It can be a bit tempting to own all our Splinterlands cards but that may not be the most cost optimal solution. The rental market has been around for a while now but sometimes can feel a little neglected.
Let's say you want to improve your battle results. You need better cards - should you buy or rent?
Rebellion Legendaries Comparison
Here are some of the new Rebellion Legendary cards. As you can see, rentals are available from as low as $0.0007 a day. How would that compare to the resale market?
The cheapest legendary Rebellion card is going for around $4 which is quite a bit more than what you can rent them for. I put this table together for a quick comparison:
| Card Name | Rental Price / Day | Resale Price | Payback Period |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chaos Golem | $0.0007 | $4.05 | 5,785 days |
| Rush Townsend | $0.0014 | $5.70 | 4,071 days |
| Risqruel Drath | $0.0013 | $16.97 | 13,053 days |
| Endura Brune | $0.0009 | $4.50 | 5,000 days |
| Daarg Deadblast | $0.0032 | $19.50 | 6,093 days |
The above table shows a couple of legendary Rebellion card rental and purchase prices. As you can see, the cost effective strategy is to rent cards in order to build your deck.
Now, if more people were to decide to rent cards, this may no longer hold true. But at the moment, the rental market seems to be neglected.
What's the strategy for newbies?
For anyone starting to play Splinterlands today, I'd tell them to first buy as much SPS as they can. This gets them started on the rewards ladder. Next, i'd advise them not to buy any cards unless they particularly like the artwork or something. Instead, rent all the cards that you need to build a good deck.
The other advantage of renting is that if a card doesn't fit your strategy, it will return to its owner after the rental period.