I do expect it to be an uphill battle. It's just rare to see something new like this take off without any struggle the moment it is actually released. Especially in crypto things tend to go well when there are only promises and hype. Once an actual product is released , it rarely lives up to the hype. I'm expecting mostly existing Hardcore Splinterlands players to try it out with much less new players actually coming in from the MLS.
For sure it's going to be interesting to see how it will go and the airdrop right now does give SPS probably most use case.