Splinterlands has a diverse economy that provides players with opportunity markets on primary, secondary, and tertiary levels. These markets provide different game assets with competitive prices and some of them also offer players to either lend their cards or rent other players' cards.
The recent changes through various updates have changed the course of Splinterlands in the way it had previously been played. The new reward system has forced players to either own new cards or rent some if they don't immediately buy desired cards.
The change has introduced a reward mechanism based on the "Reward Shares" or simply R-Shares, in simple words Rshares of a player are based on the owned/rented or starter cards used in a battle, and if a player wants to have 100% Rshares, he must not use "Starter Cards" in any battle to achieve better focus and reward points.
The Rental Philosophy
If I can't buy a home for living I'll rent an apartment and enjoy the same benefits as I would have enjoyed on my own, or if I had no personal source to commute, I would go for either an Uber ride or use a public transport. Similar cases apply to Splinterlands rental system, where a player who can't afford to buy looks towards the rental market for game cards to use them for a limited time and retain some collection power to achieve better leagues.
Since Rental is a contractual obligation between 2 parties, it has certain limitations, a player can have as many rented cards as he wants, but there is always a time limit and both players are free to cancel the rental agreement anytime they wish so, once canceled by either party, at the end of ongoing rental contract no further rental period will trigger to continue for the remaining contract periods. Thus, the renter will lose all the benefits of a card he was enjoying while the card had remained in the contract period.
I can say that this lending and renting mechanism works like a real-life situation, and it is just a known economic format that is being replicated in the game to provide players with a convenient market.
Splinterlands is a kind of game where one cannot become a rich player by playing a few games, as I said earlier this game has a diverse economy, which means it keeps rewarding once the player uses its diverse features, such as buying and selling cards and other in-game assets, lending card to other players, strengthening acquaintances with delegating cards, or participating in SPS governance to receive daily yields through staking.
The need for a strong rental system is an essential economical perspective for a player who cannot own all cards at once but struggles to grow his portfolio by playing in ranked battles with rented cards.
The growth in this game also requires a player to keep a balance between earnings and expenditures, this requires a planned approach for a profitable portfolio, a player should spend no more than the DEC rewards he earned in a day or a season unless he is quite confident that any additional spending may bring more profits than what is being invested.
New Reward System Effects on The Rentals
The Rshare craze has boosted Splinterlands rental economy, players who were able to receive season and daily focus rewards with Starter cards via the old reward system are now moving to the rental markets to increase their Rshares and points.
Many players, especially new ones, are still not feeling comfortable as they are confused with the reward system and it requires them to spend more on purchases and rentals. It might take a little bit of time to understand the game and its reward system for new players.
Some players are unhappy about the 2-Day rental period, which is currently on a 1-day rental minimum. This approach will not only increase rental prices but also leads to a scarcity of cards that have limited quantity in the market. Lenders may not take benefit from daily rental price changes. It is suggested that this update should be halted for the sake of players' integrity.
Remarks
It is obvious that the rental economy is the key factor of a player's growth be it a renter or a lender both are making rental supply and demand balanced. Since this economy is completely between players, Splinterlands should keep it as decentralized as it can be to benefit their growth.
It is also recommended to incentivize players who rent cards for longer periods, and that incentive should be a payback in terms of a rental discount or a yield in DEC according to the card's CP.
That's it for now, if you have any feedback, please provide it in the comments section.
My previous post was about R-Shares, if you like to learn more about R-Shares, please click the link below.
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