As I have now been playing "Splinterlands" for over TWO YEARS, 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, addiction science, geopolitics, forensics, law, guerilla warfare tactis, ethics, philosophy, accounting, ergonomics, investing, anger management, 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/upgrade some more Splinterlands cards and/or buy some more swap.btc ( #Bitcoin ) and/or swap.doge ( #Dogecoin ) . Also, feel free to hit me up on the battlefield.
1 ) There are so many DAMN cards I want to buy/upgrade, but my daily DEC earnings are limited. This is the reason why I am continuing to buy the (maximum) "three plots of land per month", with the hope that residual long-term earnings from those land plots will eventually increase my daily budget for buying cards into the future. Another of my goals, which I have been consistently implementing, is to stick to the "buy one gold card per day" strategy. An illustrative opportunity came along a few days ago to get a better metric of how effective this strategy actually is, in terms of increasingly my eligibility in the tournaments (which now consider your "collection power" (in the specific card editions which the tournament focuses on) to determine your eligibility to EVEN ENTER a specific tournament. To show this in action, you can see that in the recent "The Wealthy Gambit" tournament:
"The Wealthy Gambit" (Untamed Gold card edition tournament)
https://steemmonsters.com/?p=tournament&id=c923a46c45ba69e840ba3f79f7d149b32f5ec3a3
the "collection power" lower limit was stated as 880,950+ (collection power). At the time of first seeing this tournament requirement (around 12 hours before the tournament check-in time) I had 850,650 collection power, which is clearly below the eligibility requirement. So I decided to make my "one gold card per day" purchase a few hours early to see how much that would bump my collection power up toward the lower limit requirement of this tournament. You can see from the screenshots that the purchase of 1 x "Maggots" (Gold) - the card I am buying daily until I max it out in nine days) bumped my collection power up by 500 points --> 851,150 - 850,650 = 500 collection points. This was NOT enough to become eligible for this specific tournament, but it at least provides a ROUGH IDEA - a METRIC - of how far each daily gold card purchase is bringing me towards becoming eligible for these higher level tournaments over time. So in this specific case, 880,950 - 851,150 = 29,800 / 500/day = 59.6 days (or let's just round up and say that assuming I am able to continue purchasing ONE gold card (worth 500 collection power points per day) if I had tried to enter this tournament in 60 days (two months) from now I would have AT LEAST been eligible to enter. So you can see that this "buy one gold card per day" strategy DOES lead to benefits in the long term. Finally, since this tournament required a fee above 10 DEC ( 1,225 DEC in this case) it is OUTSIDE of my new rule of only spending a maximum of 10 DEC per tournament, to enter. However, you can also notice, from the screenshots, that at the time of taking the screenshot seven hours before check-in time, there were only 27 players signed up, but the lower limit (17-32nd place = 3,250 DEC winning) was 32nd place. This means that if no more than five more players had signed-up (and paid the 1,225 DEC entry fee for this tournament) then if I had AT LEAST BEEN ELIGIBLE to enter the tournament, the cost would be 1,225 DEC, but I would have AUTOMATICALLY placed and won at least 3,250 DEC (for 32nd place or above), and so 3,250 - 1,225 = 2,025 DEC. This would have been 2,025 of FREE DEC, just for BEING ELIGIBLE to enter the tournament! So this is one of the reasons why I have implemented the long-term "buy one gold card per day" strategy. When I did the above calculations I also considered what would happen if I used my ~ 5,000 remining in-game DEC to buy up ~ 5-6 additional "Maggot" gold cards (worth 500 collection points each), but that would have only brought me up around 2,000 collection power points, which is NOT at the low limit entry for this tournament. However, if I hadn't lost that 155,000 DEC last week (as a result of the 5,000 DEC tournament entry fee debacle) then 155,000 DEC / 800 DEC/card (using the "Maggots" gold as a benchmark) = ~ 194 gold card x 500 collection power points = 96,875 collection power points. Adding that 96,875 to the 851,150 = 948,025 collection power points WOULD HAVE put me above the tournament entry fee. So this is an EXCELLENT illustration of the REASON why it is IDEAL to have a reserve of DEC, as if I hadn't lost that 155,000 DEC last week I could have just gone ahead and purchased enough Untamed gold cards to be eligible for this tournament, and earn the 2,025 of free DEC -- that is, assuming no more than five additional players sign up for this tournament before check-in time. Just something to think about. [UPDATE] At the time of check-in for this tournament there were only 29 checked in players, so INDEED, if I had had enough collection power points then JUST ENTERING this tournament would have earned me a free 2,025 DEC -- that is, assuming I didn't place at any of the OTHER higher levels, which would have paid out more.
2 ) Since the previous post in this series I have spent some time monitoring the news related to the Gamestock debacle, daily price changes of DOGE and Bitcoin, and meditated on the larger socio-economic geopolitical situation we are now facing, and come up with a strategy TWEAK which I believe will be most effective going forward. One of my MAIN concerns right now is that we are beginning to see general "capital controls" being put into place, and my concern is that if I continue buying Bitcoin, and possibly Dogecoin, that sending any of my DEC/Hive value out of the Splinterlands game sphere to external wallets may ultimately end up with me LOSING those external funds if those external wallets are frozen. The good news is that I was, again, PROPHETIC in taking ALL of my crypto value out of #Coinbase 2-3 months ago, as since then they have locked me out of my account (using the "We need more info before you can access your account...") reasoning. This is ONE form of "capital control" which, if I hadn't acted in line with my INTUITION, would have made my "one tract of land" purchase during the land pre-sale IMPOSSIBLE (as I sent my remaining BTC out of Coinbase to buy the tract). Another form of "capital control" we may see increasing is the type which happened with #Robinhood this past week. That is, my concern is that if I start buying Dogecoin every week going forward there may come a time when they shut off the ability to buy more, and I would then only be able to sell it (that is, of course, ASSUMING that my Doge wallet does not SIMULTANEOUSLY lock me out of my account). This applied the same for my current Bitcoin (swap.btc) buys. This is one reason I have decided to PARTIALLY break my boycott against 
So, as a result of this, I have decided to start using the Hive and HBD income from these posts to buy BOTH swap.btc AND swap.doge using #hive-engine. I have chosen to use the Hive/HBD income for these purchases because that requires the LEAST number of transactions from Hive to Doge and/or Hive to Bitcoin. That is, it requires JUST ONE transaction for each, and therefore minimizes loss from each additional transaction. My plan is to ALSO hold on to the swap.btc and swap.doge within Hive-Engine for as long as possible. That is, I will keep those tokens AS CLOSE as possible within the ecosystem so that I can convert them back to Hive (and then DEC) EASILY if I decide to do so. If I need those funds for survival expenses in the future then I can send them to external BTC and/or Doge wallets and then liquidate (online or offline) via several potential channels I have already set up for that. Finally, as I showed in the previous post in this series, I believe Dogecoin has an ESPECIALLY significant uptrend potential, and at the still low cost of ~ $0.05 USD/Doge I think it will be best to focus MORE of my Hive income on buying up that token right now, as the cost relative to Hive is so low that it makes this more lucrative if Doge continues shooting up into the future - for instance, if I have a Doge holding of 1,000 DOGE I could convert 100 DOGE at a time back to hive and then DEC to buy more cards if/when DOGE goes up significantly. In other words, it's just more motivating to be able to buy 100 Doge with my weekly Hive income, as opposed to 0.00001 Bitcoin. I can always also exchange some of the swap.doge for swap.btc. Let's see how things play out going forward. For now, this is a sound, actionable plan for the longer term.
3 ) My strategy of limiting my daily purchase of cards to "one gold card per day" (with my DEC earned through battling) is achieving the main purpose of allowing me to continue building my gold card collection power, and decks, AS WELL AS save up enough DEC (above the cost of each daily gold card) to buy the 2-3 plots of land per month (for 15k DEC each) from my guild leader. It seems at this point that I can ALMOST SURELY earn the 30k DEC per month for TWO plots, but it IS ALSO possible - if I get lucky and play hard - to get enough DEC together to buy the maximum three plots. In terms of the "two plots per month" goal I have figured it would be best to CALIBRATE the purchase with the closure of each season, as that is when I get the nice BUMP in DEC via the season dumps. So this is the goal at this juncture - which is basically in line with my original goal of purchasing one plot on the 1st of each month, and the second plot on the 15th of each month. The potential third plot can be purchased at any time during the month. Also, I am continuing to keep track of the speed at which the retail $20 USD land plots of selling, and the general pace right now indicates that there will be enough pots available at full retail to likely get through AT LEAST the rest of the year. If not, I already have 3 x 12 = 36 plots locked in at the 15k DEC per plot rate.
4 ) I've been keeping pace with listening to the official Splinterlands AMAs, and the sense of community, transparency, and information shared in those is providing a consistent motivation to stay abreast of opportunities in the game, the nature of the development (and timeframes) of developing features, and a sense of belonging to a solid community of SMART crypto people who are working on a SOLID project with focus and competence. I urge ALL serious players to try to consume these AMAs, as they will help keep you motivated during "rough" and/or "stagnant" periods. Here's the most recent one:
Splinterlands AMA - February 5th, 2021
5 ) Okay. As I did in the all previous posts 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...
Starting DEC : 4,051 DEC
Starting Capture Rate : ~ 72.50%
Ending DEC - 6,329 DEC
Ending Capture rate : 73.37%
Balance = DEC Earning = 2,278 DEC = 11.68 HIVE x ~ $00.147 USD/Hive = ~ $1.72 USD
Spent :
1 x "Giant Scorpion" (Gold - Level 3 - $0.63 USD - 782 DEC -- one (1) card remaining to Level 10 (max))
earned 680.073 DEC from sale of "Warrior of Peace" gold card (from recent rewards dump) on the market
Daily Quest (yesterday's "neutral" quest) - Boo-Yeah!
keepers -
1 x "Axemaster" (Gold - Level 2 - $24.50 USD - 10,000 DEC -- totally BITCHIN' as I had a Level 1 of this card, but this new gold version is at Level 2 automatically. The non-gold version was selling for $4.00 USD earlier in the week, but is now down to $1.60 USD, so I will try playing the Level 2 gold card and then possibly buy the three additional cards needed to bump the non-gold version up to Level 2 over the next week or two. This is a very good card.
1 x "Almo Cambio" (non-gold (legendary) - Level 1 - $5.50 USD - 1,000 DEC)
(+) 10 DEC
nonkeepers -
(+) 10 DEC
potions - 1 legendary potions, 2 alchemy/gold potions
Untamed - 0 packs
DEC - 1,331 DEC
Daily Quest (today's "fire" quest)
Notes: completed one (of five) battles. Will finish the remaining four tomorrow.
Starting DEC : 5,550 DEC
Starting Capture Rate : ~ 75.00%
Ending DEC - 6,548 DEC
Ending Capture rate : 74.64%
Balance = DEC Earning = 998 DEC = 4.835 HIVE x ~ $00.150 USD/Hive = ~ $0.72 USD
Spent :
1 x "Giant Scorpion" (Gold - Level 3 - $0.63 USD - 762 DEC -- bumped up to Level 10 (max))
Daily Quest (yesterday's "fire" quest)
keepers -
(+) 200 DEC
nonkeepers -
(+) 30 DEC
potions - 3 legendary potions, 1 alchemy/gold potions
Untamed - 0 packs
DEC - 103 DEC
Daily Quest (today's "fire" quest)
keepers -
1 x "Nightmare"" (Gold - Level 3 - $1.40 USD - 500 DEC)
(+) 40 DEC
nonkeepers -
(+) 20 DEC
potions - 3 legendary potions, 4 alchemy/gold potions
Untamed - 1 packs
DEC - 75 DEC
Starting DEC : 5,786 DEC
Starting Capture Rate : ~ 83.12%
Ending DEC - 6,636 DEC
Ending Capture rate : 67.16%
Balance = DEC Earning = 1,200 DEC = 5.391 HIVE x ~ $00.166 USD/Hive = ~ $0.89 USD
Spent :
1 x "Maggots" (Gold - Level 3 - $0.75 USD - 850 DEC -- ten (10) cards remaining to Level 10 (max))
Daily Quest (today's "water" quest)
keepers -
1 x "Nightmare"" (Gold - Level 3 - $1.33 USD - 500 DEC - bumped up to Level 4 (to increase "health" from "+10" to "+11"))
(+) 40 DEC
nonkeepers -
(+) 40 DEC
potions - 4 legendary potions, 2 alchemy/gold potions
Untamed - 0 packs
DEC - 123 DEC
Starting DEC : 5,786 DEC
Starting Capture Rate : ~ 81.80%
Ending DEC - 10,468 DEC
Ending Capture rate : 72.00%
Balance = DEC Earning = 4,682 DEC = 22.564 HIVE x ~ $00.156 USD/Hive = ~ $3.52 USD
Spent :
1 x "Maggots" (Gold - Level 3 - $0.74 USD - 878 DEC -- nine (9) cards remaining to Level 10 (max))
earned 440.297 DEC for sale of "Mother Khala" (non-gold) card on the market
Daily Quest (today's "earth" quest)
keepers -
1 x "Barking Spider" (Gold - Level 3 - $0.51 USD - 500 DEC -- three cards remaining to Level 7)
(+) 00 DEC
nonkeepers -
(+) 00 DEC
potions - 3 legendary potions, 5 alchemy/gold potions
Untamed - 0 packs
DEC - 2,997 DEC
Starting DEC : 9,590 DEC
Starting Capture Rate : ~ 79.82%
Ending DEC - 10,479 DEC
Ending Capture rate : 67.01%
Balance = DEC Earning = 889 DEC = 4.284 HIVE x ~ $00.157 USD/Hive = ~ $0.67 USD
Spent :
1 x "Maggots" (Gold - Level 3 - $0.74 USD - 931 DEC -- eight (8) cards remaing to Level 10 (max))
Daily Quest (today's "fire" quest)
keepers -
1 x "Robo-Dragon Knight" (non-gold (legendary) - Level 1 - $1.98 USD - 1,000 DEC -- bumped up to Level 2 (to increase "melee" from "+3" to "+4" and add "piercing" ability)
1 x "Spirit Druid Grog" *(non-gold (legendary) - Level 1 - $1.00 USD - 1,000 DEC --
(+) 10 DEC
nonkeepers -
(+) 80 DEC
potions - 5 legendary potions, 1 alchemy/gold potions
Untamed - 0 packs
DEC - 180 DEC
Untamed (Milestone pack for reaching "Diamond I" season level -> + 10 loot chests --> + 60 season loot chests))
keepers -
1 x "Elven Defender" (Gold - Level 3 - $0.59 USD - 500 DEC -- one (1) card remaining to Level 5)
(+) 00 DEC
non-keepers -
(+) 70 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