absolute FAVORITE jokers

[AlphaGodith]

what are the jokers that you feel like you've won as soon as you get them, the ones you'd sell just about any other joker to open a slot for, and/or the ones you think are the best even if you never get other jokers that boost them further or work well with them specifically?

mine are the spare trousers and constellation, with runner ups being the runner, hologram, and seeing double (the one that gives xmult if you have clubs and something else in played hand), cuz most of them scale easily and/or can work with multiple hand types.

[HeraldOfOpera]

Shout-out to my boy Misprint. Lets you look at the top card of your deck at any time, including times where you don't actually own him.

Publicado originalmente por Twelvefield:

Spare Trousers is pretty reliable. I like the shaky Jokers, though, the ones that turn Balatro into more of a gambling game. Showman is a good example. It could be great, it could be a disaster. Only one way to find out.

Showman can be thought of as an uncommon version of Invisible Joker, Blueprint and Brainstorm. Vastly worse in a lot of ways, but can potentially do at least some of the broken things those are known for.

[RazzberryMocha]

Publicado originalmente por doingwork:

Publicado originalmente por AnonTwo:

Well, think of it this way

High Card per level is +15 chips and +1 mult

Think of how many times people have relied on Supernova and Bus, +1 mult per time the hand is used, and +1 mult per non-face hand used

Now consider that if you're already ahead of the game for any reason, you're only getting 1 mult per round from those cards

Despite that, they're usually still somewhat effective.

Now rounding back to Burnt Joker, While it doesn't have the chance of multi mult per round like Bus and Supernova, it

1. Gives Chips, more than Hiker (+5) and I believe the same as Runner (+15, the highest bonus from these jokers)

2. Gives mult

3. Will stay even if you eventually remove burnt joker

4. Applies before Steel Cards and Photograph

Basically you're trading an opportunity at faster scaling for a scaler that is applied at a better time, is balanced (chip/mult) and will stay even if you remove the joker later.

As an added bonus, it's one of those cards that plays well with Blueprint. Where you can move blueprint to it, get double levels, then switch blueprint back to your actual game plan.

It can very quickly give you a reliable enough amount of chips/mult to work with almost any joker strat.

The problem with Burnt is that high card scales very poorly and its too inconsistent to use for anything besides high card or pair. I have made it work before with high card but thats mostly because I had Baron and Mime as well. It really needs either a copy for 2 burnts or blueprint/brainstorm otherwise it doesn't give enough "oomph" in my opinion.

I did get it to work very well with a straight build on the abandoned deck and Shortcut, I was able to discard straights and still play them after which made life easy.

Also, high card is only +10 chips, not +15. After 2 whole antes (with no skips) you get +6 mult and +60 chips on high card. Its an OK card but too niche IMO.

Carrying burnt joker for a few antes and levelling high card will replace any chip joker (and possibly flat mult as well if you carry it longer) you'll need for beating ante 8, especially good since chips are a struggle sometimes for high card builds. In endless it becomes much more niche but is still very usable provided you've done your deckfixing and have an open slot.

[doingwork]

Publicado originalmente por RazzberryMocha:

Publicado originalmente por doingwork:

The problem with Burnt is that high card scales very poorly and its too inconsistent to use for anything besides high card or pair. I have made it work before with high card but thats mostly because I had Baron and Mime as well. It really needs either a copy for 2 burnts or blueprint/brainstorm otherwise it doesn't give enough "oomph" in my opinion.

I did get it to work very well with a straight build on the abandoned deck and Shortcut, I was able to discard straights and still play them after which made life easy.

Also, high card is only +10 chips, not +15. After 2 whole antes (with no skips) you get +6 mult and +60 chips on high card. Its an OK card but too niche IMO.

Carrying burnt joker for a few antes and levelling high card will replace any chip joker (and possibly flat mult as well if you carry it longer) you'll need for beating ante 8, especially good since chips are a struggle sometimes for high card builds. In endless it becomes much more niche but is still very usable provided you've done your deckfixing and have an open slot.

Thats fair, I definitely use it for a round or 2 alot of the time. I would hardly call it an amazing, lifesaving joker, but it definitely has its uses. I very rarely play high card builds so I suppose I see less use out of it as well.

[ulzgoroth]

I like some jokers a lot, but I don't think the threshold set in the OP is one you should ever permit. The best possible joker is still bad in the wrong circumstance.

There's several jokers I really like, but none of them that I'd be fool enough to treat so unconditionally. Flat adders aren't always good even if they're great adders. Money jokers can be unnecessary. Flat xmult can be too weak to hold a slot and scaling xmult can be too late to get going.

[Twelvefield]

Publicado originalmente por HeraldOfOpera:

Showman can be thought of as an uncommon version of ...

Sure, I go with that. When you read our friend AlphaGodith's OP, they trot out two points: which Joker makes you feel like you will win no matter what, and which Joker would you sell everything to buy.

Showman.

While I really don't agree to the first part regarding Showman, I will buy it unconditionally because of its potential, or more to the point, its entertainment value. That, and I see Showman quite a bit. Granted, I think it's done worse for me over time than better, but if I don't buy it I'll never know for sure.

[Frostea]

To the Moon, because money is what gets you wins and it’s literally the best economy joker in the entire game.

[ulzgoroth]

Publicado originalmente por Frostea:

To the Moon, because economy is what gets you wins and it’s literally the best economy joker in the entire game.

Only if you also have at least Seed Money. (And also have seed money.) Without that, it's okay but not outstanding. Cloud Nine can easily be better than To The Moon, as can Rocket, and then there's the activated ones like to-do list and mail-in rebate.

[Frostea]

Publicado originalmente por ulzgoroth:

Publicado originalmente por Frostea:

To the Moon, because economy is what gets you wins and it’s literally the best economy joker in the entire game.

Only if you also have at least Seed Money. (And also have seed money.) Without that, it's okay but not outstanding. Cloud Nine can easily be better than To The Moon, as can Rocket, and then there's the activated ones like to-do list and mail-in rebate.

It’s extra income with no weird gimmicks or rng. That’s what makes it so good in my opinion.

[RazzberryMocha]

Publicado originalmente por Frostea:

Publicado originalmente por ulzgoroth:

Only if you also have at least Seed Money. (And also have seed money.) Without that, it's okay but not outstanding. Cloud Nine can easily be better than To The Moon, as can Rocket, and then there's the activated ones like to-do list and mail-in rebate.

It’s extra income with no weird gimmicks or rng. That’s what makes it so good in my opinion.

Needing to stay above interest is pretty limiting, mainly on higher stakes where you often need to spend below interest to keep up with the blind scaling. Only with seed money/money tree is it better than its competition and those vouchers are very situational win-mores at the higher stakes. Compared to cloud nine or rocket which do the same thing but both scale very nicely and mail-in rebate which will consistently get $10 it's not close. Still a good joker, just not in the same league as the others.

[doingwork]

Publicado originalmente por RazzberryMocha:

Publicado originalmente por Frostea:

It’s extra income with no weird gimmicks or rng. That’s what makes it so good in my opinion.

Needing to stay above interest is pretty limiting, mainly on higher stakes where you often need to spend below interest to keep up with the blind scaling. Only with seed money/money tree is it better than its competition and those vouchers are very situational win-mores at the higher stakes. Compared to cloud nine or rocket which do the same thing but both scale very nicely and mail-in rebate which will consistently get $10 it's not close. Still a good joker, just not in the same league as the others.

And don't forget, money-during-play jokers like mail-in rebate allow you to go under the interest cap, lets say dropping to $15 in the shop before the blind, then you can earn the $10 during the round and still get back to $25 for the full interest to kick in. Any "during-play" economy jokers or things like gold seals can be better than the others if you play them like that.

[noisyturtle]

Smeared and Misprint have gotten me out of many a jam, underrated

obviously guys like Ancient, Blueprint, and DNA too

[ulzgoroth]

Publicado originalmente por Frostea:

Publicado originalmente por ulzgoroth:

Only if you also have at least Seed Money. (And also have seed money.) Without that, it's okay but not outstanding. Cloud Nine can easily be better than To The Moon, as can Rocket, and then there's the activated ones like to-do list and mail-in rebate.

It’s extra income with no weird gimmicks or rng. That’s what makes it so good in my opinion.

If you use it with no gimmicks weirder than always holding onto 25 unspendable money, it's barely stronger than Gold Joker - which may make it weaker if the point of having money is to spend it instead of pile it up. (Which isn't always the case, a good Bootstraps is nice.)

And you certainly should be able to make Cloud 9 pay more than $5 per blind if you make any effort whatsoever, without having to do anything except be slightly intentional about using certain Tarots. Or rocket, of course, automatically catches up after 2 bosses and then starts pulling ahead.

Interest-extending vouchers can make it quite wild, of course. I've done the thing with it giving me $10 per blind. Don't think I got Money Tree for the %20, but still.