Got some Splinterlands card skins! But... why?

In this post, I would like to share with you my thought process on why I bought the entire Rare set of Splinterstorm skins. I have also shared the cons of buying it, and my favorite skins from this set.

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Thought process before buying Splinterstorm skins

Over my past few months of playing Splinterlands, I have read a lot of opinions about buying card skins in the market. Most of which, are leaning to this idea:

"Why would you buy something that does not have utility in-game aside from cosmetics? Just save those DECs for airdrop points and buy cards!"

So I stayed with the same ideology for a while.

However, after playing few guild brawls and ranked matches, I finally managed to see a number of players who are playing with those fantastic Splinterstorm skins. The first time I saw an enemy Alric dressed with a Splinterstorm skin, all I can think of was "damn, that looks amazing". -- I still did not buy after that.

Alric Stormbringer with Splinterstorm skin

What made me seriously consider buying is after reading this post by @mawit07. It made me realize that buying a set of rare skins actually gives you a slight increase in airdrop points vs. when you are just holding it as DEC. This means that I will actually have higher airdrop points from this transaction. The only issue left is the opportunity cost involved of not being able to spend the DEC that I used for skins in buying cards.

While considering that, I still decided to push through in buying these fantastic skins given that my plan is to just wait out for Chaos Legion packs to be released before buying cards and building a proper stack. My ultimate priority at the moment is to get my hands on as much SPS as possible.

Skin set purchase transaction log

With the backstory out of the way, let me share with you all of the reasons why I bought these skins.

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Reasons for buying these skins

• Everything looks SO AMAZING. I'll share some pictures of these eye-candies at the end of this post. Even if I do not get to sell it at a higher price in the future, I don't mind holding onto these Splinterstorm skins.

• Buying skins did not lower my airdrop points. It actually increased it.
  • I paid a total of 56,430 DEC for this skin set purchase. Original price is 57K DEC, I got 1% discount because of Guild perks. These Card Skins are currently giving me 57,500 SPS airdrop points. This means that I got 1,070 additional SPS airdrop points vs. holding DEC itself.
    SPS airdrop points

• It can already be transferred to other players, a UI for it is just not yet in place.
  • See this post from @channelmagnetic to learn more about it
  • This part is important because it increases my confidence that it can be sold to other players later on.

• Speculation: I believe it will have an increased utility later on, when land expansion is already in place.* My best guess is there will be a certain % boost when Beta monsters are equipped with skin.

• Expecting an increase in demand (and selling price) once a P2P marketplace is in place, and everything is already sold out.
  • Card skins are pretty scarce in terms of quantity available. It is just hard to prioritize buying it over cards given that it does not have a known utility yet aside from cosmetics.

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Okay, all of those are goods reasons... but why not wait a little bit longer?

I learned my lesson in Azmare dice packs! When Dice packs sold out, I was only 2 months into the game. I thought that there will still be supply available, when I am finally ready to buy some packs. Oh, I was wrong. From around 20k packs remaining, everything just vanished right before my eyes.

Of course, the demand for packs and card skins are way different. Splinterstorm card skins have way less demand compared to packs at the moment, but I have decided not to put it to chance anymore. So I bought it while there are still 350+ remaining for Rare Skins. I don't mind waiting.

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Some cons in buying card skins

Before buying Splinterstorm skins, you also have to take into account the cons of it. Here are the list of cons that I think you should consider.

1. I realized this too late, but you can't use the card skins with the shadow cards or the cards that came with the Spellbook. You have to rent or buy the corresponding monster or summoner cards to be able to use the skin.

2. Opportunity cost. As mentioned a while ago, you can utilize the DEC that you paid for card skins in other in-game assets that already have a known utility.

3. If you are doing it for the SPS airdrop points, it is not worth it to buy individual skins. When buying it as a set, you get 50% discount in the transaction. This means that if you buy individual skins, you get less SPS airdrop points vs. holding DEC.

4. Aside from having amazing-looking summoners and monsters, everything about the possibility of its future benefits is speculation at this point. Having no utility down the road could mean that the chances of selling it at a higher price significantly decreases.

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My favorite Splinterstorm skins

As promised a while ago, I will be sharing with you some eye-candies from my Splitnerstorm skin set. These are 6 of my favorites among the bunch. If you want to look at all the skins available, you can view it at Splinterlands Shop.

Lyanna Natura, Alric Stormbringer, Tyrus Paladium

Malric Inferno, Medusa, Earth Elemental

Among all these cards, my favorite one is Lyanna Natura because she just looks amazing.

There you have it! I hope you enjoyed this post, and somehow learned a thing or two from it. If you have any questions or reservations about card skins, feel free to comment down below.

CREDITS

• Nice-looking dividers are made by Flauwy
• Images from Splinterlands
• Cover photo made in Canva