Unleashing the Power of Composables: Building Unique Experiences on Remarkist
John Cabrera breaks down some of his past and current Composable Memento projects and shares tips for creating your own.
Our Part 2 on Mementos briefly covered Composable Mementos, but I’d like to dive a little deeper with a few articles that examine different types of Composables. This article will cover the two simplest approaches to building Composable experiences, and our next will explore more complex methods.
To refresh, a Composable is a Memento that requires specific Mementos—previously dropped by its host—to claim. When claiming a new Composable Memento, you will lose the Memento editions that were required to claim it; however, the new Composable will include the collective density of all those Mementos you gave up (along with any additional KRNL added by the host). I like to think of Composables as the Voltron of Mementos. They are essentially larger Mementos made out of smaller parts.
Simple Composables
The most straightforward approach to building a Composable requires you to designate one or more of your past Mementos as the keys for others to unlock it 🔑.
This type of Composable Memento can also be considered a container for other lower-density Mementos. You can use a Composable like this to reward members for holding those lower-density Mementos for a long time or following you on a particular experiential journey across multiple events 🏆.
I thought it might be helpful to walk through a few case studies of previous Composables I have dropped so we can draw new ideas for building with them.
Case Study: Musical Alien Tech 👽
Our very first Composable Memento was called “Musical Alien Tech,” and it was locked behind editions from 5 different Mementos. Those Mementos were dropped during our initial Gilmore Girls watch in episodes that featured the band, Hep Alien. A musical instrument inspired each, and all of them had the word Hep in their title:
“Hep Strings”, “Hep Vocals”, “Hep Drums”, “Hep Keys”, and “Hep Mix”.
Densities got progressively larger while the number of editions for each decreased. So there were a lot of folks with “Hep Strings” but very few who could snatch up an edition of “Hep Mix”.
When “Musical Alien Tech” was released, those who held all 5 of the Mementos had to decide if they were willing to trade them in for what was, at that time, the densest Memento on Remarkist. And since there were only three of them, it became a bit of a race to see who would crack its password first 🏃. That password was distributed across a winding scavenger hunt of pieces across the app 🔎. It made for an exciting and challenging game that awarded a tiny group out of those who participated.
But those who didn’t win were left with their original Memento sets, which have grown quite special over time... and would become even more so.
Composable Series
A Composable series comprises multiple Simple Composables that require the same group of Starter Mementos to claim. This gives collectors of those Starter Mementos options for which composable they might want, or it gives collectors who didn’t have a chance at a previous Composable another shot.
Hosts can build a Composable Series so that each one differs in size: they can get progressively rarer and denser (which would reward foresight and patience 👁️), or earlier ones in the series might be the biggest so that later drops are progressively smaller (rewarding speed and initiative 💨). Or hosts can mix it up by alternating between larger and smaller. You can even match the density and rarity so that all in the series are equal.
The strength of later Composables in a series will often be dictated by how many Starter editions still exist after the previous Composables have been claimed.
Case Study: Tone Deaf Alien & Heppest Alien Tech 👽🎵
Since only three “Musical Alien Tech” Composables were available, many collectors were left with their Hep Instrument Mementos. And with so many of the smaller instruments available, it presented an opportunity to create another Alien Composable. This one was titled “Tone-Deaf Alien” and it only required the smaller instruments to claim, producing a smaller Composable than the first. It also allowed me to weave a micro-story about an Alien stranded on Earth learning about its music. Since stories are often told in chapters, Composable Series can be an excellent storytelling format 📚.
Many months later, I dropped a third Alien Memento called “Heppest Alien Tech”, which concluded the three-part story and, again, required the smaller Hep Instruments—along with another Memento from our original watch.
Case Study: Hats 👒
Hats may be my favorite Memento campaign because I just find designing them so meditative 🧘.
The concept is pretty simple. I am dropping 26 Hat Mementos at watches of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. They are all 50s-inspired, come in sets of ten editions apiece, and are each marked with a progressive letter of the alphabet.
The campaign is rolling out slowly since I can only drop them when I hold a Maisel event. That hasn’t been often, but those interested in Hats should expect more coming soon as I dive into midnight viewings of season 5.
You can also only buy them on our Discord using a special game currency we created there called DKRN 🌰. New Discord Members receive one 5000 DKRN grant that they can use to claim an available hat edition or trade with other members for the awesome stuff they’ve collected. So the pace of Hats will, at least, partially be tied to our community growth.
Once I have released all 26 hats—the Starter Mementos for this series—I’ll begin releasing various Composables requiring different combinations of hats to claim them. I’ll use the hats' letters to spell words, phrases, or even codes. And the largest of these Composables will require all 26 hats—a whopping 2700 KRNL Density.
The order in which I’ll drop the Composables will be random 🎰, so no one will know precisely when that 26-hat whopper will appear. And as long as enough editions of the original 26 hats are available, I will likely look for opportunities to create new letter combinations. The element of surprise and anticipation is part of what I’m playing with here.
And there’s much more I’d like to do with Hats long-term—various forms of utility, including a physical component to compliment the digital collection.
Case Study: Daisies 🌼
During our 2022 holiday hiatus, I snuck in some stealth, late-night watches of Gilmore Girls so I could drop two Composables in a series that honors the Gilmore daisy motif.
Both Composables required the same three Mementos to claim:
“Valedictorian”, “Nuptials”, and “It’s Muh Party”.
All three were in abundance during the early days of the platform, and some of our oldest members have been holding on to extra editions abandoned long ago. So I thought a Composable Series might be a fun way to thank those Members while bringing back some excitement around old Mementos.
The name of the first Composable is “55 Yellow Daisies”. It has a density of 55 and a description stating that “55 wasn’t nearly enough.” That suggested to some Remarkist Gilmore fans that more Daisy Composables were coming. Some Members even wondered whether this was the right time to compose their only editions of those three Mementos.
The second Composable I dropped was titled “145 Yellow Daisies”. It had a 145-KRNL Density and a similar description suggesting even more to come.
Okay, I won’t beat around the bush with this one. Most of our Gilmore Girls fans on Remarkists can guess we are working toward 1000 yellow daisies.
This experience will end with 5 Daisy Composables, each progressively larger than the one dropped before 📶 and with fewer editions. Since this is a straightforward Composable Series, I do not intend to combine them into an even larger Composable (a complexity we’ll discuss in our next article). And while each will continue to draw from the same three Starter Mementos, the larger ones in the series must also rely on additional Mementos. Can you guess which ones? 🤔
What’s cool about this particular Composable is that its subject is also made up of parts—individual flowers. Basing a Composable Memento or a series of Composables on something fractional in nature can open the way to proportionally fractional prizes—digital or physical 🧩🧩🧩🧩🧩.
Continuing the Journey with Composables
Composables offer an exciting and dynamic way to build unique experiences on Remarkist. By combining smaller Mementos, collectors can create larger, rarer, and more precious keepsakes while showcasing the collective density of the sacrificed editions. Whether creating simple one-offs as part of a singular experience or larger thematic collections, Composables add depth and enjoyment to the world of Mementos. But they can go even deeper than the case studies here. In the following two articles, we’ll examine six more examples that lean on even more complex mechanics. Stay tuned!
