Pretoria aka the splintered lands, how the battles are fought, how to earn, and how to dominate.

Splinterlands is a competitive game that tests your wits and will every time you match up with an opponent, and with its difficulty comes opportunity, if you do succeed in beating your foe, your reward will be worth your effort. As much as it sounds like a lonely road, you will always have people who welcomes you with open arms, be it the in game community or 3rd party community who is branching out towards splinterlands like @Versagames who is also trying to help players get into the game.

(Picture copyright is owned by the splinterlands company)

Battling in the Land of Pretoria

Have you ever played other card games before? Games such as Yu-gi-oh, Gods Unchained, Vanguard and many more? Splinterlands is way different than other card games! It's a fresh, innovative and interesting face in the card game genre and not only is it fun to play but as you progress to the game, you get to earn from it!

Splinterlands may seem very simple, but the strategy in each match is as deep as it can get, not only are you thinking about how your cards will attack but you also have to take into consideration how the opponent will build his or her line up.

This is the main portion of the game where you brawl it out with players, the interface in itself is simple, clean and looks very appeasing to the eye, but don't let this fool you into lowering your guard! From here on out only the best of the best can succeed in battling it out!

Clicking the big red "Battle" button will start you in your match. for a few seconds you will be queuing to find an opponent, and when your foe comes, the timer to create your team will immediately start!

This "Notification" will give you the information of what your match is going to be like, there are three things that needs to be considered when sending in a team and that is the "Rules", "Mana Cap",and "Elements".

In a match these three will greatly affect your chances of winning, taking these three into account will be your key to victory. First and foremost the "Rules" that you will be subjected to will be changing for every round, there maybe matches where there is only 1 rule and there are also matches where there are 2 rules, each rule is unique and playing around it or using it to your advantage is a good way to build your compositions.

Next will be the "Mana Cap", mana caps are essentially what dictates how many monsters you can send out into battle, each card will have it's own "Mana Cost" as indicated by a blue circle in the top left corner of a card, thus you cannot exceed your mana cap but you can always use less as it doesn't mean an assured victory if you use all your mana.

Last but not the least, the "Element" of a card is also necessary to take into account. Each card is represented by an "Element", these "Element" can be seen in the center of the card, those symbols above each name of a card are it's corresponding "Element", "Wave" for water, "Leaf" for earth, "Skull" for Death, "Flame" for fire, "Star" for life, "Eye" for dragon, and last but not the least even though it's not considered an "Element" I'll be including it here, "Swords" for Neutral.

But! Contrary to the usual view of how "Element" work, there is no such thing as an "Element" advantage in splinterlands, what it does indicate though is a specialty, some specializes in "Magic", Others in "Melee", others in "Range" and many more!

Some matches may allow all "Element", some may only allow four, and there are even instances that you are forced to play only one "Element", this makes it very challenging as you cannot just spam one "Element" but think of different ways you can win with different "Element"!

Accepting the match will lead you towards the very first thing you need to decide, these powerful beings of magic, chaos and life are all at your disposal and these are the "Summoners".

Through these "Summoners" you are able to command the powerful monsters that live in splinterlands, but the catch here is, a "Summoner" can only summon monster that corresponds to its element. Life "Summoner" can only call forth life monsters, death "Summoners" can only summon death monsters and so on, there are two exceptions!

First, Dragons "Summoners" will allow you to choose what element you would like to use, this will allow you to use both "Dragon" and the one you picked. Lastly "Neutral" monsters are available to use in all elements so you need to make good use of them!

The next step is to choose the warriors that you will send out into the battlefield. Each monsters will have their own corresponding abilities, like "Slow", "Heal", "Repair" and many more. Different matches with different "Rules" calls forth unique strategies that not only do you have to adjust to the "Rules" of the match but you also have to predict what the enemy is going to send.

There is also battle factors in which are as essential as monster abilities, these are, "Shield", "Health", "Speed", "Melee/Range/Magic", "Hit Chance", "Attack Order" and "Positioning". Each of these factors plays a critical role in your road to victory

After all your preparations, all the strategies you have combined, all the hard work into creating the best suitable team for that match, it's time to hit the green button Battle and see the fruits of your labor, time to battle it out in the splintered lands!

With all that said and done, if you have overcome your adversities, outwit your opponent, and snatched the victor's cup, you will be handsomely rewarded with the crystal that is precious to the lands of Pretoria, The Dark Energy Crystal.

The Economy and the different tokens in Splinterlands

Splinterlands is game that rewards you depending on how much effort you put into it, and how much investment you are willing to make. The economy in itself is vast and full of opportunities to make a profit! There are three main currencies that are used in splinterlands, these are DEC (Dark Energy Crystal), Credits, and SPS.

These three always go hand and hand together as their value are closely tied to each other and it's common for one to be high, the other starts to climb, just like how the ATH happened a few months ago. Credits on the other hand is more stable as it will always be 1000 credits = $1 (worth of any token)

DEC and Credits are the currencies you can use in game, their uses ranges from buying "Potions", "Packs" and even single cards from the in-game market. Currently, price of individual cards are dropping, but it is actually something good for players! This means that players can now build their decks for cheap and start buying up cards while the prices are low, and it is certain that after all the packs have been sold out and supply will start to drop, prices will sky rocket!

As seen earlier, each wins in ranked game will earn you DEC. When you reach bronze 2, your earning potential will start, the amount that you can earn has many factors taken in, you can actually even look at what percentages you are getting at in game!

The higher these percentages are the better your rewards are going to be. There is also a factor of getting to a higher "League", the higher your rank/league is in splinterlands, the higher your earnings per game will be, that is why the better you play and the better your deck is the more you will be earning! This is truly the economy where hard work and dedication plays off!

Next comes one of the most prized token in game, SPS is a currency that is envisioned to replace DEC as earnings in game, even though it hasn't been changed yet, SPS has already become a high grossing method for you to earn, and the good part it can be a passive income!

Currently there are two ways to earn SPS passively, one is the most common crypto method which is staking your sps, the more sps you stake the more you can aim through the in game APR system, secondly my personal favorite is to earn from airdrops.

SPS airdrop has been going on for quite a while now, and still has a long way to go! Different factors as seen in the picture contribute towards how many SPS airdrop you will receive each day (during snapshot). One of the important factors there is that, "Collection Power" refers to the burn value of each card you have in game, meaning as you continue to play, and you continue to grow your collection you will receive more and more airdrops making it a reward for all the effort you have done! Also, the amount of DEC you have will be a great factor on how much SPS airdrop you will receive, making it so that if you play smart and win many battles your airdrop value will also increase!

There are also other tokens in game that you can use or make profit off, Land is one of the more expensive ones as they are currently sold out and they are expected to be more of use in game when the "Land Update" comes, nothing is still certain about land but the hype is already very high! Potions are also there to help you gain better reward from Packs but are non transferable.

Last but not the least Vouchers are the other token that have multiple uses in game, currently they are needed to buy packs in game but that restriction will be lifted during the "General Sale" of packs, But! Vouchers are also expected the be of permanent use, as the devs themselves are actively trying to integrate vouchers into the in game economy.

There is also a marketplace where you can trade out your tokens, though only four of them are available, these are SPS, DEC, Land and Vouchers. This market deals with the different HIVE tokens the the blockchain handles, this marketplace is called "TribalDex" and is a place where you can get good deals if you know the proper prices!

Now, if you ask me, which one do I think is the best way to earn? Well...

Earning potentials, the best way to maximize your profit

There are two ways to earn in splinterlands, the first one is what we call the "Active Earning" and the second is Passive Earnings" both are viable methods and are a good way to earn!

"Active Earning", as the name implies this method will require you to actively play the game, this is a really good method for those who are card enthusiasts that would like to challenge other players. Earnings here can be maximized if you know the proper meta of the season, know how to build the compositions, rank up and get to higher leagues and generally get better at the game! I personally would invite everyone who want to properly earn through playing to try out the "Leaderboards".

In the leaderboards, if you finish at a certain spot on it, at the end of the season you get massive DEC rewards! Each League will have different rewards but one thing is for certain as you climb higher the leaderboard prizes gets bigger and bigger! Though this doesn't mean it's a walk in the park, strong players rise up to the challenge and battle their way through their opponents just to gain a spot in the leaderboards and get those sweet DEC rewards!

I can personally say, 2 days before the season ends, it becomes an all out war to those who wants to rise to the top, be it friend or foe, players will fight their hearts out and aim for the top!

The other method is called "Passive Earning" the core of this method is using the unique system of splinterlands where you can rent out your card so that people can use them, and the airdrop/APR system of SPS that has been explained earlier. In this process you can rent out the cards you do not always use or have an extra amount of, this will let you earn either DEC or Credits.

This is one of the features that really makes splinterlands unique as you do not have to own the cards to progress through the leagues but you can just rent them for certain amount of time and you will be able to fight in even grounds with your opponents. To top it all off, 3rd party tools/markets like "Peakmonsters", "MonsterMarket", and "Card Auctionz" are such a great way to manage, buy or rent your assets!

All in all there is a lot of ways to earn in splinterlands, what you choose will depend entirely on how you want to approach the game. There is no such thing as the superior method, as I know a lot of people who do either one of those methods and I can definitely say both methods do let you earn a significant amount. There is also an option of doing both which greatly boosts your earnings!

Last but not the least, interacting with the community is a great way to gain some free assets, gain information and most importantly gain new friends. I am personally active in the discord community, and I have met amazing people like cornavirus, sketchygamerguy, UNITQM, hyde-20, Satorihime, Eldrenora, and many many more amazing individuals who share the same passion as me.

I can definitely say that I would not be as successful in the game as I am right now without them, and I do hope to who ever will be reading this, and to who ever will be inspired by what I write and what I say, I am looking forward to seeing you in the land of Pretoria.

May the gods of RNG be ever in your favor!

-4511

Disclaimer: All pictures used in the post are owned by their respective owners, I do not claim ownership of any of the pictures and reserve all rights to the owners

Speaking of community, I just wanted to do a slight introduction and explination as what @Versagames is, as you may know, I am doing a giveaway in their server discord as to promote their community (Giveaway link: https://peakd.com/playtoearn/@sperare4511/the-splintered-lands-a-journey-to-its-roots-its-creation-and-a-great-upcoming-opportunity-versagames)
but I do feel that I have not been sufficient enough in explaining what community they are, so to commemorate the final part of the writing competition I am introducing a bit about @Versagames

@Versagames, is a community that aims to gather individuals that shares the same passion of play to earn games, though I have only been with them for two months, I have been a recipient of one of their really fun giveaway! They aim to create a community where people can share their ideas about play to earn, make the games they play known to public and also give back to the community by doing really awesome giveaways! They have kind and generous people moderating their community and the individuals that are part of their community are also good people, I am looking forward to the growth of their community and wish the best of luck for them!

I would like to thank everyone who has read the whole post, I know it's a bit long and I thank you for having the patience to finish it all, I hope everyone stays safe, and wish you all the best in the brand new year!