obsidian balance which must be maintained before the Snapshot. The primary reason you should not transact with your wallet is due to how the blockchain deals with Unspent Transaction Outputs (“UTXO”).

When you make a transaction, your wallet finds a UTXO from a previous transaction (where you were the recipient) and uses any or all of that amount as part of the transaction. The remaining change or future UTXO is then sent back to either the original address used or a new address entirely generated by your wallet. This is part of how the blockchain attempts to maintain a basic level of anonymity behind the scenes.

Can you explain what a UXTO is more?

Say you have an Obsidian Claim Address (“A”) with 100 ODN and you have another address (“B”) with 50 ODN. You’re now planning to send 49 Obsidian to another address (“C”). Your wallet has two addresses with UTXO that can be used for this transaction. It could use some of A and some of B. It could use all of B. It could also use all of B and use some of A to cover for the transaction fee.

On top of that, the change from this transaction (1 ODN) could very likely be sent to a new address that your wallet knows about, but you may have no clue about! Your wallet may contain numerous addresses that aren’t listed in the “Receive View” because they’re not associated to an account but are still known within your wallet. This has been an issue where some users have reported a discrepancy between their balance they see on the ODIN Claim Portal and what their wallet says.

What should I do if my real Obsidian balance is lower than my Claim balance?

If you’ve realized your Obsidian address balance is less than the claim balance you’ve locked in and the Snapshot has not occurred yet, you still have time to resolve it.

If your wallet shows more than what your Obsidian address is displaying, you may have made a transaction and had the change sent to another address within your wallet. To fix this, simply make another transaction, but this time sending your entire wallet balance to your Obsidian address you used for claiming. This will ensure any spare change is sent to where it should be.

If you’ve sold some Obsidian or decided to do swing trade you will need to ensure your Obsidian address is replenished in time for the snapshot.

What happens if the snapshot occurs and my real Obsidian balance is lower than my Claim balance?

Your claim will be flagged by our system and will require a manual review of your claim. This will likely delay your claim being processed and accepted and will lower the amount of ODIN you would be eligible to receive. Additionally, any bonuses you may have been eligible for will be removed.