SplinterlandsX (eXperiment): Changes

NOTE: Some of this information is repeated for the sake of those who might be reading a post from this series for the first time. For those of you who have been following this eXperiment, scroll down and begin reading at the Current Status section.

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This is the next installment in my experiment in building a Splinterlands account from scratch without additional monetary investment after the initial Spellbook purchase. I am chronicling my journey so see if this is a viable activity and, if so, how long will it take to reach that level (I'm shooting for SILVER...after that, we'll see).

Brief History

In lieu of all of the recent changes in Splinterlands gameplay, a few months ago, I started an experiment to see if a new player could build a viable account without any monetary investment (besides the Spellbook, of course). I created a brand new account for my wife and started playing it (you can read the previous installment in this series HERE). As expected, this account to make much progress in the first couple of months, so I will work on creating a post (or maybe two) per season. If things begin to get interesting, frequency should increase.

When I initially created this account, I was several days into a season. Even though I was playing this account with a bot, I was unable to accumulate enough points to earn a Season Chest at the end of that season. I wanted to see if it was possible to earn a chest with a bare minimum account that only contained a few cards that could be purchased with the original 3000 credits and starter cards. However, during my first full season, I was able to earn a single season chest with the few cards this account currently owns. It would have been nice to obtain a new card with that chest, but hey, SPS is progress.

I also began entering card giveaways to see if I could increase the collection before the season ended. I had not been very consistent in entering said giveaways until recently. However, I have found this to be best way for me to acquire new cards at this point and have begun to focus more on finding the time to be more consistent in these efforts and have seen a smattering of success.

Current Status

Today's post is about changes. There have been a few since the last post that I wanted to share.

First off, I hope everyone is getting used to having this post coming from the account I am using for this eXperiment. I know change is hard for some people, but it only made sense to make that transition. Thank you for making the effort of going through this change with me.

Secondly, it appears the bot change (version upgrade) I made last week has been a great improvement. I have only have to make a couple of restarts this week due to some kind of processing error and as you can see in the snapshot below I have already earned a season chest and we are not quite half way through the season. It has been several seasons since I have earned a chest of any kind. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I can get another and that there will be a new card that comes from the season ending rewards.

I have to admit, though, this increase in reward points is not just from the increased efficiency of the bot. I actually took some actions to improve my standing within the game. The first action I took was to utilize the diesel pools and swap out some SPT I have earned from sharing my adventures for SPS to try and kickstart my daily staking "airdrops". I was only able to trade for 1.35322154 SPS, so I am not getting an airdrop very often, but every little bit helps. I'll probably continue to make these swaps every so often to increase my staked SPS holdings. The second action I took was to take the HIVE that I had earned from posting this adventure and purchase 3900 DEC. With this added to the 200 DEC I won from @orionspeakgaming in THIS POST and the 133 DEC I won from @alex2alex in THIS POST, I was able to purchase these cards:

These cards were specifically chosen because they were the highest used starter cards that I could afford. There are a few others that are used more often, but they are out of my price range at the moment. This should help increase my RP because I won't lose so much due to using starter cards.

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In the past couple of posts, I have been able to relate my surprising success in winning a few new cards in giveaways to add to the collection. This has contributed to my slow increase of Power. I have been faithfully continuing my entries in these giveaways this week. However, in addition to the 333 DEC I won, I only won three more cards:

First, I won this one (my second one of these) from @poplar-22 in THIS POST.

A couple of days later, I won this one from @elderdark in THIS POST.

And finally, a couple of days ago, I got this from @morph in THIS POST,

I have definitely hit a dry spell. I have noticed, though, that other people have also seemed to win in bunches (one person will win several cards from different giveaways within a few days and then somebody else will do the same thing. I wonder if this a by-product of the random wheel app being used. Maybe it's not so random).

I'll keep entering giveaways and see if I can get on another lucky streak.

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With these new cards, the number of my unique Reward cards is now up to FIFTEEN! I guess my original decision to purchase non-reward cards with my initial coins was a good one (sometimes my logic even amazes myself). And I also have duplicates of a couple of these Reward cards.

Hopefully, this is not the end of my winning.

AMA (Ask Me Anything)

In my first post, I stated:

If you have any suggestions on how a new player can progress without having to invest any outside influx of capital, I'd love to hear it. Also, if you are a new player that has questions about anything I am doing with this account (or anything else, for that matter), leave me a comment...

I did get a few more encouraging responses in my last post, but no new questions. Thank you for all of your support.

What's Next

Now that I am using this account for posting, I will no longer have to transfer rewards (Hive Rewards or any other rewards [PIZZA, CTP, ALIVE, etc.] submitted to this post from readers). A special thank you goes out to all of those who have been gracious enough to contribute to this journey so far. Also, if anyone joins Splinterlands from one of the links in this post, they will be indirectly providing support to the eXperiment, as well. Who knows...this eXperiment could be your training on how to build an account without extra financial input (besides your Spellbook, of course)...both what to do and what NOT to do.

I will keep making it a top priority going forward to enter as many giveaways as I can find. Now that I finally managed to win enough cards to push the Max Tier for this account up into Bronze II, I'll have to see if I can win enough matches to take advantage of this new status. Even though I have managed to already earn a season chest, I am not sure the new tier has contributed to that yet. I'll have to keep a close eye to see how I progress.

On a similar note. I was reminded that rentals and delegations are another way to help increase your CP (and possibly RP by removing the need to use started cards). I did not feel like I was in a position to rent any cards before now and will have to do some figuring to see if that is something this account can afford, but I haven't been able to focus on that yet. I don't feel right about delegating cards from my own accounts to help with this eXperiment (I feel like that would be cheating). However, if anyone else would like to help give this account a boost by delegating any cards to it, I would offer the same courtesy that I do for the giveaways by mentioning you in my post and including a link back to a Splinterlands post of your choosing. Any card that I do not currently have (especially starter cards) would be appreciated.

"The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step." - Lao Tzu

If you missed any of the previous episodes of this series, you can find a link here:

• SplinterlandsX (eXperiment): Trading Places, Changing Luck, & Bot Revelation - Things change.
• SplinterlandsX (eXperiment): Am I Just Lucky? - My giveaway success continues.
• SplinterlandsX (eXperiment): Going About This All Wrong? - It appears maybe I have been.
• SplinterlandsX (eXperiment): Unexpected Success - Winning multiple giveaways.
• SplinterlandsX (eXperiment): It Actually Happened! - Finally won a reward card.
• SplinterlandsX (eXperiment): I'm Getting Stronger - Added more SPS and a couple of new cards
• SplinterlandsX (eXperiment): I Finally Got Lucky - Get your head out of the gutter
• SplinterlandsX (eXperiment): Mid-season update of second full season - A surprise boost
• SplinterlandsX (eXperiment): The First Full Season - Results from the first full season
• SplinterlandsX (eXperiment): The Experiment Continues - The first update
• Starting Over - An Experiment - Setting up the experiment

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NOTE: Individual card images provided by Splinterlands developers (see Splinterlands Card Images by Level).