Definitely respect your opinion and I know some others think the same way. I obviously disagree with your conclusions as to the effects of this change. I believe they will help to add value to all assets, including older cards, in the long run.
There are also some things you said that I wanted to address specifically:
I don't even really blame the Splinterlands team - their actions are completely rational. They want and need your money, and your old card collection - that you already paid for - is a huge hinderance to that goal, as long as it holds any kind of income generating potential for you.
I want to be clear that this is not about the Splinterlands team at all - that's why I published it from my account and not the company account. This change will not generate any money for the team at all.
This is about the long term value of all assets, for the benefit of the players, which will indirectly also help the team. The ecosystem as a whole does need new money to come in for it to be successful. Allowing users to continually earn rewards without needing to put more in hurts everyone and is not in the best interest of anyone who is interested in the long term success of this product.
It's easy to make the argument you're making, and I'm not surprised to see it. I just think it's incorrect, and I believe that anyone who really thinks through the change in detail with a view of the entire ecosystem in mind will come to the same conclusion. I would be happy to discuss more on the TH later today or even on a voice chat at some point, which I believe will be much easier than writing.
Thanks for your thoughtful reply, and apologies for attributing this proposal to the Splinterlands team (though I suspect as CEO, your personal opinions and proposals must overlap with the team's best interests to some degree... but I digress).
Edit: Then why not focus on attracting new players to the game? Imagine what you could accomplish if all of the time and energy spent marginalizing and taxing Wild players in the name of fighting "bot farms" was spent instead on expanding the user base!
Edit: I care about the long term success of this product, but with every new rule change that chips away at any benefit I can derive from owning old cards, I am less and less convinced that this product cares about me.
The problem for me is that as an investment-minded individual, I would have never started playing Splinterlands years ago, if I knew that it would require me to constantly pump money into new cards, while my older cards were all but guaranteed to lose value due to a Modern / Wild system that didn't exist when I made those initial card investment decisions.
I don't blame you for trying to ensure that the game economy has a constant influx of money. If I were in your shoes, I might be doing the same thing. The issue is that this goal is in direct opposition to my best interests as a rational player. I have no problem with paying thousands of dollars to build up a strong card collection, but I have a very big problem with that collection systematically being devalued so that I continuously feel pressured to buy new cards.
When I started playing this game, I (maybe naively) thought that it was possible for both Splinterlands and myself to prosper financially. But it seems that the reality is more of a zero-sum game, where in order for the Splinterlands ecosystem to prosper, the vast majority of current players must not be allowed to prosper (and this is perhaps a sobering reality of any long-running P2E game ecosystem that I have only recently begun to realize).
Simple as that!
In my opinion it doesn't help the overall game economy at all to devalue old cards. If I felt my old cards would keep/increase(!) their value, I still would consider to buy new cards, as well. However, as I observe my old cards to lose value and use cases I would be just stupid to buy new cards again (which will be 'old' sooner or later, too).
The fact that Matt, a large decision maker in this ecosystem/game/company believes this will be beneficial. Is a prime example of why this company has continued to fail with bad leadership for years.
"Repeating the same actions expecting different results"...sounds crazy to me
I believe it would be more beneficial for the team to receive the funds rather than burning them. Alternatively, a 50% burn and 50% allocation to the team could be a balanced approach. Burning all the value seems counterproductive when the team could utilize these resources to ensure the long-term survival and success of the project.