Funny... when soulbound reward cards were introduced, I thought this is a great idea because it incentivized people to hold on to their reward cards and level them up, instead of dumping them on the market or renting out level 1 cards.
After seeing the route things have turned, to say I'm less enthusiastic is to downplay how I feel right now about them.
I understand the argument that offering free cards as rewards that can immediately be dumped on the market can affect the prices of the overall cards market. But that happens with all cards while they can still be found in packs or, for reward cards, while they are in print. Many of the reward cards became very valuable once out of print as they got older.
There is also the argument that bot farms can easier juggle with reward cards between accounts if they are free to move. Ok, this argument makes sense. Although we still ended up invoking bot farms to add a sizeable fee to unlock soulbound reward cards for land. The fight is ongoing and will never end.
The question is: where is the line between fighting bot farms and overtaxing regular players/investors?
At least these recent taxes (fees) are burned and don't go to anyone's pocket. While I am not a fan of burning, it is an emergency tool that can be used to temporarily reduce the impact of the lack of demand and growth.
I know this is a tough battle to be involved in, and that sometimes you feel like winning while other times you feel like losing, that's why I hate bring up this subject.
In last week's town hall - which I listened to yesterday - Matt said the fee for fully unlocking a soulbound reward card will likely be higher than the one for unlocking them for land.
Ok... I wanted to see what we are talking about. First, talk about a fee to fully unlock soulbound reward cards is not new. The one for land was unexpected. But let's see what the fee amount would mean. We don't know this fee yet, what Matt said was that it is likely to be higher than the one for unlocking cards for land.
I checked the prices of reward cards on the market, particularly those from Chaos Legion which haven't had time to age and increase in value. Yes, they are very cheap right now, but this is a cycle and has happened with all reward cards over time, particularly in a bear market.
Even if the fee remains the same as the one for unlocking soulbound reward cards for land or slightly higher, the prices at which these unlocked soulbound reward cards would need to sell on the market to make it a good deal for the seller has to be significantly higher than the fee. As long as soulbound reward cards can be earned through gameplay, nobody will pay an arm and a leg for them (maybe with a few exceptions).
And the fee needs to be burned first. This means it doesn't matter if you are able to sell your card or not or at what price or when, you (the seller) pay the fixed unlocking fee first. Doesn't look like there's going to be much of a market for these cards...
As to unlocking your soulbound reward cards to rent them out, this seems like a dead end unless you are aiming at the very long term, and who knows what surprises expect us by then?
Looks like most soulbound reward cards are stuck in gameplay, or, for those who want to play the land fee, on land. It doesn't matter if you have doubles, regular and gold foils, you either pay for the extra use case or don't, and don't use them.
At least add staking to guilds and make it free to use for soulbound reward cards.
Where's SoulKeep? It was advertised with card staking too. Hopefully, without a fee for using soulbound reward cards.