💭・suggestions-old

[wheat sand]

like 75% or something

[grand drum]

Making the entire mechanic chance based is a not good design decision to balance it

[wheat sand]

If it was specific to the magic deck, as opposed to the voucher in general I feel like that would be less of a problem

[inland wharf]

It's really the only way to alter your core deck, tarot cards, correct?

[grand drum]

The deck directly gives you the voucher. You can’t nerf the deck without nerfing the voucher, unless you want to give you a downside outside of the tarot mechanics (like black deck), but that would not fix the problem

[inland wharf]

Seems like kinda have to rework the whole mechanic of tarot cards..

[wheat sand]

But the downside could directly affect the voucher

[inland wharf]

or at least how you get them.

[wheat sand]

like I get that it's not super clean or anything

but the magic deck could be "start with tarot reading, but it has a chance to proc"

[inland wharf]

I definitely found myself gravitating toward the deck that gives you that personally because I feel like that's a big part of the gameplay, is altering your deck.

[wheat sand]

I guess I'm just unclear whether the problem is with tarot in general or the magic deck in particular being too good

[grand drum]

I really don’t think it’s a good idea for the game

[wheat sand]

I don't see it as a problem where it's localized to the singular specific deck that seems to be one of the strongest decks

[inland wharf]

I feel like tarot needs to be changed kinda in general, it felt a little bad to me that they share space with jokers. I would be later into the run and have 6 jokers I like and didn't want to drop one to buy a tarot card in the shop. I don't know if the fix is having a separate inventory for tarot or what. It also felt bad having the spawn 3 cards, like how often besides at the beginning do you have 3 open slots. I know there needs to be some kinda of management or downside to picking something up but just how I felt.

It seems a problem that planet and tarot cards are pretty unimpactful unless you have the booster pack thing.

[young folio]

I like this idea, or maybe make the crystal ball only proc once per ante or something? Its either that or possibly change the amounts that are effected. Like only one card per tarot, money would still reign supreme but lik the steel or gold/ lucky cards, you could make the multis, death and bonus cards only change 1 card to their effect, as in death would only add 1 of whatever card you choose. Obviously money and boosted rates for tarot would still allow you to find/ change more of your deck. But you wouldnt be able to make 13 multi and bonus 4's and 8 jokers with like 4-5 tarot cards either (like @lyric lance did in his last video) 😂 sorry for the call out btw.

[wheat sand]

that was my first suggestion above lol

[inland wharf]

I guess what I'm saying is I really like the mechanic of tarot cards and altering your deck and feel they should almost be more standard, like no matter the deck. Albeit probably needing to be nerfed.

[young folio]

I think thats my main draw back from the tarot cards, they are important, but he is already trying out the idea of a seperate holding area for the planets/tarots. I felt like thats my main reason the magic deck was OP because it gave you insta use (and free) tarots. So you could use them without needing to free the inventory by removing jokers. But the other option would be like the shop i suppose. Where it stays as is but maybe you still have to buy the tarot cards at cost? Gives you the guaranteed tarots and insta use features, but makes you need to manage money early game so you can get to the point of building interest?

Not sure if thats a potential fix or not a big enough nerf. Making the crystal ball effect give the insta tarots, but still needing to buy them like if you found in the shop. And you could still only get one per hand like now, you just need to buy them. Thoughts? @obsidian apex

[inland wharf]

I could see a separate part of the shop and separate inventory for them, it seems like they are a different mechanic than the jokers and it felt bad often having to chose one or the other, especially since after using one then I just have 5 jokers for that battle/round.

I feel like altering your deck should be an integeral part of the game not something you need to spec/luck into.

but I don't know anything about game design lmao.

really liked this one though, can't wait to see it grow.

The joker system feels great, and so to tarot cards I just feel like they should be more separate and tarot more integral maybe?

Also I feel like the plant system and leveling up could be altered/made better. Maybe there's an upgrade tree/talent selection at break point for hand levels or something. Like the joker that makes flush and straight only take 4 cards. Something like that but for all the hands?

[wheat sand]

this is what localthunk was testing

well

the separate inventory slots

[inland wharf]

Yeah I see he said it wasn't solving it, but not quite sure what specifically that means.

[young folio]

Do you mean like the space joker? I think its under rated myself but i get it. I feel like maybe it doesnt get used because it levels the hands to rarely? Its a 1 in 4 right now right? Maybe bump to 1 in 3 (2 in 3 with oops all 6s) OR make it a 1 in 4 to gain 2 levels with the hand played? Not sure but ive seen people get their pair base value higher than the straight flush because their pair was leveled to 26-30. I just think as it stands the space joker doesnt provide much difference from the planets themselves, aside from the fact it can level the bonus hands like 5 of a kind or a flush house

[inland wharf]

No I meant that it seems like tarot cards are a lot more impactful than plant cards, so maybe they could upgrade hands with talents or abilities instead of just levels, like once you have lvl 5 or level 10 flush it only takes 4 cards, maybe for pair it could be 1 value above or below, for Q,K is a pair. spitballing but yea.

maybe too complicated, it just seemed like when I played with the planet deck it seemed a little too.... straight forward? just upgrade one hand over and over.

[young folio]

The issue is more with the deck or the crystal ball i feel, obviously boosting gameplay overall by letting more decks use the tarot/planet storage, you give that same buff to the magic deck. So it makes the tarots better and wasier to use, but with the magic deck you still get an extra 2-4 tarot cards each hand. So it just adds more tarot cards ontop of more tarot cards making the deck more used in different ways.

[inland wharf]

oh for sure the magic deck would have to completely change if you reword the tarot system.

[pine edge]

Making the magic deck have a chance of proccing is not a good solution game design wise. As people have pointed out, tarots are the only way to mess with your deck which is what makes them fun to use. Making people use them less would just lead to the game feeling worse. A better fix would be tuning down their power and making them more common so that with the magic deck you still get the fun of using tarot cards and without it you still feel like you can change your deck without breaking everything to bits (edit: accidentally said making people use them more instead of less lmao)

[young folio]

I think thats what he is running into. So my thought would be to change the effect of crystal ball to only give tarots once per ante. 🤷‍♂️ idk a better solution.

[inland wharf]

I guess it's like 80% of the power budget of tarot is in the magic deck. if you had an inventory the magic deck/booster could just add more tarot storage or something.

[young folio]

Thats an idea, like the over stock but with tarots? Magic deck just give you +1 and then +2 tarot storage? And i assume the telescope deck would still function the same?

[inland wharf]

I don't know if power budget is the right wording, but I mean if tarot cards were built separately as more of their own system outside of having an upgrade booster or deck then you could do something different with the magic ball deck.

Yeah I mean I could see tarot, planet, and joker all having their own sections in the shop. the cards to see more of them just working like overstock, and the magic ball/telescope boosting your storage for them?

though not sure how much having more storage would be powerful/worthwhile with consumables..

maybe have a tarot phase like right now outside the round and the upgrade lets you discard/redraw the cards you get to edit, and make them unusable in the normal round?

I just basically think that the act of editing your deck that tarot cards provide should be baseline.

cause it's fun

and adds a whole layer to the gameplay.

that currently you kind miss out on unless you have the magic ball or the magic deck.

[pine edge]

totally personal opinion/view here, even though I have a degree in game design I absolutely do not consider myself an expert in either Game Design or this game:

I don't think having tarot storage really does anything good for tarots, I think they should be the go to way to edit your deck without having the possibility of being used as a consumable as it seems to me that that throws a big wrench at the power level and usability of the cards.
I would remove the consumable component entirely and make people be able to use them exactly like the tarot reading works everytime you pick one up.
This in turn would make the changes I proposed earlier a bit easier to balance as the increased frequency coupled with the consumable nature would fuck a lot with balancing as you could use some of the tarots to cheese blinds by artificially making good hands to play.

So, to recap:

• Lower the power of tarots
• Increase frequency of tarots
• Remove the consumable nature of them and make them the go-to way to edit your deck using the tarot reading screen when you pick one up

Of course, this would break some tarots like the fool which would need some rethinking/reworking, also, everything that I have proposed might screw heavily with the intended design of the tarots which of course might not be a direction that the developer wants the game to take and that is absolutely respectable

[inland wharf]

yea I like the thought of every time you buy a tarot you use it in a reading

or even having a reading after every round and you have to pay for the cards.

you could buff number of choices of tarot, reroll portion of deck editing, reroll tarot choices, tarot costs etc with boosters/jokers.

[pine edge]

I think part of the coolness of the tarot reading is the inability to reroll it

I think it would lose its charm by allowing rerolling for deck editing purposes

[inland wharf]

it could for sure make it overpowered.

[pine edge]

eeehhh that depends on cost and how much you can do

you could make it super limited... but that would make it a pretty dumb addition

I think it portrays well the vagueness of a tarot reading by not allowing rerolling and only allowing edits on a random part of the deck

I am a big fan of the tarot reading mechanic x)

[inland wharf]

yea I like it a lot, to me it seems like that should be the base system, not the buying them and storing them in joker slots to use during a normal turn.

[pine edge]

for me the saddest part is just not finding them

they are such a cool mechanic that in my eyes elevates the game to a whole new level of fun and sillyness

[inland wharf]

I do see that using them in a normal joker slot makes them really powerful because you can wait for specific cards to use them on which maybe makes it worth losing a joker slot over it?

[pine edge]

so going to late game and being blocked by not having the possibility of buying them or not finding them at all feels pretty bad in my eyes

I haven't played enough to say for certain if they are worth the joker slot

I only played the 50 rounds demo and then watched some videos of the game

[inland wharf]

yea I used my 50 rounds so now I'm here theory crafting lol.

[pine edge]

shoutout to GothicLordUK x)

same here tbh

[wheat sand]

this would also affect the soul as well

[pine edge]

I'd love to get my hands on the game cause I am incredibly intrigued by it by so many perspectives, I love it personally as a game but I am also super intrigued professionally as a game designer and a game programmer myself eheh

[pine edge]

the soul is the joker creating tarot right?

in the case that it is, it could still trigger when you pick it up or stop you from buying it if you have full slots... or make you exceed the joker cap until you sell one EHEHEH

[obsidian apex]

Thanks for the discussion everyone. My comments were about the Crystal Ball voucher, not the Magic deck (magic deck is a symptom, not the cause of the issue).

Months ago, tarot reading and planetarium were part of the base game, but for new players I felt as though that was adding a whole system of complexity that they didn't need to understand just to play the game.
That's why there's the option to get the crystal ball. However, for mid to high hour players tarot cards are essentially a requirement, so now a run is either dead or no fun without the crystal ball.

The separate area for tarot cards ended up being a solution to buying tarot cards in the shop once you had a full suite of jokers, and it also makes the tarot related jokers much more viable, but it did nothing for Crystal ball since there's no way you're buying 1 or more tarots from the shop per round. So I still like the separate tarot area, but not as a way to fix crystal ball.

Something separate but related is the lack of things to spend your money on in mid to late game - when there are so many huge economy cards but nothing really you need to spend it on round-by-round.

My next idea for a solution to the problem is:

1. Add Tarot Reading as some kind of option in the shop, maybe a Tag you buy, maybe a booster pack, maybe just a button. Spend $5(?) and get a tarot reading after selecting the next blind. maybe it goes up by $1 per ante. Spend another $5 to give it 4 options instead of 2

2. Buff planet card upgrades. I have already done this in my dev build but now planet cards upgrade chips/mult by more per level. Should swing the balance a bit

3. Nerf some tarot cards. They are needed to modify your deck, but some of them modify the deck too quickly (death from 3 to 2, wheel of fortune odds reduction, suit modifier from 3 to 2 cards, other nerfs of that nature)

4. Add a separate area for consumeables. Base game will have 2 slots. Maybe magic deck just allows for a 3rd. You can think of this as a tarot buff since you theoretically can start using them on your mid-round hands more often.

5. Come up with a new idea for crystal ball. Maybe it decreases cost of tarot reading (crystal ball) and upgraded adds one consumeable slot (omen globe)

I am thinking changes like this would
A) Keep the game pretty much just as simple for a first time player. Biggest difference would be a new area for consumeables, but since a tarot is already in the tutorial I feel like that is not an issue.
B) Make economy jokers more valuable (risk/reward is the fun part of this game so choosing to get them instead of mult jokers is maybe better in the long run) AND necessary for deeper runs.
C) Make all other decks suddenly viable, since you CAN get tarot readings with any deck at similar frequency
D) Keep tarot readings themselves the exact same, because I like the whole upgrading random cards thing.

[inland wharf]

so the system for having consumables means that there would still be standalone tarot cards available in the shop to purchase the way they are currently, in addition to the purchasing a tarot reading? I do like the ability to use them mid round as sometimes it can save your butt per say or let you wait to upgrade that specific card. Will it be as it is now that the cards are intermixed with the jokers or will there be a separate slot in the store for tarot/planet cards? All in all it seems like you have intentions to make tarot cards/deck editing a bigger or more baseline part of the game which is awesome, as like you said it opens up other deck choices more I think.

[wheat sand]

Are each of the five proposals separate, or one overhaul package?

[obsidian apex]

One change, just broke it down into the parts it would require

[wheat sand]

I figured, just confirming

[obsidian apex]

There would be separate Joker and Consumeable areas (5 jokers, 2 consumeables I think)

And yes, tarots in the shop in addition to whatever the tarot reading thing would be

[inland wharf]

that seems cool to me. Just to reiterate really love the game haha, itching to play more past my 50 rounds. You have done great thus far and am sure it will grow in a good direction.

[wheat sand]

If crystal ball is changed to have cheaper readings I think that it might make more sense for the magic deck to have some up front benefit, like 1-2 free readings at the very beginning or something

Since most decks have immediate value

may not be needed though

I do wonder if the suit changing tarots need to be nerfed where it seems like flush based decks are weaker

[lyric lance]

Joker Sugestion re: "Buff planet card upgrades. I have already done this in my dev build but now planet cards upgrade chips/mult by more per level. Should swing the balance a bit"
The Astronomer: Planet Cards are triggered twice when used.
At the cost of a joker slot, you can ramp up hand levels faster, allowing for a more focused build

[thorn tulip]

suggestion for magic deck: start with the tarot merchant voucher. tarot cards are 25% cheaper

[pine edge]

Thank you very much for the detailed breakdown of the issue + solution.

I actually really like the changes you brought up and I absolutely believe they are a step in the right direction.
I absolutely love the idea of a tarot cards booster pack, I find it hilarious, I wouldn’t go for the tag as I like that the shop is all physical in a sense. You are always buying a physical card or voucher, I think buying the little thingy would feel off, same thing for just clicking button for tarot reading. Maybe you could have it as a ticket to visit the tarot reader instead?

As per Crystal Ball and by extention the magic deck, maybe they could give +1 card per tarot reading to choose from and then the upgraded crystal ball could give +1 card chosen so you get 2 out of the 3/5 cards you see in the tarot reading

[vivid turtle]

I have a blind suggestion, may it be boss blind or normal
Chaos blind, it randomizes the value of every card played (from 0-10 chips)

[royal night]

1 -10

[royal night]

Possiblely just a pile of discarded cards

Playing against hook I sometimes forget what they handrip

[obsidian apex]

This is related to the counting cards discussion earlier in this discord, essentially I don't want to show discarded cards/remaining cards in deck because I want to incentivize counting cards.

The Hook is an edgecase that should maybe pause a bit longer to make it more obvious which card is being discarded, but once it is in the discard pile it's up to player memory

[vivid turtle]

I don’t know if this is too cruel or too hard, but maybe a blind that debuffs even/odd cards?

[zinc gull]

Suggestion: Burnt joker should also show total number of added hand size rather than just count until next increase

[inland wharf]

also would be cool if the boot joker showed the increase, don't know if that's hard to do. math hard sometimes.

[silver vapor]

New Tarot card concept:
• The Obedient

For the next hand played, if it doesn't contain Face cards, all poker hands get +2 Multiplier. If it does, all poker hands give +30 Chips.

[maiden otter]

@obsidian apex make a mobile version of the game, ill buy it, i need it

you have 20 minutes

[young folio]

Its already been suggested and will likely be added but only after the game is released fully. Hes trying to figure out balance and bugs with the main game before worrying about trying to make it a mobile game.

Obviously just adds more work to release a game thats still in beta as a mobile game, and hes trying to make sure the game is a good functional product before mass releasing. Unlike some games he actually cares about his fans/players and not just the money 🙂

[stable ibex]

The game is a good functional product though

[young folio]

Yeah but theres still some balancing issues and kinks hes working out. This next update will change the dynamic quite a bit it sounds like.

But its up to @obsidian apex in the end. I just know the mobile version is likely to happen (from my understanding) but not a first priority at the moment.

[inland wharf]

I dunno if it's overpowered but it seems like a joker should do its given multi before the polychrome 1.5?

[mint token]

@obsidian apex add something about phone/tablet versions to the faq please!

[lyric lance]

Deck Variant Suggestion: Mysterious Erratic Deck
The Erratic Deck, but when you click run info, the Deck screen is just a big ? with no info. You have to just intuit your deck structure as you play.

[obsidian apex]

That is a great idea for a challenge run

[lyric lance]

Challenge run is a great use for it

Challenge Suggestion: Rigged Deck
Start a run with the Red Deck. 1 card in the deck is secretly a mine. If the mine is ever played within the scoring components of a hand, it explodes and the run ends. Can you figure out enough safe cards to take you to victory?

[uncut vortex]

You are evil, @lyric lance , and I can't stop watching your videos. 😄

You should re-watch Road To 100% video #8. You had me screaming at my TV last night, because you went into the run hoping to discover the last tarot you hadn't seen yet, and you are offered it right near the very start and skip it. 😄

[vivid turtle]

I have a challenge run deck idea
The Shredder: After every blind, two cards, picked at random, are destroyed
The goal is to either get as far as you can or beat the boss blind before you lose or run out of cards

[grand drum]

^ this is my personally favorite idea i saw on this server

[vivid turtle]

Thank you!

[thorn tulip]

Challenge idea: Big Spender
Everything costs 1, but jokers don’t appear in the shop

[lyric lance]

Roll seeps into the wild

[vivid turtle]

LocalThunk loves it!

[wheat sand]

I'd love to see a challenge where you have no shop and get six random jokers every blind

[lyric lance]

Challenge Suggestion: Printing Error
When cards are drawn from the deck to the hand, they either
A) Have a rank and no suit, OR
B) Have wild suits and no rank.
Cards with no rank score 5 points, and can be played in groups of any 5 unranked cards to make a flush.
Cards with no suit can never contribute to flushes/straight flushes.
When a card is returned to the deck and later re-drawn, re-randomise its status between A and B.

[keen wind]

I'd love a challenge run where you start with six jokers, but theyre all face down

can you win without knowing what they do?

[vivid turtle]

This isn’t a troll suggestion, I just don’t have the right words to explain it yet
An exodia Joker could be really cool, you could maybe call it “The Final Joke” when it’s fully formed
Each piece of “The Final Joke” has a very weak payout or buff, but when you get all five pieces, they merge and you get a busted Joker card

All the cards could be a piece of a Joker card, like bottom right corner, bottom left, top right, top left and then the middle

[thorn tulip]

how about the other half of the half joker. when you have them both they combine to give you +30 mult always or something

[vivid turtle]

THAT’S DOPE

THANK YOU FOR THE ASSIST

MY MAN

[pine edge]

it would be very funny if it was named just "the other half joker"

[thorn tulip]

and they combine to the full joker

[pine edge]

the joke

[vivid turtle]

The full card could be called “half joker squared”

[ruby socket]

Would the ripped area just be fixed with some kind of see-though tape?

[thorn tulip]

0.5^2 isn't 1 though

[vivid turtle]

🧌

[vivid turtle]

For real though, I realized that the moment I said that lmao
I just think the name would be funny

[carmine lynx]

the true prank - they combine into quarter joker

[vivid turtle]

Imagine they were just stacked on top of one another lmao

[vivid turtle]

This has already been suggested, but it’s such a good suggestion I have to repeat it
A creative mode/sandbox mode
This could be great for finding bugs and just messing around with builds

[royal night]

Challenge runs

[gloomy pivot]

adding a slot machine joker will get the dopamine flowing

[sly pollen]

it would be nice if there was a quick way to check how much of each rank you have, so it's a lot faster to check what ranks to go for "of a Kind" when you are starting the run with the erratic deck compared to just counting each rank manually.

kind of like how there is already a count of how much of each suit you have

[zinc gull]

^^ Like an "advanced" view of the deck would be nice

[lyric lance]

So seeds are 8 characters long. What about some secret/silly seeds?
'Diamonds' is a 52 diamond deck
'theroyal' is a deck of all face cards
'oddities' all even cards are swapped for odd cards
'5legends' start with the legendary jokers
'windows8' start with 8 glass cards
'24karats' start with 24 gold cards
'Benjamin' start with $100

None of these are designed to be balanced or challenging, but it's a fun way to add something silly. I know Binding of Isaac has some like it, but no idea how hard these kinda things are to implement.

[lyric lance]

'negitive' all cards on the shop always have the negitive property

[carmine lynx]

all jokers run

[vivid turtle]

‘Polyfoil’ every card in your deck is either foil, holographic or polychrome

[bitter stag]

Maybe the new Arcana and Celestial Packs could be laying in a case in the shop (visually).

Something like this

[vivid turtle]

I had a Joker idea that could be fun
“Three’s company”
Every time you play three threes, add a 3x multiplier to this card

[sacred plover]

Button on endgame screen to show final view of jokers/tarots/vouchers used, similar to Run Info (unless I missed something, didn't see a way to check that after the run ended)

[grand drum]

You can technically click on Endless end then see your jokers, but yeah, it would be nice to not cut off the jokers on win screen

[sacred plover]

Yeah even with jokers shown, a full list of names + foil/holo/etc as a separate menu (either in main menu "view previous run", or end screen "view final deck")

would be amazing for people to share

since I have no clue how to identify the jokers from pictures after only 50 rounds so far 😭

[grand drum]

The problem with listing them, is that it’s possible to have “a lot” of jokers, so they won’t fit if you textually display them

[vivid turtle]

I know that this may be very, very down the line, but, when there’s a ton more Jokers in the game, let’s say 200-250, it would be cool if Jokers you already have tagged you to get other Jokers that synergized with them, even if the tag was pretty weak

[true osprey]

make the game modder friendly (in future)

i think it would be good for longevity :)

[vivid turtle]

Foil deck needs a buff or revamp, I feel as though it’s very hard to get off the ground and not that helpful during the early game

[exotic agate]

suggestion: accessibility setting to turn off animated backgrounds

[royal night]

An irl card game when this gets big

[night cradle]

Would a setting like a basic "mini" overlay be useful? Think Binding of Isaac there is a setting for an overlay over your stats such as crit, spd and dmg. Now naturally there isn't crit and such in Balatro. However, there are "constant" changes to your deck (depending on build). I do realise there is a button for this. However, I do find it tedious that I need to open a whole menu more than I would like to admit.

For newer poker players it could also be useful to see what you need for full house, straight, flush and etc.

• I personally would love to see a quicker and more natural way to instantly see how my deck looks. How many aces or 8 of diamonds there is in total. Maybe if you were able to just hover your deck in the corner a more advanced overlay would appear as long as you hovered it?

[lyric lance]

Equally, a button like this could be put here and when you mouse over it, it shows you your listed hand levels, without having to navigate a menu

[daring canopy]

Golden Stamper (Joker or maybe voucher): 1 in 25 chance to choose a card to be a "Gold Seal" at start of round. (works in a similar screen to that of crystal ball/planetarium)

[wheat sand]

A joker/voucher that makes tarots affect an extra card (Death 2 -> 3) etc.

[lyric lance]

Mmm Like how "Oops all sixes" makes all X/Ys X+1/Y a joker like 'The Count' stylised as a vampire makes all Tarots add +1 to number of cards impacted.

[obsidian apex]

That was the original Cartomancer effect - maybe time to bring it back

[pine edge]

You could change your approach to the problematic play score jokers as the way the wording is right now is very programmatic.
You could maybe reword them to work within the rules of the game itself.
Since you can upgrade cards with extra multipliers and they already work only when played within a scoring poker hand, you could word these Jokers to give the bonuses to the cards themselves. Animation would still be the same, but the wording would be friendlier to the rules of the game.

For example certificate could be something like:

• Enhance Gold Seal cards with x2 multiplier (to keep a wording similar to the tarots)
• Gold Seal cards have/gain x2 multiplier (super straightforward)

These are just examples, maybe you can find a better way to word this

[daring canopy]

Name: ████████ or [REDACTED]: At beginning of each round, it becomes a random joker until the end of round.

[sturdy anvil]

Name: Hydra-Joker-Each hand played counts as 2 different applicable hands (aka full house would also be counted as a three of a kind)

[obsidian apex]

What do you mean by 'counts' in this context, could you elaborate?

[sturdy anvil]

Of course: For scoring purposes, a hand would score (points and multiplier) as an additional hand as well as the next highest applicable hand (points and multiplier). For example-take a full house. A full house also has a 2 of a kind and a 3 of a kind in it. A full house with this joker would have the points and multiplier of a three of a kind (next highest applicable hand) in addition to a full house points and multiplier

[obsidian apex]

So add next highest poker hand chips and mult to this poker hand chips and mult? I think I understand

So a pair would add chips and mult of high card

[sturdy anvil]

Yeah-if its too powerful you could make it a percent chance to trigger

[grand drum]

Ideas below are not tied to anything in particular, just examples for things. If someone mentioned something similar from the list - sorry

As mentioned before - consumable jokers, that work for limited amount of rounds, or until (something happens/ chance procs).

More jokers that have a downside for one thing, but a (bigger) upside for another. Not like Ride the bus, but more like Delayed grat.

Virus/Rabbit - duplicates itself and gives very small bonus (aswell as money for selling the dupes).

[Cow]/Coupon - similar to above, but gives another joker as a bonus. Might be specific for the spawn, might be just random from (common rarity). Kinda similar to Catromancer, but for jokers specifically

[Alien] - has a chance to destroy random other joker, gains permanent bonus (gold/+mult/chips/xmult etc), depending on rarity of the victim (ceremonial dagger, but more random/fun/powerful)

(How to train your) Dragon/Matryoshka - joker that has multiple "forms" and evolves over time. Whether just limited to blinds/blood gold collected/something else.

Adventurer - similar to above 2, but requires something specific from the player - specific hand played/skipped some blinds/boss defeated with some special conditions/ etc

[Twins]/[Ying&Yang] - jokers that are supposed to work better together, similar to combining 2 low power jokers into 1, but with idea that they should be fine as standalone. Should be both rares, with already "ok" effect.

Piggybank - lose some gold overtime, but greatly increase its sell prize.

And some basic ones:
Magician - give all other jokers random [non negative] Edition)/all cards player random enchant for this hand only

[Onepunchman] - gain multiplier on FIRST hand played. As dumb as it looks, it would be more interesting than Acrobat imo

[ruby socket]

it would be funny if you got acrobat and onepunchman to work together on the needle and accumulate an unessecary amount of chips

[grand drum]

also [Highlander] - some big bonus for playing a single card. With big enough bonus might make some fun runs

[obsidian apex]

Lots of really good ideas there. The rabbit, alien, piggybank are really fun. Maybe if more jokers need a new effect I'll look at the suggestions for a new one

[wheat sand]

Really like the idea of Matryoshka

[jagged finch]

these are really good!

one thing I was thinking about was round specific challenges that if achieved would upgrade an existing joker to foil/holo/poly

[magic zinc]

Not sure if this exists but maybe a blind that requires being within a range of scores as opposed to exceeding one would be fun (and challenging). Would force you to think about your play so as to not overshoot and just go for highest number possible. Maybe as a boss blind.

[steep holly]

I feel like that should maybe come with some way to estimate or see the score before hand

[royal night]

The hydra: for each 7 cards discarded gain +1 max hand size next round

[steep holly]

Tweedle Dee: Every unique pair you play adds +2 multiplier to this

[royal night]

The antiquarian: x1.5 mult for each different type of edition you play. ( gold, glass, steel, bonus, mult, stone)

[pine edge]

Tragedy: when a hand is played has a chance of breaking and making the joker to the right negative

So one use only, the tragedy finishes and leaves one of your jokers negative. Needs to be kept around for a bit before doing its thing

[ruby socket]

Deck idea:
Bourgeois tarot
Has standard cards, an additional "knight" card, in each respective suit which is worth more than a joker but less than the queen.
In addition to this there are 21 specialised number cards, which act as the trump cards in the french tarot game.

Tbf though, it would be very different to the current card layout

Otherwise there is the other french game i know, 'belote', in which cards 2-6 are removed which is more realistic

[wheat sand]

I think a Eucher Deck would be interesting

[graceful violet]

It ill be cool to add the first 2 cards or 4 cards of la loteria mexicana

-The first one is "El gallo" or the cock (sin albur) and it represents strenght and the strugle of fighting. its the first card of la loteria cuse it also represents the new beginnings and the first hour of the day.

in game // as it represent the start of the days it will be good to make the first hand played had x2 multiplier or a x1.5 multiplier (I think there is one joker that adds a multiplier to the last hand played but I dont remember, this could be its counterpart i think)

---

-The second one is "El diablo" or the devil, some people say that El diablo is the one who created all gambling games and it represents the envy, the greed and the ambition on people.

in game// I have various ideas of its effects in game since there is a lot you can do with the devil, lore wise. you can make the 3 pair of 6,6,6 and 3,3,3 had a multiplier of x6 with 1/6 chances to trigger and .333 chance to just disappear from your jokers. It will probably be really difficult to work around but it could give you some free wins, idk.

the other two are "La dama" y "el catrin" but i am still thinking of ideas, maybe you can make them had an effect only if you had both of them and increased that chance of make the other one appeared if you have one already.

or make El catrin had an intraction with the black cards and la dama with the red cards

[digital ember]

maybe a joker card that adds chips or a multiplier if your cards add up to a certain value?

jokermatician

[jagged finch]

Have you thought about aesthetic only unlocks like card skins? If so in Italy there is a card game called briscola that uses an Italian deck. Pretty much same cards but jack becomes Fante (knave) queen becomes knight (cavallo ), and king is still king

Also the suits are spade (swords) , Coppe (cups), denari (coins) and bastone (branch or baton)

[graceful violet]

Thats a spanish suited or baraja española, that will be so cool

That one right?

[jagged finch]

ya man that looks very similar! Is there a similar game to briscolla in spain?

[graceful violet]

I think is the same game, but its just called diferent.

So cool

[royal night]

All decks came from similar originsafter all

[thorn tulip]

rare joker suggestion: +1 mult after selling a card

[royal night]

The baron^

The shark: after each boss blind double all joker cards sell value

[wraith isle]

A way to play 6 cards could be interesting. Would be awesome to hit a 6 of a kind

Example Joker: Randomly plays an additional card from your deck into your hand

[daring canopy]

This suggestion is for the boss blind: Arcane Eclipse: Card Enhanced are Debuffed.

[exotic agate]

True Credit Card: get $1 (Balatro money) per US$1 (real money) spent

||those two suggestions are jokes if it wasn't clear||

[grand drum]

Should probably worded as “enhanced cards are debuffed” instead

[daring canopy]

easy enough XD Edit:done

[obsidian apex]

Might be one I replace soon actually, there are some pretty blah bosses in the game at the moment

That one seems interesting

[grand drum]

Is there? I can only think of -multi per discard one

[obsidian apex]

That one is pretty meh, same with the one that subtracts the hand level

I think there is opportunity for much more interesting bosses for sure

[daring canopy]

It would counter against Tarrot cards just like "The Fish" is a counter to planet cards.(partially anyways) [the ox for chip part of planets]

[grand drum]

If the planets get buffed maybe, as is it’s a bit annoying for most of the play styles (hand types)

[obsidian apex]

I think things like the wheel, the plant, some of the final bosses, the wall, the needle are more interesting effects than things that are just mult or chip debuffs

And all the bosses that don't let you play a certain hand type, anything you arent always able to ignore

I think there's a ton of opportunity for some fun ideas there

Always thought an anti-econ boss would be great but super hard for example. And very different from other bosses

[daring canopy]

you mean like "The tooth"?

[obsidian apex]

More harsh than the tooth - I mean a boss that punishes having a lot of cash somehow

The tooth is an anti-econ boss for sure though you are right

But it applies regardless of how much cash you have

[daring canopy]

like something like -1 mult for every $10?

[obsidian apex]

or like -1 chip per dollar you have, but yeah something like that

[carmine lynx]

or subtract cash on hand from chips

beaten by mere moments

[daring canopy]

if you do that to someone hopelessly rich, maybe you should give them a way to incernate their money XD

so it's not just game over

[carmine lynx]

you’d reroll yourself down in the pre boss shop

[daring canopy]

very true

[carmine lynx]

boss effect could also trigger first so any +chip jokers could still mitigate

[daring canopy]

what if i was this guy: https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/1117847160386502656/1127324507196108921/20230708214447_1.jpg

[grand drum]

if you would be this guy, you would be able to either reroll until you get Fool or just overpower with banner/bootstraps anyway

[daring canopy]

the bootstraps does mult but if we are doing chips... then it's multiplying zero chips unless we are considering it after all the math.

so the first option seems the only viable option... unless i'm forgetting something.

[carmine lynx]

Banner adds chips and if it triggers after boss blind ability it’ll be fine

[daring canopy]

true but that doesn't scale on econ.. just discards.

[grand drum]

yeah, but you mentioned the screenshot where person was going full on discards. and for endgame, even if i have a grand flying around, i also have more than that from space joker in chips anyway. also again, its very easy to roll for Fool as of right now

[obsidian apex]

Fool doesn't disable anymore, don't know if that would change things a bit

[grand drum]

i saw your message about Fool. and for that i will say.... im not looking forward to rerolling mark into [your suit is disabled] 😅

its a good change most likely, but yeah, gonna be rough especially for endless

[obsidian apex]

I'd love to do a boss balance/effect update so I think I can address that from the other side

If the issue is that the boss is just not fair I'd rather fix the boss than give the player an easy out

[grand drum]

i think the idea of having bosses that will always just kill you is a good thing. you kinda need to be prepared to play around it. and its not like you have time/resources to go foll on one suit/face cards etc in 10 antes*

Mark is still too hard imo, even for 3 of a kind it might be too annoying

[obsidian apex]

I agree I don't want to nerf bosses, I just don't want to make them an instant give up like the Mark often is. Especially now that there isn't a fool. I think punishing pair builds is good but maybe there's a better way for me to do it with the Mark

[grand drum]

Mark doesnt just punishes pair/3 of a kind/2 pair builds (starter pack), but also 4 of a kind, full house (which is imo the best way to go, followed closely by flushes) and 5 of a kind (which is the best thing for endgame)

and i dont really see a way of changing it (or a need for that) to change it just for pairs. maybe i am wrong for the most playerbase, but again, i think there should be bosses that just make you lose, if you are going full on something*

[daring canopy]

i think giving a player a reverse uno card is still a good way... i mean i know there is still chicot but a consumable that let's you do so would be great or change it so it lessen the effect of the boss... say instead of "No straights" "1 in 2 straights are debuffed".

even if this isn't the way... giving players options to combat it would be amazing.

[obsidian apex]

Maybe a controversial opinion - after watching a lot of people play for the first time - the base game is too easy. Especially when you never have to hedge your bets on a build

So I want it to be more difficult anyway, definitely for a 1st win. Many roguelikes don't let you win for many hours until you really learn the game

[daring canopy]

agreed the game actually starts in new game XD

[grand drum]

im not sure if WINNING for the first time is easy, but first 8 antes feels like a peace walk for new players (who knows how to play roguelikes)

[obsidian apex]

I have scaled the Ante numbers up quite a bit, and with 5 jokers I think the difficulty may be in the other direction

But time will tell. It's a balance

[grand drum]

yep, was about to right about that^

[charred stone]

i feel like from a new player standpoint (me), bosses that'll punish you for not considering branching out with synergies are great.... as long as there are enough unique and connecting paths for synergies

[daring canopy]

kinda forgot about that -_-

[obsidian apex]

Don't worry I won a run and I suck at the game

I have no clue how yall did the 10 in 10

[daring canopy]

What if you could remove a boss ability by doing a particular condition... like "No Straights" is removed by doing "Five of a kind"?

[grand drum]

also, on a balance topic, there are a lot of games that are also too easy base game. things like StS or LbaL are really easy (if you know what you are doing), but the ascensions system exist specifically for this

[charred stone]

lmao i must be a lot worse at roguelikes than i thought, i barely made it to 5/10 in all my 50 tries 😭

[daring canopy]

oh god... a debuff new game system.... that would be nuts

[obsidian apex]

Absolutely glad you brought it up, that is the 1 thing I am most excited for

Challenge runs

I want to build a system where they are easy to add in and make like a hundred of them

Or weeklies

[daring canopy]

force a deck and give different debuffs?

[obsidian apex]

Yeah and force unsellable jokers

Or other conditions that are not found in the base game

Like Oops! All bosses

boss blinds only

[grand drum]

i might have said that in a wrong way, i just played a lot of roguelikes and i know how math is designed for these games. if you could not reach ante 5 in your demo rounds, no need to worry about it, you will learn the game more when it realeases and it will also be easy for you at some point

[daring canopy]

now we need cursed jokers

jokers that jump out of the shop and require money to remove XD

[grand drum]

i thought about idea of applying negative to cards, by making it be actual negative for you (kinda like marks in LbaL)

[daring canopy]

LbaL?

[charred stone]

lol its totally fine, i was only teasing. often at the beginning of many roguelikes i play, i make more extreme moves and a bunch of leaps of faith just to feel around and see what works and what doesn't

[grand drum]

luck be a landlord, roguelike with slot machine elements

[daring canopy]

never heard of it i'll check it out :3

[charred stone]

oh you're in for a treat

[obsidian apex]

It is similar in concept - if you like Balatro you might like it

[grand drum]

be careful, you might lose couple of days into it

[vague hazel]

Don't worry I only made it to 7

[charred stone]

hell i've lost weeks to the game and i havent even played it, just watching the same playthroughs over and over again was addicting enough

[daring canopy]

i'm in new game and didn't make out of ante 10 on the non new game -_-

[vague hazel]

although I admit more than once I accidentally forgot to select a card

[charred stone]

thats so real, sometimes my adhd goes on a murder spree with my memories and i discard an absolutely fantastic hand

[daring canopy]

same... maybe we just need a "Idiot highlight" feature XD

[vague hazel]

also the memory of me accidentally skipping a planet card instead of confirming my choice will forever haunt me

[daring canopy]

highlights what you have selected.

[charred stone]

we should prob take this to #🎙・server-chat if we want to continue this convo (please im so bad sometimes)

[vague hazel]

I think adding a border around the cards you have selected is a great idea

[grand drum]

yeah, the button on this one is rough. but i believe its getting reworked, so no need to worry about it anymore

[obsidian apex]

Is it?

I may have said that I can't remember

I honestly think it is because it is red

Like if it was blue or something it would probably be less clickable because there are so few blue confirmation buttons in game

[vague hazel]

I can't remember but is the confirm button also smaller than the skip?

[obsidian apex]

I guess I made the skip button smaller in the next update

[grand drum]

for myself i want to have a button that skips them, without additional popups (are you sure that you want to skip etc), but for most players i think there should be 2 buttons, or the beforementioned popup

[obsidian apex]

I hate popups

[grand drum]

skip is in the middle, so you want to click it, use button appears only after you selected the planet

[obsidian apex]

Same with the boss ruining your 5 card hand, I like the punish. It's a dog eat dog world out there

[vague hazel]

I think a confirmation prompt to skip would be ok if it was only when someone had a planet selected

like hey you have a planet selected are you SURE you want to skip

[obsidian apex]

I think someone would click - then they would see a popup and not understand what is going on and get mad at the UI - then keep making the same mistake over and over because there was no consequence

Sounds draconian

But the punish helps you learn faster and have more fun later because your inputs are better informed

So I see that mistake with new players quite a bit but only for a run or 2 with the planetarium

BETTER would be to not need a skip button at all

[vague hazel]

yeah I definitely made sure not to do it again I guess it just felt more punishing because of the limited rounds we have in the demo

[grand drum]

how many times have you seen someone who record videos for YT suffer against <5 card boss? 🙂

that shits funny everytime

[obsidian apex]

I will not change that boss because of how entertaining that is

[vague hazel]

the only time I encountered it I had the joker that let you do straights and flushes with 4 cards so I kinda steamrolled it

[charred stone]

pop ups almost always make me annoyed enough that i just dont think about any future pop ups, and i always end up ignoring only the pop ups that would actually help me

[obsidian apex]

Yeah I think most people are like that, popups are a crutch for poor UI elsewhere

I think they are needed sometimes, but with a game like this where things arent that complicated on a granular level I shouldn't need them

[charred stone]

in my case they aren't even a crutch, they just push me away from the gameplay aspect

[charred stone]

definitely, like a confirm button early on is super nice to have, but it gets annoying after a while

[grand drum]

popups are good/fine for games where you jsut unlock new mechanic and the popup autoremoves itself after encountering it couple of times (or you can disable it in settings). example from game that probably noone here knows - antimatter dimensions, where they done it very well

[obsidian apex]

I was thinking of adding a system like that for tarots/planets before adding them to the tutorial

I guess I have popups for unlocks...

[charred stone]

speaking of pop ups necessitated by extremely complex interactions and abilities, i just remembered mtg online's maintenance ended at 7:00, so ill see yall later!! really looking forward to the full release, and actively restraining myself from begging for playtest ability /j

tbh the wait is going to make playing the full game a near-ethereal experience, given that i was so painfully hooked by less than 2 hrs of play. looking forward to losing my mind rapidly over this game

[vivid turtle]

Howdy

[gentle saddle]

Went through the 50 demo rounds, there was a moment where I wanted to check my most played planet card because a shop had a card that had an interaction with that specific wording but there was nowhere to check what it was. I may be wrong/misremembering, but I think it'd be cool if there was a place I could check stats for played planet cards, unless I missed it, I couldn't find it anywhere at least!

[lyric lance]

this is the 'High Scores' page in the Options Menu 🙂

[gentle saddle]

Oh I couldn't find that menu, good to know it's there

I was expecting that to be in the stats thingy

didn't expect that to be in the options menu, a bit unintuitive imo

[lyric lance]

Joker Suggestion: A joker that when owned, allows you to order your played cards before playing them. This way, I can put a polychrome card on the right of the hand even when it's a high ranking card that would normally be on the left, or I can play a steel card on the right, so I 1.5x a higher number from cards being scored before it.

[exotic agate]

I think you can order your played cards normally?

(don't quote me on that)

[lyric lance]

You can re-order your cards in your hand, but when you play the hand they are ordered according to the games algorythm automatically. This joker would override the sorting aglorhytm

[exotic agate]

ah, I saw in the tutorial "remember, cards are played from left to right", which I assumed was for both cards and jokers

[floral portal]

if jokers go left to right, then should mult multipliers (eg. joker stencil) stay on the right or do they apply to things after them?

[thorn tulip]

stuff like stencil to the right

[floral portal]

had that in my last run, sad it got cut off by the round limmit

it was carrying me through up till the sixth ante before i had to stop

[grand drum]

That should be a base game mechanic imo

[proud relic]

I'm playing the demo on Steam Deck, so far everything is working very well. I feel like a controller hotkey for switching between the different hand sorts would be very useful. Maybe use the triggers?

[obsidian apex]

I was planning on doing thumbstick press for that!

[proud relic]

Personally I haven't been using the joysticks at all, instead opting for D-pad so that wouldn't be ideal. But, I could see thumbstick press being convenient for someone who does. And given Steam's controller button mapping tools, it wouldn't be hard for the player to change it to their liking.

[grand drum]

would be nice if the end screen would be positioned like this, so its easier to share results with jokers being seen in one ss

[lyric lance]

Or even a button that can be clicked to 'copy run to clipboard'

[jagged finch]

What challenges are you missing at this point?

[lyric lance]

I beat the last blind today, only thing I have left is buy a polychrome of my most common joker

[jagged finch]

Im stuck on that one as well

[thorn tulip]

same

though idk if I even want to unlock it

[jagged finch]

Im so curious about the last deck but I don’t want it spoiled for me haha

[drifting crown]

is there a way to leave reviews on steam for the game yet? or is it disabled because its technically just a demo?

[obsidian apex]

Not yet - and that is the reason why correct

[drifting crown]

ah makes sense! I wanted to show my love on the main page for the game 🙂

[gentle saddle]

I don't know if there's any boss blind that does this already, but I'd love to have

The Shark
Face cards and Aces are debuffed

since this is what happens in regular poker

Also a doyle brunson reference would be lovely, gotta pay homage to the 10-2 gods

Dolly Joker / Godfather Joker
Your 10s and 2s are golden/lucky/whatever

[obsidian apex]

Writing here because I'm using this as my backlog:
Joker - 'All in'
When sold during play, gives X1 Mult per remaining hand and reduces hands to 1

[gentle saddle]

Ace From Space -- Joker
If your played hand has space left, add an ace to it

Reference if you don't know it, legendary tony g quote: https://youtu.be/o0mmW0beL5o?t=1135

[sacred plover]

Possibly a tooltip shown above the hand you've highlighted (before playing it) that shows the card combination you've selected?

Like if you hover/prep: Ace, King, Queen, Jack, 10; there will be a small tooltip showing straight

could also be a togglable option for new players to learn the hands and prevent playing hands they think are correct, but just misremembering or misclicking

I shared the demo with some friends, and the ones that didn't know how to play poker already had a tough time remembering what hands were better than others

or just tried to play a straight that wrapped around the board with Ace being high/low

[ruby socket]

could be useful but if you try to play a 5 identical cards before having discovered the 5 of a kind would it show that or simple 4 of a kind?

[lyric lance]

Could show ????? Until you play a hand once?

[wheat sand]

A joker that adds cards to your deck every round with some sort of upside

[royal night]

One of the bosses says 'subtracts discards from mult'. But it's unclear to me whether it subtracts my remaining discard number from it, or the amount of discards I have used.

[rotund spire]

probably been suggested before, but an option for colorblind/alternate suit colors, I believe the common changes are green clubs and blue diamonds (with hearts/spades remaining red and black)

it's probably not as needed for clarity since you can sort cards in your hand by suit, but as someone that's used to that color scheme in regular online poker, it would be a neat option to have

[daring canopy]

#💭・suggestions-old message

[rotund spire]

Thanks for that, I knew it wouldn't be a new suggestion, fwiw it got addressed here #💭・suggestions-old message so it looks like he's aware and it could be happening at some point

[daring canopy]

everything is a possibilty and we gotta let the good thunk do his stuffs

[jagged finch]

Oh that’s spicy as fuck

[candid stag]

probably already suggested, but anyway.
add hotkeys to view deck/combinations/etc

[vivid turtle]

Joker Suggestion
Black Comedy - Rare
For every 25-30 black cards played, add 1x multiplier multiplier to it
(I don’t know how to word what I want to say properly, my apologies)

[native aspen]

This game seems like it would greatly benefit in the long run from mod support

[lyric lance]

Re-hashing a past thought: with the introduction of tags, we're presented the opportunity to make negatives/foils etc in the shop, but these are often very expensive owing to their enhancements. As such, the ability to freeze a joker in the shop so it can be there after a few more rounds would be beneficial. Obviously you have the opportunity cost of not finding other jokers you might need for the run, specially when you're cash poor early, so it may balance out.

[carmine lynx]

If even just freezing is too powerful alone freeze could have a flat cost or accrued cost or an unfreeze cost associated

[lyric lance]

Yeah, freeze costs $1, the X+1 $ thereafter where x is the number of turns frozen or something

and with no vouchers and only 2 shop slots, freezing 1 card is a lot of retail space to lock down

[lyric lance]

The two black suits and two red suits are slightly off colour, rather than the exact shade the same for both, however|| there is a joker that groups all red cards and all black cards into just 2 suits, so a traditional 4 colour deck is being avoided. ||

There's also been suggestions to have a menu where players can self assign colours to suits as they choose, but a) that conflicys with the spoiler above and b) is much harder to implement in game

[rotund spire]

yeah, different shades and of course different figures, but it's still a slightly better way to differentiate them, as for the spoiler ||I've only done the demo, so i don't know how that joker works, does it change it visually or just in a technical sense (as in i can make flushes with diamonds and hearts) if it's visual I don't see how having 4 color decks sans joker would affect the current implementation, and if it's technical then having different color palettes be toggleable can allow people to change back to red/black when that joker shows up if it makes it easier for them to play with it||

[lyric lance]

||a flush is any 5 red or black cards yeah||

[lyric lance]

Joker Suggestion: Common- Optijoke Prime: +3 mult for each 2, 3, 5 and 7

Card Enhancement: Green Seal. When played (and scored) gain 1 free reroll in the next shop

[exotic agate]

overlaps a bit with the Fibonacci joker (intentional?)

[lyric lance]

Not specifically, but more synergies=better imo. Like Fibonacci + hack etc

[lyric lance]

Alternate: 3X mult if mult is prime when this joker activates.

[exotic agate]

now that would be very interesting - feels super hard to trigger, but pretty decent payoff. "nX mult if mult is (hard to obtain condition)" feels like an interesting design space

[lyric lance]

I think it would need to be common, more useful in early game, as late game multipliers will make everything even

[exotic agate]

one thing I really like about that is: it's easier to get if you have a low mult, but then the payoff isn't too big (3x on low mult)

[lyric lance]

It could almost be a deck rather than a joker, for very focused early game builds.

Joker Suggestion: The J20, Randomly select +2 to +19 Mult, Or Reset Mult to 1, Or 2X Mult

[grand drum]

Will they?

[exotic agate]

Joker suggestion: Switcheroo - Swaps chips and mult (might be a bit too weak?)

[grand drum]

That’s…. Actually strangeLy interesting. Very bad for base game tbh, but interesting for endless

[lyric lance]

Maybe 1.5X MULT can make an odd number? But any instance of 2X will always make evens, so it feels much less useful in the late game

[grand drum]

There is like 3 jokers that have x[even]mult, no? Drivers license, idol and Triboulet

[lyric lance]

fair, maybe it's less destined than I first assumed

[exotic agate]

it will buff +chip jokers (as they effectively become +mult) and nerf +mult jokers, so I think it's okay for "base game" especially with that joker which gives chips based on discards

[thorn tulip]

would that even have a use?

[grand drum]

problem with these types of jokers, is that by itself it does completely nothing, you need at least 1? +mult joker for it to do literally anything

[lyric lance]

Mmm AxB = BxA right?

[thorn tulip]

ye

[exotic agate]

for example:
Pair = 10x2
+10 chips = 20x2
= 40

vs
Pair = 10x2
Swap = 2x10
+10 chips = 12x10
= 120

agreed that it does nothing by itself

[lyric lance]

Ah so, just the Chip/Multi associated with the base hand score, everything else on top is added to its standard space

[exotic agate]

it would trigger in the normal Joker order (left to right), so presumably you'd put it whenever you want to do the swap (you might want to do mults, then swap, then chips)

[obsidian apex]

In the upcoming update already 🙂

[exotic agate]

omg

[thorn tulip]

ok but will it have a use

[obsidian apex]

Certificate - every time a gold seal plays and scores it swaps chips and mult

I also want to make the order of playing cards rearrangeable for this update too, we'll see

[rotund spire]

Another suggestion that probably has been made but i cant be bother to search for. Ive found myself instinctively moving the mouse downwards when i want to sell a joker, instead of to the right where the sell button currently appears. Obviously this could just be something to get used to, or something that only happens to me, but i feel ive seen some content creators have the same behaviour (namely nl) so while i like the ui i think that one part could be reworked a bit

[obsidian apex]

Used to be like that, but the issue is that the joker description is below the joker so as soon as you highlight it the description covers the sell button, was very frustrating. So I moved it. I think it's fine where it is

[grand drum]

use and sell are too close for my taste aswell

[rotund spire]

Fair enough, i feel like the sell gets kind of lost with the other jokers underneath it, what about it being on top, rather than the bottom?

Since bottom gets in the way of description, and imo right gets lost with other jokers

Tbf youre probably right, im sure youve played around with it, ive only done the demo rounds so i havent really had a chance to get used to it

[bright ermine]

I kind of referenced it in #🎙・server-chat, but I think if there was to be another blind it might be cool to have an optional blind like a “straddle” in poker where it’s like a high risk-high reward sort of thing.

[sturdy anvil]

Kind of like in Monster Train where you can opt in to a challenge mode for one battle to get a little extra cash or an artifact

[bright ermine]

Never heard of that game, but yeah, that sounds like what I’m describing

[carmine lynx]

monster train is sick and the optional challenge with the risk/reward is really well implemented in that game

[bright ermine]

Like the shrine of the mountain from risk of rain 2?

[thorn tulip]

You have invited the challenge of the Mountain...

[bright ermine]

For a humongous prize of 2 chronobaubles

[thorn tulip]

and possibly death

[royal night]

So I've been watching a lot of content as I miss the game, I'd say one thing needs to be added to the tutorial (unless you want players to learn things on their own), a lot of players think that playing cards outside of their hand will help them. ie having 2 pair and dropping an Ace for extra chips. I don't know how you'd word it but maybe it'd be nice to let them know.

[obsidian apex]

I have noticed the same issue - and although that info is in the run info descriptions of the hands that is too hidden so adding it to the tutorial is a good idea

[royal night]

Yeah I picked up on it by watching Retromation first and was surprised it took them quite a few hands to figure it out. Some discovery is obviously very cool but that one feels a little too foundational. Although the beginning of the run isn't too punishing to really matter, so probably low priority .

[mossy trellis]

What you're looking for is Counting Cards. That's a skill better left to be discovered while navigating the game...

[obsidian apex]

He's not talking about that

[mossy trellis]

Oh... Then I'm stumped then.

[royal night]

Counting Cards is a little separate to what I'm suggesting in the tutorial.

Counting Cards -> Recognize what's left in your deck
Wasting Cards -> Adding cards that don't impact your pocker hand

[obsidian apex]

He means the unscored cards played in a hand not counting towards the hand

[mossy trellis]

OH, BURNING CARDS

When you know that a card won't be counted, that's burning a card

[thorn tulip]

or discarding it

[mossy trellis]

I do that a lot when I'm fishing for something normally.

[mossy trellis]

That too.

[obsidian apex]

I don't use that terminology in the game

I think I just refer to them as unscored cards

[mossy trellis]

Whatever you decide to use, it's the same thing in the end.

I do agree that the tutorial should have a nod to unscored cards.

Many NON-Poker savvy players don't know what is scored when presenting a hand. @royal night might be on to something.

[royal night]

Yeah some players do 'burn' unintentionally though.

Because some players come from a poker playing background, where a scenario like this would matter:

Two players have two pair, both 6s and 4s but one player adds a King to their 5 card hand and the other adds an Ace. The player that added the ace would win.

Since Balatro you're just play hands that score points there's no need to add another card to a 2 pair hand. This information is in the Poker Hands info but adding it to the tutorial would make it more clear.

[obsidian apex]

That part is in the tutorial "You can play up to 5 selected cards"
But maybe not explicit enough

[royal night]

People are terrible readers unfortunately.

[mossy trellis]

And in the case of a certain Boss Blind AHEM||The Arm|| AHEM, you can't play 5 cards at all..

[lyric lance]

First impressions feedback on 0.8.8 here:
The game just generally feels so much harder. I may have just had mediocre starts, but the nerf down to 5 jokers is a big adjustment to make. It really makes taking things like Magic 8 Ball and Oops All 6s a tougher prospect.
The change to Steel and Glass cards feels little more boring. It's interesting that you can use glass cards as a scoring mechanism and a deck thinning mechanism, but I fear I'd just slowly avoid glass cards rather than use them and have them botch my capacity to make various hands. The old steel cards/Steel joker felt like it had a lot more potential for shenanigans, rather than a flat multiplier increase.
The new throwback is really cool.
The change to The Magic Deck makes it feel a lot less unique. Having to buy the booster every time, and have those costs increasing, makes it hardly feel like I'm playing a unique deck. Perhaps rather than starting with crystal ball, have The Magic Decks effect be "Arcana packs always cost $2-3" so you get to use them far more frequently, rather than just as often as other runs with 1 extra card in the pack by default.

[obsidian apex]

Glass cards:
X1.5 mult, add X0.5 mult every time this card scores?

[lyric lance]

With the same chance to break mechanic? Could be an interesting push your luck mechanic, but runs will ultimately be limited in their length by cards breaking and leaving out without any recourse to save the run perhaps?

[obsidian apex]

But yes the game is harder now by intention. Part of that is that the meta is way different and that will take some adjustment. Magic and Nebula decks can get some other kind of buff - maybe they start with crystal ball AND tarot merchant

[obsidian apex]

You can add more cards with tags though - and it plays into risk/reward still so I don't think you running out of cards in your deck would be a common problem

[mossy trellis]

Suggestion, A DAMN JOKER HOLD for the shop. I could have got a run won if I got a common joker that I wanted, but because Credit Card antics, I was too poor to get it...

[spiral path]

Would be cool to have some Jokers based on TCG's.

[thorn tulip]

exodia

[obsidian apex]

My lawyer would hate that

[regal flax]

exfauxdia

[daring canopy]

I had a thought of more boss blind designs... first one is a bit complex but the last two are probably more viable by design for gameplay due to the simplistic nature of them:

1.Boss Blind Suggestion: "The Thief": It steals half of your deck and half your hand size (Rounded down) and places half of your hand size infront of you. Each card cost $2 to play or discard. Official Text: Steals half of the deck and half your handsize cost $2 to play or discard. [deck's returned after blind]

2.Boss Blind Suggestion: "The Dumpster": Half your deck is randomly discarded. [It's returned after blind]

3.Boss Blind Suggestion: "The Classic": Your deck is replaced with a standard 52 card deck. [It's returned after blind]

[flint rose]

I was already ho-hum on High Priestess's effect since it didn't do anything in Crystal Ball, but now that Fool is just a better version of her effect she sticks out even more

[cerulean orchid]

Deck tier list in Tier-lists

[ruby socket]

I'm not sure if this is already implemented, but I thought that an alternate art for cards in the deck could be useful even despite the change to have green, black, red and orange colours on the cards. I also do think it could be nice to have multiple versions of cards designs. Either way I've come up with my own interpretation of what it could look like?
also do lmk if this is alreay a thing and im just embarrasing myself

[royal night]

would love this

[rancid oriole]

An obscure playing card fact that I didn't see represented in game is tax stamps; there used to be stamps on decks of playing cards that showed that taxes were levied on the cards. I think Alabama's the only state in the US that still has the taxes (the picture is terrible but it's surprisingly hard to find a good image of the stamp still on the deck on Google).

No idea what this would do in-game if added but seeing weird playing card stuff taken from real life like a misprinted joker is always neat!

[sturdy anvil]

You could earn tax stamps by defeating an enhanced enemy blind-which then rewards the user with extra money 💰

[royal night]

Idk why your suggestion spawned this thought...

A boss blind that hole punches a card left in your hand that permanently debuffs it. Casinos often do this to cards they sell to tourists so that they can't slip those cards in game.

[exotic agate]

suggestion: game version number on the "you win / lose" screen

[nimble cloud]

UI and gameplay loop seems tailored to mobile and I could see a much wider audience in a mobile release as well

Ik I would love to play on a commute

[serene basin]

No idea if this is what the devs are wanting but your idea gave me the feeling of ascension levels or other difficulty modifiers in other games with the way the tax stamp looks

[viscid basin]

how broken would it be to allow the ceremonial dagger to eat cards out of the tarot/planet area?

[grand drum]

Probably not hard, but now since it’s split into separate section don’t think it will happen

[hasty cradle]

Could add the minor tarot cards to add the matching # card, e.g. 2 of cups adds a 2 of clubs to the deck

[crude ivy]

Hey, I played all the rounds and loved the game! I just have small suggestion. Personally I felt like the game/animation speed "1" was a little too slow, but then game/animation speed 2 felt a little fast. I feel like an option for 1.5x speed would be perfect for the game!

[merry verge]

Make the early access purchasable, would be awesome so we can all play the game

[native aspen]

You just get a notification after your first win "Gambling is now taxed"

[royal night]

card packs having a cap to the increase?

[obsidian apex]

They do not

[royal night]

paying 15 for a 2 card pack feels rough

[obsidian apex]

The last patch was meta changing - the tarot reading concept isn't exactly the same anymore so the packs aren't always worth it especially if you have taken a bunch. 15 for a 2 card pack should only be worth if you have a ton of money now - otherwise it's better to run either an econ build or a build that creates consumables

I know it's controversial but I think there is a better way than needing a tarot pack every round, hence the changes

[daring canopy]

So far i have been enjoying the new tarrot system but some of the tarrot individual changes kinda hurt.. like death's nerf

[obsidian apex]

True the death nerf was a big one - but I assume everyone still takes it every time right?

[daring canopy]

it's the only method of deck rigging and if you can reliably get out better poker hands then yeah.

[royal night]

have the high priestess always appear on the left?

[daring canopy]

also enables the ability to get five of a kind which speaks for itself....

[obsidian apex]

If there's a different tarot idea I'd be happy to replace high priestess altogether. Fool is similar enough and more usable in the pack

[royal night]

high priestess could double a cards value make a 4 to an 8 and so on doesn't work on faces

[viscid basin]

it's about #8 on my general priority list, higher if i hit a special card with it, lower if i need color fixing

[royal night]

anything higher than a 5 becomes a 10

or make it interesting and have it have a 50/50 on halving or doubling

[daring canopy]

Suggestion: High Priestess: Enhance upto 2 cards to "Tome" cards

Tome: 1 in 5 chance for shop to have "Something Special" (Could also do another tooltip page like lucky does to further explain "Something special")
["Something Special" randomizes between cards with Gold Seal, Enhanced cards, Editions, Uncommon, Rare and Legendary or maybe even a combination]
The card sparkles in the shop to represent High Priestess's effect.

[rancid oriole]

My issue with High Preistess is when I get it from the 8-ball or I have a copy of it not from a pack where I can hold on to it, it feels great. There's a risk-reward to holding on to the card that does nothing until I have something else to use it on that captures part of the feeling of Exodia; it's not like the High Priestess is a instant win, but you get that satisfaction of your gamble paying off when you get a more powerful Tarot that you can duplicate.

BUT

When you get it in a pack, it's such a letdown, since you're paying for the option of two cards and really you've been duped and you pay for really one option. I totally get the whole feeling of a gamble not paying off, but this contrast between High Priestess feeling great at times and then just downright awful at others seems a little, I'm not sure, offputting.

Also, something about High Priestess even showing the card to the right in the collection menu made me crack up

[high tendon]

I would love for this game to be available on mobile.

[daring canopy]

Suggestion: Joker: "Idiot Clown": Played Unscored cards are scored.
"It's a legal hand it's called um... a full house with an inlaw apartment" -stupid line just made up right now.
[Bonus: add silly names to illegal hands that are possible with it... like "Three of a kind and my little friend"]

[royal night]

False joker: has a random joker effect each hand

[knotty bobcat]

Maybe I just missed where to do so, but an option to see the boss ability while in the shop after a blind round

[viscid basin]

it's in run info under blinds

[static gulch]

Suggestion: Unlock a card counter tool that would let you see what’s left in your deck. (the ‘optimal’ way to play is to track cards, but I simultaneously want to relax and play optimally): this might make a great 100% reward.

Looks like this has been suggested before: I’ll see myself out

[lyric lance]

Could be a deck: Transparent Deck: Click the deck to see it's contents

[static gulch]

Seems really powerful: more skill focused then getting a multiplier though.

I’ve been bingeing your videos btw: ran out of trial but it’s quite an addicting idea. Thanks for posting.

[daring canopy]

Intro First: "Wall blind has been my run killer for a majority of these runs. It scales so heavily that I feel it could actually be impossible without having multi mults (I was doing normal I had: "Supernova" "Blueprint"> "Ride the Bus" "Odd Todd" and "The Astronomer". (on Ante 8) [ride the bus had 66 mult at the beginning of it]. My multi mult selection is still limited... Acrobat probably wouldn't have done much (i ended it half way to goal), Driver's license is very hard to setup, no soul card was drawn (so no caino,triboulet and yorick), idol only mults hand mult and not my other mults like "Ride the Bus". The new throwback seems to be the only viable early multi mult." (forgot stencil which is the other option)

Suggestions (pick 1): 1. Wall blind nerfed to 2x base from 4x base. 2. Make more Multi mults viable as they are the only heavy carries. 3. Remove all multi mults and change scaling of antes (to make more jokers combinations viable)

[wary hemlock]

I think the blue deck is strictly better than the red deck. Playing a hand is the same as discarding, but you get points and there's more potential for money. Unless I'm missing something

I'd like to see the red deck buffed, because I think discarding is cool

[viscid basin]

there's a decent amount of discard synergy in jokers

[frank cipher]

having the extra hand is a decent boon for early money, where as you need a joker for leftover discards to be worth money

[charred stone]

idk if this is smth already incorporated in the game bc it's been like a month since i played the demo, but maybe there could be a starting deck based on the minor arcana tarot cards (cups, swords, wands, and pentacles as the suits but also has two face cards replace the one jack face card)

plus it could incorporate the different themes for each suit

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minor_Arcana

[vivid turtle]

Blackjack/Jokerjack
If the hand you played adds up to 21, gain a 4x multiplier multiplier
I apologize for the wording by the way, I’m not exactly sure how to word what I want to say properly

[meager prism]

Suggestion: Don't allow cards referencing secret hands to spawn unless the player has discovered that secret hand. (queue me, wondering why my steel cards weren't working on my full house)

edit: unless this is intentional to hint to the player the existence of secret hands.

[royal night]

Rewatching some of Sadoni's stream that I missed. I don't know if this is already the case but maybe the NG+ lvl you have available to you should be deck dependent.

IE if you've never won the base game with a Red deck but you have with Blue, you shouldn't be able to take the Red deck into NG+. Idk maybe this adds more replayability?

[lyric lance]

Joker Suggestion: Stock Broker: Uncommon, After a Boss Blind is defeated, increase the sell value of Stock Broker by the number of rounds you've held it.
To the effect of:
Rounds Past Sell value
0 2
3 5
6 11
9 20
12 32
15 47
18 65

[undone rune]

would be neat to have an option for a 4-color deck (diamonds as blue, clubs as green, other 2 suits their normal color). as someone who plays online poker it helps a lot in reading cards faster

[lyric lance]

The red and black suits are off colour to one another, but there are mechanics that rely on cards being pooled into 'reds' and 'blacks' so going full4 colour deck isn't something the dev wants to pursue at this time

[undone rune]

I noticed the slightly off-color suits. It does make it a bit easier, I hadn't encountered the red/black mechanics though

[keen wind]

I think Perkeo needs a rework in the latest update. Near useless with the way that the consumable cards work now

[regal flax]

That's understandable. I would personally prefer to just mentally keep track of "I know my blue diamonds are actually red" for that mechanic, just because I'm used to 4 colour. But it's not something you'd wanna spring on everyone

[lyric lance]

Yeah, maybe a setting/toggle in the future

[regal flax]

It could be a fun meta setting, a joker that has a mult per colour in your hand, so it'd get better if you toggle that on. That's pretty "out there" though, in terms of being intuitive gameplay and such

[formal glen]

I'm certain this would've already been suggested, but a way to see cards left in your deck would be good. Maybe just clicking on the deck in the top right and it'd show a menu similar to the deck menu in run info, but with only the cards you have left.

[rotund spire]

that is, in my opinion, part of the "skill" portion of the game, keeping track of the cards you have, and make decisions based on that, so I don't think that would be needed, unless it was on like a difficulty setting, but still I can't think of many other "difficulty" changes one could make to justify that

[formal glen]

Then it would be nice an an accessibility option if that's the intention. Without getting into the details of how it affects my life, I do have very bad memory. And even if I'm repeating something in my head, it's prone to "slip".

Personally, I think it's fine because keeping a track of cards is solely just a memory thing and not a skill thing. To me, I think keeping a track of cards left is memory, making decisions based on that informaiton is where the skill is.

[exotic agate]

@formal glen see this

[formal glen]

Well my opinion hasn't changed but I won't argue for it anymore then. thanks.

[regal flax]

I think counting cards would be an "expected" part of gameplay if there weren't so many ways you could remove, add and alter cards in your deck

I can see the arguments for and against

[winged canyon]

I don't know if it was already proposed, but it will be great to see what card are still in the deck

[tough solstice]

joker suggestion: seer: uncommon, position of this card = rank it affects, 3x multiplier if the first card u draw is the same rank as the position.
basically u can only use it for ace-6
would work well if u keep track of ur deck, weaker if used for ace since u are basically multiplying nothing

[lyric lance]

#💭・suggestions-old message

See here

[winged canyon]

oh thankx, make sens. Could be a deck who let you see it, this way you loose the bonus of the other deck for the "confort" of not having to count

[thorn tulip]

If it shows you the order of the cards as well that might actually be an interesting deck idea

[lyric lance]

Yeah, a version of Frozen Eye from slay the spire or something.

A minmaxers dream/nightmare

[obsidian apex]

It sounds like a tool that would technically improve your run but could also make it less fun - if it's too strong then that deck becomes the default way to play. Very much a minmax type idea. It could work but I'm worried it would place the focus of the game on something less fun than the core loop of focusing on Jokers and deck composition

[red juniper]

frozen eye is already so divisive in the sts community, i can’t imagine it would fare much better here

this game is a lot more gambling-style instant dopamine hits (because, well, duh) as opposed to sts’s mix of strategic planning and dopamine hits, i think a frozen eye type relic would really muddle that for both players and potential stream/video watchers?

[regal flax]

Yeah I would skip frozen eye more than not, even though it's objectively a better way to play, because it's such a tiring way to play. Feeling like you have to play around it every time, instead of just playing to your outs and seeing what happens

"better" as in, improving your odds to win

[formal glen]

Just for clarity, when I said about seeing the cards left in the deck, I didn't mean seeing the order of them. I assume there wasn't that misunderstanding, but just in case :p

[lyric lance]

Yeah there's 2 ideas here. An option/joker/deck to see the cards remaining in the deck, and an option/joker/deck to see the cards to be drawn in order.

[formal glen]

I figured. Was just clarifying in case. As for my opinion on the cards drawn in order, I kinda agree that it would make it too min-maxy to be fun for most.

Maybe instead of that, there could be something else that lets you see a limited amount of cards under certain conditions. Like a joker like "If all the cards you play are of the same suit, peek to see that amount of next cards after your next draw"

Phrased badly, but I mean like. If I play a 3 of a kind and they're all hearts, then after 3 cards are drawn to fill those in, I see the next three cards in the deck. Or it could be some other trigger. Or not in the game at all. But basically I just mean that it'd be better imo if it were limited in some way if it was implemented

[lyric lance]

Could be a job for a Reworked High Priestess:
Use: Scy 8 cards from the top of the deck, rearrange them and put them back.

[obsidian apex]

That would be hard to implement because of the timing of when the deck actually gets shuffled - but if possible that is a great idea

That kind of eliminates the annoying minmax aspect because you just can't do it all the time

[lyric lance]

High priestess could be 'create a Scy 8 tag', then the tag is used immediately after the opening 8 card hand is dealt, or immediately if created during a round.
This method prevents having to have the deck be ordered when the card is redeemed by buying a booster

[quasi quarry]

I love deck rigging like transforming numbers or suits, or removing or duplicating cards. I would actually like these moved from the Tarot deck to a different deck.

The Wheel of Fortune feels bad without any animation or flashing lights. I think any card that does nothing is disappointing. I'd prefer if it made a random Joker foil every time. It would also be fun if it transformed a random Joker into another random Joker.

High Priestess feels off-putting because your Joker hand is always almost certainly full of useful Jokers. If there were other Tarot cards that you'd like to hold onto, then it might be a better pick. If Tarot cards didn't take up a Joker slot it would feel nicer.

[lyric lance]

They don't now 😉

[quasi quarry]

Wish I could play. Better make a new Steam account lol

[lyric lance]

5 joker slots, 2 tarot/planet slots

[quasi quarry]

woooow, thats great

[lyric lance]

On the subject of joker slots; my brain really wants there to be 5x 'scoring' joker slots, 2x 'tarot/planet', and then 1x 'Utility' joker slot.
With a 5 card joker maximum, it's so much harder to justify taking jokers like Juggler/Drunkard/Oops all 6s, 8 ball, Space joker, Ring master etc
But having jokers split between 'scoring' and 'utility' feels super clunky.

[vivid tide]

@lyric lance That is an interesting idea, Right now taking a non-scoring joker is hard to pass up. I like your system though. Maybe a starting deck?

[lyric lance]

Joker Suggestion: 2 Way Mirror: At 'New Round' 50% chance to become a copy of another held joker, 50% chance to do nothing.

[spiral path]

An achievement for selling "Earth" called "The Man Who Sold the World" or some lyric from the song that's less obvious like, "I Never Lost Control"

[quasi quarry]

I just saw the NL clip, "There's no Royal Flush but Flush House is a real thing now?" You gotta add Royal Flush to the game.

[lyric lance]

Royal Flush is just the name for an Ace high straight flush.
The game has 9 planet cards matching the 9 ranks of hand, so adding royal flush for it's own sake makes it an awkward outlier

[regal flax]

Four of a Flush / Five of a Flush would be cool, I was surprised I didn't get anything for my four queens of clubs

[obsidian apex]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_poker_hands#Hand-ranking_categories

The straight flush/royal flush thing is definitely one I won't be changing - I think the royal flush is just the most popular sub-category of a normal poker hand (Would be like me adding a separate 'wheel' hand, or 'broadway straight')

[spiral path]

So you use some exo-planets

[obsidian apex]

At most I would change the text but keep the hand level/chips the same as straight flush

[carmine lynx]

use planetary moons for subhands problem solved

oh man i need to pop a europa to level up my broadway straight!!

[vivid tide]

Yeah no need for wheels or Broadway straights why waste time on extra coding? Not like that affects gameplay at all. I do think from a feeling level a royal flush feels special should give like 20 chips more base than a straight flush have your little joker buddy pop and say Wow or amazing or something and 5 of kinds. a little extra pop for big hands.

[lyric lance]

Maybe the first time you play 5 of a kind, but I don't need to see a popup animation 15+ times in a good run, would get very old fast I think

[vivid tide]

Just make it pop up for like a second I am not saying the screen needs to flash jackpot every time and chips rain down just a little something. I do think a build that makes 5 of a kind every hand would get old though. Maybe an option to turn it off?

[olive swan]

At that point it’s not worth coding

But yea I get it

[vivid tide]

True.

[spiral path]

Maybe a Joker that adds a roulette wheel mechanic? Like each red and black card you play marks a spot on the wheel and if you hit one of them you get a big multiplier.

[chrome sonnet]

I loved the demo but agree with GothicLord's suggestion of having a Tarot card slot, right now it feels like if I have a working synergy I have to either bank on finding that synergy again or give that synergy up if i want to use a Tarot from the shop. I could also see being able to use ANY Tarot from the shop right away and it bring up a hand of cards that you can then select.

I also understand there is balance reasons but imo number go up is more fun and I like becoming op in roguelikes

[lyric lance]

Not a suggestion, this is already implimented in the Beta 0.8.8 🙂

[chrome sonnet]

oooo amazing

that just makes me even more excited

[obtuse musk]

It would be cool to have some sort of antagonistic force during the card play portion beyond just debuffs or playing limitations. More stuff like the flipped card one but more aggressive and dynamic.

[olive swan]

They are in the game you probably just didn’t see them because reasons

[obtuse musk]

Alright, well they should appear from the beginning and more often, whatever they are

[lyric lance]

There are 25 'antaganistic forces' and they appear in at least every 3rd round

[obtuse musk]

Yeah, I know those ones, but something that isn't static during the card play portion. Something you have to react to within the round. I don't want to say something specific like 'an enemy' so that's what I'm saying antagonistic forces because I don't know what would work best in the game.

[olive swan]

lol

[young folio]

Clearly didnt see the patch notes from the newest update.

[viscid basin]

password

[quasi quarry]

||(Make it a hidden hand like 5 of a Kind)||

[high cave]

Suggestion: show potential score of hand

[vivid tide]

@high cave I can see that just gotta do the maths no time limit after all. It dose get close when like your trips arr level 7 and your house is level 1 etc etc. which one is better.

[high cave]

suppose there are two ways to look at it, maths is part of it in sts while in monster train you will see how it gets resolved

[vivid tide]

I do wish in like a like no full house round if you queue up a house the game says like HEY ARE YOU SURE?

[high cave]

Suggestion: abandon run feature

[lyric lance]

I'm gonna voice the other side of this and say I do like it being the players responsibility to track what hands are being played Vs what boss. It's frustrating while you learn the consequences of your mistakes, but it means you have to be more actively engaged in your decision making

[reef pike]

You can already do this

Options > start new run

[viscid basin]

add deck type to game over summary

[steel prawn]

Show what hands you have played this round with all cards not just hand type (sometimes you get the not allowed and you forgot what you played)

[modest wigeon]

I'm not a playtester, so I'm not sure if this is already a thing!
||The ability to upgrade "Hidden hands" like Five of a Kind. Maybe have a Planetarium card like the Moon and have it read ??? as a catch-all for those "hidden hands"?||

[thorn tulip]

there is a joker that has a small chance to upgrade a played hand

[lyric lance]

Joker Suggestion: +3/4/5 mult (per balancing) for each unscored card in played hand

[lyric lance]

Suggestion: Have the Streak Tracker in stats count negative/loss streaks, may help gauge difficulty across different patches

[dense valve]

So the feature for buying a tarot card in the shop and using it immediately is a great one. But, it doesn't always work, since some like The Tower need a target playing card to work.
I would suggest having a similar setup to the free tarot reading in situations like that, to allow the player to instantly use these targeted cards.
If that's too powerful, perhaps it could be balanced out by costing $1 or $2 extra?

[lyric lance]

This is a change made in 0.8.8, here's a screenshot #💭・suggestions-old message

To be specific, there is now a 2 card space in the top right, that only holds planets and tarots, so shop tarot can be put there for later use without being hindered by a full Joker inventory

[carmine lynx]

SAFE!

[exotic agate]

SAFE!

[keen wind]

You still have to make choices with them in the tarot stash without full access to the deck. It’s a little annoying even in the 8.8 implementation

[carmine lynx]

You never had “full access to the deck”

[keen wind]

sorry, I meant, without access to a sampling of cards

[lyric lance]

Sorry I got my wires crossed. In the shop, when you buy a Tarot booster, it immediately opens up the 'here's 8 cards from your deck and 2 tarot cards, pick one to apply to your cards'.

[keen wind]

right, but if you purchase one, or should you use one that places a tarot card in your hand, you do not get that additional card selection

The next opportunity is after the store and when you’re playing your next blind

which can be a little clunky

[obsidian apex]

Curious - isn't that objectively better in many ways? Because you can fish for specific cards then play the freshly converted ones?

[lyric lance]

Yeah, plus purchasing one and using it when you have a hand of 8 cards , gives you immediate benefit of the modified card, rather than it being shuffles into the deck to possibly not be drawn

[keen wind]

Sure, strategically it’s beneficial in another way, but it’s less intuitive to me in the sense that you’re used to using the tarot cards and making those strategic decisions within the store time

because if you have them in hand, then open a booster, you can use the stashed tarot’s then, but if you mixup the order of play, you’re stuck waiting with them

[lyric lance]

holding tarot cards in the 2 card zone is infinitely stronger as you can use a death card to make a 5 of a kind or some such at the exact moment it helps most, same for making a flush or steel card to hold

[keen wind]

just feels weird vs allowing a sample of cards when using them from the 2 card zone

[royal night]

Just out of curiosity here as well, you’re playing the tarot cards while in the shop as opposed to during play? @keen wind

[keen wind]

I don’t disagree with the benefit of the carryover, but it feels inconsistent at first, like a confusing artificial limitation

[obsidian apex]

This is regarding the most recent playtester patch 0.8.8, some core mechanics have changed

[royal night]

Ah I see

[obsidian apex]

When you convert a card with a booster pack tarot - the next time it becomes useful to you is during play for the next blind at the earliest, so in that sense I feel like there isn't an advantage compared to having the tarot in possession

But also the mental bandwidth is spread over 2 different points in time, is that what you mean?

[keen wind]

It might just be me, not thinking as consistently strategic as @lyric lance

[keen wind]

essentially, and that is different to the typical usage of the tarot cards up to this point

what’s the thinking to restrict a one time draw when using purchased tarot cards in the store screen?

[obsidian apex]

Well first I agree the extra mental capacity of worrying about when to use your tarot is less fun even if it's more ideal. But this was something that was in previous versions of the game already, some people just never tried to buy tarot cards

[keen wind]

that you’re going to have more complete access without that random drawn when a blind begins?

[keen wind]

yeah it felt weird to me then too, could totally just be me though

[obsidian apex]

Sorry what do you mean by this? Like why does the booster pack pick 8 random cards?

[keen wind]

no, if you purchase a tarot card, why don’t you have access to utilize it at any time, while it’s in your possession

[obsidian apex]

Because I think if you purchase a death card for example, then it gives you a bunch of bad options, that's just a wasted death card. But if you get the pack, you know you're risking having bad options so getting nothing wouldn't be as frustrating

So buying the tarots guarantees you'll be able to use them on cards you actually want to convert/delete/enhance

I think people would be frustrated with that implementation

[keen wind]

ah, so the purchase is intended to allow for more intentionality, than the random draw from the booster

[obsidian apex]

Yes

[keen wind]

makes sense

[obsidian apex]

The every round tarot reading really messed with the meta - buying tarots is I think how to really hone your deck into a certain build

[keen wind]

yeah totally

[royal night]

From an outside perspective I do think that having the functionality of tarot cards different between the tarot reading and an actual purchase is a bit confusing. Even in this demo I did spend like 30 seconds trying to add it next to my jokers and my first time even sold one to make space.

Something like this might be handy just to reduce the confusion

[rotund spire]

at the risk of sounding entitled, is a content limited demo, rather than time limited (or in this case, round limited which is basically the same thing) something that could be taken into consideration for october's demo?

[obsidian apex]

Yes. If I can make a version of the game that is content limited but still fun then I'd much prefer that

[rotund spire]

that is good to hear, i'll keep an eye out, good luck (:

[obsidian apex]

No promises though - if it makes the game no fun and samey then that's worse IMO

[lyric lance]

UI Suggestion: If I have smeared joker and I press Sort By Rank Button, have black cards and red cards merge into 2 homogenous suits so I can see straight flushes more easily

[royal night]

I'd rather just have slightly more turns. 50 was good but the first 15 were kinda was "Wasted" on learning.

[daring canopy]

Suggestion: "Deck View 2.0": the information field on the left, add number statistics similar to "quality of aces" but for all numbers. This does help me to write a cheat sheet for me to remember how many "7"s for example I have in the erratic deck or late game rigged deck that doesn't even look like it's orginal. If you think it would look too cluttered maybe put all this new information into "Advance view" button that goes from the original statistics to detailed.

Suggestion: Eco-Friendly Joker: For each unplayed card in played hand, +20 chips and shuffle random discarded card into deck.

[lyric lance]

UI change suggestion: If I've manually adjusted the order of cards in my held hand, then played a poker hand, have new cards dealt fill in from the right until I click one of the reorder buttons

[late ibex]

i know a punch of people without any game dev experience is typing whatever they want in here, but i think i had a genuinely decent idea:

Jump Rope Joker: skipping a blind now has 2 triggering bonuses

[vivid tide]

@late ibex That is an interesting idea I like that a lot! skipping blinds is such an interesting idea in this I really only did it for the 15 dollars.

[late ibex]

i just want that 1 in 5 poly to hit

[vivid tide]

now they cost more better pay up bucko i think they are now 15 dollars each

[red juniper]

joker/voucher concept: jacks, queens, kings and aces also count as the numbers 11, 12, 13 and 14 respectively

if that’s too strong, make it so that they are outright replaced by their respective numbers and no longer count as faces

[vivid tide]

@red juniperwhat about making Broadway and wheel straights like ace 2 3 4 5. its own special hand?

[grand drum]

cool idea. but would be finicky to implement, since having tag be doubled can be a bit messy with planet and tarot tags. if not same tag doubled, then second tag be random is.... ehh

[vivid tide]

maybe not the same effect twice but 2 diffrent effects. like gain 10 bucks and planet choice. etc etc

[sturdy anvil]

What about repeat next blind effect twice?

[formal glen]

Maybe different blind skip effects shouldn't show up before/after certain antes. I think what skips you wanna take (or want to risk if it's something like the 1/5 joker upgrade) depends heavily on where you're at in the game.

[vivid turtle]

I had a diabolical blind idea
The Blindfold: Mystery Score (you don’t know how much points your hands score)

[vivid tide]

good blind boss

[trim swallow]

mental math on that one gonna go crazy

[lyric lance]

An option for an ingame timer UI or a game timer elapsed stat on the end screen

[steel prawn]

Accessibility option: Customizable suit colours. (Good for colour blind people or just for making your deck look more interesting)

[lyric lance]

Boss suggestion: enhanced cards are disabled.

[sweet current]

I know this had to have been mentioned before, but...shouldn't suited 5 of a kind be above regular 5 of a kind?

[lyric lance]

Legendary Joker Suggestion: +1 X1 Mult when you play all 9 hand ranks in a row, starting with high card.

[sweet current]

Would this reset if you miss part of the streak? Would this also fail if the hand was restricted by a boss?

[lyric lance]

Yeah, you need to play it through 9 consecutive hands. Yeah, if you're up against 'must play fewer than 5 cards' boss, you can'y play a straight or a flush without 4 fingers

but if hearts are debuffed, you can still play a heart flush, just dont get any chip score from those hearts etc

[sweet current]

“Hand not allowed” situations covered? Secret hands?

[lyric lance]

would come down to the programming in the back end I guess. Playing a secret hand breaks the streak

[woeful gazelle]

Is it possible to have loyalty card dynamically change its visuals to show the hole punches based on its current state?

Im not sure if there is a system in place for cards to dynamically change their base art so if not loyalty card probably isnt that good of a reason to implement a whole new system, but I think it would be cool to have it reflect its ability visually. Would probably also make it much more clear what's going on for new players

[vivid tide]

the shake helps though

[grand drum]

you need to go through high->pair->2 pairs etc?

and its not like you can satisfy pair with full house i would assume?

[lyric lance]

Nah, scored hand like the rank chart

Play high card. Play a pair. Play 2 pair. Etc

9 hands in a row

[grand drum]

Seems hard to pull of for a x1 mult (mainly because of [flush] straights )

[lyric lance]

Yeah, but once you've done it once you're at X2 Mult, then you have room to go really big. Wild cards, extra discards etc will help alot

[grand drum]

My main concern is that your score would be somewhat low during high card -> straight, and since you need to do them in a row, without breaking a sequence you might get stack fishing for that hand. Removing “streak break” would fix that issue, without making it too strong imo

[vivid tide]

Yeah cannot say I say I am a fan maybe a super cool unlock joker like grand slam or somthing?

[obsidian apex]

I feel like without the streak it could be cool. It just tells you something like
0/9
Next hand: High card

And then
1/9
Next hand: pair

[lyric lance]

Maybe +0.5X Mult withiut the streak

[grand drum]

I think 9 (+) hands is too rough for 0.5x. It would be Really hard to pull off from the start even 5 times. Idea is very cool tho

[vivid tide]

Maybe you do it as a whole deck that way you can do the low hands at the start of the run and not late game.

[obsidian apex]

Xmult equal to the number of times you have played your least played hand?

[lyric lance]

Now that's be interesting

X0, all scores are 0

[woeful gazelle]

I like the dynamic of being forced to play as diversely as possible

[obsidian apex]

yeah lol the Xmult descriptions are tricky because of that

[vivid tide]

min 1 😄

or Xmult equal to the number of times you have played your least played hand plus 1

[lyric lance]

Could take a page out of Luck Be a Landlord and have an expanded explaination box when you hover over a card for an extended period

[woeful gazelle]

i feel like in games like this, the longer you can keep descriptions short the better lol

For post-launch DLC you can go wild and make novella length descriptions all you want, anyone buying a DLC is deep enough to handle it

[native aspen]

Yeah we dont need yugioh card lenghts (Although somekind of exodialike joker you have to assemble would be cool)

[woeful gazelle]

That's not the first time ive seen an exodia joker mentioned haha

[native aspen]

Like i feel the hard part would be balancing it

[woeful gazelle]

yeah if it was an actual 5 part joker, that takes up every base joker slot on the new patch which makes it extremely hard to justify

but it doesnt have to be 5 specifically

maybe if they had some base ability in addition to the assembled one that justifies having a half built exodia joker

[native aspen]

Maybe tie it to a voucher? Like a voucher that would add the pieces to the pool of jokers for the run? Also yeah they would def need some base ability. And i think it would be neat that if you had all 5 they would transform into taking up only 1 slot

[thorn tulip]

or have 4 uncommon pieces that maybe give a small bonus and 1 rare piece that acts like old mr bones if you have the other 4

[woeful gazelle]

I kinda like the idea of specific jokers combining together as it's own thing

[native aspen]

Like maybe the 4 suit jokers could combine?

[woeful gazelle]

like maybe the bottom half of a torn joker that combines with the existing top half

each having their own abilities but both can fit in one slot

or maybe whatever was cut out of the stencil joker being slotted back into the center lol

[daring canopy]

I think cards transforming into new ones could be great which is why i made this very silly collectormon estc joker (not to be taken too serious).

Jokermon: Evolves into new form after 5 blinds are defeated. +4 Mult
/
Comedienee: Evolves into new form after 10 blinds are defeated. 2x Mult.
/
Foolian:[Fully Evolved] Each card in hand plays twice. 2x Mult.

[woeful gazelle]

Ooo thats a cute idea

[lyric lance]

Joker Suggestion: A Joker that scales XMult when royal flushes are played? I know many are upset it doesn't have it's own hand rank tier, so maybe this could be a 'nod' to the royal flush?

[daring canopy]

True Juggler: +4 (or maybe 6?) Hand but Cards actually tossed around the screen. Each round is timed.
[Selected Cards are highlighted for sake of clarity] [Maybe like the traditional soltaire win screen?]

Angel/Devil:Card has Angel upright while a Demon downright.
Angel: -$4 at end of round; +10 Mult [Rotate when Hands >2]
Devil: $4 at end of round; -10 Mult [Rotate when Hands <2]
Example of card: https://graphicriver.img.customer.envatousercontent.com/files/136168465/angel-and-devil-playing-cards.jpg?auto=compress%2Cformat&q=80&fit=crop&crop=top&max-h=8000&max-w=590&s=d787125ede233920acfc767a55725d7a

[vivid tide]

could be hard to program. a card flipping like that. But if you do right it would open a lot of design space.

[daring canopy]

could probably have a GIF play once over it then replace the card underneath with the opposite if asset could be physical flipped. Either way it's a suggestion and if localthunk wants it he just has to figure it out.

[vivid tide]

I am just thinking about normal cards getting this effect like a queen of spades, 5 of diamonds that shift every hand unused.

[daring canopy]

Could be a cool effect for a tarrot to just combine two cards into one you can flip into different ones.

[vivid tide]

Also like a blank card for sale that you could turn into any normal card on purchase.

Can tarrot give you the return to hand effect on a card? it should be something you can add one more thing in the pool right?

[lyric lance]

Tarot can't give gold seal no. The pool for tarot is limited by the number of cards in actual tarot decks, so there's a limited design space for them

[vivid tide]

the fool used to remove the boss blind effect you give have that give the gold seal

[woeful gazelle]

Tbf if you really want to expand the tarot deck design space you can include the minor arcana but thats a whole other can of worms

becuase they work completely differently than the major arcana

[lyric lance]

Fool now creates a copy of the previously used tarot, but High Priestess may change as it's current effect is very similar

[vivid tide]

got you.

[lyric lance]

Yeah, problem then becomes oversaturation of options, so it's much harder to make various strats work if your looking for 1 Tarot in ~40 rather than in 23

[woeful gazelle]

yeah and since the minor arcana are structured much more like an actual deck of cards they dont even really mesh well in this context

[vivid tide]

not that gold seal is super awesome but it is an effect that opens design space for plays.

[woeful gazelle]

i wonder if you could make the minor arcana an actual deck you play with instead lol

[native aspen]

def could be

[woeful gazelle]

its 56 cards instead of 52, and you lose aces in favor of another face card and a numbered 1 card

[lyric lance]

The opposite of a Short Deck

[woeful gazelle]

and ofc the suits are named and visualized differently

the biggest issue would be getting it to mesh with existing content

[native aspen]

I have a pack and the numbered 1 is cursed af

[woeful gazelle]

yeah lol

[pastel urchin]

I feel like a demo (or beta, or something) with a 20 ante limit is really needed. Other than UI, bugfix, and joker recommendations, what can you really suggest when you can't even play the game. Watching NL, Gothic, and Skoot playing really takes the hype out of the game for me. I want to be figuring out the crazy interactions and builds myself, that's what makes a Roguelike fun imo. I respect a dev not keeping a game in permanent alpha, but I feel like a lot of momentum for this game is being lost when people can't play it. Words Can Kill is a great example of that happening

[keen wind]

That's what the playtest is for

[carmine lynx]

alternatively - don’t watch?

[vivid tide]

The game is kinda in a strange spot. You just have to wait it out I guess.

[young folio]

Trust me already the game is in a state thats quite different from when it started, or from when i joined about 6 weeks ago. Joker effects changed, deck effects changed and many other aspects have changed in just 6 weeks. Im sure youll have plenty to learn by the time it actually releases.

[woeful gazelle]

the closed playtest may be frustrating for people who cant play (including myself) but it clearly works well for the dev and it absolutely shouldnt be changed, instead of being frustrated that you cant play now, be happy that when you do play itll be even better

[pastel urchin]

well if you find it fun not playing the game that's great for you! I personally find it more enjoyable seeing the changes for the game myself which would make me appreciate the works that's being done that much more

[gentle igloo]

idk man, I've watched hundreds of hours of people slay the spire and I still go back and play it myself all the time. The fun part of these games isn't knowing the synergies, it's trying to create your own based off what you're given. The closed playtest is a little annoying, but it aint the end of the world. I'll just have to go into my backlog and finally finish Spelunky 2 while I wait lol

[young folio]

Nah, i love the game and would love to play more. But being entitled and impatient isnt going to make that happen any faster. I would love to play and have been on the play test list for the full 6 weeks ive seen the game. But this is the devs decision and for the overall good of the game and if you really enjoy the game youll want it to have a long future ahead instead of some pressured hodgepodge that was released too soon and flops because it doesnt have replayability (like no mans sky) 🤷‍♂️ sorry for the harsh truth but i support the dev anf the game as a whole.

[gentle igloo]

6 weeks!? I guess my 6 days aint gonna mean much 🥲

[young folio]

Yup. June 15th ish give or take a day or 2.

But i still support it fully because this game is awesome and addicting amd yes i want to try and find my own and new builds and combinations to score insane hands haha

[gentle igloo]

Also I'm thinking about this. Don't AAA studios do this kind of rollout all the time? Like with overwatch they had a beta forever and then people finally got to play the game like months later?

[woeful gazelle]

yes closed playtesting is very common

[young folio]

Theres so many possible combos and jokers i love that seem to not get used or showcased in other peoples videos. We all have our favorite jokers, but watching someone else doesnt have the same feeling of makomg your own build so i dont think it takes away from my personal experience.

[woeful gazelle]

i think these complaints keep happening because of how the demo was structured honestly

people got cut off cold turkey at round 50 while many other demos (like Inscryption, off the top of my head) is limited in content but you can replay it infinitely

[obsidian apex]

Is one objectively better than the other? I have been hearing conflicting opinions nonstop since I dropped the demo

[woeful gazelle]

I dont think there is anything objective about it, it just has a different impact

[young folio]

Maybe. I understand the idea of giving people the full game (nothing barred or locked) just limited time or hands. That way people get the full thing and not some watered down version. But then people want more and cant play where as with an unlimited time but limited jokers (in this case) you could fill your time longer while you wait for release. But then people might burn out before the game ever arrives too 🤷‍♂️ ups and downs to every side you know?

[woeful gazelle]

Im fine with whatever, but being able to jump back in and replay a demo gives people an outlet that isnt complaining for a playtest key to continue

[shut glacier]

I've seen some games do something like "there's a soft limit of 50, but they let you finish the run you were on when you hit the cap"

[woeful gazelle]

the demo lets you finish runs now

[shut glacier]

but also the sudden ending DOES keep people craving more

[lyric lance]

The demo is now offline, a new demo will be up for October's Steam Next Fest, possibly of a different structure

[woeful gazelle]

oh yeah I did know that just forgot to mention it

[pastel urchin]

for a certain amount of time. I'm just worried 2 months then another x months after is too long

[woeful gazelle]

shouldve said it let you finish runs towards the end

[shut glacier]

that's true. the harsh demo falloff is much more convincing if you can immediately pay to buy the game and keep your run going

[woeful gazelle]

too long for what? hype to be maintained? consider that may not be a goal

[tiny hemlock]

I think for some people (myself included), I'm worried that I'll miss the steam popup or something and not even realize the game is out

[vivid tide]

That the way it ends it feels like you should be able to buy it and keep going.

[obsidian apex]

The options are -

Give everyone the full game for free as a demo. I'm sure everyone knows why that is a bad idea.

Give everyone the whole game but limit how much they can play - what I did. Means you can explore the actual depth of the game but only to the limit.

Give everyone an unlimited version but with stripped out content. This might have to be the route I go but I am sure people will start saying the game is too shallow if I do that.

Maybe some combination of the last 2 as well

[young folio]

Exactly. They get a taste and want more. Builds the suspense. I approve of how it is, but i also think people are entitled and so used to the karen mentality of "if i complain loud enough long enough ill get what i want" like no one has any patience and sometimes the answer is no. Here the answer is just not yet 🤷‍♂️ waiting wont kill anyone

(Unless you have terminal cancer and proof you wont be here in 3 months) then maybe hed make an exception 😂😂

[shut glacier]

the limited route is definitely the right way to go once the game is actually out; before then, kind of hard to say for sure

[woeful gazelle]

I think the third option is the way to go still tbh, just need to play with how much is required to show depth

[young folio]

Make-a-wish type of thing 😂

[pastel urchin]

This literally happened to Words Can Kill. It demo'd in october, NL played it and it got so much hype, by the time they released it... it's sitting at 63 reviews a year after release

[woeful gazelle]

But ofc thats extra work for a demo you shouldnt necessarily do extra work for lol

[shut glacier]

at that point it's just "don't change it, that's more work for little benefit"

[gentle igloo]

Or it's possibel that the route you went was fine. It's just the streamers and youtubers having access is causing a bit of anoyance among the community. but it's also causing hype and interest. So it's a bit of a catch22

[woeful gazelle]

thats could be true honestly, I have been absolutely loving gothic's YT series but its a bit strange to be able to watch a full road to 100% series while a game is in closed playtest

normally you don't actually know what would come beyond the demo

[pastel urchin]

I think limiting the ante is the way to go. We get to play as much as we want, but not go as far as we want. This allows for the whole community to recommend and suggest features and actually enjoy the game.

[woeful gazelle]

yeah ante limit reminds me of Inscryption only letting you finish the first floor or whatever

[pastel urchin]

I think if streamers didn't pick this up, the route this game has taken is perfect. But not changing the plan when that does happen is a mistake

[woeful gazelle]

Can't really expect a solo dev to swap plans so quickly though

unreasonable

[gentle igloo]

But I think it's fair to say that too much access would make a person lose interest. Anecdotally, i bought the early acess to Luck Be a Landlord, but got tired of it after a week, never to touch it again, even after it's full release. So let's say that early access was a demo, I'm not certain if I would have bought it in the end

[lyric lance]

What none of us are even considering is that down the line there may well be a Publisher/PR group to support the full launch with proper social media/advertising. The last 45 days have been such a whirlwind for the game and hindsight is always 20/20

[keen wind]

Completely disagree. It's a one man dev team. Folding to community pressure to essentially release the game early doesn't make much sense.

The best that gets him is a lot more playtesters, but a lot larger of a community to manage, a much more vocal group, and tons of unmanagable feedback

[steel prawn]

I do believe that could be a reason. People are annoyed they can't play while their favorite streamer is. I feel it's better for the dev though that the youtubers and streamers have access, to market the game for him and create more hype.

[obsidian apex]

It may be a mistake, but I believe this is the right thing to do for Balatro. I understand where people are coming from but everyone here does not have the full picture

[woeful gazelle]

I think no matter how you look at it, the demo was a COMPLETE success and it got the game in front of a lot of people, which is awesome. Only issue is it left people frustrated in a way that leads them to complain directly on the discord which is annoying to deal with lol its something minor that just happens to be seen a lot specifically here

[shut glacier]

yeah gotta agree that changing midstream isn't the way for a small team like this

[young folio]

Road to 100% (so far) obviously with updates comes new features (like the blank voucher and antimatter) that werent there so even at 100% it wont be 100% because its not finished. Some things might be removed or new things added new achievements etc. So idk where people fail to see that, except for the newer players who havent seen gothic's original releases from like 4 weeks ago to see where the game is now.

[gentle igloo]

I think it's all fine and you're doing great. You're a solo dev that has been able to create so much hype for a game that people are angry, that's awesome! We all just gotta put on big boy pants and be patient.

[obsidian apex]

I'm not in this for a quick cash grab. I love this game and I want people to play it when it's the real version I invisioned

[woeful gazelle]

ofc but its still 100% of what's in the game now

[obsidian apex]

If I released it today - according to the comments I have been getting - people would complain it was just 'play a pair simulator'

I have work to do

[stable swift]

giving away the game for free would be insane 😄 having demos like this is already super generous

[woeful gazelle]

im really really excited to see where you take the game localthunk, it has great bones and I know you can turn it into a real gem. Maybe it helps that im basically a professional at waiting now haha, backed so many kickstarters and pre-ordered so many products that had me wait 1-2 years easily

[keen wind]

I also think that the round based demo was the way to go as well. Limiting the content would've made the game feel much more shallow, and I don't think I would've been able to get as much out of it. It would've felt like the limitations were in the game, and not my skill.

[shut glacier]

yeah there's an argument to be made for an Early Access pivot, but I don't think that's the best route

EA can be super helpful at getting feedback when you need feedback. But you already have playtesters lined up out the door

[woeful gazelle]

I think people can make this argument but I think its objectively incorrect lol

[shut glacier]

you're all set

[woeful gazelle]

but its okay, people join the discord with basically no info

(especially because they dont read the rules )

[shut glacier]

I've gone the "small indie EA release" route and it had some serious upsides, but definitely took a lot of the wind out of the 1.0 release

[keen wind]

yeah the game is dramatically changing update to update, would be super painful for EA if you're not following the community closely

[young folio]

True it seems there needs to be more jokers or buff effects for straights or full houses but flushes have the greedy joker and related cards and the pairs, 4 of a kind 3 of a kind and 5 of a kind seem easier to scale since the 5 of a kind contains all below that and therefore has the 2, 3, 4 and their bonus multi and x multis to use. But as a solo dev and having so many things to work on in the game itll come in time. Again people need to be patient and trust itll come haha

[woeful gazelle]

EA can also trap devs into a short dev cycle that leads to only shallow content being released

[stable swift]

I'd say its most likely the safest route if you just want to capitalize on the hype to get dollars, it's likely that in half a year people will not be as interested in it -- but also I think that the game is so good that the streamers will play it again when it releases fully, so I think there's nothing to worry about

[keen wind]

totally

[shut glacier]

depends on the size difference between EA version 0.X and 1.0

[lyric lance]

and the demo drove 10,000+ wishlists, which is a massive success

[shut glacier]

in this case, if it's mostly balance and polish and (some) content changes, but the core isn't changing.... it's better to wait

[gentle igloo]

https://tenor.com/view/all-good-its-all-good-its-all-good-man-saul-goodman-jimmy-mcgill-gif-12683346

I think the takeway here is that its all good

[obsidian apex]

Don't worry, I am not deterred by the comments about me bungling good press. If the press is good now - I plan on making the game much better so I trust the process and people should still want to play when it is ready to go

If they don't, they don't. I will still be proud of the game.

I appreciate the concern though

[pastel urchin]

games not a game it's Art. If that's the case then the communities opinion is moot

[shut glacier]

people will tell you you're bungling it just to try to manipulate you into releasing it earlier 😅 excitement can turn into entitlement

[pastel urchin]

which is fine btw! realized that can be construed negatively

[obsidian apex]

The community is big enough now where they have every opinion all at once. I know it doesn't matter what I say someone will think I am making a mistake

So I'm listening to me. And listening to you for feedback about the actual game itself

[gentle igloo]

Let's leave the man to do his magic! I know I gotta get my ass back to work lol

[viscid basin]

y u no maek dee em cee too donte eez baest joeker

[young folio]

Exactly. You cant please them all right away, but if you do your job right and make a good game then they will all come back anyways. The ones that dont or move on in a month werent going to get much enjoyment or play time into it anyways. They just wanted on the hype train.

[lyric lance]

Suggestion: Glitch Booster, 1/250 chance to stock in the shop instead of a standard booster pack. When purchased, offers a mega booster of the associated type, but you get to use all of the boosters contents instead of just 1

[obsidian apex]

I love the idea of weird boosters. That is a good one.

Or howabout playing card boosters where they contain normal cards - sometimes gold seals, sometimes enhanced cards, sometimes polychrom/foil/holo playing cards

[viscid basin]

i'd def buy special card boosters

[lyric lance]

I love the idea of mysterious things that happen on occasion. Stuff like "If you beat Ante 5 within 15 minutes, get the option to fight a secret extra hard blind for a guaranteed negitive"

[woeful gazelle]

localthunk how do you feel about the idea of specific jokers being able to share a joker slot? Like a cutout joker that fits into stencil joker, or the bottom half of a torn joker that can fit into the same slot as the existing torn joker?

[native aspen]

People when they discover boss rush and hush in isaac be like

[obsidian apex]

Is the only way to find them just to stumble on them in time? Or do the allude to that time limit in game

[lyric lance]

Reach Ante 7 with a prime number of cards in your deck and get a secret bonus

[woeful gazelle]

I own the binding of isaac discord server and have since 2015 - I absolutely hate boss rush and hush

[viscid basin]

i hate this

[woeful gazelle]

I want to play the game at my own pace pls

[native aspen]

20 mins for boss rush and 30 for hush

[woeful gazelle]

i usually mod the time limit out of the game because its just annoying

[native aspen]

also im not sure they allude to the limit

[vivid tide]

Boss blind you can only play a hand every 5 mins speed runners hate this 😛

[woeful gazelle]

i also dislike all of the timed doors in dead cells

[gentle igloo]

Suggestion: I might be a bit too Inscryption-pilled, but like a Joker that talks to you a little, and gives hints about secrets of the game

[woeful gazelle]

Jimbo

[obsidian apex]

Balatro and timed things are not a good match. This is supposed to be kindof a relaxing game

[viscid basin]

tbh, as someone who's only dabbled in binding of isaac, a lot of these mechanics make it hard for me to get into it because it feels like you have to know so much just to play the game

[obsidian apex]

I agree, that is why I asked

I love isaac but that is something that I know puts people off

[woeful gazelle]

thank you

Isaac started as a much smaller game that just kept having stuff piled on top for like 14 years lol

[viscid basin]

inscryption, on the other hand, entirely revolves around the secrets because it uses them as a major story point

[native aspen]

Also preferably no OOPS guess you are not fighting the final boss today because f you

[woeful gazelle]

Ive been playing since near the start and I still play with a mod that tells me items abilities because I just cant remember it all

[sullen mountain]

different genre but Braid has secrets you can miss if you don't know exactly what to do the first time you encounter them

[woeful gazelle]

yes chance based doors in isaac are really annoying I mod those out as well

Isaac is one of my favorite games but I still have to mod various features out because they are just not thought through lol

[native aspen]

I have one completed savefile and i have item descriptions on (Mostly for the 40+ mods im running but that is not the point)

[woeful gazelle]

speaking of modding, I hope balatro has strong mod support eventually (ideally via steam workshop)

definitely not necessary on launch but man does it help longevity

[obsidian apex]

I'll think about it. That could be a lot of work for me

[woeful gazelle]

Im sure it would be! Something you can think about how to prepare for now but dont need to really implement for a long time lol

even if you dont specifically implement anything its entirely possible the community ends up doing it for you, very common haha

[native aspen]

Well both slay the spire and isaac mods were first started by the community performing some dark magic so it doesnt HAVE to have mod support for a modding community it just makes it easier

[woeful gazelle]

yep ofc

[shut glacier]

most modern Nuclear Throne mods are sub-mods of the (truly dark magic) Nuclear Throne Together mod, which added seamless online multiplayer

modders be wildin

[woeful gazelle]

still cant believe everything with nuclear throne is real

its based off an old version of the game and then re-implements everything afterwards completely perfectly, and THEN adds its own stuff including seamless online multiplayer

actual technomancy

[gentle igloo]

Suggestion: Investment Joker. One that would cost like 8 gold and increase in sell value 2 gold per round played. (BTW, sorry if any of my suggestions already exist, and this is my last one of the day. Don't wanna flood 🤐)

[native aspen]

ngl the multiplayer slay the spire mods are also actual technomancy

[shut glacier]

is THAT how they did that? I knew the old version existed and was moddable, but... wow

they just went and remade a third of the game

that's crazy

[woeful gazelle]

yep its genuinely insane

[waxen juniper]

After you beat the boss blind for a round, is it intended that when you view your game info and look at the blinds that it shows you the blinds from the set you were just on, instead of the set that you're about to be up against? Because it would be nice to be able to see the next boss blind you'll face as soon as you beat the current one you're on

[obsidian apex]

It is intended - since the 'reveal' is supposed to happen on the next selection screen

Although I understand the drawback

[waxen juniper]

It does make it a bit tough, since you'll only get a maximum of two shops to prepare for the boss then (and fewer if you end up deciding to skip small or big blind)

[olive swan]

I feel like that would be a little too easy to just check before buying stuff but idk

I tried doing that too

[rancid oriole]

Something I'd like to see down the line would be jokers or other non-normal playing cards added to the deck that you can draw into your hand; the risk/reward of having one of your hand cards potentially not be able to be used but give an effect instead would be interesting. Probably would be a nightmare to balance right now though especially with all the other types of changes that are going on

[lyric lance]

Mmm, a simple version of this might be 'platinum card'. A plain card no rank/suit, but when you draw it, gain $5. +1$ each time it's drawn. You give up a card in hand you can use for scoring, but get rich

[late ibex]

joker idea = RPG Joker
every time you play a hand (pair, two pair, etc.) you gain XP in that hand to eventually level it up. (maybe like every 5 plays of a hand = level up?)

its similar to that card that pays when you make the same hand over and over (the one with space on the face, i forget which one)
but you can have a little 8 bit joker on there

[lyric lance]

That's fun, Space joker being 1/5 chance to upgrade would make RPGoker need to be higher or lower than 5 times otherwise they are mathematically identical

[gleaming beacon]

Have you considered "cursed" jokers i.e. jokers that give a debuff plus a perk such as extra chips or mult? Mb if its already a thing

[native aspen]

ngl just jokers with a downside + upside would add nice depth

[wanton inlet]

Small typo here. A rogue apostrophe

[quasi quarry]

You really nailed the theme. The scan lines, the glitched out jokers, churning the shader to the tocking of a clock going slowmo, the massive hands and the tiny payouts, it really feels like I'm playing video poker in purgatory. You have come up with a singular, cohesive, vision, unified between art, sound, and setting. Keep that unity ♡

[wheat sand]

A rare planetary alignment card that raises the level of all hands

a la the soul

[olive swan]

Oh boy do I have news for you

💀💀

[lyric lance]

Joker Suggestion: Sleepy Joker. Does nothing, 1% chance to wake up when a hand is played. +1% per hand played.
[On wake up, Sleepy Joker transforms into Well Rested]
Well Rested: +mult equal to 3x number of days slept.

[exotic agate]

fun stats / programming problem: calculate the expected (mean) number of hands for it to wake up

||f = lambda n=1: 1 if n == 100 else 1 + (100-n) / 100 * f(n+1)||

the answer is apparently ||12.20996063021598||

[lyric lance]

If it's is that, then perhaps rounds played rather than hands played

[lyric lance]

Joker Suggestion: If the draw pile is empty X5 Mult

[steel prawn]

Does the discard pile shuffle back into the draw pile when it's empty and you draw cards?

[lyric lance]

Nope, if your hand is empty and your deck is empty, you game over

[steel prawn]

Aah I see. But if you have a nine card draw, and there are 6 cards left, would you then only draw 6 cards or game over?

[lyric lance]

draw 6 cards

https://youtu.be/xaC0E5g7IS4?t=4998

this is timestamped to the last few hands with an example of it happening

[steel prawn]

Thanks

[exotic agate]

another option could be 1% to wake up on every hand, +1% per round OR vice versa

a bit verbose to explain, though

[native aspen]

Voucher suggestion: Will give a quest each round Ex: "Play a full house containing the ace of spades" and then give some kind of give reward. Could be money and for harder quests maybe jokers/taro cards or those things that i can not remember the name of which you get when you skip a blind

[lyric lance]

Could be a joker version too, escalates through a series of tougher quests offering a better multiplier/chip bonus as you tier up.

"those things that i can not remember the name of which you get when you skip a blind" these are Tags 🙂

[exotic agate]

Joker: "Grants current blind's tag when sold"

could be interesting, especially if it works at the blind selection screen (gets the upcoming tag? are two of the same tag possible?)

[lyric lance]

2 are, if you skip SB and BB that happened to RNG teh same, I've had $30 after a boss from 2x $15 tags

[exotic agate]

• it should always work during a blind to get its tag (but then you need to complete it with -1 joker)
• this shouldn't work in the shop screen, as you can get a tag without much effort
• wording it so it works in the blind selection too feels difficult, so maybe disable the effect there too

[lyric lance]

Joker Suggestion: Mr Mulligan, after the first deal, you can select any number of cards to be shuffled back into the deck, then redraw to fill your hand.

Joker Suggestion: Transmutator, After the deal, randomly Enhance 1 held card.

[native aspen]

Would this prioritise unenhanced cards?

[lyric lance]

Nah, random, that way there's a level of risk, otherwise you'd just buf the whole deck eventually

[exotic agate]

Joker: (probably underpowered?) After you play a hand, duplicate a random held card.
(the duplicate immediately appears, so you effectively draw one less card afterwards, and gets added to your deck permanently)

[woeful gazelle]

i like it because you get a lot of passive value at the cost of being unable to properly focus any specific enhancements

[lyric lance]

Could be broken if you hold trips and then quads then play 5 of a kind, just spam the effect until 1 rank of card is the majority of your deck

[exotic agate]

I think the deck is big enough that it can't be too consistent... but I guess you could fish for a specific rank using discards

[lyric lance]

discard to trips, play high card 3 times, I've made 6x that rank of card, play 5 of a kind with a 1/3 chance to get the needed rank cloned again. repeat the next hand with a pool of 7 to start, would snowball fast I think

[exotic agate]

when you put it like that, it sounds overpowered, dang

I agree

[lyric lance]

Voucher Suggestion: Gives you your least used Joker (must have room)

[woeful gazelle]

What about a voucher that gives you a random joker but you dont need room, overflowing the joker slots until you get rid of one

[hexed monolith]

Unless there was some other joker that affected odds-type jokers. It's all about synergies in a roguelike!

[woeful gazelle]

upgraded version of this voucher could give two random jokers without needing room

[lyric lance]

This is basically a free negitive joker

[woeful gazelle]

kinda like a temporary increase of slots

No because if you get rid of any joker you cant refill the slot

[lyric lance]

Ah OK

[woeful gazelle]

you are stuck with the jokers you currently have on voucher pickup unless you want to throw the extra slot away

[exotic agate]

the opposite of the previous joker:
Destroys a random held card after every hand. Cannot be sold or destroyed.

this might end up becoming "mill yourself to a perfect 5 card deck"

[lyric lance]

you game over if you can't play a hand for lack of cards

[woeful gazelle]

yea so you need to be careful

[exotic agate]

yes, that's the point :P

[woeful gazelle]

deck thinning is very powerful until it isnt lmao

[exotic agate]

"you like deck thinning? how about TOO MUCH deck thinning"

[lyric lance]

'Cannot be sold or destroyed' 52 card deck means you get to play 47 hands only, ever

[exotic agate]

you'll end up getting a 5 card deck - after playing those 5 cards, none will be destroyed because none are held

[lyric lance]

Win in 1 hand or guarantee a loss

[woeful gazelle]

boss blind: "can't play 5 card hands"
the fifth card:

[exotic agate]

realistically speaking, it feels unfun to get to that point

probably not a good design, but funny to think about

[lyric lance]

Maybe one for a Challenge mode Run

[woeful gazelle]

i enjoy thinking about any suggestion doesnt need to start balanced to be an interesting thought

[lyric lance]

1000% one so-so idea may spiral into a great one

It's why I'm here suggesting about 4 a day, even though most are probably bad

[woeful gazelle]

yep just need to open the door to an unexplored area of design space

[exotic agate]

"Destroy a random played card after every hand" might be pretty interesting - you can target cards to be destroyed by playing one card, but you lose a hand by doing so

[woeful gazelle]

you also eventually mill the deck to 0

ofc you can just get rid of the joker

[exotic agate]

yeah. I feel like it's just the death tarot but with extra steps

[lyric lance]

*hanged Man

[exotic agate]

yes, thanks

[woeful gazelle]

speaking of tarot cards im looking forward to see some videos on the new patch to see how the 5/2 slot setup works in practice

in theory it sounds good to me since i basically never used tarots outside of readings, was really hard to justify holding a tarot over a joker

i like the idea of being able to hold consumables for longer

[lyric lance]

July 28th is my last video on 0.8.7, Then July 29th is the new 0.8.8

[woeful gazelle]

Appreciate the info, ill be looking forward to it!

[next bobcat]

queue for beta test so we can know if we have any shot of getting in any time soon? Copium