Deck shaping for straight builds?

[Playerjjjj]

Shaping my deck for other hands is intuitive, but after 40 hours I'm still not sure what the best approach is for straights. Shrinking/expanding a rank early on can make it much more difficult to draw viable hands. Ideally, it seems that you'd want to cut entire ranks at once without messing up the ratios of other ranks. I always seem to screw myself while I'm still pruning. Is there a reliable rule of thumb for getting around this? Or is angling for a straight flush pivot from the start a better option?

Obviously 4 fingers, shortcut, and massive hand size can help a ton, but they aren't always available and/or optimal.

[BaconX]

Try to cut trim the fat on both ends of a straight, so take out Aces and 2s first and slowly make your way into the middle. Unless you're going for something like superposition, going for middle straight means that you can potentially have two outs instead of just waiting for a single card.

So for instance, if you have something like A K Q 10, you're just praying for a Jack, but if you have something like 10 9 8 7, you can either look for a Jack or a 6 for the straight. Cutting both ends will ensure that you'll draw those middle straight more consistently.

[Ronald Brain]

Take every Spectral Pack you can get and pray for Immolate. Sure, cutting 5 random cards every time is risky but it's always easier to add card you want than to trim your deck.

Ideally you want a 10-high straight as Face Cards has higher debuff risk, so try to remove everything outside 10 9 8 7 6 range - that also means Death those cards into 10 9 8 7 6 when you have the chance. Only go for Face Cards straight if you want to rely on Photograph + Hanging Chad.

[malogoss]

My tip is play Abandoned Deck.
Else, the 2 previous posts I agree with. I'd rather get rid of face cards before 2's and 3's. Because of bosses in general, plus Hack is a thing.

[TimTim3000]

I pretty much never go for Straight builds unless I get Shortcut and then it's practically a necessity because it does scale really quickly with Saturn. Maybe the most joker-dependent build there is.

[sbszine]

Start with abandoned deck for sure. As an added bonus you can take Ride The Bus.

[(S. C.) J. P.]

Abandoned Deck, Shortcut Joker, and also the *Four Fingers* Joker.

[QuantuuM]

I mean Aces can make Straights two ways, which no other card can do. Wait, I'm thinking this the wrong way? 6-7-8-9-T have eight different ranks they interact with for a Straight...so they can make straights more ways than A-2-3-4-5-J-Q-K? I've been destroying 6's and 7's on Straight builds. lmao.

[Paul Ryevere]

Originally posted by QuantuuM:

I mean Aces can make Straights two ways, which no other card can do. Wait, I'm thinking this the wrong way? 6-7-8-9-T have eight different ranks they interact with for a Straight...so they can make straights more ways than A-2-3-4-5-J-Q-K? I've been destroying 6's and 7's on Straight builds. lmao.

It's not the optimal way, but you can still have that work. You gotta change your discard strategy, though, to do so.

Like, if you cut out 8s, and 7s entirely, you're left with two viable six-card ranges to build a straight from.
You look at your opening hand, and it's A Q Q J 5 4 2 right?
You've got 3 cards towards a "high end" straight, and 4 cards towards a "low end" straight.
So if chips from the cards aren't a consideration, the obvious choice is to shoot for the "low end."

This can make decision-making a little more simple, and once you make that decision, you still get a benefit from a thinner deck of cards to pull what you need from.

If you manage it, and can get 9s and 6s out too, that thinning benefit (at least perceptually, I haven't done the actual math) gets better.
Once it comes time to pick a side though, as soon as you do delete that first 10 or 5, things get worse for you in terms of consistency.
Though, hounestly, if you're to the point of removing your 17th card from your deck, you probably have some way of getting even more removal, so that probably won't be that big of an issue.

I've definitely won a couple of times on low-stakes pulling cards out of the middle, trying too hard to optimize for Superposition, lol. If I'm gunning for a win on higher stakes, I'd probably avoid it, but it can be a fun thing to play around with.

Hounestly, if you're thoughtful about it, doing strategically bad things and messing around and experimenting is going to deepen your innate understanding of the game's mechanics, and you'll be a more skilled player for it.
Just, you know, be ready for a lot of those experiments to blow up in your face and kill your run, lol.