Hello, this is CoinKo Team.
The project to cover in the second Play to Earn (P2E) feature is Splinterlands (SPS).
In the past, when interest in blockchain games was not high, Alien Worlds had hundreds of thousands of fixed users, and thanks to its popularity, it showed the potential to be listed through Binance’s Launchpool. This similar trend is also seen in Splinterland. As seen through Dapp Radar, Splinterland has topped the list by the number of users, and the trend of transactions shows to be quite high, so you can feel the growing popularity of the game. As a result, the price of Splintershards (SPS), a governance token in Splinterland, is also on the rise. It is worth observing whether this virtuous cycle between User and Value will continue.
1. The basic concept of the Slinterlands game
Splinterland is a Play 2 Earn strategy simulation card game that can be thought of as a combination of Hearthstone and Clash Royale. In other words, users organize decks by collecting cards or purchasing them in the market, and based on this, they compete between players.
2. How to play
(1) Game connection and basic setting explanation: Spellbook, Store, League
Connect your wallet after accessing the website https://splinterlands.com/ to play the game. Before starting the game, press the “Pack” tab of the store to purchase a spellbook.
The spellbook is a kind of a pass that allows you to receive daily quests and seasonal rewards. The price is $10, and it can be purchased through PayPal and other cryptocurrencies. Rewards can be paid with DEC tokens and items when daily quests are completed, and rewards can be received according to the scores every season lasting 15 days. At that time, you can change your rewards to SPS or other assets for cash out in the market.
Spellbook image
If you bought a spellbook, you can see that there are other tabs such as potions, dice, and skins at the store. Potion plays a role in increasing the probability of a certain grade when pulling out a card pack. Card packs are sold out, so you can’t buy them, and you can buy daily quest potions if you have enough money.
Skin image
Skin is not for purchasing cards, but for changing effects or illustrations on cards, so please be careful.
Image of the Store
Now purchase a spelling book and conduct a tutorial. In general, the game is played according to simple rules, and you can easily learn them by playing a few games in the tutorial. When the tutorial is completed, the competition will be held. At this time, daily quests and season scores will only be completed through competition. Daily quests appear in the same form as the image below. In general, it consists of the same conditions as “N wins in the competition with decks made up of specific summoners.”
-League
In the game, the league rank consists of beginners, bronze, silver, gold, diamonds, and champions depending on the score. Similar ranks will be matched and players will compete.
Image of league
- Collection power (CP)
At this time, there is a collection power (CP) in Splinterland, and it is a kind of limitation necessary to advance to the top league. This feature is designed to increase the collection in proportion to the player’s ability, and to limit the likelihood of experienced players with small collections getting the same rewards as players with decks.
As shown in the following figure, when each card is permanently incinerated, an incineration value called Dark Energy Crystal (DEC) is given, which varies depending on four factors: the card’s rarity, set and so on. The sum of these DECs means collection power (CP) and the player’s ability to collect.
Dark Energy Crystal (DEC) measuring the collection power
In the figure below, you can see the figures needed to move from the current bronze rank to the top league. About 1,000 CPs will cost about $400 as of September 30, 2021. You can buy a card to further strengthen the deck, so you can approach it from an initial investment perspective. If you enter the ‘Possession’ tab in the card box, you can see that the CP is as active as the current DEC of the entire card you have.
CP needed to go to the top league
(2) Competition play
When you click the battle button on the game screen, the following league scores load the status of exploring the appropriate opponent. If you press the cancellation of the match after the opponent is decided, it will mean “withdrawal,” and your score will be deducted, so please be careful.
Search for players to fight
When you click the ‘Accept’ button, the battle begins. Players organize decks using limited mana costs that vary from battle to battle. You will be given a time limit of 3 minutes, and you will have to configure the deck within that time. If you don’t press the battle button within 3 minutes, you will also be considered defeated because the game will be “abandoned”. Based on the deck combination learned in the tutorial, you will form your own deck in the ranking match, but with a position of “Tanker, Healer, AD carry, Assassin”, you will be able to play easily. If you win the match, you will get a score and a DEC. If you lose the game, your score will decrease.
If you win consecutive matches, you will receive additional DEC rewards and additional points. From three consecutive wins, the points rise by about 40, but there seems to be an upper limit on additional points. The additional DEC reward for eight consecutive wins was about +35%. On the other hand, in the case of consecutive losses, there was no additional effect of deducting points. Even if there is a difference in the league rank (e.g Bronze 1 vs Bronze 2), you can win if you organize the deck combination well, but if you invest money, you can stand above the well-organized deck.
(3) Seasonal rewards
If you leave the beginner and reach the Bronze, you will be able to receive seasonal rewards. At the end of the season, rewards are given depending on the tier achieved, which makes the level of collection power and league tier important. For example, in the case of Bronze 3, the number of spoils for seasonal compensation is 5, Bronze 2 increases up to 7, and Bronze 1 — up to 9. Currently, I’m Bronze 2, so the seasonal reward appears as seven trophies, and when you click the box, you will receive several items such as DEC, potion, and card, as shown in the picture on the right below. The cards you get as compensation can be sold in the market to get DEC or used for your deck combination.
Seasonal rewards
(4) Card rental
Splinterland has the ability to strengthen deck combinations by borrowing cards from the market. As shown in the picture below, you can rent a card using the DEC obtained from the battle, but you can also purchase or rent a card by using Credit (transition to Credit through SPS).
Image of card rental
3. Staking and Daily Reward
For SPS’ staking, a Metamask wallet with a Binance Smartchain (BSC) wallet address is required. After installing it, click the SPS icon in the upper right corner of the game to see the following SPS management screen.
Click Transfer at the bottom, set it to Binance Smart Chain, and enter the amount of SPS you want to send. Afterwards, if approved in the Metamask pop-up window, SPS will be deposited to the Splinterland game after 12 Confirmation. After the SPS has been successfully deposited into the game account, click the ‘Stake’ button. As of October 1st, the APR is 86%.
Management tab and daily rewards for SPS staking
- Precautions for staking
It is important to note that the staked SPS is linearly unsteaked at 25% every week, and it takes four weeks to unstake all of them. Steaking rewards are fixed at 7.5 million per month, and you will receive as much as you contribute to the staking pool.
- Daily Reward
Daily Reward Image
As the picture above shows, depending on various items such as CP and DEC holdings, DEC liquidity pool, and card pack, there is a possibility to get an airdrop every day. If you participate in the liquidity pool through DEC and other items that you get while playing the game, you can receive an additional share of the reward. Like staking, LP rewards consist of a variety of revenue sources, with 7.5 million reward pools fixed monthly, and about 6.2 million reward pools fixed monthly for land plots.
4. Investment strategy
Here we will separate the ‘Light User’ and ‘Heavy User’ categories in order to analyze the strategies.
- Light User: First of all, if you enjoy the game without an additional investment, you will win the match using the basic deck given in Bronze 3 Tier (tier that does not require power), and get daily rewards, seasonal rewards, and daily quest rewards through DEC. In the case of Bronze 3 Tier, you only need to score 100 points as a beginner, so you can settle on that tier by playing for the purpose of performing a daily quest.
- Heavy User: You have to invest time and money to play games in the elite league and see if your card deck can be competent in the high-end league confrontation. Use decks made by others in competitions through rentals, etc., or filter card decks by league on the leaderboard page to refer to other players’ cards and competitions. If the other person has a better or a more unique card, you can get more ideas on how to organize the deck.
5. Overall evaluation
Fun
★★★☆☆/★★★★★
It’s an ordinary quality card game, so it’s a well-made game for those who enjoy strategies. However, due to the characteristic nature of card games, some people may not like it.
Profits
★★☆☆☆/★★★★★ Stable return
★★★★☆/★★★★★ Probabilistic profit
For those who want fixed and stable returns, you can earn daily rewards and staking returns, but the rewards you get from the box are very probabilistic, so we’ll give two stars to those who want stable returns and four stars if you like probabilistic playing.
Error
★★★★★/★★★★★
There is no need to worry about gas fees because there is no transaction involved in fighting and ending. There were only three places where the gas fee was swapped and token deposited, so we gave it five stars due to a couple of errors.
6. Backer
Image of Crowdfunding at the Kickstart
Crowdfunding at the Kickstart raised about $200k with 334 backers.
As of 2021–10–05, the number of monthly users is 466k, and the volume is $544.64k.
※ Our content is intended to be used and must be used for information purposes only. It is very important to do your own analysis before making any investment based on your own personal circumstances.
