I actually wanted to buy this until I found out only T-Mobile has the ip68 rating. As usual so far every damn phone I wanted this year is reduced on Verizon. Rog 3 , black shark 3, red magic, one plus 8t. All limited in function on Verizon and I don't feel like switching again

Very highly doubt this. Looks too much like a paid news.

The 8T doesn't really stand out among the other products of the same price range, in fact it lacks features (average camera, no ip68 etc). The SD 865 alone isn't really enough to differentiate a phone from its rivals.

Between the Nord (which is honestly just another copycat midranger with punch-hole cameras and a thick chin) and the Pro line the non-Pro Oneplus models don't have much role to fit in.

Kind of mind boggling, honestly. So many third-worlders fixed on replacing their generic-looking device with something near-identical...
I mean, it's just a phone... It rings, it doubles as a (very poor and hard to work with) personal computer. What's so exciting about it? What prompts such a pompous launch?