RE: Splinterlands: Are we losing sight of what's important?
You are viewing a single comment's thread:
A timely reminder. I have always been vocal about the nerfing of rewards and the lack of incentive for new players and the need to eliminate/limit bots. As a mid tier player, I have been around for long enough to remember when we this game 'blew up' and we were seeing 400+k a day on the secondary market and demand from new players drove the economy. Our player retention now is virtually non existent and we have lost many valuable investors to the economy as the bots trashed it and imo bad decisions surrounding rewards as opposed to hitting the elephant in the room on it's head.
To be honest, I am hoping land brings the changes we need. The game should drive the economy and we have seen selfish ambition manifest to protect assets of top heavy individuals time and time again at the expense of anyone who didn't invest pre 2021 and this imo has hurt the potential player base and game experience. I have always believed the best way to get a return for all investors is focus on the game and ensuring new players not only come but stay as they are the future investors of the game. To do this bots must be gone from the game and the gap in rewards must be improved and the game needs to be less expensive entry because at 4 or 5 bucks a pack on the primary market, you already wiped out 95% of your potential player base and made it an uphill battle for every future player who decides to stick around. The game just isn't worth that amount except for those who have already made bank. Make the packs $1 or 50 cents and suddenly you will see the playing field start leveling to protect new and future players and people will spend alot less time worrying about their investment.
But these are my thoughts prior to land and I am banking on land and interactive evolution of the game to get us back and on track into a fully immesive game. But it is worrying (and no surprise) to read your thoughts about what you have seen in Mav chat concerning tokenomics and that people in their are more focussed on improving their wealth than on improving gameplay experience. It makes me feel like any future investment I make will be devalued by future decisions in favour if those with a finacial monopoly above genuine player and game experience and that makes me not want to invest anymore.
Thanks for your comments. I'm not convinced that land will do anything significant for new players besides giving them spells to buy from landholders. How much will that actually enhance game play? Your guess is as good as mine. Land will not be the panacea that some make it out to be in my opinion, but time will tell. Land might be fun for me since I have 130+ plots, but most people can't afford one plot. As far as bots are concerned, I hate them too. I even hate the ones the high level players use though the cognitive dissonance is strong in that area ('good bots' vs. 'bad bots'). All game play automation is bad IMO. I agree on the packs being too expensive. I think that's one reason that CL sold as poorly as it did (though it's blamed on the bear market). The fact is that people seek out distractions in bear markets.
I've been saving for proposals for interactive land once we reach that point. I think land could be the platform that could mirror other well-proven timebased games with optional rts aspects. E.G Being able to send armies of cards e.g an earth splinter hoarde with summoner to battle for prized resources of another. Depending on how far away the plot or region is would determine how long you would be unable to use said cards and time limit the response of defenders (a day or 2) in a random battle against opponents 'defending' cards. Keep it ranked based so that silver players cant attack bronze etc but could attack diamond ranked accounts etc. But as you say we are in a world of the unknown but something like that could definitely spice up how people use land. Maybe even allowing non owners who stake in the land the chance to share raid rewards with cards stored in a plot. Thiese are just some pie in the sky ideas but there is a world of opportunity to improve the game immersion here on offer. Battling bosses on land, regional 'tavern' leagues, burning cards for valuable resources or items, God league (open or unlimited leveling arenas), Mythical Cards (above legendary) to be found via land interaction etc just to throw out a few ideas from the top of my head.
I would think there should be the option or a space in the interactive map to allow non owners the chance to navigate or traverse so that they too can be involved in other aspects of land and give those unable to afford a plot themselves at least the opportunity to do things in Praetoria.