Also, this change would directly influence how many players will be able to play in Wild.
I see this mostly as a zero-sum setup, where most of the SPS rewards that are earned in Wild will be burnt as the seasonal fee.
With 20k $ SPS rewards distributed each season in Wild, with current DEC prices, this would only result in roughly 13k players for the Wild format (if the SPS rewards were distributed evenly).
If DEC were at peg, only 10k players.
With better accounts earning more than the weaker accounts, the actual number of players that could be supported by these rewards is even lower.
What this will lead to:
- With only 13k players in Wild format, the value of current Wild cards would be destroyed. The incentive to rent cards would be completely lost. Most accounts will probably earn more or less what they spend that season. Why would they spend money on rentals if that would not pay off? Lower rentals probably will lead to lower card prices.
- With only 13k players in Wild, the price effect for sets rotating out of Modern would be even more drastic. With that low player count, there would be nearly no demand (owning or rentals) for sets that rotate out of Modern. Let's assume we get a lot more new players. The Wild format with its rewards can only support 13k players. So new players have to play in Modern (which is a good thing), for that they buy packs which they can use until the set rotates out. But if Modern has a higher player count than Wild and therefore more cards than ever will be needed in Wild, the card price will eventually go near burn.
Of course, we have Land for older cards. But with Chaos Legion cards setting the floor of PP/$, any new set that eventually rotates to Wild would probably go near the same prices (because there is no real other demand anymore).
So while this fix would probably help short-term, I see really big problems in the future. I mean, who wants to buy packs if they know that after two years they go to nearly zero?
Of course, this is a bit exaggerated, but overall I see this as really problematic.
I would really prefer one of the options above.
So overall, I'm pretty sure this change would hurt the price of all current Wild cards drastically and will make the price decline of sets rotating out of Modern even more drastic.
A lot of what you're saying mimics my feelings. Why am I going to buy packs when they are doing everything in their power to make them worthless when they rotate out of modern? And Matt freely admits that land in its current iteration is boring and doesn't have much value. He also said they are relying on a huge influx of players and money in order to hire the devs to build land. So the idea that land will save us is pretty pie in the sky right now.
One thing to note though is $20k in SPS is based on the current price. If we did get a bunch more players I can assume it would push the price up which would increase the USD value of wild rewards.
that's the point I just made. If the price of SPS goes higher, then the number of actual players we could support comfortably would be much higher.
Yes, a higher SPS price would also enable more players to participate in Wild.
However, if we have to rely on the token price increasing to prevent Wild assets from decreasing in value, then something is seriously wrong.
Given the current state of this ecosystem, this will further devalue wild assets and in my option also modern assets.
The reason I disagree with what you are saying about old cards going down in value long term is that so little of land has been released right now. Look at how much impact the grain LP has had in such a short time. Look at the staked DEC on land, it's constantly going up now. We are already at $35k liquidity in the grain LP and it's only been about a week. Next is going to be the research leaderboards titles which means people will be fighting over those rolling titles which will require grain.
I just don't understand how you read the white papers for land and don't get it, how this will not make old cards valuable.
Every tiny thing they release for land is going to act like a leverage of stimulus to the economy as long as they make it somewhat relevant to ranked.
Example A
Lets say next month or the month after that, they release the salt system. Players that own at least 2 surveyed land plots will now earn SB desalinization crystals in ranked. Now we can start desalinating our land to reduce our trading fees, our taxes and boost our production. On top of that, on the other end, we will earn salt tokens. Salt tokens in the white paper can be combined with potions to create something called "enhanced potions" but what if they let players use their salt tokens in the 2 week run up to a promo event. "The company is letting you use our alchemy lab temporarily during this promo event to create enhanced potions" and you can apply those to the promo cards and also to jackpot chests.
Now all the old players with thousands of potions will start making these enhanced potions that can be sold on the market.
Example B
None of the magic plots have been released/enabled yet. What if they release/enable the next 2 magic plots and they match the same elements of the next legendary summoner airdrop?
And they make it a requirement that you produce and burn on the wagon a specific number of those same magic resources in order to qualify to get the special skin of that summoner. How much do you think that special skin is going to be worth? And this will drive up the price of grain.
I think the problem with the land white papers is too many people went to sleep trying to read it because of all the details. All they have to do is start releasing/implementing little parts of it and make it relevant to ranked.
OK so its currently midway through 2024. Land was supposed to be fully released in 2021 and currently the company doesn't have the money or human capital to work on land in any major way and won't unless we get a massive influx of players, which is far from guaranteed.
So why does the land whitepaper not excite me? For the reasons above but also because the distribution of land is so concentrated that almost none of these people will ever be able to utilize it all. The thing about land, and almost all Splinterlands systems is its not based on what you have, its based on the percentage of the active whole. The same SPS rewards are being given out whether 5 plots are running or 150k plots. Its also why raising the SPS staking requirements in this proposal is pointless (but that's another topic.)
And as far as the DEC being staked on land, about a month ago we were higher than we are today. We got up to 1.522 billion. It dropped to 1.509 billion and we are currently back to 1.514 billion. It has gone back up some since the grain LP but we're still lower than we were a month before the LP came out. Losing players.
Now for example A. Having yet another thing to buy and sell doesn't bring money in. It shuffles value around and dilutes the value of existing assets. As existing assets drop in value, players run away because their assets are dropping again and that sends asset prices down even further. We've been in this spiral for a few years now.
For example B. First I'll say that this is a long shot. Second I'll say that it shouldn't ever happen because it will again lead to players leaving. They bought thousands of dollars in cards but now they can't even get their airdrop unless they also do something else? Moving the goal posts repeatedly sends people packing.
I want land to be amazing and bring value to the cards but its not even close to ready yet, there's no gaurantee it will ever be ready, and it has a lot of hurdles even if it gets ready.
Don't forget the affect the first part of the proposal will have on SPS value/prices!
If, as you say, the # of accounts playing in Wild drops from 75K to 13K- the amount of SPS rented should also drop by ~80%, as long as the multiplier remains the same. By halving the value of staked SPS while reducing the demand- I would expect a drop in the volume of rented of ~90% with a corresponding drop in prices for renting SPS.
On the bright side- with zero incentive to hold any staked SPS, all the accounts in Wild should start unstaking and dumping their SPS immediately.
(I could quibble with the 13K number but in general, I agree- only 10-15K accounts could continue playing in Wild and they would all be bots/botted accounts that spend 0 on rentals and 0 on SPS)
This analysis assumes that SPS will never go up in price. If that's your base case, then you would be right to think these things. On the other hand, if you assume a much higher price and do your same analysis, then you will get much different numbers.
Of course, we can hope and pray that the SPS price rises so that the Wild Format can support more players, but I won't just sit around and hope for the best. With the current SPS prices, it's nearly guaranteed that the value of Wild cards will implode.
well if that's the case, then none of this matters. I would disagree with your premise, but only time will tell which of us was right.
The first part of this proposal (halving the SPS multiplier) would, by itself, crush SPS value and increase the % of rewards given to bots in Wild.
The second part of the proposal (blocking out new/casual players from the game) would just exacerbate the effects of the first- crush SPS prices and increase the % of bots in Wild.
I, currently, don't see any basis to think that SPS or asset prices could rise- this proposal like most of the moves made by the company just seemed designed to push the game faster and further in it's current trajectory.
you've messaged me in multiple places and I gave you an indepth reply here. If you want to talk in more depth, then feel free to message me on discord and I will be happy to discuss with you and show you why I think you are looking at the wrong things.