The prices of Splinterlands cards have increased significantly in value over the last few months.
My card collection has also increased its value considerably.
As you can see from the calculations in the image below, my card collection was worth $519.24 on 4 March 2021 and is now worth $1303.27.
With card prices so high it can be worthwhile to buy packs of cards.
My buying strategy
My buying strategy is based on comparison of two values:
- estimated value of a pack of cards
- purchase cost of a pack of cards.
When the estimated value of a pack of cards is at least $0.30 higher than the purchase cost, I buy one or more packs of cards.
Nine days ago I bought 3 packs of Untamed cards because I found a very good price.
I wrote a post in which I calculated the convenience or otherwise of buying packs of Untamed cards and explained the reason for my purchase:
Today I am going to calculate the cost-effectiveness or otherwise of buying DICE card packs based on the various purchasing methods available.
In the image on the cover you can see the calculation of the current prices of DICE card packs according to the purchase method.
In fact, DICE card packs (as well as Untamed packs) can mainly be purchased with:
- Credits (1000 credits = 1$) on the Splinterlands website
- DEC tokens on the Splinterlands website
- SWAP.HIVE tokens on Hive Engine/LeoDEX.
If you buy with credits, the cost is 3000 Credits which equals $3.
If you purchase with DEC tokens, the cost is variable and depends on the value of the DEC tokens and HIVE tokens at the time of purchase.
Today, 17 May 2021, the purchase price of a DEC token is 0.199 HIVE = $0.00097.
One HIVE token is worth $0.485.
Based on the current values of HIVE and DEC tokens at the time of writing this post, buying a pack of DICE cards with DEC tokens is equivalent to spending 5.97 HIVE = $2.89.
On HiveEngine/LeoDex there are 2 packs of DICE cards for sale for 4.95 HIVE (SWAP.HIVE) = 2.40$.
On the Splinterlands website (SHOP section) you can buy DICE card packs in blocks of 20 packs or 100 packs.
Buying 20 packs of cards in bulk grants a bonus of one free pack of cards.
Buying 100 packs of cards in bulk grants a bonus of 10 free packs of cards.
Of the various purchase methods, the lowest price is obtained by using SWAP.HIVE tokens as a payment method and buying on Hive Engine/LeoDex.
The estimated value of a pack of cards
In order to decide whether buying a pack of cards can be profitable, it is important to know the estimated value of the pack of cards you want to buy.
To find out the estimated value of a pack of Untamed cards, I have always used the useful tool at https://peakmonsters.com/packs.
However, this tool only calculates the estimated value of Untamed card packs and not of DICE packs.
To find out the estimated value of a pack of DICE cards I used the tool made available by the site https://www.splintercards.com/
The site is young and still under development but the creator @tehox is doing a really good job and if you are a Splinterlands player I invite you to take a look at this useful site.
According to Splintercards calculations the estimated value of a pack of DICE cards at the time of writing this post is:
- $2.00 in the situation where you have no potions
- 2.51$ in the situation where Alchemical potions are used
- 2.50$ when using Legendary potions
- 3,216$ in the situation where both Alchemical and Legendary potions are used
With very few exceptions, it is not advisable to open a DICE or UNTAMED card pack if you do not have a sufficient number of Alchemical and Legendary potions because in this case the estimated value is always lower than the purchase cost.
The calculations change considerably in the following two cases:
- You don't need to buy potions because you already have enough potions from completing the daily quests and the fortnightly seasons of Splinterlands for free.
- It is necessary to buy potions.
The potions have a cost that is added to the initial cost of the packet and to get the highest estimated value you need a total of 10 potions per packet of cards to open:
- 5 Alchemical potions
- 5 Legendary potions
In the following image you can see the calculation of the estimated profit or loss in case you already have both potions available and do not need to buy them ( Profit/Loss (Expected) column).
As you can see from the calculations, it is always worthwhile to buy a pack of cards, because the estimated value is always higher than the purchase price.
The situation changes if you have to buy the necessary potions.
To the cost of each pack of cards you have to add the cost of 10 potions ($0.42).
In this case buying with credits and DEC tokens leads to an expected loss.
Buying 20 packs of cards from the Splinterlands website leads to a minimal expected profit.
Buying 100 packs of cards leads to an expected profit of $0.15.
Buying 2 packs of cards from Hive Engine has the best expected positive result: +$0.38.
I have performed the same calculations for buying packs of Untamed cards.
Buying the DICE packs was the best purchase for today.
In fact, for the Untamed packs of cards, the best expected profit was the one obtained by buying 500 packs of cards in bulk: Expected profit $0.52148
For DICE card packs the highest expected profit is produced by buying from Hive Engine/LeoDex: Expected profit 0.81177
Important note: the profit is called "expected" because it is not a certain value and the estimated value of a pack of cards becomes more accurate as the number of packs of cards purchased increases (500+...).
I immediately bought 3 packs of DICE cards from Hive Engine and found even lower prices than I wrote in the table above:
I preferred to leave in the table calculations the prices of the packs of cards still available for purchase on Hive Engine so that my calculations can be useful to my readers.
Currently on sale: 1 pack of DICE cards for the price of 4.95 SWAP.HIVE and 50 packs of DICE cards for the price of 5.34 SWAP.HIVE.
The expected profit is also very positive for the price of 5.34 SWAP.HIVE.
After the purchase I decided to open the three packs of DICE cards immediately.
3 packs of cards are very few to hope to have a result in line with the estimated value and therefore in my case luck will play a fundamental role.
Let's see what I found in the three packs of cards.
As indicated by the Peakmonsters website the total value of the cards is $17.19 (14.89+1.14+1.16) using market prices.
I spent $4.71 on the purchase of the 3 packs of cards.
I was definitely lucky but regardless of the lucky or unlucky results I will receive in the future from opening a few packs of cards, I will continue to follow my buying strategy because I believe it is valid in the medium to long term.
I hope you liked this post and I thank you for taking the time to read it :)
Not a Splinterlands player?
If you are not a Splinterlands player, you are missing out on a unique opportunity to have fun while earning cards and DEC.
If you decide to register, you can do so from this link:
https://splinterlands.com?ref=libertycrypto27
Of course if you'd like to use my refferal link... :)
If you use a refferal link when registering for Splinterlands you have the following advantage:
Splinterlands is a great game but it has also proven to be a good investment (at least so far) and if you regularly participate in the weekly contests organized by the @splinterlands account you will recoup the cost of registration in a few weeks.
Any game that allows you to buy cards and tokens is never just a game, it is also an investment.
I am not a financial advisor and my advice is not financial advice, it is just my personal opinion based on my experience.
If you decide to invest in the Splinterlands game you do so at your own choice and risk.
See you on the Splinterlands battlefields.
Unless otherwise indicated, the images in this post are screenshots taken from the sites:
https://peakmonsters.com/@libertycrypto27/explorer
The font used in my images or images edited by me is Open Source
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Twitter: https://twitter.com/libertycrypto27
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