The one thing I believe that Splinterlands really needs more than anything is a new Game Mode that includes and gives value to older cards. These are some of the Design Choices I would always make...
The Problem With Ranked
Enough Cards Available!
By now, 670 Unique cards have been printed in Splinterlands which is more than most players can remember and process properly. Yet the main model remains to print more and more cards to pay for the developer salaries while totally neglecting the use case of older cards. For players who own them, it has been nearly impossible to actually play them in the game which totally breaks the connection with them.
Poor Game Design Choises !
is the mysterious 'Hardcore Mode' and the only thing that was kind of said about it is that you are going to want more than 1 max level card in it which really made me lose even more hope as they are just kicking the problem further away. Max level cards used to be something that only the biggest of whales could achieve and it was watered down to becoming the norm even for beginning players. Now they are going to make a mode where the Pay2Win extends this to needing to own multiple copies? It feels very similar to poor design choices where with the Untamed set, they all of a sudden increased the mana cap so they could sell 12 Mana cards which indicetly stole the value of 1-2 mana cards. Later on they even increased it to 16 mana which stole the value of the previously increased mana cards. This is just one of the many poor design choices that were implemented to bring in more money while making the game actually worse
Splinterlands is Full of Design Choices Which Focus on the Economical Aspect that come at the cost of Fun & Gameplay!
New Game Mode Design Choises !
With a totally new Game Mode, it would bring an opportunity to focus on Fun while Giving Older Cards more value along with making it an easy and affordable for new players to enter. Here are some game design choices I believe could help save the game
Basic Setup: The basic setup for a new game mode to give older cards more value and use case again is one where players pay a fixed fee to enter and play. Packs or individual cards along with possibly some Glints can be given as a reward making the game mode an indirect way to purchase them. Players who own the cards should provide them for this game mode by locking them on land and receive part of the entry fee. This both gives them an easy rental return while making land more useful without complicated development.
Level Playing Field: The fact is that Splinterlands is by far the most fun when you actually can play on a level playing field with your opponent. Only Skill and luck should be factors in who wins or who loses and not in most cases who paid more money to have the better cards. This should also be done with Max Level cards since those unlock the most Fun level of Splinterlands.
Play When You Want To Play!: This is what a new game mode should be about. We already have Modern Ranked where players are forced to play at least an hour each day. This insanely narrows the player base down to only those who can make it a full time job leaving out all casual players who just want to sit down and have some fun at times when they are able to.
Give All Cards 'Equal' Use Case: Right now many of the 670 cards have no use case in the game whatsoever and will never get to a point where old players ever get to enjoy them while older players can't get emotionally attached to them. In a new game mode, some cards should be almost forced upon players to be played. off course there should be an aspect of actual fun deck building in the new game mode and not just force players to use cards for the sake of giving them a use case.
Make it Easy and not Overly Complicated or Complex!: One of the selling points in the past for Splinterlands was that it was not too complicated of a game. However with more cards, more abilities, more game rules, SPS staking requirements, vouchers, ... it all became too overwhelming for new players and also for existing players I would argue. When you see some of the new abilities they have become just ridiculous especially in an age where people have the attention span of a gold fish.
No Bots or Battle Helpers Allowed: Splinterlands by far is the most fun when you play against human players instead of just facing bots who play nearly optimal. They showed that it can be done in Modern mode so this new game mode should exclusively be for human players only. I understand that it will be hard to fully ban 'cheaters' as some players naturally will be better. Another measure that can be taken to make sure poor players don't lose all their matches is to count an overall winning % and link players to opponents with a similar winrate. This would also make it so that better players get to play better opponents.
Make it Stream & Viewer Friendly: One of the key aspects for games to go viral and have many players coming in is when they are fun to watch. Right now, Splinterlands even for me as a player who understands all the rules is just not fun to watch. So one of the design choices for a new game mode should be that it has a structure so it can be streamed properly while viewers understand what is going on and get existed for the outcome.
No Major Investment requirements: Right now the entry cost for Splinterlands is either extremely expensive or overly complicated (renting). The new game mode should be as easy as new players initially buying a spellbook which includes 1 or more entry tickets for this game mode. Afterward there should be no SPS Staking requirements (even though a small discount would be nice for those who do have SPS Staked as an incentive)
Conclusion
More than anything, Splinterlands really needs a new game mode as there are enough cards available while many of them have become totally useless and unable to ever be enjoyed by new players. This new game mode could improve of the major flaws of ranked play putting players on a level playing field, allowing them to play at times that they want, Give all the cards a use case again, Making it easy to understand, banning all bots, making it nice for viewers to watch. And all this without the requirement for Major initial investment from players. All this could help to give both old cards and Land more use case. I will do some brainstorming to come up with some practical examples of what a new game mode could look like
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