WHY SHOULD YOU BUY CARDS INSTEAD OF RENTING POWER?
Today I want to discuss the choices and tradeoffs of buying cards and investing directly into owning assets in Splinterlands. Frogdynasty here and I have been playing Splinterlands since last September and I am blown away by how fun and rewarding this game can be.
Since I have started out on my Splinterlands journey, I have met a lot of positive players and content creators out there that are very bullish on this game long term and are very generous in spreading their wealth of knowledge about strategy and market analysis. However, there are also a people out there that are skeptical and some that throw around FUD without breaking down their reasoning or skepticism. I see a lot of comments about how high the cost of entry is to owning your own cards in order to get to a league of play where you are actually earning rewards. When in reality that number is way lower than they claim and also lower than other play to earn games such as Axie.
I want to break down the cost of purchasing a water deck and supplemental dragon deck in order to get enough collection power for silver 3, as well as the added long term benefits of owning these assets.
For our water deck, we have a maxed out Silver league Vera at level 4 which allows us to utilize max level monsters for the silver league level caps. Vera also gives all monsters the snare ability which is a gamechanger for the earthquake ruleset and can also help with making flying monsters easier to hit.
Price: 100 usd / CP:1000
For our tank, I chose a level 4 gold foil demented shark for his inspire ability and the bonus to DEC earnings from the gold foil. Demented Shark's inspire when synergized with our sneak monsters make for short work of our opponents back line.
Price: 18 usd / CP:1000
Another water tank that cost less mana and ideal for the little league rule set is a Level 5 Gold Foil Cruel Sethropod .
Price: 8.80 usd / CP:625
Capitalizing on our Demented Shark's inspire ability, Flying Squid (level 5) is a solid option in the second position with its reach ability.
Price: 7.80 usd / CP:300
Our next two monsters specialize in magic and can bypass enemy armor. In addition, Venari Wavesmith (level 4) gives armor to allies and Djinn Oshannus (level 2) is a seondary tank or main tank if facing an opposing team that also utilizes magic. His void and Phase abilities help keep him alive throughout the battle.
Price: 7 usd / CP:500
Price: 27 usd / CP:1500
Our only ranged unit for this water deck is a level 4 Gold Foil Angelic Mandarin which has Triage and can heal your back line when they take damage from either sneak, snipe, opportunity or taunt.
Price: 22.83 usd / CP:2000
To round off our water deck we have Pelacor Bandit at level 5 with the flying and sneak ability, making him harder to hit and when paired with Demented Shark, devastating to your opponents back line units.
Price: 3.60 usd / CP:300
To supplement your Silver League Deck I also selected a few Dragon monsters along with a maxed out Silver league Kretch Tallevor at level 3. (Side note, the summoners are the most expensive addition to this Silver 3 team. Their price to CP ratio is significantly lower than the monsters listed here).
Kretch maxed out for the silver league is going to allow you to summon not only maxed Silver league dragon monsters but also maxed level silver league monsters in any splinter you pair him with, such as our water units listed above.
Price: 89.76 usd / CP: 2000
For our Dragon tank we have Djinn Chwala at level 3. Djinn Chwala's thorns combined with high armor and health are incredible for low mana matches (if your opponent is melee heavy) or all melee matches.
Price: 9 usd / CP: 1000
For the second position I chose a level 4 Gold Foil Twilight Basilisk with the reach ability. His high speed and armor are added benefits to his reach ability and is a great choice for all matches and a solid option in little league matches. As well as the added DEC bonus from winning matches with all the Gold Foil cards in this lineup we are building.
Price: 19 usd / CP: 2000
Rounding out our Dragon monsters is a Level 4 Gold Foil Naga Assassin. Naga Assassin is a ranged monster with backfire which damages your opponent if their attack misses Naga Assassin, which will happen often with 5 speed. The low cost also makes this card viable in low mana matches.
Price: 18 usd / CP:2000
Lastly, I have selected three neutral monsters that can be played with any splinter and bring added value to the table.
The first neutral monster is a Level 5 Gargoya Lion with the void ability which makes this a great tank for opponents who rely heavily on magic.
Price: 3 usd / CP:300
The next neutral monster is a Level 4 Gargoya Devil with flying, close range and deathblow. Flying makes this monster harder to hit, close range allows Gargoya Devil to attack in the first position and Deathblow deals double damage if only one monster remains on your opponents team.
Price: 4.10 usd / CP:500
The last neutral monster is a level 3 Uraeus with the sneak ability. When used with Demented Shark or any other card with inspire, Uraeus can severely damage back line monsters on your opponents team.
Price: 9.23 usd / CP:1000
Crunching the numbers, these 15 cards cost a total of 347.18 U.S. Dollars and are worth 16,025 collection power, which allow you to compete at the Silver 3 league level which nets you 2 rewards chests daily for quests and 12 rewards at the end of each season.
The million dollar question is why should I purchase these cards to own when I can just rent daily for a fraction of the cost?
The answer is twofold. One, owning these assets and 16,025 collection power will net you 1.6 SPS daily and by the end of the airdrop you will have gained 320 SPS tokens in total (not counting your reward cards gained throughout seasons and added to your CP for sps airdrops). Even if you do not think SPS will gain value in the future, staking your SPS will net you fractions of vouchers which you can sell or hold for future card packs.
Owning your assets also allows you to rent those cards out and earn passive income while you slowly gain a ROI towards your purchases of said cards you decide to rent.
A couple parting caveats.
This is not financial advice, I wrote this post to express my passion for the game, dispel rumours that you needed thousands of dollars to start earning and discuss the choices and tradeoffs of owning assets in this game and how it rewards your for doing so.
This is just one example of owning cards to reach the Silver 3 league. You could do this with any splinter or combination of splinters you choose. Another strategy might be just buying rewards cards and Chaos Legion cards at the best CP/cost ratio to reach Silver 3 league then just renting whatever summoners you need daily to complete your daily quests.
Please let me know your strategies and what has worked for you in the comments!