Earning the Astronomy Achievement requires you to discover all Planet Cards. Doing so will also unlock the Astronomer Joker. Some Planet Cards are secret, however, which is why most players get stuck. Let’s study the conditions for this achievement in more detail.

Discovering All Planet Cards To Earn the Astronomy Achievement

Discovering all Planet Cards means using them at least once. You can spread this out over as many runs as needed. You’ll get most of them through regular gameplay (though you may need to upgrade a few hands you consider useless). There are, however, 3 exceptions. These Planet Cards only have a chance to show up once you play them at least once.

This is easier said than done because:

• The hand types for them are not in your list by default, so you need to either know about them or stumble upon them
• You will not be able to play them without enhancing your deck first, as you will not have all the cards required for them in your starting deck

Secret Planet Cards To Earn the Astronomy Achievement

1. Planet X: Five of a Kind

Enhancing your deck to get the potential for this hand is very easy. You just need to add one extra card to your deck. Getting all 5 cards into one hand is a lot trickier, though, so I recommend getting as many copies as possible instead.

I prefer going for Full Houses while building up towards Five of a Kind. Three of a Kind is rather weak while Four of a Kind takes a while to build up to as well, by which time you may lose a run.

To unlock this card, I prefer playing the Abandoned Deck on the lowest difficulty. As this deck only has 10 x 4 different cards instead of 13 x 4, it’s easier to build up towards Planet X. You will need to add 75 unlocks to your Collection to unlock the Green Deck first, then win a run with it (on any difficulty). This will then unlock the Abandoned Deck.

Alternatively, if you don’t mind some randomness, you can use the Erratic Deck on the lowest difficulty. This deck randomizes the ranks and suits of all your cards, so you’re likely to have a good starting point. It is quite tough to unlock, though, requiring you to beat the game with any deck on the Orange Stake (second highest difficulty).

Apart from the obvious Death Arcana to copy an existing card, Strength is also very handy. In fact, turning any pair into a higher value will give you a very strong start of six copies of the same card.

2. Ceres: Flush House

A Flush House is a Full House that exists out of cards that all have the same suit.

It’s not actually that much tougher than Five of a Kind to pull off if you are using the Checkered deck. This Deck has 26 Hearts and 26 Spades, which means it already has 2 copies of each Heart card and Spade Heart. You can then:

• Change cards within a certain suit (Death and Strength like above, maybe a Cryptid Spectral Card if you’re lucky)
• Get as many cards of one suit (changing a pair to Hearts suddenly gives you 4 copies of that card)

To unlock the Checkered deck, you’ll first need to add 100 items to your Collection through regular gameplay. This will then unlock the Black Deck. Winning a Run with the Black Deck will then unlock the Checkered deck. A win on any difficulty works, so just play on the base difficulty.

Just as with Planet X, you only actually need one extra card to potentially pull off a Flush House, but you’ll want to build up as many copies as possible to do it more reliably. Although it’s a bit counter-intuitive to not go for Flushes with the Checkered deck, I recommend you focus on Full Houses straight away. Just form them with mixed suits until you get a Flush House.

Alternatively, if you have it, you may also try your luck with the Erratic Deck.

3. Eris: Flush Five

A Flush Five is a Five of a Kind of the same suit. It’s the hardest combination to pull off.

Both the Abandoned Deck and the Checkered Deck can work for this:

• The Abandoned Deck has less different cards, making it easier to pull Full Houses
• The Checkered Deck starts out with 2 copies of each card, giving you a head start
• The Erratic Deck can give you a good starting point if you have it unlocked, especially if you’re willing to restart runs to improve your odds

In the end, it’s up to your personal preference. Feel free to give them all a go to see what works well for you.

Note on Black Hole and Royal Flush

• Black Hole is a rare card that has a 0.3% chance to replace any Planet card in a Booster Pack. It however counts as a Spectral Card, so it is not required to unlock the Astronomer Joker.
• Royal Flush does not have its own Planet Card. Its value increases together with the level of Straight Flush (through the Neptune Planet Card)

I Have the Astronomy Achievement but Don’t Have the Astronomer Joker in My Collection?

Before a Joker is added to your collection, it needs to be discovered. Discovering an Unlockable Joker requires two steps. The first one is to meet the unlock conditions, which in this case is earning the Astronomy Achievement. This will give the Joker a chance to show up in the shop going forward. The second step is actually buying the Joker at least once. Only after this will the Joker be added to your collection.

Are the Secret Hands Worth It?

In general and in my opinion, no, not once you have the Astronomy achievement. Let’s have a closer look at their base stats compared to some of the stronger achievable “normal” hands:

Straight: 30*4 = 120 points. Let’s give this a base score of 100% for further comparison.
Full House: 40*4 = 160 points (125%)
Four of a Kind: 60*7 = 420 points (350%)
Five of a Kind: 120*12 = 1440 points (1200%)
Flush House: 140*14 = 1960 points (1633%)
Flush Five: 160*16 = 2560 points (2133%)

Huge jumps for sure, but now let’s have a look at their respective Planet Cards:

Straight: 30*3 = 90 points. Let’s give this a base score of 100% again.
Full House: 25*2 = 50 points (55.56%)
Four of a Kind: 30*3 = 90 points (100%)
Five of a Kind: 35*3 = 105 points (116.67%)
Flush House: 40*4 = 160 points (177.78%)
Flush Five: 50*3 = 150 points (166.67%)

Not as impressive as the base score differences, but still quite a significant difference for some of them, right? The problem is that you will only be able to upgrade the secret hands after you played them at least once that run. Before that, their Planet Cards will not show up.

That means you’re likely to be looking more at something like a level 5-10 “normal” hand vs. a level 1 “secret” hand to start out with:

Straight (Level 7): 210*22 = 4620 points (100%)
Full House (Level 7): 190*16 = 3040 points (65.80%)
Four of a Kind (Level 7): 240*25 = 6000 points (129.87%)
Five of a Kind (Level 1): 120*12 = 1440 points (31.17%)
Flush House (Level 1): 140*14 = 1960 points (42.42%)
Flush Five (Level 1): 160*16 = 2560 points (55.41%)

You may think it is easy enough to clear the gap, but it’s not quite the case. In the time you can take a Secret Hand from level 1 to 7, you could also have taken your main hand from level 7 to 13. Things get even worse if you have the Telescope Voucher (in my opinion the most powerful of all available Vouchers) or the Supernova Joker.

When It Is Worth Going for Secret Hands

Despite generally not advising it, there are some scenarios where it is more interesting to go for Secret Hands:

• If you don’t care about Planet Cards too much (you really should, though!) then their base value is far superior
• If you can pull them off before you are able to upgrade a “normal” poker hand by much
• When you still have a lot of Antes ahead of you to be able to upgrade the Secret Hand
• If you’re playing the Erratic Deck it can be an interesting option to go for rarer hands
• When you are going for some specific Joker Unlocks (such as Hit the Road Jack)
• If you’re trying to go for some specific Achievements.The Astronomy Achievement is the most obvious, but there are others where going for Secret hands can be worth it. If you’re trying to earn the ones for reaching Ante 12 or getting 100 million points in one hand, it can be worth the risk.In this case you’ll want to play risky, trying to get these hands as soon as possible. It will likely lead to quite a few failed runs, but if you do manage to get things going early enough this will give your chances a big boost.

The post How To Earn the Astronomy Achievement and Unlock the Astronomer Joker appeared first on Answers for Gamers.

The Basics of Unlocking the Shattered Achievement

To break 2 Glass Cards in one hand, you will obviously need Glass Cards. This involves buying Arcana Packs and applying Justice Tarot Cards to your existing cards. Of course you can also just find Glass Cards in Playing Card Packs, but it’s less consistent. Once you have a few Glass Cards, you can also use the Death Tarot Card and the Cryptid Spectral Card to copy existing Glass Cards.

If you don’t generally include Glass Cards in your decks, going for this achievement may be a bit annoying. Luckily, it shouldn’t take you all that long to unlock.

When To Go for the Shattered Achievement

There are 2 ways to go for this achievement, the immediate way or the easy way:

• The immediate way means that you will go for the achievement every run, regardless of what the shop throws at you. This may require a few tries but isn’t overly difficult.
• The easy way is to wait until you get an “Oops! All 6s” Joker early in the run. This unlockable Joker causes Glass Cards to break 50% of the time instead of 25%.

  It would be a negative synergy in every context except for when you’re going for the Shattered Achievement. I recommend this route, if you have the patience to wait multiple runs before going for the achievement.

The Oops! All 6s Joker only has a chance to show up in the show if you ever scored at least 10,000 points in one hand. If you’re at the point you’re going for the Shattered achievement, however, it’s very likely that you already unlocked this Joker.

Regardless of which route you take, you will want to still play a solid game and prioritize survival. That means building up a good deck and moving towards $25 as you usually would to get your $5 interest each Round. Building up a sufficient amount of Glass Cards requires time, which means you need a deck that can get you to later Antes.

I recommend starting to go for the achievement on the second to last Ante before the expected end of your run. E.g., if you think you’ll make it to the end of Ante 8, try going for the Shattered Achievement at the beginning of Ante 7.

The Odds of the Shattered Achievement

Attempting to trigger the Achievement with just 2 Glass Cards is not advised. The odds of it happening are mediocre and you risk breaking one Glass Card, which decreases your odds of earning the achievement later in the run. That being said, if you fear your Run will end soon, just go for it. Odds of 1 out of 16 may not be superb, but they are also too good to be wasted if you may not get another chance.

Here are the full odds of the amount of Glass Cards you’ll break in different circumstances:

Your Deck of Choice

The Zodiac Deck with its extra Tarot Cards seems like the obvious choice, but I personally prefer the Abandoned Deck. This deck only has 40 starting cards, which makes it easier to draw out the Glass Cards to trigger the achievement.

To get the Abandoned Deck if you haven’t unlocked it yet, follow these steps:

• Unlock the Green Deck. This requires you to have at least 75 items in your collection. Tarot Cards, Planet Cards, Spectral Cards, Jokers etc. all count as collection items, so you’ll get here soon enough. Just remember that seeing an item in the shop isn’t enough to discover it (add it to your collection). You also need to buy each item at least once.
• Win at least one Run with the Green Deck. Winning on the lowest difficulty suffices.

As always when trying to earn an achievement, I recommend playing at the lowest difficulty level (White Stake). There is no reason to add another layer of difficulty and the further you get, the more Glass Cards you’ll be able to add to your deck and the higher your odds of drawing them.

The post How To Earn the Shattered Achievement in Balatro appeared first on Answers for Gamers.

How Stone Cards Work

Stone Cards don’t have a rank and a suit, but they score 50 chips whenever played. The game also states as much, but is pretty vague about how you can use these cards to your advantage.

The main advantage of Stone Cards is that they always score when played. Even if they are not part of your scoring hand.

That means Stone Cards boost the score for the following hands:

• High Cards
• One Pair
• Two Pair
• Three of a Kind
• Four of a Kind

How Good Are Stone Cards?

There is nothing wrong with incorporating some Stone Cards in a Two Pair/Spare Trousers Deck, but it requires some balance for so-so gains. The more Stone Cards you have in this type of deck, the less consistent you’ll pull off Two Pair. The boost you’ll get is also not as high as it could be, since you can only use one Stone Card per hand.

For this reason, Stone Cards work best with decks focusing on High Card and One Pair. These can focus on stacking as many Stone Cards as possible in their deck. They can also boost their score with 3 or even 4 Stone Cards per hand.

A lot of new players start out focusing mainly on Flushes. This is not necessarily bad, but one of the best ways to get better in Balatro (and Roguelites in general) is to be flexible. Depending on what the shop offers during a specific run, you’ll want to adjust your deck accordingly.

One way to adjust is to consider focusing on Straights and Full Houses, both which are a lot stronger than Flushes. Another is to focus on One Pair or even High Card. While less powerful per hand, they are a lot more consistent to pull off multiple times per round. These decks can rival decks focusing on 5-card combinations and make Stone Cards shine.

Stone Card Synergy

Here are some examples of cards which synergize well with Stone Cards:

• +Mult Jokers retain their value a lot longer compared to xMult Jokers compared to decks focusing on 5-card combinations
• Steel Cards are a lot less dangerous since you can pull off your hands more consistently. They come into effect before jokers, though, so will need to ramp up through hand level.
• This can happen faster than you think, though, since Blue Seal cards (which create a planet card of the last scoring hand) also work very well in this type of deck.

There are also Joker synergies such as the Marble Joker, which adds a Stone Card each time a Blind is selected. I will not go over them all, since they are quite obvious. I will, however, make a special mention to the Stone Joker. This Joker gives +25 chips for each Stone Card in your deck, which can add up to a significant multiplier of your score.

If you haven’t been using Stone Cards, you may not know it exist. This Joker is one of the few who only show up when you already have a specific card in your deck (in this case, a Stone Card).

Turning a Stone Card Into a Regular Card

A Stone Card is an enhancement. Overriding it with any other enhancement will turn it back into a regular card with a rank and suit.

There is some use to this because of the way Bonus Stacking works in Balatro. If the Stone Card has a seal or edition (Foil, Holographic Polychrome), then it will keep those bonuses even when you remove the Stone Card enhancement. This can be very much worth it in decks that have no use for Stone Cards but do want those bonuses.

You can override it with any enhancement, even those with no apparent use to you (e.g., the less popular Lucky Card). Do note, however, that you will not know in advance which Rank and which Suit your new card will have.

The post How Stone Cards Work in Balatro (And if They Are Any Good) appeared first on Answers for Gamers.

Types of Unlockable Jokers

There are 3 types of unlockable jokers in Balatro:

• Legendary Jokers
• Jokers that require you to take an action during a run for them to appear that run
• Jokers that require you to fulfill a requirement before they appear in ANY run

Unlocking a Joker vs. Discovering a Joker

Unlocking a Joker means fulfilling the requirements for that Joker to appear. Discovering a Joker means buying it once from the shop after it appears.

To add a Joker to your collection, you need to discover it. That means simply unlocking it is not enough to clear achievements such as Completionist. It also means you’ll need to buy every Joker you consider useless at least once.

On the image above, the Joker on the left is already unlocked. We just need to encounter it in the shop and purchase it to discover it. We still need to unlock the Joker on the right. You can hover over it to see its requirements (or simply check its requirement further on this page).

Uses of Unlocking Jokers

The average Unlockable Joker is arguably a bit stronger than the average “regular” Joker. This is not the case for all of them, however. Adding Jokers to your collection by discovering them also dilutes the Joker pool. This makes it less likely to find the specific Joker you’re searching for.

In general, though, more Jokers do increase your chances in the game. They will also count as items in your Collection, which will unlock additional decks for you to play with. Completionists will still want to do it to earn these achievements:

• Ante Up!: shares the same requirements as unlocking the Showman Joker
• 10k: shares the same requirements as unlocking the Oops! All 6s Joker
• Ante Upper: shares the same requirements as unlocking the Flower Pot Joker
• Heads Up: shares the same requirements as unlocking the Blueprint Joker
• Cartomancy: shares the same requirements as unlocking the Cartomancer Joker
• 1,000K: shares the same requirements as unlocking the The Idol Joker
• Astronomy: shares the same requirements as unlocking the Astronomer Joker
• 100,000K: shares the same requirements as unlocking the Stuntman Joker
• Speedrunner: shares the same requirements as unlocking the Merry Andy Joker
• Nest Egg: shares the same requirement as unlocking the Satellite Joker
• Completionist: requires you to complete your Collection. Jokers are only one part of your collection, but are likely to be one of the biggest hurdles along with unlocking all stakes (difficulties)

Legendary Jokers

The game has 5 Legendary Jokers. These are Jokers that never appear in the shops, not even if you already bought them in a previous run. To unlock and discover these jokers, there are 3 requirements:

1. You need to find a “The Soul” Card in an Arcana or Spectral pack. There is a 0.3% chance for it to replace each card, so Jumbo and Mega Packs increase your odds. With such low odds, however, it’s still going to take you many, many attempts.
2. You need to have room to add a Joker to activate “The Soul”. When you already have the maximum amount of Jokers, “The Soul” can still show up. You will, however, need to sell one before you can activate “The Soul”. If you are working on unlocking Jokers, this is a no-brainer even in the extreme case it causes you to lose the game.
3. You need to be lucky enough that it creates a Joker you did not discover before. There seems to be some bias toward Jokers you have not discovered yet, but this is just my feeling. It’s not confirmed by data.

As “The Soul” can not appear in the shop, there are limited options to increase your odds. Using the Anaglyph Deck and saving the Double Tags for Mega Arcana packs can help. Unlocking this deck requires you to win a Run on the first 4 difficulties. If you didn’t get that far yet, however, don’t worry. The benefits of using that strategy to unlock Legendary Jokers are fairly marginal.

The Legendary Jokers are the last 5 Jokers on the last page of your Collection. As the requirements do not differ between them, we will not discuss them separately here. Feel free to click through to have a look if you’re curious about their effects, though.

Jokers That Need To Be Unlocked Every Run

These are Jokers that you need to unlock every run you want them. They will not appear solely by buying them in previous runs, even if you met their general unlock condition.

Jokers You Have To Unlock Before They Appear in Any Run

The majority of Jokers belong to this category, so I will just include them in the full list below.

Full List of Unlockable Jokers by Collection Page

These are ordered by the page of your in-game collection they appear in.

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Joker Name	Effect	Unlock Condition	Tips
Golden Ticket	Played Gold Cards earn $4 when scored	1. Play a Hand with 5 Gold Cards for the general unlock 2. Have at least 1 Gold Card in your deck during that run	Click here to jump to the relevant section
Mr. Bones	Prevents Death if chips scored are at least 25% of required chips self destructs	Lose 5 Runs
Acrobat	x3 Mult on final hand of round	Play 200 Hands	You will unlock it through regular gameplay. To unlock it faster, you can focus on One Pair and Stone Card Decks.
Sock and Buskin	Retrigger all played face cards	Play a total of 300 Face Cards	You will unlock it through regular gameplay. To unlock it faster, you can follow the same tips as for Golden Ticket (see above).
Swashbuckler	Adds the sell value of all other owned Jokers to Mult	Sell a total of 20 Jokers	You will unlock it through regular gameplay. To unlock it faster, you can play with the Yellow Deck, buy Jokers, then intentionally lose.
Troubadour	+2 hand size, -1 hand each round	Win 5 consecutive rounds by playing only 1 hand	Focus on Straights, Full Houses or Flushes (a little harder). Playing the Plasma Deck on the easiest difficulty will allow you to unlock this without any jokers the first 4 rounds if you focus on cards with a value of 9+.
Certificate	When round begins, add a random playing card with a random seal to your hand	Have a Gold playing card with a Gold Seal	Getting the Gold Seal is significantly harder than getting a Gold card. Play with the Ghost Deck to increase your odds of Talisman, which adds a Gold Seal.
Smeared Joker	Hearts and Diamonds count as the suit, Spades and Clubs count as the same suit	Have at least 3 Wild Cards in your deck	Fairly easy through the use of Arcana Packs. You may have to sacrifice a run victory to focus on the relevant enhancement instead of your preferred one.
Throwback	x0.25 Mult for each Blind skipped this run	Continue a saved run from the main menu	Press Esc during a run. Select Main Menu. Click Play. Choose Continue. Resume your run.
Hanging Chad	Retrigger first played card used in scoring 2 additional times	Beat a Boss Blind with a High Card	Click here to jump to the relevant section
Rough Gem	Played cards with Diamond suit earn $1 when scored	Have at least 30 cards with Diamond suit in your deck	Can be done on any deck, but Zodiac Deck with its extra Tarot Cards increases your odds. Using Ghost Deck and hitting an early lucky Sigil to change a full hand to Diamonds can give you a riskier early boost.
Bloodstone	1 in 2 chance for played cards with Heart suit to give x1,5 Mult when scored	Have at least 30 cards with Heart suit in your deck	The checkered deck, once you unlock it, starts with 26 Heart suit cards. It requires you to win a run with the Black Deck, which itself requires you to unlock 100 items in your Collection.
Arrowhead	Played cards with Spade suit give +50 Chips when scored	Have at least 30 cards with Spade suit in your deck	The checkered deck, once you unlock it, starts with 26 Spade suit cards. It requires you to win a run with the Black Deck, which itself requires you to unlock 100 items in your Collection.
Onyx Agate	Played cards with Club suit give +7 Mult when scored	Have at least 30 cards with Club suit in your deck	Can be done on any deck, but Zodiac Deck with its extra Tarot Cards increases your odds. Using Ghost Deck and hitting an early lucky Sigil to change a full hand to Clubs can give you a riskier early boost.
Glass Joker	This Joker gains x0,75 Mult for every Glass Card that is destroyed	1. Have at least 5 Glass Cards in your deck for the general unlock 2. Have at least 1 Glass Card in your deck during your specific run	Fairly easy through the use of Arcana Packs. You may have to sacrifice a run victory to focus on the relevant enhancement instead of your preferred one.

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Joker Name	Effect	Unlock Condition	Tips
Showman	Joker, Tarot, Planet, and Spectral cards may appear multiple times	Reach Ante Level 4
Flower Pot	x3 Mult if poker hand contains a Diamond card, Club card, Heart card, and Spade card	Reach Ante Level 8	This is the last Ante Level you need to beat to win a run. You will regularly get here through regular gameplay as you unlock more jokers and get better at the game.
Blueprint	Copies ability of Joker to the right	Win a run
Wee Joker	This Joker gains +8 Chips when each played 2 is scored	Win a run in 18 or less rounds.	A full run has 24 rounds (Small Blind, Big Blind, Boss x8 Antes). That means you need to skip at least 6 rounds. That’s not very restrictive. Just make sure to pick the most interesting Tags (bonuses for skipping rounds).
Merry Andy	+3 discards each round, -1 hand size	Win a run in 12 or less rounds	Much more restrictive. You can only play 4 rounds apart from the bosses. Best attempted when you get the Throwback Joker early in a run (x0.25 Mult per skipped round). Play on the easiest difficulty.
Oops! All 6s	Doubles all listed probabilities (ex: 1 in 3 -> 2 in 3)	In one hand, earn at least 10,000 chips	This will be easy enough once you get used to the game. Focus on Flushes, Straights or Full Houses and +Mult Jokers.
The Idol	Each played Ace of Spades gives x2 Mult when scored  Card changes every round	In one hand, earn at least 1,000,000 chips.	You will reach this level when you regularly win runs. On top of previous tips, also focus on Scaling xMult Jokers.
Seeing Double	x2 Mult if played hand has a scoring Club card and a scoring card of any other suit	Play a hand that contains four 7 of Clubs	Click here to jump to the relevant section
Matador	Earn $8 if played hand triggers the Boss Blind ability	Defeat a Boss Blind in 1 hand without using any discards	Click here to jump to the relevant section
Hit the Road	This Joker gains x0,5 Mult for every Jack discarded this round	Discard 5 Jacks at the same time	Click here to jump to the relevant section
The Duo	x2 Mult if played hand contains a Pair	Win a run without playing a Pair
The Trio	x3 Mult if played hand contains a Three of a Kind	Win a run without playing a Three of a Kind
The Family	x4 Mult if played hand contains a Four of a Kind	Win a run without playing a Four of a Kind
The Order	x3 Mult if played hand contains a Straight	Win a run without playing a Straight
The Tribe	x2 Mult if played hand contains a Flush	Win a run without playing a Flush

Page 10

Joker Name	Effect	Unlock Condition	Tips
Stuntman	+250 Chips, -2 hand size	In one hand, earn at least 100,000,000 chips	Click here to jump to the relevant section
Invisible Joker	After 2 rounds, sell this card to Duplicate a random Joker	Jokers	Win a run on the first 3 difficulty levels to unlock the Painted Deck. This deck gives +2 hand size and -1 Joker slot. Beat it on the lowest difficulty without adding any Negative Jokers to your deck.
Brainstorm	Copies the ability of leftmost Joker	Discard a Royal Flush	Get 100 items in your Collection to unlock the Black Deck. Win a run with this deck to unlock the Checkered Deck, which has 26 Hearts and 26 Spades. If you don’t get the unlock on the Ante 1, Small Blind, start over. May take some tries.
Satellite	Earn $1 at end of round per unique Planet card used this round	Have $400 or more	Win a run on the first 4 difficulties to unlock the Anaglyph Deck. Don’t skip any rounds. Skip the Economy Tag on Ante 8 or higher. Sacrifice your run by selling your Jokers if you’re just a few dollars short.
Shoot the Moon	Each Queen held in hand gives +13 Mult	Play every Heart in your deck in a single round	You will basically want to eliminate almost all Heart cards in your deck. You can do so through Hanged Man and turning them into other suits. Easiest in Abandoned Deck (requires a win on Green Deck which requires 75 unlocks) as it only has 10 Hearts.
Driver’s License	x3 Mult if you have at least 16 Enhanced cards in your full deck	Enhance 16 cards in your deck	You will get this one pretty quickly through regular play. Focus on Arcana Packs instead of playing cards. They affect more cards plus Seals (little stamps) and Editions (Foil, Holographic Polychrome) don’t count towards the total.
Cartomancer	Create a Tarot card when Blind is selected (Must have room)	Discover every Tarot card	You will get there with regular play, though you may need to pick some enhancements you consider useless.
Astronomer	All Planet cards and Celestial Packs in the shop are free	Discover every Planet card	Click here to visit the dedicated page for this Joker (opens in a new tab)
Burnt Joker	Upgrade the level of the first discarded poker hand each round	Sell a total of 50 cards	You will get here through regular gameplay, but it may take you a while.
Bootstraps	+2 Mult for every $5 you have	Have at least 2 Polychrome Jokers	Requires some luck, but you’ll get here through regular gameplay.
Canio	This Joker gains x1 Mult when a face card is destroyed	Legendary Joker
Triboulet	Played Kings and Queens each give x2 Mult when scored	Legendary Joker
Yorick	This Joker gains x1 Mult every 23 cards discarded	Legendary Joker
Chicot	Disables effect of every Boss Blind	Legendary Joker
Perkeo	Creates a Negative copy of 1 random consumable card in your possession at the end of the shop	Legendary Joker

Tips for Unlocking Specific Jokers

Unlocking the Golden Ticket Joker

Playing a Hand with 5 Golden Cards is easiest with the Plasma Deck or Nebula Deck. These Decks concentrate on base chips, without relying too much on Arcana enhancements.

The Plasma Deck is the third to last deck in your Collection. It requires you to win a Run on the Blue Stake, the 5th difficulty. The Nebula Deck is significantly easier to unlock. It only requires you to win a Run with the Blue Deck on any difficulty. The Blue Deck only requires you to unlock 20 items in your Collection, which will only take a few runs through regular gameplay.

Focus on a deck with Face Cards (e.g., Full House or Two Pair with Face Cards). If you can keep this up by increasing chips and multi through Planet Cards and Jokers until Midas Joker appears, it’s pretty much an automatic win.

Do keep in mind that Midas Mask only turns cards Gold after you play them. Unlocking the Golden Ticket Joker will only happen when the cards are already Gold when you play them. That means you may need to play a few hands with Midas Mask before you’re ready for the unlock.

Unlocking the Hanging Chad Joker

Beating a Boss with High Card is easiest in Ante 1 on the easiest difficulty. There it is still easy to manually calculate your extra score. Even if don’t succeed, you will also not lose a lot of time per attempt.

I recommend playing with the Yellow Deck, the third deck in your Collection. It’s unlocked by having 50 items in your Collection, which you will get through regular gameplay. Don’t skip any rounds so you get 2 shops before the boss. Don’t worry about building up interest. Just use the deck’s extra funds to buy any chip and Mult-enhancing Jokers. You can also buy Pluto Cards if you happen to see them.

For my example while writing this section, I bought a Red Card Joker. I then skipped all packs to get +12 Mult. Not the best strategy for long-term success, but easy enough to unlock Hanging Chad. Other Jokers with a similar mediocre power level will work just as well.

On your first hand, get as close to 600 without going over it. Calculate your score manually for this:

• Select your hand to see your base score
• Mentally add the value of your cards (and chip-boosting jokers) to the blue part of the equation.
• Add the value of any Mult boosting jokers to the red part of the equation.

After this, only play High Cards to finish the job. Play only Aces and Face cards. In my case, my King scored (10 + 5) x (1 + 12) = 195 points thanks to my Red Card. 

Make sure to follow the conditions of the Boss so your hand counts! In my example, I had to play K-T-9-6-4 to have a High Card and to meet the requirement of playing 5 cards.

Unlocking the Seeing Double Joker

To play a hand with four 7 of clubs reliably, you will preferably build a collection of quite a few more of these cards. There are a few ways about this, but my preferred strategy uses the Abandoned Deck.

The Abandoned Deck only has only 40 cards, but still has two 7 of clubs. This enables us to more reliably draw the cards we need. To unlock the Abandoned Deck, you first need to unlock the Green Deck by having 75 items in your collection through normal play. Then you need to win a Run with the Green Deck on any difficulty.

I do not recommend focusing on Four of a Kind right away. You’ll have an easier time focusing on Clubs/Flushes or on Full Houses with Sevens while you build up your Deck further. You can play the Abandoned Deck on the lowest (White) difficulty.

Here are some of the more reliable ways to build up more sevens of clubs:

• The Death Arcana can copy the Seven of Clubs. Make sure to sacrifice a non-club, non-seven to copy into a Seven of Clubs
• The Cryptid Spectral Card can create two copies of a Seven of Clubs without sacrificing anything
• The Moon Arcana can turn three non-club cards into club cards. Preferably you will change 7s, but 6s and 5s are a good option as well, because..
• …The Strength Arcana can turn a six of clubs into a seven of clubs. If you don’t pull any sixes, you can also upgrade fives for later upgrading. If you don’t pull any fives or sixes of clubs, you can also convert other suits to attempt to conver them later
• The Lovers Arcana can make one non-club seven count as a seven of clubs
• Playing Card Packs are also a semi-reliable option. They may not often have a seven of clubs but they may have a 7 of another suit or a 6 of clubs you can further alter with Tarot Cards

Unlocking the Matador Joker

Unlocking this Joker uses a similar strategy to the Hanging Chad Joker, but requires no maths. We need to beat the Boss in one hand, without discarding. We’ll try to do it in Ante 1. It’s both the easiest time to do it and the fastest.

First, you will need to unlock the Yellow Deck if you haven’t already. The extra starting funds of this deck will be of great help for the next steps. You unlock the Yellow Deck by having 50 items in your Collection. Just play regularly and you’ll get there sooner rather than later.

Start a run with the Yellow Deck on the easiest (White) difficulty. Don’t skip any rounds so you get 2 shops before the boss.

• For the first shop, focus only on score-boosting Jokers and loose Tarot Cards (that you can use for the hand you’ll play instead of hoping it will show up). You can even consider starting over if there aren’t any.
• For the second shop, you can also consider Arcana Packs if there are no interesting Jokers (for +Mult and +Chips preferably, though other options such as Stone, Steel, Glass and Lucky Cards can work as well). Spectral Cards can help as well. Reroll if you have funds remaining to buy rerolled items. Try to avoid buying Planet Cards. As you can’t use any discards, it will be difficult to know in advance which hand you’ll play.

I recommend starting over if you don’t manage to do the unlock in the first Ante. It may take you a few tries, but shouldn’t take too many. In my example, my Photograph Joker was useless as I had no face cards but my +50 chips for a pair and Raised Fist still pulled through.

Unlocking the Hit the Road Jack Joker

To reliably be able to discard a hand of 5 Jacks reliably, you will need to collect quite a few more Jacks. Remember that you can’t use your last Discard to draw more Jacks. I recommend gathering as many Jacks as possible and only trying to go for the unlock when you are not certain you can win the round.

 My deck of choice for this unlock is the Blue Deck for its +1 extra Hand. I prefer it over the base Red Deck with its +1 Discard because in most situations because:

• An extra hand means an extra dollar per round
• In most situations, you can also use a hand as a discard that scores you points

You unlock the Blue Deck when you add 20 items to your Collection. This should happen after just a few regular playthroughs. You will then need to add Jacks through any means possible, the most reliable of which are:

• The Death Tarot card, to change a different card into a Jacks 
• The Cryptid Spectral Card, to create two create two copies of an existing Jack
• The Strength Tarot Card, to transform Tens into Jacks
• Playing Card Packs that may give you Jacks directly or Tens which you can later on turn into Jacks

I prefer focusing on Full House for this unlock, although Two Pair can work as well.

Unlocking the Stuntman Joker

Scoring 100,000,000 chips in one hand will be one of the toughest unlocks for most players. It will require some luck, as well as a focus on the core elements for getting insanely high scores:

• +Mult Jokers are attractive early on, but scaling xMult Jokers trump them quite soon. Remember that xMult Jokers also Multiply each other. Only scaling +Mult Jokers have a place in a deck that can manage this unlock. The 2 main ones that come to mind are Fortune Teller (+1 Mult per Tarot) and an early Spare Trousers (+2 Mult per Two Pair).
• A significantly leveled up hand. Many players have a tendency to ignore Planet Cards, but a leveled hand gives you a base Mult rivaling those of the best Jokers. The extra chips it gives can also multiply your score multiple times.
• Proper ordering of both your cards and jokers. Have the +Mult go first and the xMult go last – that way your +Mult gets multiplied as well. To determine which hand you are forming, it only looks at which 5 cards you select, not their order. If you order your hand as 7-T-8-9-J this will still count as a straight!
• Flushes may be easier to hit, but a leveled-up Straight or Full House is a LOT more valuable. Four of Kind and higher hands tend not to be worth the marginal extra value they bring.
• Although not absolutely necessary, Jokers repeating cards in combination with xMult Jokers can do wonders for your score.
• To finish off the unlock, Glass Cards can give you quite the edge, especially if repeated and/or having a Red Seal. Steel Cards and Polychrome Cards with a Red Seal are very powerful as well.
• If you unlock the Anaglyph Deck before you finish the unlock, it can give you the boost you need. Don’t skip any rounds until you get a Negative tag, then hope for some powerful extra Jokers.

 

 

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Earning the Extreme Couponer Achievement: Quick Guide

You get the Extreme Couponer Achievement by Discovering Every Voucher. The process to do so is a bit non-intuitive, which is probably why less than 3% of Steam players have this achievement at the time of writing. Once you know the steps, Extreme Couponer is actually quite a bit easier than some of the more commonly earned achievements.

There are 16 Basic Vouchers that appear by default and 16 Advanced Vouchers. These 16 Advanced Vouchers have a triple condition to discover them:

1. Meet its general unlock conditions
2. Buy its basic version during the run you are on to have a chance of it appearing in later Antes
3. Buy it at least once to finish the Discover process

Advanced Unlockable Vouchers in Balatro

How To Check Which Vouchers You’re Missing for Extreme Couponer

From the Main Menu, click “Collection”. From there, click “Vouchers” (third option on the left).

Vouchers that have a question mark (left icon on the above screenshot) are already unlocked, but still undiscovered. You just need to buy them at least once in the shop when they appear (don’t forget you need to buy their basic version during a run for this to have a chance at happening).

Vouchers that have a lock symbol (right icon on the above screenshot) require you to clear their general unlock requirement first. You can check the general unlock requirements by hovering over them or by referencing the table in the previous section. Note that unlocking a Voucher will still require you to Discover them in later runs. This means you’ll need to buy their basic version during a run to give them a chance of appearing, then buy them at least once.

Tips for Unlocking Specific Vouchers for the Extreme Couponer Achievement

Having some difficulties unlocking some specific vouchers to complete Extreme Couponer? Hopefully, the tips below will help. 

Tips To Unlock the Liquidation Voucher

To unlock this Voucher, you need to redeem at least 10 Voucher cards in one run.

1. With any Deck on White (the easiest) Stake

Ignore the very first voucher, then work towards getting $25 as fast as possible. Once you meet that goal, you will get $5 of extra interest each round, making it much more comfortable to buy Vouchers frequently. Buy your first voucher after beating the Ante 2 Blind at the latest, even if you’re not quite at $25 yet. 

This strategy will require you to beat Ante 10 (buying your 10th voucher before taking on the Ante 11 Small Blind). You may get there one or two Antes earlier if you encounter (and can afford skipping) Rounds that have a Voucher Tag. Note that Vouchers that appear in the shop don’t last until the end of the Ante. You need to buy them as soon as they appear. 

2. With the Yellow Deck on White (the easiest) Stake

This Deck unlocks when you discover 50 items in your collection, which goes quite quickly, seeing as your collection has 340 items. Jokers, vouchers, cards from packs, boss types etc. all count towards meeting this requirement.

It allows you to start a Run with $10 extra, which also means extra interest early on. Beat the Ante 1 Small Blind and Big Blind and stock up on interest, then buy the Ante 1 Voucher. After that, continue as if you were following the previous strategy. You’re in essence giving up the advantage of this Deck in exchange for buying the Ante 1 Voucher this way. In return, you only need to beat 9 Antes (or less if you encounter and can afford skipping Rounds with the Voucher Tag).

3. With the Anaglyph Deck on White (the easiest) Stake

This is the easiest strategy but requires you to beat the game with any deck on the Black (fourth) Stake/difficulty first.  

Play as normal, buying a Voucher here and there when you can afford it. Try to stock up as much cash as you can afford to without risking losing (up to $100 minus $10 per Voucher you purchase). Don’t skip any rounds until you find a Voucher Tag. You will then get one Voucher Tag plus one additional Voucher Tag per Ante you already beat. This allows you to add the Liquidation Voucher to your Extreme Couponer collection well within the standard 8 Antes.

Tips to Unlock the Glow Up Voucher

To unlock this Voucher, you need to have at least 5 Joker cards with Foil, Holographic or Polychrome edition.

Reroll (restart new runs) with your favorite deck until you have at least one Foil, Holographic or Polychrome Tag in Ante 1. Skip that round to get the Tag, then start basing your build around the Voucher you’ll get for free. This will give you a head start to get the other 4 special edition jokers you’ll need. Skip further Foil, Holographic and Polychrome Tags when you can afford them. 

Playing with the Black Deck (unlock by completing 100/340 items in your collection) allows you to keep one base joker of your choice, but will make earlier Antes harder.  

Playing with the Anaglyph Deck is, as often, the easiest strategy. To unlock that deck, however, you first need to beat the game with any deck on the Black (fourth) Stake/difficulty first. It’s up to you if you want to go through that process to unlock the Glow Up Voucher.

If you do, then play without skipping any rounds on that deck on White (the easiest) Stake until you see a Foil, Holographic or Polychrome Tag. Doing so, you will get an extra Tag (and a free special edition Joker) per Ante you beat before that skip. Note that all Jokers may not appear during the same shop. You may need to reroll the shop a few times first. If you can’t afford rerolling (or don’t want to), you can also load multiple shops by going through multiple rounds.

Tips to Unlock the Reroll Glut Voucher

To unlock this Joker, you need to reroll the shop a total of 100 times.

If you haven’t already, first unlock the Yellow Deck. This requires you to unlock 50/340 items in your completion list, which is fairly easy to do. Once you unlock the Yellow Deck, you can beat the first Small Blind, then reroll twice, then start a new run.

If that is too boring for you, don’t worry about it. If you follow the basic strategy of getting above $25 as soon as possible and staying there, you will get $5 of interest each round. You will then get plenty of chances to reroll the shop naturally. Of course you can spend all your funds when you know you cannot beat the next Round to get a few extra rerolls in.

Tip to Unlock the Omen Globe and Observatory Vouchers

To unlock these vouchers, you need to use 25 Tarot Cards and 25 Planet Cards from packs.

Similar to the previous Voucher, using the Yellow Deck is an easy way to get these unlocks done. This requires you to unlock 50/340 items in your completion list, which is fairly easy to do. Once you unlock the Yellow Deck, you can beat the first Small Blind, then buy the relevant packs and start a new run.

Tip to Unlock the Tarot Tycoon and Planet Tycoon Vouchers

To unlock these vouchers, you need to buy 50 Arcana Cards and 50 Planet Cards from the shop.

If you haven’t unlocked these Vouchers naturally yet, unlocking the Zodiac Deck first will make things quite a bit faster. This deck starts with the Tarot Merchant, Planet Voucher and Overstock Vouchers. Thanks to these Vouchers, there will be 3 items in the shop instead of 2 and both Tarot and Planet Cards will appear twice as often.

To unlock the Zodiac Deck, you simply need to beat the game on the Red (second easiest) Stake once. Beating the game on the White (default, easiest) Stake once will unlock the Red Stake for that deck.

The Red Stake is identical to the White Deck with the exception that beating the Small Blind gives no default reward. This means you should be a bit more likely to skip a Small Blind Round. Don’t blindly skip all Small Blinds, though. Remember that you still get $1 interest for every $5 you have and $1 for every hand you didn’t need to play.

Advice to Unlock the Antimatter and Illusion Vouchers

The conditions for unlocking the Illusion Voucher aren’t very hard. This Voucher is missing in a lot of player’s Extreme Couponer collection, however, because going through the unlock process generally lowers your odds of winning that particular run. 

Unfortunately, there are not that many tips I can give you apart from making the necessary sacrifices for the long-term good of your Balatro journey.

– Unlocking the Antimatter Voucher requires you to buy the Blank Voucher a total of 10 times. Doing so does nothing at all to help you for that particular run. It’s just a long-term investment. You can also buy the Blank Voucher a maximum of once per run, meaning you’ll need to make this sacrifice during 10 separate runs. You can read more about the Blank Voucher and Antimatter Voucher in this dedicated article.

– Unlocking the Illusion Voucher requires you to buy the Magic Trick Voucher first to unlock Playing Cards in the shop for that run. Then you need to buy a total of 20 Playing Cards from the shop. Unfortunately, before you finish unlocking Magic Trick, these will be plain cards without any bonuses. These are unlikely to help you apart from some very specific builds, so it’s again a sacrifice for the greater good. You can split the 20 purchases over as many runs as necessary, but it is better to get it over with in as little runs as possible.

Tips to Unlock the Petroglyph Voucher

For most players, this Voucher, which requires you to reach Ante 12, will be the biggest obstacle for the Extreme Couponer. Although there is no set strategy to make it that far, there are a few tips I can give you:

1) Make sure you are playing on the White (easiest) Stake, regardless of which Deck you use.

2) You’ll want to get a ramping Joker such as Hologram and Constellation early on to have a shot at this. Ideally, you’ll want to even have them duplicated with an Invisible Joker, Blueprint or Brainstorm. Consider selling mediocre jokers before selling the active Invisible Joker to maximize your odds of duplicating the Joker you want.

3) At first you can fill the rest of your Joker Slots with ones that give a flat Multiplier value. Later on, it is advisable to keep only your strongest Joker of this kind and fill all other slots with more multipliers. 

4) In combination with the previous tip, having the Telescope Voucher as early as possible to build up a base multiplier to slowly replace jokers with flat Multiplier value is very handy.

5) Your Blueprint and Brainstorm Joker(s) can first start by copying the abilities of a flat multiplier joker, then later copy the multiplication joker instead.

6) Try to add cards with a Red Seal to your deck whenever possible. Then, when reaching Ante 10 and 11, start turning them to Glass. Adding such a card at the end of a scoring hand (you can reorder your cards before scoring them!) can give you up to 4x extra multiplier. Glass cards without a red seal are also very valuable when nearing the end. Avoid having too many Glass Cards early on when you don’t need them, as it’s unlikely they’ll make it to the end.

To get an extra boost, you can play on the Anaglyph deck, which you can unlock by beating any deck on the Black Stake, the fourth difficulty. While playing on this deck, don’t skip any rounds until you see a Negative Tag. The more Antes you go through before getting a Negative Tag, the more Negative Jokers this will give you. There is still some luck involved, since not all Jokers will help your build, but it can give you a significant boost.

How to Unlock the Retcon Voucher

The Retcon Voucher is one of the easier Vouchers to unlock for the Extreme Couponer achievement, though it can take a while. It requires you to discover 25 out of 30 Blinds. Blinds are simply “opponents” you battle against. You get the Small Blind and Big Blind the very first time you play, so this unlock boils down to “discover 23 out of 28 bosses.”

Blinds do not have any specific requirements to unlock them, so just keep going through the game naturally to get there eventually.

Tips to Unlock the Palette Voucher 

You start with a hand size of 8, so you’ll need to reduce that by 3 to unlock this Voucher. The main way to do this is through Spectral Cards, though there are alternatives.

Through Spectral Cards

– Ouija: Converts all cards in hand to a single random rank. -1 hand size.You’ll want to focus on a Full House/Four of a Kind/Five of a Kind deck if you go this route.

– Ectoplasm: Add Negative to a random Joker. -1 hand size. The penalty increases to -2 hand size the second time you use it during the same run. That means getting this card twice is enough to unlock Palette Voucher (1 + 2).

You can boost your chances of unlocking the Palette Voucher by playing with the Ghost Deck first. This deck gives a small chance (around 7% per slot) for Spectral Cards to appear in the shop. To unlock the Ghost Deck, you first need to win a run with the Yellow Deck. This Deck unlocks when you discover 50 items in your collection, which goes quite quickly, seeing as your collection has 340 items.

When playing with the Ghost Deck, avoid buying the Magic Trick, Tarot Merchant and Planet Merchant Vouchers. These vouchers increase the odds of having other cards appear, thus reducing the odds of Spectral Cards appearing. Do buy Overstock and Overstock Plus when you get the opportunity, which will give add extra slots to the shop. Also consider buying Crystal Ball (+1 consumable slot) to have a chance at getting the Omen Globe Voucher, which gives a chance for Spectral Cards to appear in Arcana Packs.

Alternatives

• The Joker Merry Andy gives you 3 extra Discards and reduces your hand size by 1.
• The Joker Stuntman gives increases your score by 250 Chips and reduces your hand size by 2.
• When you play against The Manacle Blind, your hand size is reduced by 1. This is only temporary, however, so you’ll already need to have reduced your hand size by 2 before you get that far.

If you got this far, it’s likely you finished all steps to unlock the Extreme Couponer achievement. Congratulations!

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The Blank Voucher Unlocks the Antimatter Voucher

Blank Voucher’s description of not doing anything is correct, if we’re talking about the moment of purchase. When you buy it 10 times, however, this unlocks the Antimatter Voucher. These 10 purchases can be in 10 separate runs (in fact, you can only buy it once per run). Even if you don’t clear Ante 8 in a run, it will still count towards unlocking the Antimatter Voucher.

The Antimatter Voucher gives you an extra Joker Slot. It’s kind of like a Joker with a Negative Bonus but even stronger:

• It doesn’t come with any negative side effects the way adding Negative from a Spectral Card does.
• You can choose which Joker to add to your build, unlike Negative Jokers you get through Tags (skipping Blinds).
• The extra Joker can still be Foil, Holographic or Polychrome.

How To Get the Antimatter Voucher After Unlocking It

So you unlocked the Antimatter Voucher, but the very next run the Blank Voucher is back in the shop. What gives? Well, the Antimatter is a so-called Advanced Voucher. These Vouchers only show up after you already purchased their basic version during that run. In other words, for a chance to get the Antimatter Voucher, you will first need to buy the Blank Voucher during that same run.

Is the Antimatter Voucher Worth It?

If you have been trying to complete the Black Deck in various difficulties, you likely already know the issue with the Antimatter Voucher. Its effect may be strong, but the immediate drawback ($10 to have a chance at getting it later) is nothing to sneeze at.

It’s basically a “win more” card. If you’re already doing well economically and you encounter the Blank Voucher early in the run, then by all means. Getting a chance at the Blank Voucher can significantly help the later part of your run (and increase your chances of getting some of the harder achievements/unlocks). If you’re already struggling, however, don’t feel bad about leaving it in the shop. In that case, you’re better off investing it into building interest and/or simply surviving.

The Rarity of the Antimatter Voucher

There have been reports of the Antimatter Voucher being exceptionally rare. This has not been my personal experience. It seems to appear about as often as other possible Vouchers, as long as its triggering conditions are active. It is true, however, that there are less chances for it to roll, since it can only appear after you buy the Blank Voucher.

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Three Sets of Bonuses You Can Stack

The answer to this question does exist in the game, but it’s a bit hidden away. In the collection menu of the game, when you select “Enhanced Cards”, “Seals” or “Editions”, we see the following:

In other words, you can stack up to 3 bonuses on one card, as long as it’s one bonus from each category. Applying a bonus to a card that already has a bonus of that type will overwrite it.

There are 8 Enhancements, 3 Special Editions (4 for Jokers) and 4 Seals. In theory, this makes for 96 bonus combinations, some with more synergy than others. In reality, this is rare. Enhancements come by often but Editions and Seals less so. Stacking all 3, like below, happens rarely:

Determining Which Bonuses Stack

We now know the theory behind bonus stacking in Balatro. To apply it, however, we need to be able to distinguish the 3 different sets. This is easy enough for Seals, which are a small Joker stamp on the top left of the card. The wording for adding a Seal to a card is also pretty clear.

The other 2 are a bit harder to distinguish. They come from different sources, but that only helps so much when determining if they can stack with existing bonuses. Here is a high-level visual overview, after which we’ll study the bonuses in more detail per category:

Card Enhancements

There are 8 Card Enhancements in Balatro. They are the most common bonus. They appear regularly in card packs and can be applied through Tarot Cards. These bonuses stack with Special Editions and Seals (see below), but not with each other.

• Bonus Cards score 30 extra chips when part of a scoring hand. These extra chips are then multiplied by your Multi-value, so they synergize well with Mult Cards.
• Mult(i) Cards increase your Multi-value by 4 when part of a scoring hand. They synergize well when you score them with Bonus Cards, Jokers that multiply your Multi-value and Foil Edition Cards.
• Wild Cards can be used as any suit, making it easier to get a Flush, Straight Flush, Flush House or Flush Five.
• Glass Cards double your Multi-value when part of a scoring hand but have a 25% chance of breaking each time they are scored.
• Steel Cards increase your Multi-value by 1.5 when they stay in your hand (in other words, when you play a hand that does not include them)
• Stone Cards score 50 points and have no rank and no suit. They score when added to a scoring hand (meaning they will increase the value of e.g., a Three of a Kind). If you find a Special Edition Stone Card, you may actually consider overwriting it with another enhancement, so it can be used in 5-card hands.
• Gold Cards give you $3 when you beat the Blind while they are still in your hand, without you playing them.
• Lucky Cards give you 20% to increase your Multiplier by 20 and a 1 in 15 chance to earn you $20 when part of a scoring hand.

Special Editions

Special Editions are much rarer than Card Enhancements. You can only apply them to existing Playing Cards through Spectral Cards. If you’re lucky, you may also find them in Card Packs directly. These bonuses stack with Card Enhancements and Seals (see below), but not with each other.

This is the only Bonus Type that does not apply to just Playing Cards but to Jokers as well (though there they cannot stack).

• Foil Cards score 50 extra chips when part of a scoring hand. They are a stronger version of the Bonus Card Enhancement and synergize well with Mult Cards. If you’re lucky, you may even get both bonuses on the same card.
• Holographic Cards increase your Multi-value by 10 when part of a scoring hand. They are a much stronger version of the Mult Card Enhancement and synergize well with Bonus Cards.
• Polychrome Cards multiply your Multi-value by 1.5 when part of a scoring hand. If you have Jokers that add a flat amount to your Multi-value when scoring them, it is important you place a Polychrome Card after those cards. That way, they also multiply that flat Multi-value. You can rearrange cards without it breaking your hand, e.g., 6 – 7 – 9 – 10 -8 with a Polychrome 8 is still a straight.

Balatro Seals

You can find Playing Cards with Seals in packs or add them to existing Playing Cards through Spectral Cards. They are rare, but not quite as rare as Special Editions. Spectral Cards applying a Seal also don’t come with the drawbacks Special Edition Spectral Cards have. Seal Bonuses stack with Card Enhancements and Special Editions, but not with each other.

• Gold Seals give you $3 when part of a scoring hand. This gives them reverse synergy with the Gold Card Enhancement, since those cards need to stay in your hand. Combining the 2 of them unlocks a joker, however, so you want to do it at least once.
• Red Seals trigger a card twice. They synergize well with all bonuses (and even give extra chips for cards without bonuses), but some stand out more than others. Glass Cards will multiply your Multi-value by 4 when they have a Red Seal (2×2). Polychrome and Steel Cards will multiply your Multi-value by 2.25 (1.5 x 1.5). Lucky Cards with a Red Seal are less dependent on Random Number Generation.
• Blue Seals give a Planet Card of the last played hand when you beat a Blind. It’s a powerful effect for most builds, but gives reverse synergy with everything but the Steel and Gold bonuses.
• Purple Seals give you a Tarot Card when you discard them. This gives them reverse synergy with all other card bonuses. They are best used on Playing Cards not part of your build (e.g., when you are building a Heart Flush Deck, you may want to stick it on a Spade or Club card).

Joker Bonuses

As we stated before, Jokers can only have Special Editions and no other bonuses. Jokers can also be Negative, which is a Special Edition Playing Cards cannot have (as it would be useless on them). That means that in total, Jokers can have 1 of 4 bonuses:

• Foil: adds 50 extra chips to the total score of each played hand.
• Holographic: adds 10 to your Multi-value each played hand.
• Polychrome: multiplies your total Multi-value by 1.5. You want to have these jokers on the right in the majority of the cases. That way they also multiply the flat additions to your Multi-value (from Holographic Jokers or the regular effects of Jokers).
• Negative: these Jokers increase your total Joker limit by 1. This essentially means the joker is “free” in that it takes up one spot in your roster, but also increases your roster capacity by 1.

Joker Bonuses can appear randomly in Buffoon Packs and on Jokers in the shop. There are Vouchers that increase the odds of this happening. You can also add a bonus to an existing Joker through Spectral Cards, though this comes with a negative side effect. Lastly, some Tags (bonuses for skipping a Blind) will make the next Joker to appear in the shop free and give it a guaranteed bonus.

Unlike with Playing Cards, you cannot overwrite a Bonus on a Joker.

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How To Get a Score on Fire in Balatro

You probably didn’t require an article to figure out that your score catches fire when it’s high. But the same score may catch fire on one blind and not the next, so what exactly triggers it?

The answer is that your score catches on fire when it’s high enough to complete that blind in one hand. But wait, you say, you had your score catch fire when it wasn’t your first hand that blind? It doesn’t matter if it’s your first hand or not. As long as your score is higher than the total score you need to beat that blind, it will catch fire.

Advantages of Scores on Fire

When your score is on fire, it means you’re well ahead of the curve. That means you likely aren’t in danger of losing anywhere soon, meaning you can:

• Work towards going over $25 so you get $5 of interest every blind
• Prioritize Jokers that take a while to ramp up, such as Hologram or Constellation
• Keep “utility” Joker Cards around a while longer, such as economy Jokers or Cartomancer
• Earn extra money, as each hand remaining gives you an extra dollar at the end of a blind

Getting a Score on Fire During the First Ante

The more elements work together, the more difficult it will get to predict if your score will catch fire. During the first ante, however, it is fairly easy to calculate. You just need to know how to calculate extra chips scored, which is 11 for an Ace, 10 for Face Cards (King – Queen – Jack) and 2-10 for 2-10. You then add these extra chips to the blue part of the image below.

Small Blind

Getting a score on fire gives you a few extra dollars, which also helps getting over the $5 mark to get an extra dollar in interest during the next blinds. It is generally worth discarding for this for this reason in my opinion.

• Straight: needs to score at least 45 extra chips with your cards (Queen – Jack – 10 – 9 – 8 or above)
• Flush: needs to score at least 40 extra chips with your cards (e.g., Ace – Queen – 8 – 7 – 4)
• Full House: needs to score at least 35 extra chips with your cards (e.g., 9 – 9 – 9 – 4 – 4)
• Any Four of a Kind or Straight Flush

Big Blind and Boss

I generally don’t advise trying to get a score on fire beyond the Small Blind unless you have a Joker or used a Planet Card. The requirements of getting one are quite high and discarding for it could get you in trouble. I recommend getting there in 2 hands instead. You can do so with most Straight+ hands without counting your chips too heavily.

If you’re still curious, however, here are the requirements:

• Big Blind: Any Four of a Kind or any Straight Flush
• Boss (that does not reduce your base chips or debuffs relevant cards): Four of a Kind of 7 or higher or any Straight Flush

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