Wow.... sometimes luck is really with you, and I got STUPID lucky this morning! I had some spare DEC from a couple of Splinterland card sales that had gone through overnight, and I generally use these proceeds to bolster up some of my cards. However, I also do save and scrimp up the DEC to purchase DICE and UNTAMED packs. This morning, I had enough to buy one DICE and one UNTAMED pack... so, I decided to give myself a little treat.

Now, the DICE was okay... I picked up two of the new summoners, which I've started to hold for long term. That said, I'm not really convinced that they fit my play-style and the fact that I'm not really buying that many DICE packs to make them a worthwhile card to field to lead my splinters. So, it is likely that they will head to the market soon enough.

On to the UNTAMED pack... four pretty ordinary cards... and then that shaky shaky animation (and the sound that overwhelms the SILENT setting on the website... ahem (please fix!)). As every Splinterlands player knows, that incredible animation is the precursor to a tasty Legendary card dropping!

... and what a feast! A Legendary Mimosa Nightshade.. and a GOLD FOIL! So, now I'm left with a bit of a decision to make... BURN, SELL or HOLD?

BURN

Well... the easiest thing to do would be just to BURN the card for 50,000 DEC and use that to buy more DICE/UNTAMED packs and to bolster my minions with market purchases of cards. However, 50,000 DEC is the rough equivalent of 50 USD which is slightly less than rough market price of 70 USD... on the other hand, it is a guaranteed "sale".

My main objection to the BURN route is the same reason that I've never burnt a card (except when testing out the idea...). These Splinterlands cards are NFTs with a limited run... I feel terrible about destroying them! I felt terrible burning common cards to see how the burn worked... and I would feel hideously guilty if I destroyed a card that had only 55 instances in circulation!

So, my aversion to burning the card is a bit more guilt-driven and backed up by a more rational economic analysis. Would I burn it if I would get 2 or 5 times the market price in burn rewards? Who knows... I guess everyone has their price... these things are always a balance in incentives, I'm emotionally attached to the card, so... I guess I would take the mercenary route in this case!

HOLD

Well... there is some incredibly kudos with holding such a rare card. I can put it on my CV and tell my wife.... who will be stunningly uninterested. As a level 2 gold card, she is still a weaker summoner (with respect to the monster levels that she can field) than my Beta-type summoners. To achieve parity with my regular summoners, I would need another gold foil Mimosa... and at 70 USD, I'm NOT buying one.... and the likelihood of being struck by the Splinterlands Good Luck Fairy again is pretty damn slim! (that is, unless I get rid of this card... in which case, I'm probably guaranteed to be smitten by dastardly good luck again!).

So, at 7 mana to play for a decidedly weaker monster team, Gold Foil Mimosa has very little going for her... except....

... she increased my Player Power rating by 50,000 points to put me in Diamond 1! Well, initially I had thought that this would be a great thing, as it means that I'm eligible for greater daily and end of season rewards. However, I think that the Power Ratings are working in a good way to spread out the difficulty rating of matches... and in Diamond 2 I was sitting pretty okay for wins/losses with the team that I could field.

In Diamond 1, I'm getting stomped quite heavily... I'm matched against fully maxed common monsters and I have a LOSE streak of over 10 games whilst trying to complete my daily quest! OUCH OUCH OUCH...

So, this Gold Foil Mimosa is a bit of a mixed blessing... almost a curse!

So, let us try to look at this rationally.... Gold Mimosa puts me in the Diamond 1 League, which only gives me 10 more loot chests at the end of the season in addition to a few more loot chests for the daily quest. Weighted against this little bump in loot haul... is the fact that I'm really struggling to actually win a Daily Quest as my team is completely outmatched by other Diamond 1 teams.

SELL

This would seem to be an enticing option... at roughly 70 USD for the sale (I probably would sell it for lower to just clinch the sale), it would give me the funds required to level up my Beta and other monsters that make up the mainstay of my team. I could level up some Beta commons that I generally use as tanks, and have some left over for some more rolls of the DICE (haha...) and purchasing UNTAMED packs.

Mostly likely, the bulk of the purchase would go towards targeted leveling of monsters that I regularly use on a daily basis. This route would definitely dump me out of the Diamond 1 League back into Diamond 2... but I'm happy with that. It is better that I get back to Diamond 1 with a balanced team rather than a useless Gold Foil trophy, in that way, I can actually field teams that have a chance of winning!

The Decision

So... the BURN options is off the table. Which leaves me with the HOLD and the SELL option. This is really an exercise akin to the Aesop Fable "The Cock and The Jewel"... sure, the Gold Foil Mimosa is such a gem to have in my collection, but it is functionally USELESS to me. Thus, the market price of the gem is really not indicative of the worth in my eyes. In fact, there might actually be a negative price to HOLDING the gold foil Mimosa in that she bumps me artificially into a League that my team is unable to compete in.

In the end, I will definitely SELL the Gold Foil Mimosa... it will be sad to let her go, but I would rather have the functional worth of the card being directed towards leveling up my existing USEFUL and DEPLOY-ABLE cards rather than sitting in a trophy case.

.. but I will hold her until the end of the season, it is only a couple of days... and I can see if I can just get a couple more loot cases out being in a higher League level!

Splinterlands (aka the best blockchain game out there!)

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