My thoughts on the new Splinterlands rewards system.
Another change is coming to Splinterlands, and this time, the reward system will be completely overhauled for the first time in a long time. For starters, I believe that this change should have come with the previous one. To reduce the amount of time required for adaptation. This is because adapting to changes is always difficult, unless you have the passion, money, patience, and time.
Another issue is that it is always difficult to develop a solid goal and plan, especially when the system is constantly changing. However, I hope we do not see another abrupt change that will have a significant impact on play and tokenomics anytime soon. This will be a complete overhaul, with no one expected to earn chests but instead another reward token known as GLINTS. This is another type of soulbound token that can be used to buy other items, such as merits, but it cannot be used to buy SPS.
According to the team, the regular SPS that should be earned per account will now be applied to ranked battle wins. Another change is that the most coveted gladius cards will no longer be convertible to DEC, but rather to merits. This means that the monetary value of Gladius cards has been reduced, and they now resemble a secondary soulbound card, similar to those that can now be purchased with Glints in the new system.
The only difference is that regular soulbound cards cannot be traded for anything, whereas gladius cards can be traded for merits, which means that players can now earn more gladius cards because they are now tradable, making them secondary soulbound rather than full-fledged soulbound cards.
50% More Reward For Modern
The new reward system is currently untested, but Splinterlands INC is providing 50% more glint and SPS rewards to players in modern. This is most likely to encourage more players to migrate to modern, but it also systematically harms the real players in the wild. Some of the cards that are no longer allowed in modern may lose value because they are no longer as desirable.
That is, players who have full decks that are tailored to playing in Wild will be unable to sell their cards for a higher value because the new system depletes the reward in Wild even further.
Inasmuch as Splitterlands is attempting to increase the value of the new cards, I do not believe the rewards should be reduced. It calls into question the longevity of one's assets, particularly whether they will remain relevant in the long run. I believe that the bot issue is not being addressed adequately. To address the issue of bots, reducing Wild's rewards is like throwing out the good with the bad.
The Bot Economy Is Inevitable
The bots do create a functional economy on Splinterlands, which is why I believe that a separate gaming ecosystem should be created for the bot system and completely left open to players who want to compete with the old cards.
While new players are sought in modern, the requirements to play there remain high and costly.
This makes the modern system seem like a haven for wealthy oligarchs to an extent. New players cannot afford modern; it is simply too expensive to play, even though the goal of modern was to provide new players with the opportunity to compete in a modern league.
Making Modern More Lucrative Isn't Still Cutting It
I simply believe that getting players to play modern requires a completely different system. Splinterlands requires new money, new adoptio ns, and so on, but rewarding modern players while not lowering the requirements to play is equivalent to ignoring the real problem.
Some of these new changes are aimed at keeping money in the game, but further empowering Modern with more rewards will not entice players to switch to Modern, because even if they wanted to, they do not have the money to buy complete sets of cards, and their assets in the wild will begin to lose value as the ROI on these assets decreases with each change to the game.
Getting It Right Before The Bull Run
I believe the bull is approaching, and now is the time to make informed and timely decisions for the sake of the game as a whole.
However, I am curious to see how these changes will play out over time; I want to believe that the team is made up of geniuses, whereas I am just a regular person with no knowledge of game development or economics. We trust them to deliver and do their best, and I understand that these decisions are difficult.
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Ah the only thing that is constant is change.
I haven’t been playing the game myself for a year now but it sounds like this change is indeed a strange one. I know that you have to cater to your biggest buyers in a lot of ways but that doesn’t mean shutting out your new people and people with less money and ability.
It remains to be seen what this will cause but it doesn’t sound like it will be attracting massive amounts of new players. I unfortunately think there are too many layers of complexity here (pun intended :D) and the learning curve is getting steeper.
Yeah I saw you've not been playing cuz it's been long I saw you in the Guild. I think there has to be a balance. I know it's important to incentivize the big investors and the mainstay but there has to be a balance between attracting new players and keeping the old ones. At the moment modern is just too expensive. Even if I still my whole deck I still won't be able to compete there.
Pun seen, hehe. It's truly concerning. A lot of complexities but I'm trusting they're professional and know what's best for the game.
As a wild player who only uses mostly beta cards this news is not great…
Almost every wild player do not like it. But, the choice is to upgrade to modern.
I like the Wild mode, and one good thing I see in this change where the best rewards will be in Modern: I'll pay less for card rentals. I think this update pleased some, others not so much, but every change is like that, after a while we get used to it.
That's how the updates are. It's never going to favor everyone. I feel that it always favors some and not so much for others.
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It feels like they are making things yet even worse. It's like they don't understand they need new players...
How are you doing today?
I want to believe they know the best, but it's not a development I generally feel positive about.
It starting to feel like they are shooting themselves in the foot... They don't understand they need to attract players and make it affordable to play, and that is the one thing they aren't doing...
It's becoming frustrating!
We will be able to burn regular soulbound reward cards for Glint, just like we will burn Gladiators for merits.
At first, I thought this was unfair toward Wild players. But we have to consider things as a whole, Glint + SPS rewards. If more people migrate to Modern, then the competition for rewards in Wild decreases and in Modern increases, with the proper adjustments for SPS rewards.
GLINTS or merits can no longer be used to purchase dollar based splinterlands assets. So gladius cards have lost that value, sadly so.
When it was burnable for DEC, after the new system, it's impossible to do this anymore .
I think it's still is, but then we'd have to test it to fully know or understand this to some extent.
I agree that Gladius cards lost one of their use cases this way, by not being able to be burned for DEC. It looks like they want to remove almost all sources of DEC inflation, as small as they might be.
Yeah, maybe it will be. We'll have to see it in practice.
The changes are happening so it makes me wonder if going to wild is a good idea for me or not. I might have to try the system and I think the bot issue in modern will probably happen. The bot owners are definitely aiming for as much money as possible but I hope that the ranked battles become easier.
Despite all the imperfections, I'm still excited for the new reward system. Every major game has to deal with bots, even Web2. I just want the team to keep delivering cool stuff and hopefully that draws in more players.
I hope so too, I get they have to make the tough choices and all, but overall I'm hoping these changes can translate to massive successes.
Thanks for your continued delegations to me
No problem, I hope they've been helpful!
Yes, they have. I have been able to play in Wild and move up quite well.