"Splinterlands" Power Strategy Tips #58

As I have now been playing "Splinterlands" for over a year, I've wanted to contribute something of ACTIONABLE value to my fellow players (and FUTURE players) - but NOT just fill my #Hive feed with daily images of quest reward - or battle - SPAM (no offense to those doing so). Ultimately, Hive is about ADDING VALUE to the social experience - that is the magic of blockchain social media technology. So, after some serious pondering, I decided that a weekly "Splinterlands" player strategy diary" type series, with CONCISE and ACTIONABLE tips, would be of most value to my audience. Please let me know your thoughts (good and/or bad), and I hope that readers (now and into the future) will benefit from this series. If you gain a better understanding of blockchain, gaming, "blockchain gaming", marketing, psychology, forensics, phlosophy, and/or any other area(s) of knowledge I end up exploring (voluntarily or involuntarily) as this series naturally progresses, then I will have done my "good deed" (of providing value) for the week - and have a little extra Hive to buy some more Splinterlands cards/packs. Also, feel free to hit me up on the battlefield.

@transcript-junky

1 ) I hit 1 x "Lensmaster" (non-gold) card for the first Dice airdrop, and as planned, I put it up for sale on the market for $4.00 USD (the going market price on the day of the airdrop). It sold a few hours after I put it up, for 6732.813 DEC, which I used to buy : 2 x "Battering Ram" (Gold - Level 3 - $2.97 USD) cards in my continiung effort to max that excellent card out. And with the remaining 1,477 DEC I bought : 2 x "Grenadier" (non-gold - Level 1 - $0.84 USD - 1,486 DEC). Since I DO NOT upgrade my life deck (using any "life" cards (airdrops, rewards) I get to liquidate some DEC to buy cards I want from the OTHER three decks) I think this is a winning formula - in terms of a productive balance of liquitity relative to collection-building. An example of this is when I got the "Kralus" gold card in one of the packs in the 100 (+ 10 free) promo batch I bought (last week, during the first round of the pre-sale), and immediately converted that card to 50,000 DEC to buy more packs to both open and add to my eligible 1st airdrop pack collection.

My plan for the remaining four "Dice" airdrops worth of the presale is to continue buying one additional pack at a time when I hit any especially valuable rewards cards (or DEC loot chests), and/or any additional valuable airdropped cards from the remaining SEVEN Untamed airdrops, and/or when I get additional Untamed packs in quest/season rewards. The hope is to gradually increase the number of packs eligible for each of the remaining four Dice airdrops, because you never know when just that ONE additional pack may land you an extra Dice aidropped non-gold - or even GOLD - card. Plus, each extra Dice pack is an additional "daily pack" to open over time. And judging from the pace of sale of the "Orbs" packs, I expect the "Dice" packs to be available on the market for several MONTHS, which is a good enough time to increase my total number of eligible airdrop packs substantially. For instance, if the "Dice" presale goes on for three more months, and I am able to consistently buy THREE packs per week, then -> 3 months = 12 weeks x 3 "Dice" packs per week = 36 additional "Dice" packs eligible for the airdrops.

2 ) I FINALLY got around to experimenting with, and using, the #splinterlands mobile app! Part of the reason it took so long is because I was too lazy to log in to my LastPass app to get my Hive private password to then log in to the game app. I think I tried it once when the mobile app first came out, but people were saying there were glitches with the game app. Actually, it seems that there STILL ARE glitched with the game app, but the reason why this is important is because I am often out on the road (around the city here in Vietnam) and it is inconvenient to open my laptop

The first time I logged in with the mobile app this week was two hours before the end of the season, to try to win my last "dragon" quest at the "Champion I" level. The bad news is that I couldn't hit the five won battles. The good news is that I WAS able to play some battles, and experiment with some of the many features of the mobile app (ex. browsing my collection, opening some Untamed and Dice packs, battling, etc.) My general impression is that the mobile app is INDEED very valuable when you need to do some game-related stuff but are on the go and/or pressed for time. I often sit in cafes here in Vietnam (like before I go teach my English classes) and that is an ideal time to finish off some quest battles, or just add some additional wins to my normal daily game play (especially when I don't have time to use the laptop proper). The mobile app certainly has glitches, and it DID crash on me several times (resulting in lost battles and general frustration), so I don't want to depend on it for my MAIN daily gaming effort, but it certainly serves some important needs when I can't be in full-on gameplay mode. Hats off to admin for pulling off a "good enough" mobile app, and I am glad I finally got around to getting rolling with that. That has been a major goal I have been procrastinating on.

3 ) A few days ago I logged into my BetFury.io account to claim my residual Tron, from all of the playing I have done in the past six months. The residual daily income is around 11 Tron per day, and I have been trying to log in once per week to claim the ~ 50 - 60 Tron and try my hand at the slots. On a few occasions I've been able to bump the 50 - 60 weekly Tron up to a few hundred. It's even possible to get it up to a few THOUSAND if you get lucky. I can then convert that Tron into DEC and then use it to buy more #Splinterlands cards. The problem is that my "impulse control issues" got the best of me this week, and after losing the 60 Tron I made the DUMB mistake of chasing that with 10,000 DEC from my Splinterlands account, which I then made the DUMMER mistake of selling 0.01 Bitcoin, losing that, and then another 0.01 BTC chaser (which I lost), and then a massive 0.03 BTC final chaser which DREW me down into the ABYSS of two days of TORTURE as all I did was play slots and blackjack. This was one of those "hard lesson" situations, but there is certainly much to be learned here. Firstly, the sheer STING of blowing 0.05 BTC was a real wake-up call for me. It was a stupid and substantial loss, especially in the context that I original obtained around 1.0 Bitcoin (through some work I did for a client who paid me in BTC - back in 2013-2014 (when Bitcoin was valued at ~ $200 - $400 USD. So in the grand scheme of things I really only lost $50 (in 2013-2014 terms), but it still stings. My whole goal has been to CAREFULLY MAINTAIN my BTC holdings (HODL), and this kind of loss (when added to some of the other losses I have had with SCAMMY Bitcoin online casinos) adds up. I can't be making this mistake anymore, as my Bitcoin reserve is now getting into the "too low" zone. However, some GOOD things that came out of this debacle were that I was able to continue taking more BTC out of Coinbase (a goal I have been implementing slowly over the past year). In fact, after I hit "rock bottom" on this recent round of TORTURE I just went ahead and sold another 0.02 BTC to buy a second 100 (+10) "Dice" pre-sale promo batch - so that I now have 355 Dice packs bought during the presales, to be applied to the remaining four airdrops. In this way I was able to "chase" a dumb loss with a "smart" spend. What hurts most is comparing all of the Splinterlands cards I COULD have bought with that 0.05 BTC.

Another good insight came from comparing the TORTUROUS two-day order of compulsive "pay for play" (specifically the traditional gambling variety of "pay for play") with the more enjoyable, and skill-based, Splinterlands "free for play" activity. When you take away the "potential for loss" (combined with the fact that in traditional gambling the "house" has the upper hand), along with the absence of NFT ownership (and thus long-term earning potential) from games like Splinterlands, it is a "night and day" comparison. That in, after two days of GRUELING "pay for play" gambling I was literally getting physically and mentally SICK (common symptoms of compulsive gambling), and at the end I basically just WILDLY increased my betting strategy (amount of bet per hand, or slot pull) to "high risk" level simply because I just wanted to "blow my wad" so I would have no choice but to stop playing. This "bender" also prevented me from paying proper attention to TWO days of my Splinterlands daily quests, and so I lost out on the loot chests - some of which could very well have been substantially valuable. Just all around, the opportunity cost is MUCH GREATER with "pay for pay" gambling (both in the short term and long term). It was a dumb, IMPULSIVE goof - I own it - and so shame on me. The only thing we can do is try to move forward when life throws us lemons. But better yet, the key is to "make those lemons into lemonaid" (as best possible). That's why I chased my major 0.05 BTC loss with the 100 (+10 free) "Dice" promo batch - to end things on a somewhat "positive"/productive note. I HATE losing at gambling (who doesn't?). It's like the morning after a 'one night stand" that you otherwise wouldn't have engaged had you not been drinking hard liquor (or other aphrodesiadic mind-altering substances). But this recent debacle was especially hard to swallow, because I got caught up so fast. It may be the case that I should simply limit my future BetFury activity to only WITHDRAWING my current weekly (or monthly) earnings of Tron and convert that into DEC as ANOTHER crypto income source to use to buy more cards. In this way I won't (potentially) get "caught up" in the gambling, because I won't actually be ENGAGING in it. That is ultimately what happened in this case - for a mere 60 Tron I let me self get SUCKED into the vortex which landed me 0.05 BTC ( ~ $500 USD) poorer. Well, on the positive side of things, I opened the 10 free "Dice" packs immediately after buying them, and now have a nice amount of 119 reserve packs (I was down to only 19 packs) which I intend to open as part of my daily "one pack per day" pack-opening routine. At roughly "one pack every OTHER day" those 199 packs could last me~ 238 days (exclding ADDITIONAL packs I will also continue buying (around three packs per week). In addition, I also bumped up to the "High Roller" level on BetFury.io which increases my "cashback" from 6% to 8%, and I got 1,200 Tron ( ~ $31.50 USD ) "cashback" as a result of this recent catastrophic loss. I intend to at least play that (in slots) to see if I can recoup the 17,000 Tron ( ~ 0.05 BTC) and convert that to DEC to buy more Splinterlands cards (which was the original goal), or play it down and then NOT play anymore on BetFury. The ROI is not worth the risk. I also got 0.0001 BTC bonus ( ~ $10 USD) for hitting the "High Roller" level, which I intended to withdraw to Coinbase and then buy more DEC for cards, but then I set the currency to "Bitcoin" and rolled one slot and lost it all. In other words, the BetFury.io site (just like every other site that SOCIOPATH Justin Sun is associated with) is SCAMMY, to the extent that when you try to use any of the other currencies (besides Tron) to play the games the system doesn't make it clear how much you are actually betting. The wager amount is set relative to Tron - and so one roll of the slot that would normall cost 0.25 Tron ends up costing more that the 0.001 BTC bonus ( ~ $10 USD ) I got as a bonus for reaching the level. So I unintelntionally blew $10 USD on one pull of the slot. I wonder how many other people have fallen victim to this. This is a NOTORIOUS TRICK used by the online casinos (especially those that accept multiple cryptocurrencies, as they can claim that "you should have known". Gambling is ultimately EVIL and just plain UNCOUTH. I should have learned my lesson by now, but I have come to realize that in the crypto world the key is to MANAGE the scams versus the opportunities. That is, for every $1.00 USD lost there is some form of airdrop, or earning, opportunity out there to offset the loss. The key is to try and keep losses MINIMAL and bonuses MAXIMAL so that you remain "in the black" in general. Live and learn.

Another "positive" which has arisen out of this recent major 0.05 BTC loss is that I am now going to MORE ACCURATELY focus on monitoring and calculating the amount of regular earnings I am getting from my Splinterlands activity. I mean, I would say that overall I am earning AT LEAST $1.00 USD per day from my Splinterlands activity (resulting from my daily battling, quest completion, season rewards, tournaments, etc.) That works out to $1.00 USD x 365 days/year = $365 USD/year (not accounting for appreciation in value of the cards in my collection. I have been thinking about making weekly small purchases of BTC, but when I really compare the benefit of holding DEC as OPPOSED to BTC I think I am becoming more and more convinced that holding DEC right now has a better ROI (at least in the short-to-mid term), as BTC has been hovering at the same general value for YEARS now. In other words, while BTC may be valued at ~ $11,000/BTC there is no real "earning power" from the main asset (aside from appreciation). With DEC however, the cards are more KINETIC (in the sense that you are earning and accumulating MORE of the underlying asset as you engage with the game). Right now, you can see that on Peakmonsters ( https://peakmonsters.com/@transcript-junky/collection ) my overall collection value is roughly $4,000 USD. If you consider that my original BTC holding was 1.0 BTC (and I still have a few thousand USD remaining in BTC (let's say $2,000 USD, hypothetically - so $4,000 (DEC) + $2,000 (BTC) = $6,000 USD -- plus I wasted some BTC on gambling, and some dud altcoins, and cashed out a few thousand $$$ for legitimate survival cash needs) then that provides a relatively hard metric with which to set the goal of getting my Splinterlands collection value up as close to the current value of 1.0 BTC (at any given time) as possible. I am now thinking that it would be IDEAL to attempt this by having most of my total crypto holdings in DEC for now, because that is where the "earning power" is. Otherwise, the BTC is just sitting there in 'potential" mode (a store of value INSTEAD of a "currency"), while GROWTH is being missed out on in the more "kinetic" dApps like Splinterlands. I will now be adjusting my main strategy towards this goal. I tried buying small weekly amount of Doge, and some other alt-coins, and I DO NOT believe that rebuying Bitcoin right now has the same ultimate ROI at this time than if I focus on harnessing the earning power of DEC and then potentially buy more Bitcoin further down the line. Perhaps it will be the case, in hindsight, that Bitcoin indeed served as a "starting crypto" for me, and was a "bridge" to be able to tap into the more kinetic earning potential of dApps like Splinterlands. After all, I would not even have become involved in Steemit, and then Splinterlands, if I had not got involved with Bitcoin back in 2013-2014, so maybe this is all part of my larger "crypto destiny". Ultimately, this recent CRISIS has caused me to take a step back and consider the bigger picture. I think I have a better sense now of what I want to achieve in the long-term. Fingers crossed.

4 ) I am continuing to earn a nice little chunk of Hive, which I convert to DEC, from each of these weekly series posts. I earned 9.756 Hive (2,667 DEC ) from the previous post (which paid out today), and have used that nice little extra income to buy TWO more "Battering Ram" gold cards, and TWO more "Grenadier" non-gold cards (which I am working on maxing). I will continue to use the weekly 9.5 Hive towards more "Battering Ram" gold cards - which at the current pace ( also using my reward earnings) I should have maxed within the next month, and the start working on maxing the "Grenadier" gold. I can't wait to start being able to earn that extra 20% "gold promo" bonus from that card, since it is a "gold promo ("Dice") card, so it earns me a 20% bonus for each battle I win when I use it. Right now i have he non-gold version maxed, and so DO NOT get the 20% DEC bonus per one battle. That 20% DEC bonus adds up, and translates into being able to buy up more cards FASTER. As a result of this, that relatively "small" amount of DEC income ( ~ 3.0 Hive ) from these weekly posts ends up being LONG-TERM income worth MUCH GREATER than the initial amount, since I both OWN the NFT cards, and the gold cards (and "gold promo" moreso) generate a consistent income "dividend" (via the 20% won battle bonus). This is why I have always focused on accumulating, and maxing out, (as much as possible relative to the DEC I have available) as many gold and "gold promo" cards as possible. Using the "gold promo" cards as much as possible significantly accelerates one's progress in the game, as you generate a significantly larger amount of DEC income per day by using them. Ideally, you want to use the 20% "gold promo" bonus to buy up MORE "gold promo" cards, which is essentially a form of "compound interest".

In addition, my two other ongoing post series ( "blockchain gaming news" and "blockchain social media news" ) serve the DUAL purpose of generating some additional DEC (less than this main series, but often enough to buy a few cheaper cards) and MORE IMPORTANTLY providing me useful current info with which to take advantage of various opportunities ( ex. airdrops , valuable information about the wider " blockchain gaming " world which can translate into increased earnings of various sorts ( ex. news about airdrops from different games, integration of Splinterlands with other games and cryptocurrencies, etc.) It is often the case that "if you snooze you lose", in the sense that there are often opportunities that you can benefits from (in terms of earning crypto or NFT assets) which you can ONLY really take advantage of by KNOWING about them, and knowing about them "in time" if they are time-sensitive opportunities. This is also why I monitor the #splinterlands "trending" page daily, as there are often limited-time opportunities which come up which I can't gain from if I don't know about them.

5 ) Okay. As I did in the last post in this series, the highly-detailed "diary" of my daily #splinterlands activity is laid out in the last part of this post, for those of you who are inclined to follow, more closely, what I am doing. It occurred to me that this "diary" section is JUST THAT - a highly detailed record of my daily activity in the game, with some JUICY "play-by-play" analysis notes, and commentary, on what works, what doesn't, and some suggestions for further tweaking and experimentation. So, with this in mind, I hope some/any of you will enjoy this information. If not, you are under no pressure to read it fully, and are free to SKIM, or even IGNORE, any parts, or ALL parts, completely - at your discretion. I lay this out because it also HELPS ME to document my progress in the game over time, and may help some people NOW, and into the perpetual future...

September 16th, 2020

Starting DEC : 18,875 DEC
Starting Capture Rate : ~ 91.86%
Ending DEC - 21,547 DEC
Ending Capture rate : ~ 87.86%
Balance = DEC Earning = 2,672 DEC = -> 10.755 HIVE x ~ $00.167 USD/Hive = ~ $1.79 USD

Spent :

1 x "Dice" pack - 2,880 DEC

80 DEC contributed to guild

Dice (Pack #1 : today's daily pack)
keepers -
(+) 60 DEC
nonkeepers-
(+) 20 DEC

converted 3.015 Hive to 892 DEC

Daily Quest (today's "dragon" quest)
keepers -
(+) 150 DEC
nonkeepers -
(+) 45 DEC
potions - 3 legendary potions, 2 alchemy/gold potions
Untamed - 1 packs (bought one more "Dice" pack against this free "Untamed" pack)
DEC - 100 DEC

Season Rewards ("Champion I" level - 150 loot chests)
keepers -
(+) 1,210 DEC
nonkeepers -
(+) 740 DEC + 25 DEC (gifted to gang)
potions - 23 legendary potions, 32 alchemy/gold potions
Untamed - 1 packs (bought one more "Dice" pack against this free "Untamed" pack)
DEC - 1,041 DEC

September 17th, 2020

Starting DEC : 18,667 DEC
Starting Capture Rate : ~ 87.86%
Ending DEC - 16,161 DEC
Ending Capture rate : ~ 100.00%
Balance = DEC Earning = x,xxx DEC = -> xx.xxx HIVE x ~ $00.xxx USD/Hive = ~ $0x.xx USD --> recordkeeping was thrown off because I was busy and played most battles on the mobile app. I'll try to get things caught up tomorrow.

Spent :

80 DEC contributed to guild

Untamed (Pack #1 : today's daily pack)
keepers -
1 x "Contessa L'Ament" (Gold - Level 2 - $3.27 USD - 2,000 DEC)
(+) 40 DEC
nonkeepers-
(+) 10 DEC (+) 10 DEC (gifted to gang)

Dice (Pack #2 : celebration pack for starting new season at "Diamond II" level (+ 50 season loots chests)
keepers -
(+) 60 DEC
nonkeepers-
(+) 30 DEC

Daily Quest (today's "earth" quest)
keepers -
(+) 380 DEC
nonkeepers -
(+) DEC (+) 35 DEC (gifted to gang)
potions - 0 legendary potions, 4 alchemy/gold potions
Untamed - 0 packs
DEC - 60 DEC

September 18th, 2020

Starting DEC : 16,616 DEC
Starting Capture Rate : ~ 100.00%
Ending DEC - 19,100 DEC
Ending Capture rate : ~ 99.33%
Balance = DEC Earning = 2,484 DEC = -> 9.039 HIVE x ~ $00.171 USD/Hive = ~ $01.54 USD

Spent :

1 x "Battering Ram" (Gold - Level 3 - $1.47 USD - 2,484 DEC -- one (1) card remaining to Level 7)

80 DEC contributed to guild

Untamed (Pack #1 : today's daily pack)
keepers -
(+) 40 DEC
nonkeepers-
(+) 20 DEC (+) 20 DEC (gifted to gang)

Daily Quest (today's "water" quest)
keepers -
(+) 40 DEC
nonkeepers -
(+) 60 DEC (+) 25 DEC (gifted to gang)
potions - 3 legendary potions, 2 alchemy/gold potions
Untamed - 0 packs
DEC - 152 DEC

September 19th, 2020

Starting DEC : 15,814 DEC
Starting Capture Rate : ~ 100.00%
Ending DEC - xx,xxx DEC
Ending Capture rate : ~ xx.xx%
Balance = DEC Earning = x,xxx DEC = -> xx.xxx HIVE x ~ $00.xxx USD/Hive = ~ $0x.xx USD -- recordkeeping thrown completely off today, as I descended into the ABYSS of "pay for play" traditional gambling on BetFury.io and ended up BOTH losing 0.05 BTC worth of crypto AND my focus on the usual daily Splinterlands activity. Hey, shit happens.

Spent :

Dice (Pack #1 : today's daily pack)
keepers -
(+) 60 DEC
nonkeepers-
(+) 00 DEC (+) 20 DEC (gifted to gang)

Daily Quest (today's "water" quest)
keepers -
(+) 110 DEC
nonkeepers -
(+) 10 DEC (+) 25 DEC (gifted to gang)
potions - 4 legendary potions, 5 alchemy/gold potions
Untamed - 0 packs
DEC - 51 DEC

September 20th, 2020

Starting DEC : 63,077 DEC
Starting Capture Rate : ~ 100.00%
Ending DEC - 64,381 DEC
Ending Capture rate : ~ 93.20%
Balance = DEC Earning = 1,304 DEC = -> 4.394 HIVE x ~ $00.176 USD/Hive = ~ $00.77 USD

Spent :

1 x "Battering Ram" (Gold - Level 3 - $1.39 USD - 2,433 DEC -- bumped up to Level 7 (to increase "speed" from "+3" to "+4")

Notes: What a MESS, folks. I slipped up after playing the usual ~ 100 Tron of residual Tron income on BetFury.io two days ago. After losing the 100 Tron I added an additional 10,000 DEC from my Splinterlands account, lost that, and then descending into a complete BENDER which ultimately led me to chase the original loss with a WHOPPING ~ $500 worth of BTC. I know, I'm a dumbass. Sometimes the urge to gamble just sneaks up on me, and before I know it I'm "balls deep" (of probably EVEN DEEPER) in a multi-day torture session. The only GOOD things that came out of this was that I was able to continue taking more BTC out of Coinbase, and after I hit rock bottom on this recent round of TORTURE I just went ahead and sold another 0.02 BTC to buy a second 100 (+10) "Dice" pre-sale promo batch. I opened the 10 free cards immediately after buying them, and now have a nice 119 packs which I intend to open as part of my daily "one pack per day" pack-opening routine. I also bumped up to the "High Roller" level on BetFury.io which increases my "cashback" from 6% to 8%, and I will be getting 1,199 Tron "cashback" as a result of this recent catastrophophic loss. I also got 0.0001 BTC bonus for hitting the "High Roller" level, which I will withdraw and use for Splinterlands stuff.

Untamed (Pack #1 : today's daily pack)
keepers -
(+) 40 DEC
nonkeepers-
(+) 20 DEC (+) 20 DEC (gifted to gang)

Daily Quest (today's "death" quest)
keepers -
(+) 20 40 DEC
nonkeepers -
(+) 500 DEC (+) 25 DEC (gifted to gang)
potions - 3 legendary potions, 4 alchemy/gold potions
Untamed - 0 packs
DEC - 579 DEC

September 21th, 2020

Starting DEC : 61,948 DEC
Starting Capture Rate : ~ 93.31%
Ending DEC - 65,514 DEC
Ending Capture rate : ~ 90.28%
Balance = DEC Earning = 3,566 DEC = -> 12.973 HIVE x ~ $00.159 USD/Hive = ~ $02.06 USD

Spent :

1 x "Battering Ram" (Gold - Level 3 - $1.24 USD - 2,214 DEC -- five (5) cards remaining to Level 7)

2 x "Grenadier" (non-gold - Level 1 - $0.81 USD - 1,451 DEC -- seven (7) cards remaining to Level 5)

converted 9.756 Hive (from previous series post) to 2733 DEC

Dice (Pack #1 : today's daily pack)
keepers -
(+) 10 10 40 DEC
nonkeepers-
"Kralus" (non-gold (legendary) - Level 1 - $4.68 USD - 1,000 DEC -- put up for sale on the market for $4.50 USD, and will use the DEC to buy additional "Battering Ram" gold cards)
(+) 00 DEC (+) 20 DEC (gifted to gang)

Daily Quest (today's "fire" quest)
keepers -
(+) 200 DEC
nonkeepers -
(+) 55 DEC (+) 20 DEC (gifted to gang)
potions - 3 legendary potions, 4 alchemy/gold potions
Untamed - 0 packs
DEC - 100 DEC

Whew! These posts are growing dense - but that's okay. Take what resonates with you,and leave the rest. I hope you find some/any of these tips useful in increasing your understanding and/or skill level in the Splinterlands and/or any other game(s) - and the " blockchain gaming " industry as whole - which I end up exploring as this series evolves. More JUICY tips to come with each weekly update, as I dig deeper into this whole REVOLUTIONARY PHENOMENON, and become more experienced and successful in the game(s).

See you on the battlefield...

@transcript-junky