Well, it's classic narcissism behavior, being good to some to get a free pass to bully others.

It's quite clear how Splinterlands is playing out for those who buy assets (especially from sales), no new players are coming in (why would they?) to keep prices from falling further, and the money that comes in just goes to dev salaries while DEC is constantly being recirculated into the system making the entire flywheel just a myth. Something fundamentally needs to change, but for that to happen, the devs their paychecks need to be at risk which only happens when the few whales that are left give up leaving the entire game dead in the water.

I might be a bit too bearish though :)