Splinterlands | Why Green Candles Matter Most !
What Caused Previous 2021 Adoption ?
When looking at what actually caused the previous Splinterlands Adoption Wave in 2021, I think everyone can agree that it wasn't the actual game. Even though it was ok and probably in a better state as it is right now since things became more complicated with the requirement of SPS staking, switch between Modern & Wild, Rewards having become Soulbound, ...
The main reason that people wanted to get into Splinterlands was because they saw prices going up which was the result of the creation of SPS airdrop which required existing players to hold on to their assets to receive it. Since DEC was included in the airdrop which at that time was the token printed out of thin air to reward players, that went up above peg as well creating higher earnings. With a mechanic that more DEC was printed the higher it went above peg, things went absolutely wild and with no card packs available all asset prices followed.
All this happened in a period of about 3 months and it was followed by The Chaos Legion Release of which both the price and print rate was increased exponentially causing the supply to explode and with the combination of falling prices as DEC was always going to get back to peg while the low supply and high demand of SPS only lasted that long for everything to come down and get in a death spiral which we are still in years later.
Price Increase Causes Adoption and Not The Other Way Around!
When it comes down to crypto, in nearly all cases when there is initial adoption, it is the result of the price having gone up and not the other way around where that the price goes up because there is some adoption.
This creates a spiral as the adoption that comes from the price having gone up will make the price go up more creating even more adoption and so on...
So the main question in Splinterlands to turn things around should be how can we get the price to go up and not so much how can we get new players in as it simply won't happen with the game in a depressed state like it is in now.
Tales From The Crypt Mancer Video
The New Player Experience
In the past 9 months, a lot has been said about the 'New Player Experience' and there have been some changes already with how the menu looks, the Glints store, the site rentals which all are kind of minor changes that don't really do that much and I'm not really sure what is left to come that actually would make the experience of new players better.
It is said that this new player experience will allow the team to do some marketing which they are now getting Funds from the DHF for.
The Marketing Deception
I'm quite sure that marketing Splinterlands (and Hive) will turn out in a major deception with the cost being way higher compared to what it actually brings to the game. As Tales pointed out, it failed for Illuvium who had an exponentially larger budget and they actually stopped it since it was not worth it.
In the end, especially with what Splinterlands has as a game right now, the only real thing that counts and matters is a big green candle as that is the only thing the majority of people care about. Some kind of fomo and belief of new players that come in again to do well is needed in order to get them in.
3 Major Overhangs That Need To Be Fixed !
- Too Many Cards in Circulation!
- Too Much DEC in Circulation!
- Not enough SPS Utility!
Proposed Solutions!
These are some of the proposed in the video that make sense and immediately would make a change.
- Warpgate in Land where you can burn cards which create consumable cards that act as a item/spell in modern
- Building in Guild where you can burn cards to get another guild benefit for example use 1 extra gladiator card.
- Extra Energy for Each 100k SPS Staked: in order to give more incentive to stake SPS. if it was up to me reduced the rate at which Energy is refreshed could be 80 Minutes instead of 60 to balance it out.
- Pay DEC to see Alternate Team Suggestion: After you play a battle Splinterlands could show an alternate better team selection at the cost of some DEC to help players study and get better at it.
- ...
These are all quite easy and straightforward changes that would help the price up and I might do qome brainstorm myself to come up with some more ideas next week.
Printing Cards is a Problem, Not a Solution!
So far, pretty much every problem that the team and the DAO faced was 'solved' by printing more Promo cards. Even now, the proposal of paying ~200k to develop land came with the creation of 2 more Promo Cards which seems to be passed by all the whales.
If anything, Splinterlands should have a complete cards print stop for some time combined with a burn as there are more than enough cards in the game already to have fun with them without it getting old for years to come.
Conclusion
This concept on how Green Candles are the only thing that matters is so painfully obvious and the most frustrating part is that nor the team or the whales in the game seem to understand this. What happens next is for the new player experience to be finished followed by throwing the HBD at marketing which won't make a difference aside from more money being lost. |  |  |
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Nice post. To many cards/to many DEC so basically burn baby burn.
Love the idea to give SPS stake holders more energy
Yeah, I'm quite sure like Tales said that it's not that hard to come up with multiple ideas to give SPS more use cases while having something that burns cards and DEC.
Very interesting ideas! The card-burning benefits are interesting, also the extra energy part.
In general, there always needs to be a balance between rewards for those who hold SPS, without giving too much advantage. Right now, I see the gameplay quite balanced with a good mix of pay to win and play to win - you can have fun without the OP cards, but you'll probably not play as high or win against them. But it doesn't destroy the fun of the game.
The way I see it is that Splinterlands is the most fun when everyone plays on a level playing field and a game mode should be introduced which makes that happen. Once you have a collection and the needed SPS stake, and play at the higher levels the pay2win is kind of 'acceptable'. for new players though I feel it's all way too much and I understand why nobody that checks out the game ends up getting in. I also don't think the next player experience will change that unless people feel the hype of the big green candles.
Those are some great and very easy suggestions that you could implement for Splinterland... It really is a no brainer. The same with Hive, burning the HBD in the very bloated Dao would give a massive market cap boost to Hive and restore some of the balance to HP holders.
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Hive indeed suffers from the same issue, I'm trying to find reasons to buy more hive and increase my stake but so far I just can't find any that are legit. Buying Hive feels like a donation over time to those who get the 15% HBD APY and everyone who just uses blogging to cash out.
It is sadly very skewed, 15% APY for doing nothing and a 3 day withdrawl, versus ~12% and 10 weeks. Thats not counting the 21M HBD plus used to support the peg so far.. Something is out of balance here...
Thanks for sharing! - @alokkumar121
I think they know about these solutions to improve the tokenomics and financial attractiveness of the game, somehow something is just making the management stall on the necessary decisions.
I have no clue anymore what they are thinking.