[Part 4] - The (almost) free journey through Splinterlands: The first month

I have been playing Splinterlands for around a month now and I have to say that I am impressed. Here are a couple of impressions that I gathered in the first month:

The Game

The game itself is very beginner friendly. It took me roughly three days to figure out how to place my monsters to win some games. I am still in Bronze, but there are huge differences between Novice/Bronze III and Bronze I. In Novice players often times don't know how to place there monsters (e.g. putting ranged minions in first place), while in Bronze I those rookie mistakes are almost non-existent.
The higher your rating becomes the harder the opponents get, with better cards or straight up better strategy. I learn a lot when losing against players that have the same/similar monsters as I do.
Overall I really enjoy how this game works. I can spend hours playing or do a quick match if I just have a few minutes to kill - the perfect balance.

The Rewards

One of the things I always liked about card games when growing up, was the fact that I can grow my collection. In other online TCG (like hearthstone) you can also grow your collection, but it's not really yours (e.g. you can't sell/trade your cards). In this regard Splinterlands brings back a lot of nostalgia, because the cards you buy/earn are actually yours. So every time I get a card from the daily or end-of-season reward, I can see my collection (and the worth of it) grow.

The Community

I think I have never encountered a nicer community than this one. I used to play a lot of League of Legends so my bar is not particularly high, that's why I was even more amazed how friendly and helpful this community is.
Splinterlands has a telegram group and a discord channel, with lots of active members that always help me when I have questions and my god are they nice to you. Especially as a beginner, if you don't want to learn the hard way, asking question will help you get going.
How do stats get influenced?
How much does an ability increase a stat?
Which cards to buy/lease?
Shall I buy packs or buy cards?
And so many more questions I asked.
The answers were always friendly and most of the time helped me a lot. The community is very beginner friendly, everyone tries to help and sometimes even rents you cards to get enough power to get the better end-of-season rewards. I'm amazed every time I look into discord/telegram by how nice the people there are.

Lessons Learned

• Join the discord server.
  • Ask questions
  • Get the latest updates
  • Theory craft with other players
  • Buy/sell/trade cards
  • Check how much your collection is worth
• Join the telegram group
  • Ask questions
  • Chat with other players
  • Earn DEC by being active in the group
• Checkout the Splinterlands wiki
  • Find much information about the game in general
  • Contribute to the wiki and earn DEC
• Buy/rent cards on MonsterMarket and Peakmonsters

I can't stress enough how pleasantly surprised I am by the game and the community. Everyone who is looking for a nice online trading card game, Splinterlands might be your best choice.

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Splinterlands - The next generation of collectible card games