obelisk needs a rework

[BooQueefius]

a decent joker that is genuinely not fun to play

[Cupcake]

It's very annoying to have to constantly check your played hands. I usually always skip it even though it's decently strong. I played it one time and accidentally reset and just insta-lost after that. Maybe some kind of alert if you're about to play a hand that would reset obelisk? Feels like a lame change though, I'm not sure how it could be fixed.

[Lil brekky]

obelisk won me my first gold stake. it fit perfectly because I was already playing 1 hand type every round. I continued doing this as long as I could without losing rounds and eventually had a budget of like 27 hands played for other types. Obelisk has a specific job it does well.

[Ronald Brain]

Eh, I say it could probably become Uncommon, or higher scaling. Definitely not worth picking up as a Rare, it's way too situational and can't carry into Endless.

[srn347]

Apparently it's been nerfed twice (from 0.5x per proc and then 0.25x).

[sober]

just remove it that it resets on a tie. it makes the joker borderline unplayable. watching my 5x multiplier disappear because i got 6 hands at five times played is not fun

[Teie]

Yeah, Obelisk has always been kind of a lame card. Not your main multiplier anyway for sure. But when you have nothing? It could be better than potentially nothing. With x0.5 scaling it at least had some redeeming qualities for very specific situations. x0.25? They've basically killed it. It's not items we're talking about, it's hands. Way too risky to get out of a difficult situation, way too risky to play it mid game and late game since you already have a set of hands that at least give you something. Same with Campfire. It was a decent carry/support multiplier mid-late game when your economy is strong until they nerfed it from x0.5 per item sold to x0.25 per item sold. These cards were never overpowered and now they are outright lame. Not useless, mind you. Just meh to put it mildly.

[Goblin]

Originally posted by sober:

just remove it that it resets on a tie. it makes the joker borderline unplayable. watching my 5x multiplier disappear because i got 6 hands at five times played is not fun

The issue there is that you didn't spend a few rounds playing high cards before finishing the round to pump it to 20+ times played, not that Obelisk is bad. You shouldn't be trying to pump it up when your highest number of plays is 6.
It's not a godtier card for sure, but some of you think it's a lot worse than it actually is.

[Arancil]

I personally don't enjoy using it, but I want niche jokers like these to exist. It's no fun if everything is easy to use all the time.

[Ratch]

Originally posted by Goblin:

Originally posted by sober:

just remove it that it resets on a tie. it makes the joker borderline unplayable. watching my 5x multiplier disappear because i got 6 hands at five times played is not fun

The issue there is that you didn't spend a few rounds playing high cards before finishing the round to pump it to 20+ times played, not that Obelisk is bad. You shouldn't be trying to pump it up when your highest number of plays is 6.
It's not a godtier card for sure, but some of you think it's a lot worse than it actually is.

Please explain better.
afaik You have to like, throw the first 3 antes playing only high card while simultaneously tanking the resets each time and still winning. Your proposal doesn't solve the issue Sober presents. In order to keep pumping the card up like you suggest, you'd have to reset the card constantly because high card will be your highest played hand. That's not a viable solution when the problem is "it resets on a tie"

edit: pre-emptive projected strawman response "yeah dude it's only good for like 2x mult at most" then it's garbage

[RazzberryMocha]

I know obelisk isn't for everyone but I've found great success with it on some of the harder stakes. Late game it's most likely just a dud, but finding it in the early to mid antes and just playing around 15 high cards then winning the run afterwards is something I like. Also, you can play all your hands as high card while saving your last hand for something big to close out like a flush or smth while still scaling well. It takes some understanding, but carries runs.

[lordatog]

Originally posted by Ratch:

Originally posted by Goblin:

The issue there is that you didn't spend a few rounds playing high cards before finishing the round to pump it to 20+ times played, not that Obelisk is bad. You shouldn't be trying to pump it up when your highest number of plays is 6.
It's not a godtier card for sure, but some of you think it's a lot worse than it actually is.

Please explain better.
afaik You have to like, throw the first 3 antes playing only high card while simultaneously tanking the resets each time and still winning. Your proposal doesn't solve the issue Sober presents. In order to keep pumping the card up like you suggest, you'd have to reset the card constantly because high card will be your highest played hand. That's not a viable solution when the problem is "it resets on a tie"

edit: pre-emptive projected strawman response "yeah dude it's only good for like 2x mult at most" then it's garbage

The point is, there are two ways to use Obelisk.

1) When Obelisk shows up, you already have a most-played hand that is far ahead of every other hand (ideally not High Card). In this case, you can just take it, pivot away from that hand, and ride it for the rest of the run.

2) When Obelisk shows up, you don't have a strong frontrunner hand, but you're doing well and can afford to spend some time building up Obelisk before you need it. In this case, you buy it, then start focusing on one hand for a while until it's far enough ahead, then you can pivot away as in option 1. Obelisk won't do anything for you until after the pivot, but you're strong enough to survive for a bit anyway.

If neither of these are the case (you don't have a frontrunner hand, and can't afford any deadweight right now) then you don't get Obelisk.

[Ratch]

Did you restate what I already said as your um ackshually second way to use Obelisk? The first way is an incredibly good way to lose a run. Neither are good. That's the point being discussed. The card isn't good and actively sucks to play with.

edit: tbf I don't think it needs a rework. I put no respect on Obelisk, that's all. It's an easy never-buy card.

[lordatog]

If you meet the criteria in either of those situations, then Obelisk is powerful. How, exactly, is getting an increasingly powerful multiplier for the rest of the run "an incredibly good way to lose the run"? If you're saying that because you feel there's a risk of losing your combo, then that's just user error. If you screwed up and played the wrong hand, or misjudged how many hands you would need and got stuck resetting the Obelisk - that's on you, and it doesn't mean the card is bad.

[Ratch]

I overshot when saying lose a run, admittedly. Going from 5oaK to Flush5 or straight to flush straight, etc would go insane. That wasn't the initial point and by now we've already proven Goblin wrong. "play high card 3x per round to pump up obelisk so it doesnt reset on a tie" followed up with "you guys just don't understand Obelisk" is what I took umbrage with. I didn't, but neither did Goblin.

[Arancil]

Originally posted by Ratch:

I overshot when saying lose a run, admittedly. Going from 5oak to Flush5 or straight to flush straight, etc. goes insane. That wasn't the initial point and by now we've already proven Goblin wrong. "just play high card 3x per round to pump up obelisk so it doesnt reset on a tie" followed up with "you guys just don't understand Obelisk" is what I took umbrage with. I didn't, but neither did Goblin.

Yeah, if you can spend the time to just throw away extra hands (and thus extra cash) just to pump up obelisk LATER, it seems you're already doing quite well and won't need to rely on obelisk to get across the finishing line. Sounds like a meme strategy at that point.