How to run NFT mints and in-game actions without users paying gas
Your player has no BNB for gas and quits at the claim. How to sponsor mints, claims and on-chain rewards without changing the user wallet.
The player reaches the claim and stops
A player earned an item and wants to claim it. A collector wants to mint. A loyalty-program user wants to redeem an on-chain reward. All three land on the same screen and read the same thing: insufficient balance for the network fee.
Notice what happened. The user did everything right — played, accumulated, decided to act — and was blocked by a prerequisite that has nothing to do with your product: holding the network's native coin. On BNB Chain or Polygon that amount is cents, which makes it worse, not better: you lose the conversion over cents the user cannot obtain without going through an exchange.
Why this hurts more in games and collectibles
In a financial flow, users expect some friction. In a game, they do not. The context is entertainment, the decision is impulsive, and the attention window is short.
Three traits of this audience make it worse:
- Unit value is low. An in-game item does not justify opening an exchange account and passing identity verification.
- The action is frequent. It is not one transaction a month, it is several per session. Each one hitting the gas wall.
- This is the least technical audience there is. People who play do not want to learn what a network is, let alone which one.
The outcome is familiar: the on-chain mechanic gets designed, built, and then almost nobody actually uses it.
Sponsoring the operation removes the prerequisite
Instead of requiring the user to hold the native coin, you pay that operation's fee. They sign — remaining the owner and the authorizer — and the transaction goes through.
The part that matters for product: with EIP-7702 the user does not switch wallets. The account they already use temporarily delegates to a contract and starts supporting the sponsored operation, keeping the same address. No migration, no "create a new account and move your items there" — which in a game would be worse than the original problem.
To be precise: gas does not stop existing. It becomes your cost, and on a low-cost network that means cents per action.
What to sponsor, and what not to
The choice is not all-or-nothing. In practice it works better to sponsor the operations that are the entry point and leave the rest normal:
- Worth sponsoring: the first mint, the reward claim, the item redemption, the signature to enter an event. These are actions where the user has no reason yet to have invested anything.
- No need to sponsor: player-to-player trading, withdrawals, high-value operations. There the user is already engaged and gas is not the obstacle.
That separation also controls cost: you pay where the return is activation, not where the user already converted.
Integration
npm install @vkx/gasThe pattern is simple: at mint or claim time, your server requests sponsorship for that user's operation, they sign in the app or browser, and the transaction is submitted. The call originates in the backend because that is where your secret key belongs.
If your collectible contract follows ERC-721 or ERC-1155 — the usual standard for game items, since it allows many items in one contract — there is nothing to change in it. Sponsorship happens at the transaction layer, not in the asset contract.
Abuse protection, which here is mandatory
Games attract automation. If a sponsored mint can be called without limits, someone will write a script in the first week.
The viable minimum:
- A limit per account and per time window — not per total.
- Sponsorship restricted to your contract's calls, never arbitrary calls.
- A tie to game state: only sponsor the claim of someone who actually earned that item. That validation is yours, in your backend, before requesting sponsorship.
The third item is the one usually missing. Without it, you are paying for the transaction of anyone who finds the endpoint.
When this is not your problem
If your audience is made of people who already operate on-chain — NFT traders, DeFi users — gas is not what stops them. Sponsorship there is a cost with no conversion gain. The signal is simple: look at how many users reach the claim screen and do not finish.
FAQ
Do I need to change my NFT contract? No. Sponsorship acts on the transaction, not the asset contract. Existing ERC-721 and ERC-1155 contracts stay as they are.
Does the player need to install another wallet? No. With EIP-7702 delegation, the account they already have supports the operation, at the same address.
Who owns the minted item? The user. They sign the operation; sponsorship covers only the network fee.
Can I sponsor only each player's first operation? Yes, and it is a common policy: sponsor the entry and leave the rest normal.
What does it cost? The operation's real gas. On BNB Chain, Polygon, Base and Arbitrum, cents per transaction — which makes sponsoring mints and claims cheap at game scale.
Next step
If your on-chain mechanic is already built and conversion dies at the claim, the problem is probably not your contract. See how to implement sponsorship, understand the paymaster mechanism, or check the VKX Gas page.
Disclaimer: this content is informational and educational and does not constitute investment advice.