I’m wondering which of three strategies is the best for a miner when the last block before difficulty adjustment is being mined.
A) Miner that uses accurate timestamp
B) Miner that uses maximum acceptable future timestamp (+2h but perhaps minus epsilon not to disqualify relay over nodes who have slightly different clock)
C) Miner that uses minimum acceptable historical timestamp
Is there any difference (even if very small) that would arise from an advantage to tie-break in the miner’s favor either
- from slightly smaller new difficulty for the next period, in which case we expect the next mining with lower difficulty would decrease the time for the next block; OR
- from slightly higher new difficulty for the next period, in which case (despite we expect more time to mine the next block) the next block would overpower the other simultaneously mined block on the other fork?