Good morning Splinterfriends and Soulkeepers!
It has been a hot minute since I wrote anything about Soulkeep!
In fact... let me look back through my posts real quick... hop in the handy time travel pod...
BUTTERY CRUMPETS MY GOOD LADS IT HAS BEEN QUITE A SPELL!!
It seems my last Soulkeep Post was TWO MONTHS ago on Jan 14th!!
Here it is - a guide to help players earn more points, advance quicker and take home some bigger prizes: Enter Time Travel Pod At Your Own Risk
Ok, after you go check out the previous article and return from your sojourn through History please let me know in these comments if it helped you in Soulkeep!
Today I want to talk about what has changed since then and how the game is progressing... but before we do, I'd like to make my stance on this game very clear:
I like Tower Defense Games, I like the concept, I thought it would be cool as pitched and tied into Splinterlands...
The game is fun, enjoyable but a bit repetitious... from what I've heard that's pretty similar to how Splinterlands started and look at it now!!
However, I've made some new friends, had a blast with competition, earned some Rewards and ultimately... want to see this game SUCCEED...
I have played since Day 3, enjoy the evolving game but also do not hesitate to point out things as an avid player that need to be addressed/fixed/improved and will be vocal with both criticism and praise.
When Soulkeep Launched in June of last year, it was pandemonium... Chaos... it was FUN... it was FRUSTRATING... it was SUPER BUGGY... all in all... it was NEW and that was EXCITING!
Despite the crashes, the issues, the "cheats" like "Persistent Spells" and tricks that some of the creative players learned like "Spawn Locking"... despite all this... it was FUN.
There were bumps of course - an unannounced tripling of Ticket Price... which was met with huge animosity by the community in Discord... Patches... Patches... MORE PATCHES... a Reset, the Russian Mafia and so many things... it was like a bar fight turned brawl
Unfortunately, it was like carrying a pot of chili...
Or perhaps trying to drink a pitcher of water?
Or a Cougar downing her beer before the prowl?
Basically - every time there was a bump... more players were spilled (lost)... and many didn't come back.
Then... with the rise of the Multi-Accounts aka Russian Mafia, Gel0, Arkay and a few others... it became an exodus.
Combined with a flawed "Reward System" where ALL Rewards for a League were distributed IF at least ONE PERSON was in that League...
So if there were 0 Players in League 10... League 10 was closed and no one earned those rewards...
When ONE Player advanced to League 4 or League 7 or League 10... They earned ALL the Rewards for that League... When Alex reached League 10 this became a major Red Flag... because of how much they were earning and there was a MASSIVE barrier to entry for all other players due to the "patches"... how much did they earn???
This led to a halting of Rewards due to that issue, gatekeeping by Double Coconut's "patches" - intentionally or not, it created a pretty screwed up scenario that resulted in a time where Soulkeep lost it's SPS Rewards.
Agreements were reached and I lobbied my ass off to get things fixed, turn the Rewards back on and let those of us who remained, get back to enjoying a Tower Defense Game on Hive!
This culminated back with the Re-Launch of Soulkeep Tournaments and the "No Multi Account Policy"... which has been mostly good?
So... how are things now?? Have they trimmed out the Multi Accounters? Have they improved the game? Have they satisfied everyone?
Oh - here's the actual link to my previous article... To be fair...
I DID warn you about "Enter Time Travel Pod at your own risk"... 🤣🤣🤣
@captaindingus/top-tips-to-help-new-and-old-players-earn-some-nice-rewards-in-soulkeep
Ok - on to what has happened over the last two months...
You know... I haven't typed a lot about Soulkeep lately... in fact, I haven't written anything about it in two months... that's partly my fault... apologies.
But one final time... let's review what happened in December/January:
The Great Reset - everyone was reset back to League 1, no Souls, no Soulboxes... this was a BIG OL' BOUNCE and I think we lost as many Players here as we lost Multi Accounters... and we lost some of the big players too... ☠️
After the Great Reset... it was a mad dash out the gate to reach higher Leagues and Higher Rewards:
There were several miscommunications here but it mostly started okay and players stratified themselves by several different methods:
First - who was willing to throw down the big bucks advanced faster...
For some, the exponential price curve of Tournament Entries was a barrier to entry and many couldn't/wouldn't justify the expense of buying 2, 5, 10 Entries - even at lower leagues (this is a mistake btw... you MUST THROW DOWN EARLY WHILE IT'S CHEAP)
In addition, people who bought Soulboxes could use them to advance quicker - there was an "issue" where certain players who "magically always seemed to have things work in their favor"... knew they could buy Soulboxes after the Reset... but before the game launched... this gave them 3 days of Soulboxes that others didn't buy... which may not seem like a lot... but it was... inconsequential at this point... but shitty and shady by those involved.
Those who spent more, played more, earned more Souls and naturally... Advanced Faster
Second - Skill played an important part in this stratification too. Those who knew the maps, who knew how to use the Spells like Soulful properly and were willing to sacrifice Leaderboard Position today... for League Position tomorrow... found themselves at the front of the pack.
Third - after these front runners came a group of seasoned vets and behind them the casual players and multi accounters... wait... I thought they were BANNED???
Nope... we had to submit tickets... lots of tickets... SO MANY TICKETS...
They were Reported/Reviewed/Removed... but for some odd reason... Double Coconut didn't publish a "Wall of Shame"... despite how many times we asked... and said they wanted to keep that info Private... on a PUBLIC BLOCKCHAIN?
That doesn't make a lot of sense but whatever... not worth griping about.
Ok... so they made all these changes... now what... How many "Players" are left... and what do the Leagues look like today... ok well Yesterday to be specific...
Total Open Leagues: 9 of 10
Total Players: 139
So with all that data... let me just say... you can rent everything you need to play competitively up to League 5 or so... for PENNIES... the most expensive thing you'd need to rent is the Hero Celene and they are ~80 DEC/day...
You could LITERALLY rent all the cards needed to play... all the way up to League 5 for about... 185 DEC/day...
All in all - the cost of playing is EXTREMELY LOW... The earning potential is VERY HIGH... but for some... it just doesn't excite them... it's not their thing and that's ok!
So... it seems things are pretty good... despite the low player base... but are they?
My current observations, thoughts and issues with this game mostly revolve around Double Coconut...
There have been a number of suggestions from the community... you know... those who "pay" for the tickets n stuff to play the game...
These are often met with "Yeah we can't do that". By often... I'm pretty sure every suggestion I've ever made has been dismissed...
I don't know much about coding or the Dev Team but I know enough to have some hypothesis on how to improve gameplay, using existing code, so it shouldn't require much time/effort/expense... like...
"Make the Spells draggable once placed, like Celene... since I know that code exists... just copy paste!"
DC:
But that's ok - maybe it is that easy... maybe it isn't... who knows?
Their reasoning was "OH YEAH?!?! How do you assign priority to which spell moves when they're stacked??? IT'S NOT JUST COPY PASTE"...
To which the answer is... Last Placed, First Moved... or have a "Lock Button"... or... Last moved/placed spell has priority and double clicking switches spells... or...
Please note: that's not how they replied in Discord... it was kinda like that but slightly less snarky...
Which brings me to the biggest issues facing Soulkeep...
- The players have stratified and not much movement happening with League advancement
- The Tournaments are super repetitive using the same maps
- The Random Rulesets make it a lotto and many players only play once now - ESPECIALLY Leagues 8/9 with VERY EXPENSIVE Tournament Prices: 652 Tickets for the second attempt in League 9 = 2,608 DEC!
- Probably the biggest issue... the deafening silence of DC in the Soulkeep Discord.
They used to be readily active in Discord but now we can go WWEKS without any update or contact... unless someone like Dave, Clay or Tofu poke them...
Overall... the game is still fun to play but getting a bit stale... but it would be better to see the upper level maps in rotation more in the higher leagues...
I mean, I'm in League 9 and I just played "Sharp Defense" which is a League 1 Map... I want to play the League 7/8/9 Maps lol... I don't want to play League 1/2 Maps...
We know DC uses WEIGHTED RNG... so WEIGHT THE MAP ROTATION and let us play some Upper League Maps... in the Upper Leagues!!
It would also be nice to see more game modes, varying tower positions, better/smoother gameplay stuff like the "Spell Reposition" and overall more communication...
As far as we know... Double Coconut has just left the Servers on and are on vacation lol
Literally a MONTH in between updates... and they weren't really updates... just more like an Update in January... and two FYI's lol
I'd really like to see this game grow... but I don't think too much is happening "behind the curtain"...
I'm going to keep playing and starting this week... I'm going to start writing fairly comprehensive Walkthroughs... maybe like once a week... dunno, I want to help...
I like the game... it's fun... but... it doesn't seem that anyone actually cares... which is sad because it has a lot of potential.
That's all I have for you today folks!! Thank you for reading and I would LOVE for you to join me in game!!
Naturally, after everything leading up to this moment, I believe Splinterlands is one of the BEST web3 games out there!
It brings the #play2earn feature to the forefront of development as well as many opportunities for people to earn rewards - whether Player or Investor!!
If you're interested in the future of gaming, it's worth checking out!
You can sign up here: Splinterlands
Cheers 🍻,
- CaptainDingus
#Splinterlands #Soulkeep #Hive #play2earn #web3 #NFTGaming #Rebellion #Conflicts #SurvivalMode #ArcadeColony