As I have now been playing Steem Monsters and Drug Wars for several months, I've wanted to contribute something of ACTIONABLE value to my fellow players (and FUTURE players) - but NOT just fill my Steemit feed with daily images of quest reward - or battle - SPAM, (no offense to those doing so). Ultimately, Steemit is about ADDING VALUE to the social experience - that is the magic of blockchain technology. So, after some serious pondering, I decided that a weekly "Steem Monsters + Drugs Wars player strategy diary" type series, with CONCISE and ACTIONABLE tips, would be of most value to my audience. Please let me know your thoughts (good and/or bad), and I hope that readers (now and into the future) will benefit from this series. If you gain a better understanding of blockchain, gaming, "blockchain gaming", marketing, and/or any other area of knowledge I end up exploring as this series naturally progresses, then I will have done my "good deed" (of providing value) for the week. Also, feel free to hit me up on the battlefield...

@transcript-junky

1 ) Through reading a "how-to" post about the @steemmonsters tournaments I FINALLY figured out that the time displayed on the daily tournaments board is actually adjusted for my local time zone. I tried to find this information somewhere on the main #SteemMonsters site but couldn't, and was confused because back when the tournaments were not automated on the site I had this exact issue with not being able to figure out the time zone (since I live in Asia). SteemMonsters should state this clearly on the tournaments page so that people like me can feel more confident about trying the tournaments. Aside from that I have started playing 2-3 tournaments per day now, but interestingly I have been getting my butt kicked! I have thought of myself as a decent player of the game, but for some reason don't seem to be adjusted to the various parameters (level limits, etc.) of the tournaments. Hopefully, this will be a challenge which will ultimately make me a better player. I will monitor my progress in the tournament play in the coming weeks. My goal is to use any winnings I get in the tournaments to continue buying and upgrading gold cards, with the long-term goal of being able to play the "gold card only" tournaments. But starting to play the tournaments has been a goal of mine for the past few months, and so this was a significant milestone achievement for me. Another issue is that my current purchases in the game (which include: one gold card per day (either new, or one card to upgrade existing cards (~ 1,000 - 1,500 DEC/day), PLUS two "+5 reward card" potions per season (~ 3,500 DEC x 2 = 7,000 DEC/season), PLUS one "+25% gold card" potion (~ 6,000 DEC), PLUS my daily 200 DEC contribution to my guild) may actually REQUIRE that I win a few tournaments per week, as my current DEC earning from game play ALONE is probably around 1,500/day, and this INCLUDES converting some of the reward cards that I don't want into DEC. Winning a few tournaments would likely make up the difference so I can maintain the above-outline strategy of purchases to reach my longer-term goals in the game. I COULD take the option of using some Steem to buy the cards if absolutely necessary, but prefer to try NOT to do that if possible. I will start keeping a daily log of my ACTUAL daily DEC earnings this week to get a more accurate measure of my inputs versus outputs. As I have said, the gold cards are the key, as they pay dividends in the long term, and so any investment of DEC into them will ultimately pay itself back in future DEC earnings.

2 ) Last week I wrote about how my 2,000 DEC investment in the SteemMonsters "upvote service" had started paying out a bit more, which I attributed to the lowering of author payouts due to the hardfork. To my dissapointment I then saw that a few folks, who seem to be running an operation to downvote bid-bot posts, gave me a few downvotes in the amount of ~ 75% of the $5.50 upvote received by @steemmonsters on the previous post in this series. I contacted the downovoter ( @trafalgar ) directly (and diplomatically), and the fokls in that group informed me of the reasoning behind the downvote, which I actually DO believe is partly justified, although I don't COMPLETELY agree with them. Their claim is that ALL "paid votes" are damaging to the Steemit/Steem ecosystem. But after gathering some intelligence (primarily with my budddy's in my SteemMonsters guild) this is not a majority opinion. That is, my stance (and that of some others I asked about this situation) is that "buying votes" is more complicated than just "paying to artificially pump" a post. I spend a lot of time writing the posts in this series, and believe that the ~ $5.00 upvotes I have been getting (by investing my hard-earned 2,000 DEC earning from the game, and making the significant effort to write these posts) is justified, based on the quality of the posts. My posts add value, and due to the overall legitmacy of SteemMonsters, I believe that them "supporting" posts is justified. On the other hand, an argument could be made that simply adding ANY post url in the "memo" section when you contribute DEC to the @splinterlands account would be evidence AGAINST my argument FOR the "pad upvote". So I am in PARTIAL agreement with the downvoter. And since my mission on Steemit is certainly NOT to cause trouble, I took it up directly with SteemMonsters admin (on Discord). Luckily, the top admin of SteemMonsters was very helpful in this case, saw the logic in discontinuing the "bot-ish" nature of the upvote system, and informed me that they are now working on tweaking things so that people who are posting valuable posts related to the game can be rewarded to the same degree as with the "bid-bot". They were also gracious enough to happily refund my 2,000 DEC from the last post (which I used to buy a new "+5 reward cards" potion), AND give me a nice JUICY upvote for the trouble. If they replace the "bot-like" upvote which just a plain upvote from their main account I will then use the 2,000 DEC per post (which I will no longer have to spend out of my own assets) to buy more gold cards, and/or gold card ugrades, which will continue to pay DEC "divididends" into the future. So this recent crisis may likely turn out to be a blessing in disguise.

3 ) I was finally accepted into one of the gangs. I spent a good month or two TRYING to get into a few of the gangs, by applying, but most of them seemed to be filled up, and I didn't get any responses. But the leader of the "x" (Executioners) gang posted in a comment a few weeks ago that he had just started his new gang, and was looking for members. So I replied that I would be willing to join to "try" out the gang feature (since I had not yet been in a gang). The good news is that getting into the gang HAS enabled me to at least experiment with how the gangs work, and I have been contributing a consistent amount of assets to towards upgrading the buildings. The only problem is that there seems to be essentially ZERO communication between the gang boss and members, and so this DISINCENTIVES me to contribute more. This is something I have learned from being a member of a thriving SteemMonsters guild - that when everyone is contributing it becomes a team effort, and that motivates all members to participate. I will continue trying to make a connection with our gang boss and ask for some guidance, but for now I have achieved the mission of joining a gang, and am more familiar with how gangs work, so that if I choose to join ANOTHER gang I will at least be able to participate IMMEDIATELY upon being accepted. I will start looking for other gangs and see if any will let me in.

4 ) The production level of my four non-primary bases are now reaching up into the area where I am able to start steadily building my army so as to be able to both DEFENSE each installation from attack, AND initiate attacks from each additional base to bring in some more assets, and then reinvest them. My storage levels are high enough to protect assets, and I can use my primary army to retaliate against any FOOLS who try to attack any of the secondary bases. I have decided that, upon waking each morning, I will use all of the accumulated overnight resources from each base to buy battle units. I will also transport assets from the primary account to upgrade my "operations center" and "training facility" to increase the speed at which new battle units are recruited. Right now, the slower initial pace is the main limitin factor for building the armies - which is why having the primary base as cover is so important. Over the days/weeks/months my armies will increase in size, and I can start initiating battles as they become strong enough, and use the asset earnings to further building production and army capacity. I will use my primary base as "air cover" for the secondary bases as I build them up.

5 ) After losing A LOT of Steem in the @kryptogames debacle two months ago I have decided that instead of just letting the 3 million of their token sit idle in Steem-Engine, I would sell them off and use the proceeds to buy SteemMonsters gold cards (and/or upgrades), and in this way increase my "dividends" (bonus DEC earned from the gold cards from won battles) and buy more SM cards. In fact, going forward I will start progressively selling of my other Steem-Engine tokens, ata controlled/strategic pace, and use the proceeds for the same purpose. My #steemmonsters active gameplay with the gold cards unleashes earning potential from all of the other tokens which I convert into cards, so it is a good strategy for the long term. In line with this strategy, I intend to progressively increase my daily contribution to my guild, in relation to my increasing earning power with the gold cards. This past month I increases my daily contribution from 100 DEC/day to 200 DEC/day, and will bump it up to 300 DEC/day when my income from the gold cards makes that feasible.

I hope you find some/any of these tips useful in increasing your understanding and/or skill level in the Steem Monsters (Splinterland) and/or Drug Wars game(s). More JUICY tips to come with each weekly update, as I become more experienced and successful in the game.

See you on the battlefield...

@transcript-junky