Welcome to another weekly update on my attempt to challenge the Splinterlands ranked leagues! Initially it was a self challenge, to see how far I could get with the initial set of cards plus whatever I could win. But, that kind of fell apart around week 30 (with the game integrating with the WAX network and users being able to buy and sell cards on Atomic Hub).
There's quite a lot going on in Splinterlands right now. They just released their new Splintershards (SPS) token on the Binance Smart Chain network, which is going to eventually be used for all sorts of things related to the game. Nothing is really set in stone, though the primary use will be for future voting on changes to the game.
I had hoarded a million Dark Energy Crystals (DEC) for their air drop points, which combined with my collection means I'm getting about 200 SPS a day. The total supply is going to be 6 billion SPS, distributed through various means. They added a new screen into the game itself, where you can claim the airdrops and transfer this token in and out of the game.
Right now it seems more monetarily focused, with no game related utility yet.There is also an upcoming expansion to the Brawls and combat UI. Since I got into Monster Mavericks, I was able to participate on the QA server. They gave me 11 million fake DEC to spend on the test server, and with prices the way they are it cost me about 5 million to get a maxxed out Silver league deck. To be fair, I did buy quite a few cards that were over Silver league level, but I was pretty far from a full Gold or higher set.
The new Arena match screen from when I was testing.
The new battle screen, where you can see the summoner buffs on their icons.I probably should have done a separate post to just talk about the arena changes, but I haven't had the time with trying to play two accounts (and real life)! Also, these changes are still in testing and may be changed again before they go live. Anyhow, I'll write some more at the end, but here's my usual weekly updates:
Daily Quest Rewards:
Daily Quest # 325 - Win 5 with Death… rerolled to Win 5 with Water. For completing this daily quest, I got 31 DEC (11 + 13 + 7) and a Legendary potion.
Daily Quest # 326 - Win 5 with Life. For completing this daily quest, I got a Legendary potion, a Gold potion, 6 DEC, and a 2nd copy of Kretch Tallevor (the epic Dragon summoner)!
With the air drop of SPS about to start, I spent some of the WAX I still had to pick up 3 more copies of the epic Life monster card, Evangelist. They were the best deal on the market at the time, for how much WAX I still had kicking around.
I combined Evangelist cards to level it up to 2.Daily Quest # 327 - Win 5 with Water. For completing this daily quest, I got a Gold potion; a 7th copy of Evangelist; a 15th copy of the common Fire monster card, Charlok Minotaur; and a 21st copy of the common Death card, Phantasm.
Daily Quest # 328 - Win 5 with Fire. For finishing this daily quest, I got a Legendary potion; a 22nd copy of the common Death card, Phantasm; an 8th copy of the common Earth monster card, Harvester; and a 3rd copy of the legendary Life monster card, Bila The Radiant!
I thought Bila The Radiant would be the best card I got this season, then my alt account got a Gold Foil Kretch Tallevor!
Daily Quest # 329 - Win 5 with Sneak. For completing this daily quest, I received 17 DEC (12 + 5), a Gold potion, and a 16th copy of Charlok Minotaur.
Daily Quest # 330 - Win 5 with Life. For completing this daily quest, I got 13 DEC; a Gold potion; a Legendary potion; and a 10th copy of the common Water monster card, Demented Shark.
Daily Quest # 331 - Win 5 with Dragon. This being the last day of the season, I moved up into Gold III for the extra daily reward. I got 78 DEC (52 + 26); a 10th copy of the rare Death monster card, Grim Reaper; a 17th copy of Charlok Minotaur; and a 26th copy of the common Death monster card, Nightmare.
I also opened pack 18 out of the 50 that I had gotten several months back. It was pretty decent with 3 rare cards, one of which was a summoner! Also as an aside, at the end of the season, my Investygator rental account had gotten over 50 potions as rewards!
Tournaments:
Thursday Bronze Blunderbuss, no legendary cards, Untamed set only tournament: I went 8-3 on the first day, having a generally less than stellar performance this week. I finished 15-7 to come in 28th place to win 200 DEC.
Saturday Bronze Sit-N-Go: @Stealthtrader has been putting on small real time tournaments irregularly for quite some time now. I won this one to pick up 1,000 DEC!
Sunday Bronze Blunderbuss, no legendary cards, all sets tournament: I went 9-2 on the first day, so slightly better than the last Bronze Blunderbuss. But, still finished 15-7 to come in 35th place for 196 DEC.
I also played in a couple of @MarcusWahl's Bronze tournaments, but didn't do particularly well and got knocked out in early rounds. Either because of renting being added to the game, or just players with larger collections entering, the competition has become a lot tougher when legendary cards and summoners are available.
Guild Brawls:
Guild Brawl #25, playing Gold foil Bronze, Untamed set only. I got three matches this time around. The guild also came in third place once again, which seems to be how we usually end up.
Vs BENNYONETWO of Digitspin FuriousChickens
Vs WINNINGSTREAK of Team Possible S Force
OMNIJA of The 420 Syndicate failed to submit a deck, so I won by default.
From beta testing the Brawls in the QA server, there are also new Gladiator cards that will be coming out. You can play only one in a battle, but they are very strong cards. You can only get them by earning Merits from participating in Brawls, and then spending those to buy a new type of Gladiator pack.
The Rest:
Well, the price of DEC briefly went up over 1,000 DEC = $7, which made card prices in terms of DEC drop significantly. I mentioned last week that I had sold my few Alpha cards when this happened at the start of the jump in prices. I managed to take advantage of this myself to pick up a few more cards.
You can see the DEC price drop dramatically for the same dollar pricing.I spent about 120,000 DEC all told. In my initial buying spree I mainly looked for deals to improve my ability to play in higher leagues. I picked up a max level Daria Dragonscale (Dragon summoner), a Level 6 Alpha Zintar Mortalis (Death summoner), a Level 6 Alpha Tyrus Paladium (Life summoner), a Level 5 Alpha Rexxie (Earth monster), a Level 5 Pyre (Untamed Fire summoner), a Level 5 Bortus (Untamed Water summoner), and a Level 2 Qid Yuff (Dice Fire summoner)! This makes my summoner collection a bit more viable to play in Silver league, once I get some higher level monsters.
This spree did negatively impact my air drop points, which was the main reason I had been holding onto DEC. However, my next buying spree was when Gold Foil cards started to be priced for less than their DEC burn value - or, air drop point value. To try to clarify, I was buying cards for about 2,000 DEC that I could burn to get back 2,000 DEC. I think that the cards will hold their value longer, as DEC will eventually drop back down towards the intended 1,000 = $1.
For Gold Foils, I picked up 8 copies of Centauri Mage, a Silvershield Sheriff, and a Level 3 Child of The Forest. Historically, prices on WAX have been higher than on the in-game market, but with card prices skyrocketing I found few instances where this wasn't the case. I sold off my Alien Worlds mining gear, which wasn't really paying out anymore, and picked up 2 copies of Kralus, a legendary Life monster card, and a Two Gun Pete, a legendary Water card. I resold one of the Kralus cards, which paid for all three.
I tried to run my rental account, Investygator, up to Diamond, but got stuck in Gold I. I got close to diamond a couple of times, but lost several matches due to Hive node issues causing me to be unable to submit teams and things I was renting out getting cancelled. I did continue to have pretty good luck with daily rewards, picking up another Gold Foil Silvershield Sheriff from a chest!
Here were the season rewards from both accounts:
On my main account, I got a third Kretch Tallevor and a Gold Foil Ant Miners!
Investygator got a lot of cards, but nothing too exciting.It's been very time consuming trying to keep up with playing two accounts! I haven't entered my rental account into any tournaments, and just trying to keep up with what I still have rented out is a lot of work. The extra rewards are pretty nice, but at some point I think I'll need to try to find someone else that wants to play it.
My plan for the upcoming season is to continue to hang out in Silver on my main account and maybe push into Gold again on my rental account. A lot of what I had rented out is expiring, so I'll need to extend it. Cancelled rentals with things being relisted at ten times the price has also been an issue.
I feel like most of the topics I've touched on with the game could be their own article, and maybe I'll expand on them if I get time! If there's anything in particular that anyone would like me to go into my thoughts on, please leave me a note in the comments! And, if you made if this far, thank you for reading!
Bad form to cancel your rental just to up the price, but it’s dog eat dog at the moment.
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