How Survival Mode Will Be Broken...
So While I like the idea of having cards that go in a cooldown mode when a match is lost, that's pretty much the only thing that really makes sense for the upcoming Survival Mode in Splinterlands. These are what I see as obvious Flaws...
No New Gameplay: It's a lazy new game mode where not that much really changes aside from the fact that there is a card cooldown instead of energy. As someone who has been playing Splinterlands for nearly 7 years now it very quickly will get old and more a way to potentially earn reward instead of a game that I really want to play.
Bot Farm instead of Real Players: This issues has been addressed by the active community in that it's another game mode where not only players who bot their account dominate but where bot farms again can run wild farming almost unlimited battles at lower levels especially with so many soulbound cards out there.
No New Players: Survival mode mainly is a mode for existing players who see their chaos legion cards move out of modern and those who have been sitting on the sidelines with cards that are unusable in the game as the rental market is totally dead.
Time Investment Requirement: It's once again a mode where you either run a bot and don't care or where you have to put even more time in daily that nobody really has.
Increased SPS Inflation: Basically all efforts to lower the SPS inflation will be undone by just increasing what is now given out in Modern and Wild by 50%
Boring Pay2Win Garbage: Splinterlands already is the most pay2win game ever and this game mode increases more on this as it wants players to hold multiple max level cards to get as high as possible. Even more than Wild and Modern, for most players this will be frustrating once they hit a wall.
How To Improve Survival Mode!
While it would take quite a bit more work to develop, I believe this setup would he way better for Survival mode in so many different aspects:
Players pay a fixed entry fee to enter a round of Survival mode, for that entry fee they get a set of random Max Level Monsters and Summoners they can use in Survival mode. With those cards they need to make decks based on the game rules and face opponents with a similar win-rate. Each time they lose a battle they lose all the cards and they can continue to the point where they no longer are able to field a team or to a max number of wins. The cards that they play with are supplied by players who own the cards by locking them on land and in return they get part of the entry fee as 1-click passive rental earnings. After each round players get some rewards based on how they performed and at the end of the Day / Week / Season there is a leaderboard to give extra rewards in a fair way.
This is just the basic idea and lots of tweaks can be made to possibly improve upon it.
How This is Better!
New Player Friendly: What Splinterlands needs the most is new players and a game mode done this way allows new players to come in with a very low entry requirement while they can experience the game at max level which is most fun. There is no complicated procedure of having to buy or rent cards, get SPS,... Instead they just pay an entry fee, can play and learn the game while earnings some rewards.
Level Playing Field: What Splinterlands needs from a new game mode is a way to put players on a level playing field. This way to do survival mode does this while adding randomness to the mix. Anyone can get lucky or unlucky by the card draw which is something that evens out over time. Having players face off against opponents with a simular win rate also helps to make it harder for the good players and softer for the players with not as much skill.
Human Players Ony!: Bots and Battle helpers should be void in this game mode making it human players only. Splinterlands in the first place is a game and it's most fun to play against other players instead of having it as a defi yield platforms where bots just play against bots.
Easy Passive Rental Income!: Right now one of the reasons why the rental market is dead is because it's way too much of a hassle to manage all of it while. If it was easy and there was demand, everyone with spare cards would simply put them on the rental market. This clearly is not the case now and I also don't think that Survival Mode now will do much about that.
Reasons to Level Up Cards: The survival mode now likely will be more optimal to play with 400 common single cards instead of having 1 max level common cards which has 400 copies combined. So far combining cards has always been something of a capital destruction since single can be sold for more. Having Survival Mode only played with Max Level cards gives a nice incentive for players to combine their cards.
Give Old Cards Use Case & Value: The way the passive earnings should be distributed is that cards that have a lower print rate should earn more and there is no real discrimination as all cards are useful.
Everyone Can Enjoy All Existing Cards!: Right now, most players never will get the excitement and fun of playing with the most powerful cards let alone at max level. This wile there are many cards that nobody ever plays. With a game mode like this all cards actually get a proper use case in the actual card game that everyone get to enjoy for the same entry price.
Fun To Watch!: One of the issues of Splinterlands right now is that it isn't really fun to watch. A game mode like this would get way more streamable. First, there is the excitement to see what cards players get in their set, afterward there are a limited number of games where every match counts and once done there are the rewards to open and the leaderboard.
Gives Land Use Case!: A survival mode done this way would give land instant and easy use case. No crazy requirements, just the owners of max level cards who lock them on a land plot (with a revenue share for the land owner)
No Soulbound Card Problem!: Survival mode done this way would give no issue with Soulbound cards and the only way for them to be provided is if they actually are unlocked. It would give more reasons to unlock cards and possibly also an extra DEC burn if it allowed gladius cards to be unlocked.
Play When You Want To Play!: last season I started playing Modern League again on my alt account on a day where I really felt like playing. This was plenty of fun but now near the end of the season it became a real task again as I want to use my energy and cards not letting them go to waste. This is a massive issue for Splinterlands nobody is really talking about. To get adoption, players should be able to play and have fun with the game at a time they want to without losing out on anything. Doing Survival mode like this would unlock this! Players who just want to play for half an hour can do so while players who want to play 8 hours in a row also can do this without exponential higher cost.
Actual New Gameplay: The fact that you get assigned a card set also gives new gameplay since you are forced to strategies around those exact cards. Right now, when playing Modern or Wild, you pretty much play similar decks over and over again and I fear that the Survival Mode won't change much about this.
Entry Fee Indirect Way to Buy Packs / Rewards: Instead of just realsing a bunch more SPS as rewards, The entry fee for each round of Survival mode can be an indirect way to buy Packs / SPS / Glints / or other rewards that come from it. It should be done in a way that for good players it's slightly profitable and for weaker players it comes as a small negative.
Counters Power Creep: One of the main issues in Collectible Card Games is that there is not only an incentive to print more cards but also to make them more powerful. The ultimate showcase of this is the current Heloise The Hollow auction. A game mode like this would counter this power creep and make it more a luck RNG factor since everyone has equal odds to get good or bad cards. As you face off against opponents who have similar win-loss ratio during their run you either will face players without or with the powerful cards leveling it out.
More Conclave Arcana Sales: As the new set is released, the new cards from the start could get implemented into this game mode. This means that there is a bigger incentive for players to buy packs as fewer of these cards will be in circulation so the entry fee cut for them will be higher. This also goes for existing Soulbound cards which have a high premium to unlock, there would be a proper incentive to do so.
Always Fresh Gameplay: Right now, players have the cards that they own or rent and are pretty much stuck with those. Most of the time it are also just the meta cards that are played which gives repetitive gameplay. With a game mode like this everyone would constantly discover new cards since there are already so many different ones in the game which will keep it fresh for longer time.
Simplify Gameplay: With the trend of more new cards that are constantly introduced along with new abilities which get increasingly complicated and confusing. Splinterlands has become too complex for most players and it's one of the things that devalues older cards since Modern is the only place where this is somewhat manageable. So a game mode like this with a limited amount of cards available would simplify thing and make it way more enjoyable for the average player who just wants to have some fun.
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Conclusion
I strongly believe that Survival Mode can be done in a much better way than wat it is set out to be right now. Many of the negatives currently can be turned into positives in such an easy way making it a real new game mode that new and existing real players can enjoy to the fullest. I just can't see why it would be too hard to do it this way or reasons why the current Survival Mode would be better. Special Shoutout to @yabapmatt / @aftersound / @bulldog1205 / @synist3r
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