A Promising Start, a Slow Burn
When Rebellion was first announced, I had high hopes. The hype surrounding the edition, combined with the game's consistent daily activity, led me to believe we could sell 2-3 million packs with relative ease. Yet, post-presale, the momentum fizzled. The data doesn’t lie—many accounts have stuck with Chaos Legion, whose cards remain highly competitive in the Modern format.
While Rebellion introduced exciting new mechanics and fresh strategies, it hasn’t provided enough of a competitive edge to justify a mass migration away from the tried-and-true Chaos Legion decks. It’s a tough sell to convince players to invest heavily in a new edition when the current one performs just fine.
The Dilemma of Power vs. Balance
The biggest question now is whether Rebellion can prove itself in the Modern format. If it turns out to be as balanced as Chaos Legion, players may continue to overlook it, leaving packs to burn rather than sell. However, if the next edition of cards introduces significant power creep, Rebellion might become obsolete, pushing the community to question its value even further.
For Splinterlands, this presents a precarious situation. While power creep might spark sales, it risks alienating long-time players and undermining the carefully constructed balance of the game.
A Year of Overload
Adding to this dynamic is the sheer volume of Promo Cards released this year. While these cards are undoubtedly exciting, their frequent launches have saturated the market and diluted interest in new editions like Rebellion. Many players, myself included, feel overwhelmed by the constant influx of cards, which makes it harder to justify the time, effort, and financial commitment to new packs.
The Role of Land and the Bigger Picture
Meanwhile, land—a feature with incredible potential—remains underutilized. Its promise to enhance gameplay with resource management and strategic depth has yet to be fully realized. If land mechanics had been more fleshed out, they could have added another layer of demand for cards like those in Rebellion. Instead, the lack of utility has left players waiting for meaningful integration, another missed opportunity to reignite enthusiasm.
What’s Next for Splinterlands?
As a player and collector, I find myself at a crossroads. The idea of Rebellion being a complete failure is disappointing, but it could be the shake-up Splinterlands needs to reassess its strategy. The development team faces a tough challenge: how to balance the needs of long-time players with the necessity of driving sales.
One thing is certain—2024 will be a pivotal year for the game. Whether through adjustments to Rebellion, a reimagined approach to land, or a new edition that avoids the pitfalls of power creep and oversaturation, Splinterlands must find a way to reignite the excitement that first drew so many of us to the platform.
For now, I’ll watch closely as this story unfolds. While I remain invested in the future of Splinterlands, this edition has been a sobering reminder that even great ideas need the right execution to succeed. Let’s see how the game evolves from here.
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It's natural that Rebellion failed to sell much. Most players have spent a ton of money in CL and saw the value plummet due to various factors. Most of us are not willing to get burned again so we played with CL cards, which are much cheaper to max out. I did invest some money in key Rebellion cards but I don't have anything close to a full collection as I do with CL. Some have invested more than me in Rebellion, most have invested less or even 0. And Conclave Arcane will not be different for the majority. I don't expect it to sell more than Rebellion, unless a significant influx of new paying players happens. Most players will move to Wild. If the wild pass makes it not profitable, they will give up.
Will be interesting to see how they balance such a powerful set leaving (CL) but Rebellion staying to compete with the new set...
This, it's not about the power of the collection it's about it's price and the risk of getting burned again, as a card holder everybody knows that as soon as the set gets out of modern will be devalued, maybe the idea of changing modern for bots and wild for humans is not bad after all, as Royaleagle suggested.
Thanks, I enjoyed reading. What you wrote is well balanced and presents different perspectives that are worth considering.
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I couldn't disagree more. I think Rebellion is a huge success! The set is slightly bigger than Beta and smaller than Untamed with less than 1M packs sold. That is good because that is all the current player base needed. Based on the new sale/burn mechanics, the set was not oversold and fit our current player demand.
The secondary prices of Rebellion cards remain strong and I believe they will increase when Chaos Legion rotates out of modern. People will chase after meta cards that are needed to compete in the new modern with Conclave Arcana and Rebellion.
I can understand the frustration of thinking we could sell more packs, but the SPSDAO is doing fine on funding and importantly Rebellion was not oversold. I'm more curious to see if people spend more on Conclave Arcana than they will on Rebellion due to needing to replace CL in their modern deck. Only time will tell...