Hello, Splinter fans!
Today my research of the upcoming Rebellion edition continues and this time I'm going to take a look at the revamped airdrop system. As you might remember, during the previous card pack edition eras, the chances of getting cards from the drop were simply tied to the number of packs purchased from the in-game shop.
Starting in December, Splinterlands will launch a new, more gamified version of the airdrop system named Conflicts. To take part in these conflicts, players need to stake their unopened Rebellion packs and cards into Battle Wagons which will carry 5 cards and up to 100 packs.
Use Cases for Vouchers
Even though the price of the wagons still remains undisclosed, it's announced that players will need VOUCHERS to buy them. The price of VOUCHERs has been declining for a while now as seen in the picture below but depending on the wagon price, this should add a good sink for them and create some Demand.
More than that, each airdrop will have a 2% chance of being a gold foil one but players can increase that number by using, well, you guessed it - VOUCHERS.
Obviously, these two sinks will create demand for VOUCHERs but it's also interesting to see how it reflects in other Splinterlands assets such as SPS & DEC. I would guess many players might be using their SPS rewards to swap to VOUCHERs when the time comes.
As for me, I'll be holding on to the VOUCHERs I already have and be watching closely for the VOUCHER chart and start stacking up soon when the price is still reasonable.
Cards
As mentioned, each Battle Wagon will hold only 5 cards but if they are combined, players will get more points counting toward the total contribution. This is where it gets interesting as it probably will be beneficial to break some packs and upgrade cards with a high collection power. Even more interesting is the fact that these cards can be used in the gameplay. However, the staked cards cannot be sold, rented out, etc.
All of this will most likely encourage players to stake their cards for a quite long period of time as there will be 9 airdrops which will equal 9 months. This would then minimize the effect of a lot of new cards flooding the already crushed card market.
At the same time, I can see the demand probably increase toward Rebellion cards and packs as there might not be that many units circulation on the markets. A lot will depend on how lucrative the players will see the new airdrop.
Packs
It is uncertain how many points one unopened pack will count toward the total points compared to (combined)cards. This is something that will require some future calculations before ripping open each and every pack.
Another thing to take into consideration is the place where to get those Rebellion packs. I did some math and compared the $ price of a single between the Splinterlands in-game shop and the secondary market on Hive-Engine:
- Sell order on Hive-Engine: 8.8999 x 0.339 = $3.016
- 4000 DEC + 5 VOUCHERs
- 4000 DEC = 10.63 HIVE
- 5 VOUCHERs = 0.41 HIVE
- 11.04 x 0.339 = $3.74
By the time of writing this post, it seems the price of a Rebellion pack is roughly $0.74 cheaper on H-E so if it was just like that it shouldn't be a no-brainer. However, there's an incentive when buying packs from the SPL shop, or actually two...
GRIMBARDUN SMITH and MANTAROTH are limited edition promo cards rewarded to those who purchase packs from the shop and meet the following requirements:
- To get a regular Grimbardun Smith card, players need to buy 10 packs with a 4% chance of the card being a gold foil one.
- A guaranteed gold foil version of it will be given to those who bought 250 packs.
Every single Rebellion pack also has a 1% chance of receiving Mantaroth, a legendary neutral card.
To secure a guaranteed Mantaroth, players need to buy 100 packs from the shop.
A gold foil version of this card is guaranteed to those who buy a whopping number of 2,500 packs.
There are quite a few factors to consider here. First of all, the market will eventually decide the future value of these cards so it comes down to perhaps comparing them to previous promo cards and their current value before making a decision.
Another thing that requires some thinking is the total amount a player is planning to buy. I'm a small fish and at the moment I'm considering buying about 10 - 20 packs. Based on my calculations above I would save about 7 dollars when buying from Hive-Engine. Even though I would get a guaranteed Grimbardun Smith card I cannot imagine its price setting anywhere near $7.
So what about Rebellion pack whales going for that 2,500 limit?
In this case, I would definitely choose to buy from the shop. Not only because of all the perks but also cos the H-E sell wall is pretty thin and is quickly eaten up making some of the packs as expensive as in the shop. In fact, there aren't even that many packs on sale at the moment.
Conclusion
I'm 100% to take part in the Rebellion and the new staking system. However, the approach and the scale still remain as question marks.
There seems to be a decent amount of packs still remaining in the shop but most likely I'm going to acquire those 10 - 20 packs from the secondary market and then follow closely any news and articles and adjust my strategy based on that info.
Also, we've seen some positive $HIVE price movement lately which is another thing to take into consideration. If the upward momentum should continue, it might be a good idea to put my liquid HIVE to use and perhaps buy a pack or two more.
Thank you for reading!
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Disclaimers:
- Thumbnail background image made with Canva
- Other pictures are screenshots from Splinterlands