Good morning Mavs, Devs, Team, Tavern and all my fellow Praetorians... not you @Schwarzchild (a joke from old Bronze League Leaderboard days... this player was the 🐐)
There's been some "discussion" among the Mavs about certain issues and some problems have been more heated than others... I think I just figured out a way to solve several of them at one time!
The "problems" I believe this would solve, with ONE simple update...
Problem 1: Bot Farms of old
Problem 2: Soulbound Reward Cards
Problem 3: Incentivizing Player Advancement in the Leagues!
Problem 4: Rewarding your players and increasing the #play2earn focus WITHOUT diluting and/or diminishing Card or Token values!!
Problem 1: Ye Olde Bot Farms
The problem with bot farms is that one person can create 100,000 bots, rent out a few cards or even just play starter cards and "earn" a little DEC per battle. This eventually became SPS. In addition to DEC (in the past) they also used to earn Reward Cards (RCs) - which could be sold on the market. Now however, the rewards are SoulBound Reward Cards (SBRCs) which are currently account locked.
Like the tale "A Single Grain of Rice" - if you have a TON of something seemingly insignificant... it will add up.
So even "Dust" rewards, 100,000 times over, every single day - adds up to a significant amount of SPS rewards and a WHOLE bunch of RCs... for almost ZERO investment. The sole purpose of a "Bot Farm" was to EXTRACT VALUE from the Splinterlands System. The Bot Farms owners would then sell it for personal gain, not caring about the Game or the effect this had on the Game Economy - crashing card prices by flooding the market with TONS of RCs.
By switching to the Soulbound Cards and stating "Bots are banned in Modern" the team wanted to relieve the Bot "Value Extraction" issue, thus rewarding the Players, instead of Bots.
However, this solution unfortunately created another problem...
Problem 2: Soulbound Reward Cards
Here's the MAIN issue I have with the SBRCs... They aren't #web3 and they aren't play2earn.
The entire concept of #web3gaming, which is what drew me to Splinterlands is that when you won, you got a chance to earn rewards (Token + RC) which you could do WHATEVER you wanted with.
Sell it. Burn it. Combine it. GIVE IT AWAY. Didn't matter - it was yours to do whatever you wanted because THAT IS THE DEFINITION OF WEB3!
The main issue with SBRCs is they AREN'T web3 at all - they are web2 and no different than Clash of Clans or Hearthstone or any of Blizzard Freakin' Entertainments games... They aren't truly "owned" by you since you can't transfer/sell/rent them and if you were to get your account banned from playing, for whatever unfathomable reason, by Splinterlands... You. Will. LOSE. Them.
That's web2, NOT web3... and Splinterlands is not supposed to be web2.
In the end, SBRCs are simply Starter Cards with extra steps. In their current configuration, this is anathema to the literal CORE CONCEPT of Splinterlands - PLAYER OWNERSHIP.
The SECOND issue I have with SBRCs is this: after playing enough to earn Max Level SBRCs... we're stuck. Any extra BCX is a WASTED REWARD CHEST.
In their current setup - there is NO REWARD for earning them after they are maxed. This is NOT PLAY2EARN in any stretch of the imagination. This is ALSO ANATHEMA to the CORE CONCEPTS of Splinterlands.
This can be solved by adding utility to them or better yet - Unlockable Utility... this could look something like:
Pay X DEC: Unlock the ability to RENT THEM
Pay Y DEC: Unlock the ability to USE THEM ON LAND
Pay 2X DEC: Unlock the ability to BREAK THEIR SOULBONDS and be treated as a regular card.
The first NFT Based, Blockchain Trading Card Game that was created, is called Spells of Genesis.
This game was released in 2015 on the Counterparty Blockchain ($XCP) and they utilized this method of "Unlocking" Rewards Cards.
They had a name for this "Unlocking" ability too: "Blockchainization"
You could play the game, win the rewards (which were essentially soulbound) and then when you "Maxed" the Card out... you could pay a fee to add it to the "Blockchain" and thus take a web2 card and make it web3.
In my experience and veteran TCG player opinion: THIS IS A FUCKING BRILLIANT WAY OF DOING IT
But they weren't the only company to do this or even the FIRST!!
Wizards of the Coast used to allow you to REDEEM A FULL DIGITAL SET OF ANY "Magic: the Gathering Online Digital Cards" FOR ANY "IN PRINT" SET OF PAPER CARDS
What you did was: Pay $5... which then became $25 due to costs... and they would REMOVE your DIGITAL CARDS from your MTGO account... AND MAIL YOU A PHYSICAL SET OF THEM 😮
This is where I believe "play2earn" was born and I used to play/earn/redeem A LOT before the SEC got involved - again, this was another one of the original reasons I was drawn to Splinterlands.
I believe Utility would mitigate this issue but it wouldn't fully solve the web2 aspect of them... unless it allowed the "Unlocking" of the Soulbound Rewards Cards by paying DEC or SPS.
There is good news however... actually there is GREAT news and it's probably not what you think.
Above all else, do you know what I truly LOVE about this game?
THE TEAM: Matt, Aggy, The Devs - the willingness to try something and then say "Oh crap, that didn't work as planned" and ADAPT to it.
I urge everyone to consider the challenges faced by anyone when blazing into unknown territory - there are no guides or maps or easy to traverse, well known paths... They have to make it up as they go and sometimes they take a wrong turn or get Dysentery...
What I admire about the team has been their dedication to ALWAYS OBSERVING the results of implemented changes and updates. Then amending the bad ones and keeping the good ones.
Unfortunately, the Bear Market severely affected their ability to do this and greatly increased the Salt content of the Mavs - lol... Salt.
However, with the waning of that market cycle and blossoming of Crypto Spring... I believe we will see better sentiment, better morale and the renewed ability to work on solving these problems.
Problem 3: Incentivizing Player Advancement in the Leagues
Wooooo boy... this has been a problem as long as I've been around - which is over two years now.
Even though I regularly played Modern Bronze with Llama-Kron and Brawled with my Guildmates in Bitcoin & Brews...
I haven't been as active in the community as I used to be in Ye Olden Days...
After Splinterfest, from roughly Dec '22 - Nov '23 due to life/work issues I was kinda MIA from the Splinterlands Discord/Peakd Community - my apologies.
Now, when I first joined - you needed Collection Power to "League Up". This was the incentive to Own/Rent enough cards (assets) to play in the Big Leagues: Diamond & Champ, where the Rewards were supposed to high enough to entice players to collect and hold enough Cards to do so.
This was a way to preserve Card Value and it seemingly worked ok - but you could also rent this CP... which was cool in the fact that Max RF Venari Heatsmiths used to rent for ABSURD amounts of DEC/d at the End of Season (Eos) so players could "Reward Bump".
The Team frowned upon the "Reward Bump" and the Season/Reward Chest Structure changed format to it's current configuration to amend that.
That change sure sucked for the collection of Max Level RF/GF Reward Cards I was amassing... I used to be able to rent them for 30 DEC/d at the end of the Season... and now get... .1 DEC/d for a L10 Venari Heatsmith at end of season 😒
The Team then tried adjusting the Reward Pools for the Leagues... I'm not entirely sure how this worked out but that's really not required for this post.
All in all - the goal remains the same: Incentivize Player Advancement
In my opinion, the BEST way to incentivize Players to Advance - is through a "Reward Incentive" rather than "Lower League Restriction" i.e. the Mana Cap and Rulesets.
Unfortunately, with the current setup you have to overcome this issue:
Most Players: Bronze + Silver Leagues
Least Players: Diamond + Champ Leagues
Highest Reward Pool: Diamond + Champ Leagues
Lowest Reward Pool: Bronze + Silver Leagues
Read: Splinterlands Ranked Reward Pool Distribution
What the result is: The largest amount of players split the smallest reward pools.
This is unfortunate for the New Player Experience (NPE) as most players either won't just jump in and buy or rent all the cards to aim for Champ... or the reality: most new players won't be able to afford to play in the higher leagues because it's not cheap... this is ok - but by doing this. By not effectively incentivizing the Leagues... it ends up being less a reward for High Level Players and more a punishment for people who can't afford to dive in head first.
The reality is: I live in America. Most of the team does too. To truly reach a broader player-base and generate a large amount of New Players...
The focus should be on making it CHEAPER AND EASIER TO START PLAYING AND EARNING REWARDS... which will allow you to advance through the Leagues after playing for a long time...
I don't think this is really feasible with the current SBRC structure because Bronze League Rewards don't yield the Epic and Legendary SBRCs at the rate where they can be effectively utilized to play in ever higher Leagues.
I know the argument: you can't expect to invest $20 and earn $100.. I think that is a Fallacy.
I believe you SHOULD be able to invest $20 and expect to earn $100... if you are willing to invest TIME.
I mean, I have WAAAAY more than $20 invested in $SPS and I fully believe it will be worth more than $.15 in the Bull Market... thus turning my $20 Investment into $100... but requiring TIME.
For another analogy (don't overthink this): You can dig the same 30ft hole with a $20 Shovel that you could with a $20,000 Backhoe... you'd just have to work harder and longer with the Shovel (Time investment).
Unfortunately, as it is currently divided and structured... Even with the knowledge that the largest amount of players, especially New Players will be Novice/Bronze/Silver... you can't really solve Problem 3... without creating Problem 4...
**Problem 4 - the BIG ONE: Fairly Rewarding Players of ALL Leagues WITHOUT diluting Token Supply and/or diminishing Card Values via "Bot Inflation"...
The goal has always been: Encourage Players to Level Up (Combine) their cards and advance in the Leagues. As a "Reward" for doing this, for each battle the winner is given points towards Daily and Season Chests, as well as $SPS.
The amount of rewards INCREASES as you advance higher in the Leagues: Novice -> Champion.
Soon it will not just be a benefit (Bonus Accumulated Chest Points) to Stake SPS... it will be a REQUIREMENT to stake SPS, in order to earn rewards.
In order to boost the Rewards of the Higher Leagues, we seem to be making it increasingly difficult to "Play 2 Earn".
In addition, in the current structure, the largest and most influenceable yet fragile Player Base is the "New Players", especially those in Novice/Bronze"... but they have the MOST Restrictions on Card Play (Mana Restrictions) and as Bronko pointed out: this reduces the VARIETY of Games that can be played in Bronze and reduces the FUN of and Bronze.
I'd like to take this moment to point out the ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM: A Game NEEDS to be FUN TO PLAY... in order to retain entice and retain its Player Base.
With the Bear Market, the focus on Land and Rebellion's release... I think that may have gotten lost along the way... I know the 2024 focus is NPE and I must stress that the GAME must be FUN... not RESTRICTIVE... in order to OBTAIN AND RETAIN Players... REGARDLESS. OF. LEAGUE.
The ONLY thing different between Leagues: Should be Card Levels and Rewards.
The enticement of Leveling Cards and advancing Leagues should be the promise of ever increasing REWARDS and for that, I propose a solution that neatly ties it all up in one little package and it is SIMPLE... (Simple is good).
Before we get to the solution I want to address the "Bot Farm" issue once again...
Bot Farms were a problem because they extracted value from our ecosystem without putting much if anything in.
The "solutions" have been:
However, there are problems with these... the first one is massive, as it takes us a step back from web3 -> web2 and I am very opposed to this (as it is currently structured - see above for suggested utility amendments to mitigate this issue).
The thing about "Bot Farms" is they were designed to extract value, not play well... Archmage Tokens are a bit different.
But... do you remember what it was like? Wading through the HORDES of Bots in Bronze... It was like clubbing Dewgongs...
Once you moved past Bronze and into Silver, Gold and beyond... The Bots disappeared because it wasn't viable to Rent/Own the cards to qualify for those Leagues... They wouldn't win and couldn't extract value... The capability and ROI just isn't there for Farming...
To me, what this means is: Bots aren't really the problem. BOT FARMS are the problem.
The difference is a Bot simply plays a High League deck and this requires a SIGNIFICANT investment...
Bot Farms could sweep the "Dust" from the lower leagues, in huge quantities, leeching tons of value from our ecosystem fractions of a DEC at a time...
So if Bot Farms were never an issue in Gold/Diamond/Champion Leagues... and our goals are:
The question then becomes: How can we possibly accomplish this?
The Elegant Solution:
Design and Print a NEW set of NON SOULBOUND Reward Cards
Issue them with the constraints of a Max BCX Supply and also with a set time of "Print Run" aka a 3 Month or 6 Month Reward Cycle Block or even a 1 Year Cycle to match their corresponding Core Set.
After the Cycle Timer ends, "Burn" any unprinted BCX, thus limiting the supply with two constraints - MaxSupply AND Time. *
[I think this is how they used to be done before]*
THE KEY: THESE CARDS WOULD ONLY BE AVAILABLE IN GOLD/DIAMOND/CHAMP CHESTS!
This eliminates the Bot Farm threat
This INCREASES Rewards for Gold+ Leagues
It PREVENTS DEC/SPS Inflation Mechanics
It DOES NOT require changing/skewing/restricting the Reward Pool for Lower Modern League
Finally, it ADDS a benefit to the Gold+ Leagues, thereby adding an incentive for players to set a goal of Leveling Up their cards... and increasing their League.
We should also keep using the "Updated" versions of Soulbound Reward Cards with "Utility" as well - but only give out the NEW Rewards Cards to the Gold+ Leagues.
Naturally - they'll hit the Card Market and be available for Rent, so New Players will still have access to them... but only High Level Players can PLAY2EARN THEM
Please, please let me know what you think - Good, Bad or Indifferent...
Let's talk about it!!!
Please leave replies, feedback, improvements, etc in the Comments and let's discuss this novel way of solving both the long standing issue of League Tier Rewards as well as returning to our web3gaming roots.
I look forward to reading your replies... even if you think I am stupid, wrong and smell funny...
Thank you for reading and leaving your feedback, I truly hope this ends up being worthwhile 😌
Cheers 🍻,
