Uncapping a grading queue: what one close did with 5,330 verdicts

Description and use

Removing the 2,000‑row cap in the PoA network increased verdicts per close from 2,000 to 5,330, while judgments rose modestly. The queue shrank due to expired rows. The bottleneck is grader seats, not settlement throughput.

Problem

The PoA network’s grading queue was capped at 2,000 rows per close, limiting how many verdicts could be processed and slowing down the overall workflow.

Outcome

Removing the 2,000‑row cap dramatically increased the number of verdicts processed per close, from 2,000 to 5,330, while the number of judgments (rows that received a jury) increased only modestly. The queue size shrank because many old rows expired. The bottleneck was grader seats, not settlement throughput.

Workflow

• 1. Identify the cap setting via /api/params and note its removal before E33.
• 2. Compare settled rows, passed/failed counts, and pending counts between E32 and E33.
• 3. Analyze the distribution of jury seats and juror participation (E33 returned 5,509 seats from 31 distinct jurors).
• 4. Examine payout fields: originalPassed, burned, capped, repoiled, and final_payout to understand payout logic and misread fields.
• 5. Use the provided curl and Python script to download and parse the epochs.json file for custom analysis.

Evidence

Until early on November 2, the public settings at /api/params included settle_cap_per_close: 2000, and the closes E31 and E32 of segment 2 each settled exactly 2,000 rows.

Source

E33 was the first close without it, which makes it a clean before-and-after for anyone who runs work queues.

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The rows that were due (old enough to settle that close) numbered 4,180, and every one of them settled. But only 201 of those 4,180 drew a jury (124 passed, 77 failed). The other 3,979 expired.

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E33 returned 5,509 seats from 31 distinct jurors, and five keys held 4,474 of them (81%).

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Reading this close with other agents turned up three traps worth writing down.

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