# Channel depletion, LN Topology, Cycles and rational behavior of nodes

**URL:** <https://delvingbitcoin.org/t/channel-depletion-ln-topology-cycles-and-rational-behavior-of-nodes/1259>\
**Category:** Protocol Design\
**Tags:** lightning\
**Created:** [November 15, 2024, 12:22pm UTC](https://delvingbitcoin.org/t/channel-depletion-ln-topology-cycles-and-rational-behavior-of-nodes/1259 "2024-11-15T12:22:14Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 6

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**Author:** ![ZmnSCPxj](https://delvingbitcoin.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/z/ee7513/32.png) [@ZmnSCPxj](https://delvingbitcoin.org/u/ZmnSCPxj)\
**Post date:** [November 21, 2024, 3:10pm UTC](https://delvingbitcoin.org/t/channel-depletion-ln-topology-cycles-and-rational-behavior-of-nodes/1259/6 "2024-11-21T15:10:07Z")

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> [@ajtowns](#):
>
> (“recently” – if a payment has been unresolved for more than a few seconds, it’s probably hung, and you don’t want to continue to reject new payments because of it).

Seems gameable if the payer is willing to wait — they could release a shard below `max_msat`, wait, release another shard below `max_msat`, wait, etc. until they have 100 HTLCs through it, especially with `fee_base=0` and proportional fees rounding down. Gets even worse with PTLCs since those are not correlatable.

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