Dear Splinterlands,
You've built a strong community which has stuck by you because we trust you are doing your best. When pioneering a brand new world, we understand that you will make mistakes, then we expect you to learn from them and adjust.
We have some exciting new things happening on the horizon, so for the most part this is a great opportunity for us all ahead.
Battle Scars
However, we do have battle scars. These scars are a result of many battles we've had over the years, where the community was doing its job to helping you to decipher the inputs to reach a system that works. We got these scars not because we were weak, but because we were strong.
We got these scars because we did care and were willing to fight all (even you) when we felt changes needed to be made for the game to survive. Nobody wanted to fight, but everyone that did so believed it was to make the game succeed. Because we cared.
We are your soldiers and you are the Generals. We need you and you need us.
Learning From Mistakes
After watching the community reaction from the latest rollout of the Survival Mode, its clear to me legitimate questions have been raised which need to be addressed. These questions aren't technical in terms of how Survival Mode operates, but are theoretical in nature regarding intentions.
What are you trying to accomplish with Survival Mode, and where will this take us? Is automation the key aspect in determining future success within this whole game? Said otherwise, are we targeting humans for growth or reverting back to targeting money growth with automation and/or financial advantages.
Is this a reversal of mindset regarding bot play versus human play? Should we interpret 2/3rds of the payouts going to the players that use bots as an admission that human-only play can not sustain the game? If so, then this has implications for people that question our six year marketing strategies and what it portends for future success.
Is this a trojan horse way to get the SPS DAO to eventually spend more of its money to bring bot farmers back? Realizing that the team is only funding the initial rounds, its clear that the team is spending valuable dev resources in expectation that the SPS DAO will continue funding. Is this the right way to roll out such a large portion of our reward pool because its bound to cause division and negativity once the SPS DAO has to decide between possibly two unpleasant choices: (1) spending DAO money when times are tight or (2) having the team waste all their DEV work and killing the program.
I've seen the understandable variety of reactions from many over the past few days, and they range from super excited to absolutely against it. There's a ton of assumptions being made, in addition to conclusions being drawn based about the future of the game based on those assumptions.
We all realize you don't have all the answers and want to experiment, and that's even a smart way to do it as long as you engage and respond in a timely fashion. We can't wait months and months to make changes, and we can't hide from the motives either. Hitting things head on with clarity is important, so I hope the team is super responsive with such a shakeup to the system.
Great Leadership Requires Confidence, Trust, and Vision
Earlier I said you were the Generals and we are the soldiers. Soldiers are in the fight and want to see the mission succeed, they are individuals with their own minds and feelings.
The Generals have to anticipate and address issues that come up. They have to provide vision of where we are headed, and convince the soldiers to follow this plan. To do this, first the Generals need to be trusted, and then they need to make the soldiers confident of success.
I think most everyone still here trusts the team, but its clear to me that the vision for the future is blurry to many of our players with battle scars. As a result of this massive new mode, they are now questioning many things, so we need great leadership to address those issues and be responsive with clarity.
My Personal View On Survival Mode
-I don't mind experimenting, but to me its simply an experiment.
-If funding from the DAO was to be voted on as it stands, I'd be a "no" because I don't think it will work systemically to bring in a meaningful amount of new money, and the trade-off of negativity is not worth it.
-I will play it if I can win something, but I won't invest in buying more cards or rentals as a result of this (I'm afraid this will be the norm btw)
-I don't mind having an automated place where people can manage their collections to win (defi), however I don't think that Defi does much more than shuffle around assets to give an edge to certain people over others. So its not a super high priority given the current state of the game.
-I'm very worried about our ability to attract and retain new players, to me this is the only essential factor to determining our success. I've been unclear as to who we are targeting, and this mode is a bit scary as it seems to be reaching for another big bot buying spree (which I don't think will happen, and even more so, if it did then I feel that is still not a good thing)
-Finally, I feel that if we are going to have this battle again, which will create new scars on those that fight for something they believe in, then we must have great leadership from the team to listen and learn, in addition to being clear about the vision/purpose. If the team is responsive as things get moving, then we will all see how it works out together.
I, too, have expressed my doubts about this new mode because human players are sidelined, and it should not be that way.
I am glad that I am not the only one who sees these issues
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I think there's a wide range of opinions on it, and you certainly aren't alone. The goal if we are to succeed with this imo, is to have great communication and adapt very quickly to the inputs received. People can draw conclusions (like both of us), but validation will come quickly once its live and I really hope the team reacts and communicates clearly.
Thank you for writing this Dave. As usual, you hit the nail on the head. My main concern is that this feels VERY similar to Aggy's 'new mode' distractions when he pulled devs off of vital SPL work to focus on the company's new games. We have had focus issues for years, and we need to feel confident that the team is learning how to focus, finish what needs to be done, and not get sidelined with new ideas before finishing those that are much more important.
We have very limited resources and very limited time to catch this bull run. We need ALL of our focus on attracting and maintaining new players. If we are going to spend dev time on a new game mode, it should be a mode that NEW PLAYERS can enjoy, not a mode specifically meant to target 'players with large collections' which has ZERO chance of new players participating. In fact, if a new player were to accidentally play this mode and suddenly find their cards on cooldown... man, there are so many things to consider here that are not even on the table. I fear this is a whole Pandora's Box of unseen consequences that are not being considered.
As mondroid points out, this mode just gives a bigger piece of the pie to legacy whales with ZERO benefit for our most important demographic, new players. I can't wrap my head around the stated belief that those with large collections have been neglected, which is the stated reasoning behind this mode is being launched.
Land has consumed SO much of our dev resources and will consume so much more before we even get to actual spells and items. Land is exactly what Matt claims this game needs, it IS that asset management mode he speaks of. And the promo cards being marketed to whales (Matt's own words - "we needed something for whales to buy" hence the pricing of the promos), and the auction card... these are ALL new things that are pretty much 'whale exclusive' regarding community participation.
It's the most important demographic being neglected once again, the bronze and silver players. And at a time when these players need to be considered our MOST important asset...
If the goal here is to bring value to cards by creating demand, it's missing the mark. The only real long term way to create PERMANENT demand for cards is to CONSTANTLY GROW OUR PLAYER BASE.
This mode is an incredibly dangerous gamble at this point in time, as it has the very real potential to drive even more existing players away at the worse possible time. This again points to the issue of TIMING, a lesson the team is in desperate need of learning!!
If this mode was proposed a year from now after a successful marketing campaign that brought in a lot of new players, if our NPE and tutorial was finished and successful, if ranked was 'working' as intended regarding levels/matching, and a new game mode or two had been launched that focused on ALL players, or even just one for the little guys, THEN this mode would likely have been embraced as one more cool thing in the ecosystem to add variety. Instead, because of the timing, it's a wedge issue and a distraction from what we really need to focus on right now.
They can't get legit human new players (are they even trying at this point?). There are many reasons for this, but the fact the game is built on HIVE is probably the biggest one. EVERY move they make is centered on existing users, whales in particular. It's amazing they just keep doubling down. They know their goose is cooked as far as game adoption is concerned and the only way forward isn't a card came, it's staking and 'tokenomics' shell game. It's about enticing suckers with deep pockets to keep spending to keep the sham going.
Thanks for taking the time to write this post Dave. I think if you asked any splinterlands player we would all agree that attracting new players to our game is by far the most important goal the team should be focused on and time is of the essence...
It's deeply concerning to me that we're paying CM to develop land... a passive income / staking platform for Legacy players... Wild is almost entirely played by bots and legacy accounts... and now we're spending even more dev time and resources on yet another passive earning place that BOTS and Legacy collections will have a massive advantage over humans / new players in.
When I look at where the team is spending their money and dev time it's clear the focus isn't on new players, it's giving the legacy players a pay day / subsidy.
As a fervent anti-bot player of the game... at some point I just have to realize this game isn't meant for me. I have to stop hoping the game becomes X while clearly they want the game to be Y.
It's their product, they can do with it what they wish so it's on me as the customer to stop buying it if I'm unhappy with it's state / direction.
I have stuck around because I believed the team had learned from their mistakes and fully understood the severity of bringing new PLAYERS to the game but it seems we have quite different ideas of what is going to be appealing to new players.
I have some decisions to make...
That's a decision I made quite a while ago, but I still follow the discussions around Splinterlands (and still sit on quite some assets).
I can only speak for myself but for me the main condition for enjoying a game is - apart from being challenging and fun - to make sure that the BEST and most skillful players should win (and also earn most).
In Splinterlands there are two reasons why that is not the case:
There is such a huge (inflationary) amount of (partly very expensive) cards on the market that only these players who spend a lot of money have a chance to dominate the rankings and tournaments. That has always been the case but is getting more and more extreme (of course owning certain cards should still be beneficial in many ways but in my opinion the decisive element for being successful have to be skills!).
In the only mode (wild) where one can use all one's cards one will mainly fight against 'players' who are using any kind of software which has nothing to do with skill in the game (and most of them are not even using self-made programs).
In my eyes a 'player' who doesn't play is a contradiction in itself.
The idea of "idle games" (passive earning) never attracted me at all. If I want to have a passive income I stake any crypto currencies and don't need a complicated game with many requirements at all.
(I personally also don't like the strategy at all to focus on the (temporary) value of new cards while neglecting old ones - these new cards will be 'old' sooner or later, too, and everybody who observes and understands that mechanism will abstain from buying new cards for exactly that reason - but that is another topic.)
Concerning the bot discussion:
A real human maybe, but not a real player.
If I let my chess software beat chess grandmasters that doesn't make me a chess player (maybe a good programmer, but in case I use the chess software of anybody else, I might not even be a programmer).
But fortunately, in every successful game software is strictly separated from human competition.
agree 100%
@mondroid I'm sorry to hear you are thinking this way, and sadly I've heard it from other players over the last few days as well.
While I still have hope that the team will figure it out (or I wouldn't be wasting my breath), I can understand that everyone has their own patience threshold.
I made the post to highlight the issues I see, and try to help @yabapmatt see what others are relaying to me. Hopefully it will be heard and the communication on the topic much more focused in the coming days and weeks. I do think its important to discuss as many people are reading it the way you are reading it.
I know we've lost so many people over the years on these issues and each time it breaks my heart to know that it could've been stopped with better communication. I'm glad you are communicating, and hopefully you don't make any decisions until more details are fleshed out and revisions to handle issues are made.
Thanks for the comment @mondroid and thank you for being a highly-respected and big player in the game for a very long time!!!
I'm hearing this exact same sentiment from a LOT of long term andvery invested PLAYERS at this time. The amount actually surprises me. This mode has the potential to push a considerable amount of loyal platyers out of the game. This would not only be devastating to our remaining, dwindling community, but have the opposite effect on card value that Matt hopes for by launching this mode. You are right that communication is VITAL at this point, and we can only hope that this need is heeded from the team. All too often we hear crickets at times like these between THs.
To get back to this topic, I think there is a far better way to do Survival Mode
I made a full breakdown of the current flaws and the benefits of doing it differently here
I like that idea and think it would be fun. The issue is your idea has a different objective than the one they're releasing. They are targeting whales and large bot farmers/services with their approach in an attempt to create a lot of demand for assets. Your idea would be a good mode for the average person to play, and that's a future objective - just not this one.
What does this tell you about their expectations of new grassroots players? They told you 'we just have to wait for the bull market and everything will be awesome'. First it was Bitcoin, now Bitcoin is near 100k. Now it's alt season (SOL and ETH are at/near all-time highs). What's the next panacea? I can tell you what it's not going to be: Soccer and Moon Carts.
This way the demand from whales would still be there as they can easily stake Max Level cards and get passive returns (which is otherwise the objective by running farms and bots) which can't really be done now on the rental market. It incentivizes people to level up cards instead of keeping singles and it also allows everyone to actually have fun with all the cards that exist.
Thanks for reading the idea!
Nice that you follow @davidorcamuriel, but it's just me who is using that account. :)
Great post, spot on in all these questions. I do admire how constructive can you stay during all these moves; for me, and reading all the comments I'm definitely not alone, it is just frustrating at this point: we have an awesome game, a "new player experience" is taunted as the priority, and it seems almost every change seems to go the exact opposite direction.
Do hope we have a REAL change of focus. I wouldn't mind a new mode at all, even though this one will unlikely do anything to atract new players; even so, I would see it with good eyes, more diversification is always better... but seeing as welcome the automation that nearly ruined the game (and in my opinion, keeps ruining it), is a straight NO from me.
Thank you for the compliment Pardinus!
I think its hard to know at this point whether or not the focus will change. I hope so of course. And I don't mind new modes, I don't even mind trying this one if its simply an experiment. But I do know that communication has to be better, objections need to be handled, and confidence built.
The team chose to take a detour from the main stated goal for 2024, and that might be fine. But given the past circumstances, I think its up to them to get people to buy in and not be surprised by the doubt. Having said that, I hope it succeeds if we are going to do it either way :)
With you on that one as well. Fingers crossed!
I’ve expressed my thoughts on this subject many times before, so I’ll keep it simple here:
I stopped putting money into this game a while ago, but I still haven’t sold my assets or left yet. The truth is, I still believe this game can succeed under the right conditions.
Whenever a new asset is sold by the company, I ask myself: "Hmm, should I buy that?" Lately, the answer has been a clear NO.
What the company needs to do is change my mind. Prove me wrong. Let’s remember, I’m just one of many players. My individual opinion might not matter, but if these feelings are shared broadly, they’ll start to matter.
If you’re telling me that the rewards for my efforts and time playing the game will be reduced by 33%, you’re not motivating me to invest in new sets or assets. In fact, quite the opposite.
So, who is this update really for?
Definetely It’s not for real players like me. But its not only that is not for real players, this update actually HURTS real players.
Do you truly expect whales and bot farms to buy the new set when the time comes?
Honestly, @yabapmatt, you need to stop basing decisions on the thought process of "What would Matt do?" What you would do as a player doesn’t matter since you’re not a regular player.
If you keep making decisions from that perspective, only whales will remain in the game. Whales might hold a lot of assets, but they don’t sustain the game or make it grow. Only real, small players will.
Anyway, great post dave, I agree with most of what you expressed.
I share your sentiments with the exception that I refuse to sit on my hands. I'm either participating fully or not at all. Lines continue to get crossed where I want nothing further to do with this game. It's pretty clear their target market is now whales, and that is not sustainable. I think they know this and are trying their best to postpone the inevitable.
Eldon, thank you for expressing your thoughts in detail. I hope they are read. I do 100% think your viewpoints should be considered, because you express sentiments well that many people are feeling.
And I have many others. But you mostly expressed them in your post, I saw no point in repeating them but I totally agree with them.
I agree, it took years trying to fix the sins from the past making sure that bot farms can't milk the system while reducing the SPS inflation. Now with this game mode, bot fams will be able to farm again while the extra SPS inflation likely will put pressure on the price. All while nothing about the game mode brings in any new players.
At least it's good to see that an attempt to create a new game mode that increases the utility of old cards is made. It's the same old problem though that economic incentives are prioritized over Fun & Gameplay.
Instead of creating a menu option called "Survival Mode" we should have an entire section called SplinterLabs or Splinterland Labs ... where the whole idea is to give people the option to play really easy to create adaptions like Survival mode.
Queue up for games every 5 minutes. Maybe let people have challenge rooms or lobbies. Something.
While this may not be a game for the masses... If we're being honest with ourself we can't keep playing the same mostly luck-based-BLIND-drafting game for 6 years where you don't even know what you're going up against just kinda playing by yourself (with a vague idea of the meta) until you hit the button ... "oh wait there was someone on the other side, i didn't even know". I mean i guess you could keep going with it... if people were coming in droves to play it... but like you said...
Let them cook... it's not a huge project... I personally hope that it becomes the first step toward a non-blind-skill-based turn by turn game. But a boy can dream. Let's put it in a LAB and see how people respond. It's mostly UI on the same results engine.
Great idea Jarvie. I would love Splinterlabs to be created and then let people get creative. I bet we could find some ideas that are real gems!!!
I mean if you're using the same graphics and the same game results engine and the same game rule sets engine that's a lot of the work already that people don't have to duplicate.
Great points Jarvie, I hope they will consider something like this.
Well said, Dave. You've always approached Splinterlands and the Community with a level head, an open mind, and with the game's future success and sustainability as your north star. Never.Change.A.Thing. There is a reason why you are so well respected in this Community. Keep fighting the good fight! 💪
Thank you for the very kind words Synister! That's a very humbling compliment!!!
I just want to say - well done, sir. Most of the comments were also well put, and I hope this "experiment" gets put on hold (forever would be fine by me).
:) ... thank you Pero!
Great post Dave!
Thank you Joshman :)
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Wow. This is a really well thought out, and well written article. Thanks Dave 💪 some soul-searching is needed here.
Thank you Star-Shroud! That is a very nice comment :)
Good write up Dave. A heap of fear, a heap of worry… but let’s give it a go anyway 😊
lol Micheal! I don't mind if we try it either, I just hope we have excellent response time for any adjustments needed. I think there will be a lot of changes needed because this will create tons of issues to deal with when its live.
I agree with your thoughts dave. I think if we want we could pass a vote to instruct the splinterlands team to not release any new modes where bots are allowed
But it feels crappy that we have to do that.
Dave,
I agree with you and thanks for sharing this. I hope the Splinterlands team responds to your post.
Thanks for sharing! - @azircon
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Me too.
I am even worried about the experiment, because there is nothing to learn from this. We already know if we let people exploit they will exploit. We have tested this hypothesis so many times that we can seal this as a law and write it just below the landing page where we say:
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The DAO proposal will be a strong NO from my end. I am not willing to spend a single SPS for this. I will also lobby so that other stakeholders see reason and vote NO when the proposal comes.
Hey AZ,
I think there could be a danger of having this experiment depending on the vision motivating it. If its truly just a test to see how things will work, then I don't mind a test at all.
There is a hypothesis by the team that if we do this, then they expect certain things to happen. Some will be positive, some will be negative. We can all have our opinions of what is a positive or a negative result, but I think its vital that the team clearly states what "they think" will happen so we have a basis for evaluation later. In other words, "we are doing this to: 1) ... 2) ... 3) ..."... and "we expect the following things to happen as a result: 1) ... 2) ... 3) ..."
The way this is being done can be structured in many different ways, and already we've seen many suggestions about how it can be altered to be acceptable to a person's beliefs. Underlying those thoughts are definitely a fear that it won't be done a particular way, and thus creates automatic negativity.
Is this process worth it? Everyone can draw their own conclusions, but the team should definitely be aware that these conversations are taking place and be super sensitive to communicate when making such a big step.
This could fundamentally alter things in both directions, so I really hope as many issues as possible are addressed on a timely basis as possible so that nothing gets out of control.
If its truly a test, then that should be desired by everyone - the team and the community alike.
The problem with this way of thinking is that you can never truly measure the results until it’s too late.
If this new mode is released tomorrow, sure, some cards will go up, some tokens will rise in value, and everything will seem great... for a time.
But at some point, bot developers will catch on and figure out the best way to automate things. By then, it will be too late—the damage will already be done.
We need to learn from our mistakes. From the moment we started shouting at the team about bots to the moment they finally took action, a year or more had passed. The damage was done. It was, in fact, too late.
We can’t release this mode, spend resources on it, dilute player rewards, and then (six months down the line) realize we made an obvious mistake.
This needs to be stopped before it’s implemented, or it will be too late.
I do not think this will bring new players. I think it will only help a limited numbers of legacy players and bot farms. I am uncomfortable in running this experiment as well.
I fully understand all those points.
I agree with you 100% here. This is not an 'experiment' we can afford at this time. For a multitude of reasons we see presented by a multitude of players.