Splinterlands is OG when it comes to games of its kind but it's in its infancy when it comes to investment. Yesterday Splinterlands broke 100K active accounts for the first time! Up an astounding 1000% in about a month.
Yesterday we added 7000 active accounts which was basically as many active accounts as there were just 40 days ago, but still Splinterlands is in its infancy.
Before we look at who's coming in if we keep growing at an absolutely mind bending 7% per day, let's see where we are right now and who the Splinterlands cast of early adopters and future millionaires is :)
Here are the four main player/investor types in the Splinterlands economy.
#1 is the casual player:
This is the person who just likes the game. They might invest a little here and there for a card they want to play more but that's about it. If they joined a few months ago or earlier, they are thrilled at their account might now be worth a few thousand bucks.
#2 is the DEC farmer:
This is the gamer who's spending some bucks in the rental market and buying a few cards here and there. They like the game and they probably have a few accounts they play until their ECR is too low. The main purpose of this person is to win and farm DEC. Some version of Llamakron is probably in their arsenal. There's a good chance any cards they win will be put up on the market to sell immediately.
#3 is the arbitrage investor:
These are the OG investors who realized they could buy a few thousand packs for $1.50 (or whatever) and sell the cards for 1.68 (or whatever) and then get a bunch of free airdropped legendaries to sell as their bread and butter. This also includes people who run apps on hive or other popular websites that involve tools for Splinterlands players. I'd argue it even includes the founders of Splinterlands themselves as I still see their names all over the sales markets.
These people are currently the largest holders of in game assets and probably all just saw their fortunes rise into at least high 6 figures if not much more but the thing that sets them apart from the next class is that no matter the price or future trajectory of the cards, they are always sellers and their names are listed all over the both the rental and the sales markets.
#4 The "I'm going to make a living in the rental market if it kills me" investor (me!):
I'm the guy (or gal?) who likes the game and has been playing causally for a bit but now sees the potential and is buying the floor on hundreds of different cards. A middle class investor who sees future value and mainly buying for rental income but also dabbling in rare cards for future value and vanity. We're price sensitive but we believe heavily in Splinterlands and what its going to mean going forward and can't see not being all in. Unlike the class before, every card was bought with a purpose and we aren't selling! lol
While I'm sure I didn't get every nuance here and most people have a toe in multiple categories, I think that's a pretty good summation of where Splinterlands is in terms of players and investors as we crest 100k.
So who are the players that start filtering in when we crest one-million and what will happen when they get here?
#5 is The Collector:
This is the person who dabbles in the game but their main reason for coming in is that they realize that Splinterlands matters in the scheme of things and they can spend under 6 figures and pick up some really rare cards for their collection of art and NFT's.
When these people come in, Gold Legendaries and Alpha's will spike and we'll see our first newsworthy purchases start to hit. That's when you'll start hearing that a card wasn't just priced high but actually sold for $100,000 dollars. These are the Crypto Punks people 6 months ago. They will be fun but the next investor is the one that will make many of us overnight millionaires.
#6. The if it's rare I want it and price is no object investor:
This is the type of investor who just now entered the NFT space. This is the person who just made waves by spending 5 million dollars in a day buying the floor in CryptoPunks. This isn't the same as the Cristy's investor who bought the single punk a few months back for $11 million. This guy didn't care what he bought as long as it was a Cryptopunk.
Not only did he buy everything that wasn't nailed down, he game the market a shot of addrenaline and put everyone on notice that Cryptopunks were going to do nothing but go up and go up fast.
When this investor type hits the market, it makes others more bold. Suddenly it seems like it was always te obvious move and it brings in others like them.
You'll know this person hit the market when all at once all the Alpha, Legendary, and even most of the Epic Golds are gone no matter what the price they were listed at. You'll see people who listed at prices they never thought they'd get be angry that someone paid it because suddenly that card will be worth double what they just got for it. Anyone who didn't get bought out will delist as quickly as possible to reassess and the Splinterlands market cap will double or triple again overnight.
Not that we haven't seen this all before...
