Throughout 2021 hundreds of thousands of new players have entered the arena know as Splinterlands. Along with them, many millions of dollars worth of crypto have flooded into the marketplace creating an economy no one would have imagined possible this time last year. Some players have flaunted their whale status and purchased max level decks to stack SPS airdrop points while also battling their way into challenger, but some of the biggest earners (and most competitive challengers) have come from the rental market.
The rental market has made it possible to play with the awesome cards that most players can't afford (looking at you Julian). Some players have found it feasible to rent out max decks to turn a little income, but it's not for the feint of heart (or the underskilled). These players have put in the book-time and have established themselves as real competitors for longstayed champions like 
The fact that there are zero summoners in Champion level 1 proves the level of competition has shot through the vaulted dome of the earth. Typically we see at least 2 or 3 of the top Champions hovering the 4,700 rating mark; yet, as it stands now the highest rated players are only sitting in the 4,400 range, and there's only three of them! Shoutout to 
Here I present to you the top 10 finishers in last season with their current and previous winrates. The current season is represented with the red line, and the previous season is represented with the blue line.
We all know the famous book Bill Gates loves to pose with How to lie with Statistics, but I'm going to try to give an honest breakdown of these results.
- 7 players have lower win-rates this season
- 3 have improved win-rates
- The Average Win-Rate of the Current Season is 67.8%
- The Average Win-Rate of the Previous Season is 70.3
- The Total Difference between last season and this season on average is -2.51%
Is this a sign of the end of the reign of our Splinterlands Champions, a season where new competitors are coming for their thrones? I don't see it happening, personally. These competitors are seasoned veterans who know the best builds for every ruleset and the counters for those best builds. They have the data, whether in their brains or on their spreadsheets that lead them to consistent victory. Their innovation since the release of Chaos Legion has kept them as top performers, and their presence on the leaderboards show it.
As promised, here is the data for the top 10 players of the current season.
Note: there are only 3 players in the top 10 that were not included in the above data.
- The average difference in win-rates here is -1.8%
Hopefully you've enjoyed this data dump, as I was simply personally curious about this and figured I might as well share it with everyone else! The ranked grind is getting tougher and tougher out there, and it might be interesting to take the data of all champ players on average to increase the sample size of win-rate differences. If anyone wants to do that, let me know your results!
Blessings, fam