I have never looked into Splinterforge, but I like the idea. This is what can happen in the future too, where people who "own their assets" will be able to utilize them outside of the direct ecosystem. Might be interesting. Perhaps Land expansion could have been a separate company for example.

The problem with Splinterlands needing more new players, is that they are cutting out the community interaction aspect. If people are focusing only on ROI, they are essentially cutting out the possibility to attract new players because price to compete is too high. What is the point of buying cards when you can't compete with the bots? Where is the fun for a new player, and there isn't even a community built to really discuss these things.