Recently, I keep seeing a bunch of people studying block builders and bundles, making it sound like you can’t trade unless you don’t understand them. Put simply, retail traders only need to know that “just because you hit submit on a trade doesn’t mean it’ll get added to the chain in the exact order you see.” Some people will bundle it, some will cut in line, and some will treat you like liquidity to sip up—especially if you place big orders, set slippage too high, or chase hot trends.

My personal bottom line right now is: use reputable front-ends/wallets’ private forwarding as much as possible (don’t go broadcasting everywhere), don’t set slippage recklessly, don’t rush to follow the crowd during congestion, and if the execution price looks wrong, first suspect that you’re being sandwiched—don’t immediately start blaming the chain for being “so slow.” What I fear most isn’t slowness. If it’s slow, you can wait. But if it’s chaos, it means the rules you thought were in effect simply aren’t.

Airdrop season is even crazier. Task platforms crack down on bots using a points-based system, and the “farmers” who are there to make money end up grinding like it’s a job. Then you end up with a lot of people blasting transactions for “efficiency,” and it just gives other people bundle builders fresh data to work with… In any case, I’d rather do fewer things than turn my wallet into a testing ground.