Chaos Legion Edition Splinterlands Cards That Have Weathered the Downturn
There were cards that held their value after all?
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The capitulation in the Splinterlands card market due to the exodus of players, downsizing, reallocation, and negative market sentiment has not reached certain corners of the market. It may be surprising to find out that some cards rose in value during the past two months. Much of the focus is on the cards that fell, which is because it is the majority of cards held and because so many participants are heavily invested in Chaos Legion. However, not all cards were wrecked.
Chaos Legion Bright Spots
Scavo Hireling
This neutral Common monster from Chaos Legion held its value in the marketplace in the Gold Foil market, but also managed to do the unthinkable.
Be the only Regular Foil Chaos Legion card to increase its value in the past two months. Going back to March 20, 2023, if you bought any Regular Foil card and held to the present day, the card depreciated and the only one that did not depreciate was Scavo Hireling.
Regular Foil Scavo Hireling rose after the Christmas lull and then maintained its price in the past two months.
Gold Foil Scavo Hireling had a similar track, but there was a bit of a supply crunch that sent the price surging near $3 per card right around April 19-20.
Gold Foil Iza the Fanged
Iza the Fanged has not given back the gains it made during the First Quarter Land Rush Rally. This is a card that has remained on the positive side for those who bought in two months ago and generally held value. This was a comically underappreciated and underpriced card, even after the release of Fernheart and subsequent price bump that did not last.
Gold Foil Ifrit Rising
"We Buy Ugly Houses" has a Gold Foil Legendary card and that is Ifrit Rising. The recharge ability is not well-received and it is not a popular card to play and it has been a bit of bust in the secondary card market, but it is a gainer over the past two months making it an aberration.
A massive price run-up in early April followed by a cooldown and the price of the asset meeting support is playing a role in why Ifrit Rising has not fallen. Those who bought Gold Foil Ifrit Rising in the Christmas lull could have seen a 400-500% return on investment, if they sold in early April.
Conditions in late May 2023 vs. Christmas 2022 are quite different.
Riftwatchers
Only 28.9% of Riftwatchers packs have been opened thus far. This means that this "mini-set" has a lot of packs still left to be purchased and opened. There's a limited supply because nobody is buying the Riftwatchers packs due to SPS prices being so low ($0.0219 at present time). Riftwatchers (Commons) was a great set to flip during the First Quarter of 2023 as supply and demand crunches happened frequently leading to cards making wild jumps. The supply has risen a little bit since this time, but the demand has fallen off generally speaking due to the end of the Land Rush Rally. The wild swings while less prevalent, can still be found.
Gold Foil Corsair Bosun
Corsair Bosun made some wild swings in price and by sheer coincidence upon examining the price, it is just coming down from an upswing at a time when the card is up 23.4% from the value it held on March 20. The price support happens to not be far off from the March 20 price.
Gold Foil Sea Stalker
The tight supply for Sea Stalker means that this price could go right back up if the two cards priced at the level where the price was 2 months ago are sold. The problem is that there could be a race to the bottom. The alternative is to be smart to price above those two prices at roughly $10 and hope that someone buys multiple copies at those prices.
I can see the reason why Scavo Hireling doesn't lose value not so much the Efreet or Iza lol, I guess that they were so low that was difficult for those to going lower.
The fact that the prices held value for Iza and Ifrit Rising is quite something.
Lira the Dark is an example... it fell off 15% during the same 2 month timeframe. It was not exactly a "loved" card and it got a later push than some others in late March, but it fell back down below that push.
Desert Dragon was not loved pre-Land Rush either. But look at what happened, it fell off 17% in price if purchased and held for two months. It also experienced a wild supply shortage and run-up in price that was ridiculous.