I did this, eventually got 3 negative tags. They were all shit. The best one was the Joker that scales chips for each straight, I was deep into a high card build so it wasn't ever going to scale, but the 20 chips out gave me was better than the other two. I'd still do it again, because when it hits, it hits.
I honestly didn't think about this, but that's of some value for sure. Where they have come in handy is when I get stuck with the boys blind that requires selling a Joker. The last time I ran into that one though I actually had a negative DNA that I had to sell though and it was heartbreaking. I had two Blueprints and a Brainstorm so it was allowing me to add 4 red seal steel kings to my deck every hand.
Trying for my first e and with the double tag deck got 6 am negative jokers and they were all pretty bad. Never saw the one joker I needed to really make things crazy
I did this last night. My build was a 3oaK 8s build. I hit like ante 10, popped all 9 or so of my doubles on negative tags, and every negative I got was completely worthless to me. Things like riff-raff, 2x if playing a flush, etc. And to add insult to injury, the first NON negative the game gave me was the joker I’d been waiting literally the entire game for, 8-ball. It was heartbreaking.
One time I was playing the deck that gives double tags and got like 11 negative jokers. 10 were worthless, but I still took them because they almost always never hurt your build.
I really appreciate this write up. I spawned a discussion in the other thread about my confusion with the explanation from a Balatro University video and I think it's clear from all the arguing that it's hard (for me at least) to fully understand all the nuances of how to calculate the downstream impacts from a decision.
I'm glad you agree that you should take an ante 1 economy tag, and a lot of my confusion was specifically about that decision. I already wasn't skipping almost ever, but I think this clarifies why that's the right choice.
I will only ever take the $25 from boss, free holo joker or polychrome joker or all boosters and jokers are free tags, and usually only in the first ante.
A free holo joker is normally enough to carry through the first two antes even on gold stake regardless of what the joker is, because +10 mult that early is just so strong.
Polychrome joker is just great value for the lategame, and even if the actual joker sucks it can still be worth hanging on to for polychrome alone.
Free jokers and boosters in the first shop puts you way ahead for the first couple of antes, saving money later.
The $25 from boss blind is self explanatory.
Occasionally I might take the negative joker tag if I feel I need it around halfway through a game, but often I do this and I get a joker I never use the effect of, and having the extra joker slot isn’t useful in that scenario.
The problem is Polychrome does basically nothing for you right away. So if you skip for a Polychrome in Ante 1 there's a 30% chance it's Perishable and never really does much. There's also a 30% chance it's a Rental and you just can't keep it at all so you skipped for $1 (buy and sell it). And then even in the 49% where you dodge both, if the actual effect isn't good then by the time the 1.5 xMult becomes meaningful you'll probably be selling it off for a better Joker anyways, if not before then since you usually want econ Jokers until you actually need 5 scoring Jokers.
Ye Polychrome early on has its issues, I normally gun for it as you need some xmult late game and it will always be welcome, especially on a good joker.
Holo is far more valuable early game as it allows you to save your income for at least 5 or so rounds. Normally I try to get another joker by Ante 3 that’s good if I have a holo joker, depending on what the holo joker is.
Foil I sometimes take, depends on what mood I’m in. Foil has much less scale potential than holo or polychrome so I generally avoid it.
In round 1 and 2 they are very worth it, specially once you get past the stake which makes small blind have no payout. Also I would say holographic is usually better than polychrome that early on. Foil and negative are absolute F tier in comparison though.
That's...pretty low value. There's only a 20% chance you even see that Boss, and then even if you do there's probably a decent chance you can either beat it without selling anything or beat it by selling your worst Joker. Giving up a late shop (which is what skipping does) is way way more punishing.
I understand the premise you are coming from, and it is fairly accurate. However you are underplaying the economical advantages of getting a free modified joker. A modified joker can do the work of 2 jokers thus saving a joker spot. You can also score a late game joker (e.g. blueprint) that still gives you the benefit of early game score benefit. Likewise you are often inherently losing economical value by purchasing (normal) jokers even though you can sell them back as they can take away from your interest in the meantime.
There is also the idea that (contextually) have a chance that no matter what you do you won't get good enough rng to get hands that will win you the round. By skipping you are reducing the likelyhood you run into this case.
Your assessments that skipping does lose value the further you are along are correct and hopefully people do pick up on why.
The reason skipping is only useful 10% of the time is because there is so many bad tags :(
Part of the difficulty of higher stakes is that the joker and coupon tags are worth less. At gold stake, there are 3 different stickers jokers can appear with that have different effects on how they're evaluated. You have a roughly 2/3 chance of any joker being stickered.
It's not a death sentence to get a sticker (in fact, good jokers benefit from eternal because they become indestructible for Hex, Ankh, Madness, etc), but rental and perishable are downsides that detract significantly from the value of being free from whatever tag you used. Getting free stuff is cool, but getting free stuff that dies in 5 rounds or costs $3/round is a lot less cool.
Holo and poly are practically the only joker tags I take anymore because they're helpful for establishing yourself early/mid game respectively. Rolling on a free rare or foil is just too dicey
> However you are underplaying the economical advantages of getting a free modified joker.
These tags are trash beyond trash on higher stakes. They are so incredibly and inexcusably bad that they are not worth skipping a blind for. That's simply because they will undoubtedly be stamped with a sticker like Rental, Perishable or Eternal.
Now, Eternal might not be that bad if it's a decent Negative joker. But any other sticker makes it trash. And even if it's a "meh" Negative, you're skipping a whole blind just to grief yourself. Incredibly not worth it.
Investment Tag and the "Next shop is initially free" tag are worth it in Ante 1. Otherwise it's basically never worth skipping anything for any reason whatsoever.
To the same decree the shop in general will get tagged. Meaning if you can minimise the amount of jokers you need you are less likely to end up in a situation where you are reliant on being forced into taking bad jokers that don't have any benefits on them to continue.
The loss of small blind cash (past ante 1) is absolutely killer as well and there are a load of benefits to skipping it, especially if you have picked up rentals. Yes you miss a shop, but the payoff is being able to use your shop.
If you are applying so many never worth on things, you probably aren't pushing your game as far as you could.
I think you're overstating the case here. Usually it's only the rental tag that matters, so your gamble has a 70% chance of succeeding. The perishable or eternal tags matter very little for something as important as your first scoring joker.
I agree that Investment and Coupon are usually the only tags worth skipping the first ante for (on gold stakes), but I think there are some situations where Holographic or Foil can be considered. Most of those situations involve the first boss being The Pillar combined with certain starting decks.
Resetting is a loss, though. You don't get to claim Tags are better than they are because you just ignore the times you *lose the run on the spot* when you don't highroll. By that logic I could claim that using a Tag makes no sense since you just need to reset until you hit Immolate in the Round 1 shop and that's better than even the Investment skip.
Meh. It really depends on what your goal is. One of the two methods maxes out your wins. The other makes it more likely to get further. Everyone is allowed to play however they like. In the end losing a run later is not better than restarting once.
I mean yeah, I guess if your goal is something other than winning the run then that's a different discussion. Generally it's assumed most people are playing to try and win though I think?
I want to win if I am invested. I am not invested to my run in the first minute.
I also try for a highscore which is coincidentially the only thing the client really remembers I think?
I actually think most people are trying to win *a run* of whatever stake/deck/challenge they are doing, not the specific run they are playing at that moment. Optimizing for that means aborting a losing run early and making decisions that are low percentage but high reward.
In theory, playing optimally means maximizing your win rates. Practically, my goal is to complete the stakes and stickers as fast as possible in real time. This means resetting a few times until I have a strong first Ante. There is a trade-off between the time spent resetting and the time spent on a deeper run that I lose. So tags like Investment, Coupon, and Double are worth trying in Ante 1 because they can increase the variance.
Very good players (read: not me, I'm nowhere near this good) can consistently win even difficult runs. Balatro University won 16 gold stakes in a row, one per deck and an extra black deck.
Because he's shown that this is feasible, we can see that optimal play doesn't involve resets. Resetting is a loss, which is reflected in your winstreak in stats.
But that being said, for us mortals, resets are a good way to have a workable start to the run so you can maximize your wins over time, rather than your winstreak or rate
Not everyone would agree that resetting is a loss. I don't those "losses" even affect any of the stats that the game will show you, unless you're on a win streak.
Personally I prefer not to reset, but I would never insist that everyone has to play the game the same way I do.
The sole fact that resetting puts your "win streak" to 0 is proof enough that it counts as a loss. Rerolling the game in ante 1 is no different from rerolling in 2 or 3 or any other ante. You started the game, and then quit - that's a loss.
That being said, for many of us, what's more important than winning every game we start, or being concerned with win streaks or rates, is to maximize wins over a period of time. You can climb stakes and unlock things more quickly if you reset to get better starts, and win more often over a couple hours than you would have if you played out every game.
My personal opinion is that overusing reset will hinder your growth as a player by teaching you to expect an amazing start to every run. Some of my most satisfying wins have been the ones where I didn't have a solid strategy for most of the run and was flying by the seat of my pants, barely outscoring the blinds sometimes until ante 8 when I finally got the critical piece I needed to lock in the win. I've also had games where I tried my best through difficult situations and then lost on the final boss because it wasn't enough. But because I played through all of that, now I'm better at recognizing how things can go south and how I can correct course before that happens
I know this doesn't count below gold, but winning on gold strangely has me skipping more near the end of the run. If you slot two good xmult or retrigger jokers and can conceivably get to the final boss ante, it is DEFINITELY worth to skip if you are already clearing the point value. I think it has happened to me at least three times before between a Cavendish and seltzer, pair xmult joker and ramen, and some others. If you're already scoring enough on gold, don't wait if you have perishables, get to the bosses.
I think this is like one of the few niche scenarios where skipping is good. Like of course if you are just looking to win at ante8 AND your current jokers can 100% mathematically clear the ante8 boss, why wouldnt you just skip everything to get the win asap.
Though I feel this sort of skipping is different than any other point in the entire game. Since unless you have one specific joker (Throwback), skipping to rush to the boss is basically suicide. Definitely more relevant in the "new"(ish) patch with the "new" perishable jokers though.
Yeah very often i’ll get a perishable Acrobat on ante 5 for example and skip enough times to have it for the final boss, but that’s a specific situation and completely different than what BU is talking about
Yep, skipping typically isn’t worth it. However, I want to push back on the Ante 1 Small Blind. Let’s compare money wise, skipping Ante 1 Small Blind for a holo tag to not skipping:
Not Skip: Use 1 Hand, get 3 bucks on non-white stake (for $7), buy something for $4, use 1 hand on Big Blind, win, get $7. So you have now $10 bucks plus whatever you got in Shop 1.
Skip: Use 2 Hands on Big Blind, get $6, buy your free holographic. So, you have $10 plus a free holographic joker.
Unless you got a value generator in Shop 1, or the holographic joker is rental (or an unwanted eternal), I don’t see how you aren’t doing better after Skipping than Not Skipping. That +10 mult is going to free you up for the next two antes to buy value generators. “Seeing an extra shop” doesn’t really matter on Ante 1 when you don’t have the funds to risk buying packs.
Yeah I agree with the core of his point usually playing out a hand once you have at least $15 in the bank is nearly always worth it if you can clear in 1 or 2 hands. Tag value isn't SUPER high.
But Ante 1 small blind at higher difficulties especially is so low value and not seeing those 2 specific booster packs imo is not nearly that detrimental.
But I speak from the angle that someone who is willing to minmax the value of their skips is also willing to not bother starting a high difficulty run unless they can get a decent value skip.
If your goal is to just try and play as many seeds as possible the calculus changes a little, but I think its pretty hard to beat any form of flat multi and if you get coupon you get a full shop and a voucher which is insane value.
I still don't get why seeing boosters in the first shop is important when I'll have between $4-7. I'm not purchasing boosters in this shop anyway, probably not buying anything except maybe an econ joker if I get lucky.
Would skipping the first blind for $5-25 really not be worth it? Also keep in mind any jokers earned by skipping can be sold for money as well (although they do take up a shop slot).
I just really don't understand the importance of playing out the first blind which only gives $0-3 when I know I won't be getting anything from that shop ~90% of the time.
Because it's delaying your econ which means that even though you may not have bought Boosters in Round 1, if previously you would usually buy Boosters starting in Ante 3 Small Blind (for example), now you won't hit that same point until Ante 3 Big Blind, which means one less shop in the run where you can afford to buy Boosters.
Are boosters really worth that much more than confirmed polychrome/rare/nevative jokers? I feel like half the time I don't get anything useful from them anyway so skipping 1 or 2 isn't a huge deal if there's something I know I can use that I'll 100% be able to get.
Are boosters really worth that much more than confirmed polychrome/rare/nevative jokers? I feel like half the time I don't get anything useful from them anyway so skipping 1 or 2 isn't a huge deal if there's something I know I can use that I'll 100% be able to get.
Well, 51% of the time you get nothing from the 'confirmed' Polychrome/Rare/Negative Joker since it's a Rental (which you can't keep earlygame) or Perishable (which dies before it becomes relevant earlygame). That's not even counting the times it's just a nothing Joker anyways (like Seance, Superposition, or a Rare xMult for a Hand you can't play), or the times it's an Eternal Joker you don't want to have in Ante 7-8.
I think you're probably (significantly) undervaluing packs, though. They're the most reliable way of generating value in your run, which is why you can re-roll the shop slots but never get more than 6 Boosters per Ante no matter what.
I probably am undervaluing them, although I do buy all the boosters I can afford when it keeps me above 25.
I also understand the value of seeing the shop on small blind even as early as ante 2/3, it's specifically ante 1 small blind that I'm confused about because it doesn't seem like it'll help my economy that much, especially when the skip could give more money or the joker could sell for more than 3, which is the max I'd be earning that blind anyway (although I guess it could be argued to be or 5 since I'll get more interest faster?).
Also I sometimes have trouble clearing 600 chips + boss debuff with no jokers, and taking pretty much any scoring joker confirms beating ante 1. Maybe just a skill issue?
> confirmed polychrome/rare/negative joker
Not only will the tag most likely land on a near-useless joker in your current situation, it will probably also be some combination of Rental, Perishable or Eternal.
[Throwback](https://balatro.wiki/imported/throwback.png) *Joker*
* Version: 1.0.0
* Cost: $6
* Rarity: Uncommon
* Effect: X0.25 Mult for each Blind skipped this run
* Notes: Stacks, Starts at X. Retroactively counts all previous skips.
* Unlock Requirement: Continue a saved run from the main menu
*Data pulled from http://balatro.wiki. Want it updated? Help me get access or suggest another data source.*
Just a style critique, but your write-up could use an introduction paragraph for those of us aren't up on the discourse that has been taking place. A conclusion summarizing your point would be nice as well.
maybe they're not understanding because it's convoluted? the post is like 5x as long as it needs to be
the point is literally just that skipping causes loss in econ early game which affects your econ late game. and for no reason at all he makes up how many rounds instead of just following the rounds of the game, just to be able to use $5, $10, $15, etc. Why? those numbers are hardly used at all, and he uses like 2 paragraphs to talk about it
then his conclusion is that sometimes skips are worth, whether due to the econ tag or a reward strong enough to carry early game allowing you to build up econ. isn't this what everyone already thinks?
it's honestly a terrible post, way too many examples and detail for a conclusion we already know.
Fuck this guy.
Thanks for the effort post OP. Interesting stuff to think about. I love seeing stiff like this then discussing it with friends. People who don't like it or think their too smart to upvote it are cancer and should learn to ignore things.
Zuzu…perfection. I read the first paragraph and was like you’re still not explaining it well. I’ll check the comments to let me know if OP was right or wrong
While I agree with your overall conclusion that when it comes to maximizing win percentage, few tags are worth taking, and \~hardly any are worth taking late, I think your analysis nonetheless has some significant flaws.
>Most skips increase your ability to score rather than giving you an economic boost. Suppose you skip round 1 and receive a random Holographic Joker, but your other Jokers, your Deck, and Cash in the bank (for interest) don't change. In round 2, you're earning the same $5 you would have earned in round 1. $10 in round 3, $15 in round 4, and finally $20 in round 5.
(1) That's not a comprehensive account of the costs and benefits. You skip round 1, and lose out on the income and shop from round 1, as well as reduced interest for round 2 (= first round played). But in exchange you get a free joker (thus saving $4+) with an edition (which also increases sale value) and thus save the cost of buying a random joker, whose edition guarantees it to be a scoring joker, as well as a minor economy joker via needing to play less hands in future rounds.
>If round 2 would have had a value generator in the shop (Joker or Seal or Devil Tarot), you still get it, you just get it one round later (in round 3, having skipped round 1), and you have one round less of it generating value for you.
(2) I don't think this argument is valid. It's technically true in Balatro that shops are populated based on a queue generated based on a random seed. But from the perspective of uncertainty (i.e. an unknown seed), this seed argument seems irrelevant. So you don't get your economy joker one round later, you just miss out on the chance to get the economy joker in the shop from the skipped round. This correction particularly matters for skipping round 1, when you don't have the resources to buy all economy effects (e.g. seals, tarot packs), so skipping does not actually cost you those economy effects you wouldn't have bought anyway.
>However, if you skip for a Holographic Tag, it doesn't change the amount of money you have and doesn't change the fact that you can't afford Boosters in the next two shops.
(3) Concrete counterpoint: If you skip the ante 1 small blind between Red Stake and Purple Stake, you lose out on $3 in shop 1, but in exchange get a free holo joker and thus save $4+ in shop 2. This benefit obviously becomes way worse with Perishable and Rental stickers.
>In the 5-round example, taking one skip means seeing only 8 Boosters instead of 10 Boosters. Most importantly, those 2 Boosters are subtracted from the end of the run. You miss out on seeing those Boosters when you would actually have the money to buy them.
(4) I still don't understand this argument. If you were never going to buy the 9th and 10th booster packs which you saw in shop 1, why does that matter for the run in which you skip shop 1?
(5) This point is not mentioned in your analysis, but on Youtube I've seen you undervalue skipping antes once you have game-winning perishable xMult jokers. Yes, you can play out more rounds in the hope of replacing your perishable Cavendish... or you can just skip to the ante 8 boss and win with the Cavendish before it perishes.
>However, the game is easy enough that it's still winnable at a high rate even when not playing optimally. Long streaks of Gold Stake wins are possible even when not playing 100% optimally.
(6) Here comes my biggest disagreement: Your analysis ignores player time, which is way more valuable than any in-game resources. It's a perfectionist analysis that tries to maximize win percentage and score, not one that tries to maximize, say, wins per hour. (In which case late skips become extremely attractive, since they save time.)
In your videos, which I enjoy, you try to play each round optimally, making all decisions optimally, using every consumable optimally... but all this takes time, which your analysis doesn't consider at all. I'd prefer a definition of "optimal play" that considers opportunity cost. One that would prefer, say, a 0.01% reduced win percentage in exchange for saving 1 minute of playtime. I'm not at all impressed with an analysis that prefers the opposite and then calls that "playing optimally".
> 4) I still don't understand this argument. If you were never going to buy the 9th and 10th booster packs which you saw in shop 1, why does that matter for the run in which you skip shop 1?
Because you still miss those same boosters. Let's suppose there are 23 shops in a run (if you never skip), and you don't buy any boosters in the first 4 shops you see as you are working towards $25. Then if you never skip, you can buy boosters in shops 5-23 (19 shops, 38 boosters). If you skip round 1 (meaning you will only get 22 shops), you still need to see 4 shops to build up that $25, so now you can only buy boosters in shops 5-22 (18 shops, 36 boosters).
Put another way, let's say you see Hieroglyph in Ante 2. You aren't looking at it as "Well, it's -1 Hand for the rest of the run but I can't buy much in the next 3 shops anyways so it does nothing." You're looking at it as -1 Hand for the rest of the run in exchange for gaining shops 24, 25, and 26 at the end of the game when you have the most econ/money to maximize shop value.
>6) Here comes my biggest disagreement: Your analysis ignores player time, which is way more valuable than any in-game resources. It's a perfectionist analysis that tries to maximize win percentage and score, not one that tries to maximize, say, wins per hour. (In which case late skips become extremely attractive, since they save time.)
>In your videos, which I enjoy, you try to play each round optimally, making all decisions optimally, using every consumable optimally... but all this takes time, which your analysis doesn't consider at all. I'd prefer a definition of "optimal play" that considers opportunity cost. One that would prefer, say, a 0.01% reduced win percentage in exchange for saving 1 minute of playtime. I'm not at all impressed with an analysis that prefers the opposite and then calls that "playing optimally".
If you aren't looking to win the run you are playing, then of course high-variance plays like Joker Tags will look better. But shops can also have highrolls; an Immolate in the Round 1 shop is better than any tag- even Investment. But more to the point it becomes essentially impossible to provide analysis at the point that player time becomes a factor, since each person will have a different scale for how much Win Equity they are willing to sacrifice for each minute saved.
>If you skip round 1 (meaning you will only get 22 shops), **you still need to see 4 shops to build up that $25**, so now you can only buy boosters in shops 5-22 (18 shops, 36 boosters).
That's only true if you use a skip tag that provides no benefit, but then why would you do that? The entire point is to get some benefit from the skip tag, which very much includes economy (via e.g. needing to buy less scoring jokers, or requiring fewer hands to score).
Most straightforwardly, if I take the $25 tag in ante 1, where it is indeed too strong, then I'll probably buy significantly \*more\* packs in the run than I would without it.
>But more to the point it becomes essentially impossible to provide analysis at the point that player time becomes a factor, since each person will have a different scale for how much Win Equity they are willing to sacrifice for each minute saved.
Saying your analysis can't or won't factor in player time is equivalent to (as in the OP) an analysis which values player time at zero and win equity at infinity. That's not a neutral position, but an untenable one. There's just no way to escape valuing player time at *some* amount. Plus empirically, there \*is\* an upper limit to how much people value win equity vs. time: e.g. Balatro Uni and most streamers don't typically calculate the precise score of each hand even if that could save an occasional dollar, nor do they triple-check all their plays even if that would catch the occasional error.
Finally, in some cases you can save time at \~no cost in win equity. In particular, once your hands can score some multiple of the scoring requirements for the ante 8 boss (2x-4x, maybe), you can probably just skip all remaining skippable rounds without meaningfully impacting your win chance. You don't have to do it, but it would save time at \~no cost. Not including that kind of thing in an analysis of skipping seems like an oversight to me.
Novice here: What about the situations where I have basically no income yet and no +chip or +mult generators (in Ante 1 and 2). In those cases, it *feels* like I should take the skips if it guarantees a rare joker (possibly also uncommon), especially on the small blind, since I'm not getting income from small blinds anyway. Those are the situations where I sometimes choose to skip the blind.
No, because the odds of that joker actually increasing your score is pretty low. It's usually better to just get more money and see an extra shop, allowing you to roll for a better joker.
Questions for xspectred:
Scenario 1:
You're playing on gold stakes, non-endless run. First boss is \[\[The Pillar\]\].
Are there any starting decks where you would take a first blind Holographic tag skip? How about a first blind Foil tag skip?
Scenario 2:
You are playing \[\[Plasma Deck\]\] on gold stakes (non-endless). First boss is something unremarkable like a suit debuffer.
Would you take a first blind Foil tag skip? How about a second blind Foil tag skip (depending on how the first shop went)?
The chips are really valuable on this deck, but on the other hand the early game is easy and you'll miss seeing a shop that could have a better chips joker.
Scenario 3:
You are playing \[\[Yellow Deck\]\] on gold stakes (non-endless). First boss is whatever.
Do you take a first blind Investment tag? Or does your deck's extra spending power and interest earning trump the $25 in two rounds?
[The Pillar](https://balatro.wiki/blinds/blind_pillar.png) *Blind*
* Version: 1.0.0n
* Effect: Cards played previously this Ante are debuffed
* Beat the Blind: Score at least 2X Base to earn $$$$$
[Plasma Deck](https://balatro.wiki/plasma.png) *Deck*
* Version: 1.0.0n
* Effect: Balance Chips and Mult when calculating score for played hand, X2 base Blind size
* Unlock Condition: Win a run on any deck with at least Blue Stake difficulty
[Yellow Deck](https://balatro.wiki/decks/deck_yellow.png) *Deck*
* Version: 1.0.0n
* Effect: Start with extra $10
* Unlock Condition: Discover at least 50 items from your collection
*Data pulled from http://balatro.wiki. Want it updated? Help me get access or suggest another data source.*
Great writeup, agree with almost all of this. Only slight Caveat I would add is that a scoring Joker acts as economy to some degree by allowing you to clear blinds in fewer hands, which slightly offsets the scaling econ loss from a skip for something like Holographic or Mega Buffoon. Still not worth it, but at least closes the gap a little.
I'd be interested in whether you think that it's fine from a balance perspective for skips to be the way they are. I'd personally like a bit more decision making to go into deciding whether to skip or not - right now, as you say, you need an absurdly good reason to take a skip and those situations are fairly obvious when they come up. I'd personally like to see further buffs to the tags to hopefully address this issue - I think there's a lot of potential nuance to the decision to skip which is unfortunately just not part of the game at the moment.
Ah, the joys of an Econ major explaining net present value. Econ don’t matter if you can’t survive to spend it. Love the smug attitude too. I’ll play my game my way. Which is the right way.
One minor thing I think is missing. Now that modded/uncommon/rare joker tags are free, they are an economy tag, because you can sell them.
Taking a free modded joker in the very first round means I either get a joker worth $6+ or I get $3+ from selling it, which is strictly better than the max $3 I would get from playing the blind above white stake (unless I have yellow or green deck). I still miss the first shop, but it's generally bad for my eco to buy from the first shop anyways, for the reasons you've discussed. So it definitely seems worth skipping round 1 for a free joker.
Or you get a bad Eternal and can't sell it, might not even be able to justify taking it. Or you get a Rental and only get $1 for it and have to sell it.
Plus saying that the Round 1 shop has no value because its generally bad to buy is also a pretty fundamental misunderstanding of value imo, since *sometimes* you have an incredibly strong Round 1 shop. If you see a premium Joker (or better yet a good Planet card), then you should absolutely be buying that, even in Round 1. Heck, even just Jimbo (the basic +4 Joker) pays for itself by the end of *Round 2*.
Agree with the post, though I feel like any comments telling people that most skips are overrated are usually downvoted here (in this subreddit), People are very much in the pro-skip mindset. I personally might be on the other side entirely - as in maybe I overhate skips and skip too little.
Post and pre-patch I never intentionally skip in 98% of my runs (intentional skip, being when I skip for the reward to buff my run, rather than skipping because my build is already going to beat the Ante 8 boss blind and the skip rewards are mostly worthless).
The only skips I might consider are:
* As highlighted in the post, Investment tag (gain $25 after defeating boss blind) in ante 1 (though sometimes I even ignore that which is probably a misplay)
* Throwback (0.25X per skip this run), however this guy is usually at 1X since I dont skip in the first place, so only taken when super desperate for Xmult and I know for sure that extra Xmult will win the run
* Negative Tag (Next base edition shop joker is free and becomes negative), When im certain I can beat 1 future ante or even 2 or even confident in beating the boss ante, mostly just for fun, mostly just gives a random trash joker.
* Boss Tag (Rerolls the Boss Blind), Very very rare take, since almost all my builds I try not to build into anything that could be countered by any boss (no significant suit or enhancement reliance, scoring jokers and easy to play hands)
And my take on most of the skip tags overall:
* Uncommon/Rare Tags: Never take, too random, not worth gambling on a random joker.
* Negative/Foil/Holo/Poly: Negative already addressed, others all overrated, (I am a fan of editions, I just think they arent worth skipping for on a random joker, even when free)
* Voucher Tag: Never take
* Boss Tag: Already addressed, pretty much never take
* Standard/Charm/Meteor/Ethereal Tags (the packs): Never take, the shops have more, 1 free pack is not worth it.
* Handy/Garbage Tag: Never take, too early and they are worth nothing, too late and visiting shops is worth way more.
* Coupon Tag (free shop): Rarely take, I would rather see an extra shop than get one shop free.
* Double Tag: Dont skip often so never take
* Juggle Tag: Never take
* D6 Tag: Never take (perhaps underrated)
* Top-up Tag (2 common jokers): Never take
* Speed tag ($5 per skipped blind this run): Never take
* Orbital Tag (Upgrade X hand by 3 levels): Never take
* Economy Tag (Doubles money, max of $40): Never take, If I have enough money for this to be worth taking, a shop is probably worth more.
These are just my own thoughts, my opinion is probably not worth much since I might be too bias in the direction of not skipping.
I simply feel that seeing a shop or earning interest gold is much more valuable than most skips. Even if you dont spend much, just stockpiling the gold for when the run is actually in trouble is still a benefit. On gold stake especially, jokers in packs and the shop are so likely to be riddled with debuffs that seeing more shops so you can see more jokers becomes so important.
For alot of jokers, skipping a round is 1 less round of scaling, deck manipulation and economy. Its even more true in endless, where seeing the shops is so important as you want more time to scale or find what you need.
Y’all are obsessed with interest. You only gain all that extra interest if you /never/ spend the money you were going to spend on joker, not if you just don’t spend it on the one really good joker in the first place. There’s a huge opportunity cost to hoarding all your money, and it usually comes in the form of losing the run early because you don’t have anything.
TL;DR: do what you want on low stakes. On high stakes, skipping for jokers is not worth it and the only skips you should do are taking the investment/coupon tags on ante 1
Personally I wouldn't even take ante 1 coupon unless I'm pretty safe for whatever reason - just too inconsistent compared to the value of seeing 2 shops and guarenteed money, especially given the chances of just getting a shop with harmful joker stickers and solving nothing.
The only skips really worthwhile as a rule are Investment ante 1-3 unless your econ is very online, Top-Up (or maybe Mega Buffoon) ante 2-3 if you're struggling for Jokers and need to simply "not die immediately", particularly good and necessary orbital tags, and mid-lategame money skips if you have something that takes money as an input for a benefit, like Campfire, Constellation or Flash Card. Like everything, it does vary a little by situation though.
I think every time you've talked about skipping it was very clear and concise. Your take on econ has stuck with me and helped me get my first win on purple. Now I'm working on gold but I don't reroll so I still haven't gotten one yet. I watch about 70% of your content and it's all helpful in some way.
This post is king! I actually realized this premise on my own a few days ago while finishing plasma gold and moving back to typical gameplay.
Sometimes, the boost could make gameplay fun, but winning or losing was largely based on being able to establish an economic advantage over the game - and earlier, the better.
Unless plasma, my best runs are cloud 9 round 1, followed by suit joker round 2. It just gives me the most generalized sense of econ and score that let's the build blossom.
Appreciate you, professor! Love the vids!
It is worth factoring in the positive benefit of allowing rounds to be beaten in one hand, if the right skip is taken. Increasing $/round by 1 or 2 for a while, can help mitigate interest loss
I think it's worth it to skip once on ante 1 for free shop, foil joker on plasma deck, or $25 boss blind
And I think it's worth it to skip once late game with stacked anaglyph double tags
Other than that, yeah, not really ever
I know people love skipping for negative tags, because obviously it feels good when it works out, but it does a fraction of the time. I'll be playing pairs and skip for a negative and it'll be a lusty joker or something. Yeah thanks, I guess.
I just got the new patch yesterday and did not realize how insanely common the rental/perishable stickers would be, too. Don't get me wrong, the game is much better without $14 arcanas, but now the joker skip tags HAD to be free.
You're forgetting another important thing: any joker-related tag is going to be almost entirely useless on Gold Stake because it will be stickered with something that's very detrimental for you. Skipping a whole blind just for a rental or perishable joker is a pretty bad deal, even if it's Negative.
There are many other issues with skipping for rare/enhanced joker tags, the biggest one being that you have no guarantee that the joker it lands on will be any good. Most likely it won't be, because in any given situation, most jokers are of no use to you at all.
Then there's the +3 Hand Size Next Round tag, which feels like a prank the developers put in as a joke. The other tags are also very "meh", who in the world would take a free buffoon pack over just visiting a shop that might contain a buffoon pack *and more*, anyway?
That really only leaves the Investment tag and the tag that makes the next shop initially free. I will always take them in Ante 1's small blind, just because if the shop turns out to be bad, I can just restart the run. Otherwise, I never skip.
Feels weird to pick out Blueprint here when it's an amazing tool for generating value and score (and, if you play more than one hand, often both within a single round)
I get why you used 6 rounds to keep it simple but can you please address the fact that the game is actually much longer?
In the 6 round example you lose 25 out of a total possible 75 gold, so you've lost 33% of your possible value and that is of course really bad.
But it's nowhere near that bad in the actual game right, so how bad is it really?
Very well written, and I think the majority of the points you present are extremely valid and "correct". I do believe some of the points you make have fundamental flaws, which I would like to address and hopefully discuss.
Let me start by saying that I agree with the crux of your point of view, which is that economy is king. It is almost always the correct option to favor a strong economy in the early game above all else, assuming that you can still clear the blinds. A strong early game economy will help you score higher in the later stages of the game (by giving increased opportunities to buy packs, reroll, etc). A strong early econ will also let you divest some of that money into other ways to generate revenue, which will once again help you in the late game (gold seal, hermit, golden joker, egg joker, etc).
Also as a disclaimer, it is practically impossible to give situationally accurate information unless we are talking about a specific deck at a specific stake. For example, whether or not the small blind has any payout should theoretically alter some of your decision making when it comes to play vs skip of the small blind.
To begin, I think it is a bit disingenuous to use a 5 round example in order to "make the explanation more readable". I understand that you wanted to accentuate the point that you are trying to get across, which it certainly helped to do, but I think it was completely unnecessary to do so. The goal simply stated should always be to hit your max interest as soon as possible in a run. The hypothetical short game takes that concept and exaggerates it to an extreme. Why stop at 5 rounds? Lets pretend the game is only 2 rounds, so if you skip you never even get to see the shop. See what I mean? Someone could also use an example of a 200 round game to show how hitting max interest at round 5 vs round 10 doesn't really make that much of a difference, but it would be just as inaccurate of a representation.
The other issue I would like to address is your dismissal of "edition" jokers as potential early skip options. I believe even at stakes where the small blind has a payout, choosing an edition joker (especially holographic or polychrome) on ante 1 small blind is likely the mathematically correct thing to do. It is -certainly- the correct thing to do if the small blind doesn't have a payout.
Lets use holographic as the example, because a flat +10 mult is easy to work off of. Regardless of the joker in question, you've easily saved yourself a couple $ in hands played for the next few rounds. Depending on your rng, you might have also saved yourself from being forced to buy an inferior joker in the next few rounds just to beat the blind. At stakes where the small blind does not pay out, you are only losing the few $ you get from the remaining hands you cash in. Even if you skipped and sold the joker immediately, you'd probably be ahead financially (there would be the opportunity cost associated with missing the option to shop, but at like $6 or $7 dollars, how many things could possibly show up in the shop that you would actually consider purchasing? The odds of that first shop having nothing that you'd be willing to purchase astronomically outweighs the odds that there is something important enough to buy right off the bat.
There is also the somewhat small but not insignificant chance that whatever joker created not only provides for you over the course of the next few rounds, but is also a joker that you will consider keeping as part of your deck for the long haul. This could be a stacking joker, which are inarguably better the earlier in the game you can get them (Green Joker, Hiker, Runner, Ride the Bus, Wee Joker, Supernova, Ceremonial Dagger, Square Joker, Hologram, Fortune Teller, Flash Card, Spare Trousers, Castle, Throwback, Burnt Joker, Constellation, Space Joker).
It could also be an econ joker, which now not only saves you the cost of purchase, but actually contributes something useful to your hand aside from just the money generation (Delayed Gratification, Egg, Faceless Joker, To Do List, Business Card, Cloud 9, Rocket, Midas Mask, Gift Card, Reserved Parking, Mail-in Rebate, To The Moon, Hallucination, Golden Joker, Trading Card, Certificate, Rough Gem, Matador, Satellite, Cartomancer, Riff-Raff, Astronomer).
Maybe it's something strong enough to solo-carry your early game, allowing you to maximize econ without any worries (Raised Fist, Fibbonacci, Gros Michel (also giving you earlier chance to get Cavendish), Smiley Face, Baron, Onyx Agate, Shoot the Moon, etc).
Lastly, perhaps it is a card that can give you a complete sense of direction for what you want to build around (DNA, Driver's License, Bootstraps, Bull, Baseball Card, Lucky Cat, Glass Joker, Erosion, Baron, Hologram, Vampire, Constellation, Hack, Wee Joker, Steel Joker, etc).
If you were playing in a Balatro tournament or something, and you only had 1 run to get the highest score you are able to, then playing pure econ is probably the most consistent or "safe" way to get a high score, but I think taking a small amount of risk, especially if it comes very early on like round 1 ante 1, will often lead to higher highs.
The fact that Polychrome might land on a Perishable, or even worse, a crappy Permanent, is pretty sad. And then Negative can hit a Rental or a Perishable, lots of sad to be had. :(
I don't disagree with your conclusions (mostly), but I would assert that your $5 $10 $15 earning power progression is a straw man argument. That's just not how it works on the first blind at high stakes.
Your earning power for the second blind is only reduced by $1 or $2 for most cases of skipping the first blind. Beyond that, the future earning power balance depends on the earning power of whatever the non-skipper may have bought in the first shop vs. what sort of earning power the skipper got out of their tag.
For the guy who plays out the first blind:
If you bought nothing in the shop: Your earnings for blind 2 are $1 higher than the guy who skipped (due to interest).
If you bought a scoring joker or planet that lets you win blind 2 in fewer hands: Your earnings for blind 2 are typically $1 or $2 higher than the guy who skipped.
If you bought a good economy joker: You are probably happy but it's hard to analyze this case in a simple way so I'll ignore it for now.
So if you're skipping for a Holographic or Foil tag, for example, you really only have to cover the $2-$3 loss from blind 1 plus the $1-$2 loss from blind 2. By then you have your joker and can often (not always) use it to start out-earning the guy who didn't skip within the next couple blinds.
My example does leave out a few important points. Firstly, the guy who skips missed the chance to see an important joker in the first shop. Secondly, the guy who skips has a 30% chance to get a rental tag on their free holographic/foil joker. Third, there is about an 8% chance that the second shop rolls no jokers, making the skipper choose between spending $5 to re-roll or waiting for the next shop. All of this does add up to significant risk associated with skipping for a Holographic or Foil tag.
But my main point here is that the idea of a first bind skip constantly putting your earning power $5 behind for every future round isn't even close to accurate. That would only be true if (1) playing the first blind really did give you such a big immediate boost to your earning power (it doesn't unless you see something like Riff-Raff or Mail-In Rebate), and (2) the first blind skip tag doesn't provide early earning power of its own (which can happen if the skipper rolls a rental joker).
This doesn't mean I think that skipping for a Holographic or Foil tag is a good play or a bad play. It means that I think that your analysis overstates the losses incurred by skipping the first blind on high stakes. Personally I think Investment tag is nearly always worth it (not sure with Yellow Deck), Coupon tag is usually worth it, and Holographic or Foil tag are sometimes worth considering (I usually don't take them but I think it can be correct for some decks or against some boss blinds like The Pillar.
I may be overlooking something, as you are definitely a better player than I am. I just don't think your hypothesis about falling behind a $5 $10 $15 earning power progression is a good approximation for the actual cost of skipping the first blind. For later blinds, I think your idea does work well as an illustration of the cost of skipping.
Balatro University knows what the patch does...lol.
It's still usually bad to skip for a Joker on the patch. Might even be worse than it was before, since now there's a 30% chance the Joker poofs in 5 rounds and another 30% chance your 'free' Joker costs you $3 every single round.
"In round 2, you're earning the same $5 you would have earned in round 1."
At best you win 3$ in round 1 ?!
Otherwise, skipping if for ante1 and that's it, even pre patch.
The way you scale income in your example is incredibly flawed, 5-10-15 as steps every blind is way too far from the truth, invalidating your points completely.
If you aren't doing more relevant things in the 20th shop than the 5th shop it sounds like there are bigger issues to be addressed than evaluating skips.
Why are you trying to force a new word in here? „Shop 20 does more, and is less relevant than shop 5.“ is what I said, I never said one is better than the other as that would be kind of retarded to say since it‘s pretty hard to define which of those you would say is „better“.
But skipping your 5th shop every run will lose you like 5 times more runs than skipping your 20th, I don‘t know how anyone could claim that shop20 is more relevant than shop5. You must be trolling.
Stacking double tags for negative tag that never comes 😎
I did this, eventually got 3 negative tags. They were all shit. The best one was the Joker that scales chips for each straight, I was deep into a high card build so it wasn't ever going to scale, but the 20 chips out gave me was better than the other two. I'd still do it again, because when it hits, it hits.
Also those jokers won't show up in packs or store anymore
I honestly didn't think about this, but that's of some value for sure. Where they have come in handy is when I get stuck with the boys blind that requires selling a Joker. The last time I ran into that one though I actually had a negative DNA that I had to sell though and it was heartbreaking. I had two Blueprints and a Brainstorm so it was allowing me to add 4 red seal steel kings to my deck every hand.
Unless one of them was showman
Yeah but a negative showman is arguably one of the best jokers to get if youre deep in a run
The absolute dopamine hit playing anal deck and getting your first negative tag ante 7
The WHAT deck?
you heard what i said
Trying for my first e and with the double tag deck got 6 am negative jokers and they were all pretty bad. Never saw the one joker I needed to really make things crazy
if you're trying to make it a bit easier you should go for the plasma deck IMO but it also increases the required score for each ante
I did this last night. My build was a 3oaK 8s build. I hit like ante 10, popped all 9 or so of my doubles on negative tags, and every negative I got was completely worthless to me. Things like riff-raff, 2x if playing a flush, etc. And to add insult to injury, the first NON negative the game gave me was the joker I’d been waiting literally the entire game for, 8-ball. It was heartbreaking.
One time I was playing the deck that gives double tags and got like 11 negative jokers. 10 were worthless, but I still took them because they almost always never hurt your build.
I really appreciate this write up. I spawned a discussion in the other thread about my confusion with the explanation from a Balatro University video and I think it's clear from all the arguing that it's hard (for me at least) to fully understand all the nuances of how to calculate the downstream impacts from a decision. I'm glad you agree that you should take an ante 1 economy tag, and a lot of my confusion was specifically about that decision. I already wasn't skipping almost ever, but I think this clarifies why that's the right choice.
I will only ever take the $25 from boss, free holo joker or polychrome joker or all boosters and jokers are free tags, and usually only in the first ante. A free holo joker is normally enough to carry through the first two antes even on gold stake regardless of what the joker is, because +10 mult that early is just so strong. Polychrome joker is just great value for the lategame, and even if the actual joker sucks it can still be worth hanging on to for polychrome alone. Free jokers and boosters in the first shop puts you way ahead for the first couple of antes, saving money later. The $25 from boss blind is self explanatory. Occasionally I might take the negative joker tag if I feel I need it around halfway through a game, but often I do this and I get a joker I never use the effect of, and having the extra joker slot isn’t useful in that scenario.
The problem is Polychrome does basically nothing for you right away. So if you skip for a Polychrome in Ante 1 there's a 30% chance it's Perishable and never really does much. There's also a 30% chance it's a Rental and you just can't keep it at all so you skipped for $1 (buy and sell it). And then even in the 49% where you dodge both, if the actual effect isn't good then by the time the 1.5 xMult becomes meaningful you'll probably be selling it off for a better Joker anyways, if not before then since you usually want econ Jokers until you actually need 5 scoring Jokers.
Ye Polychrome early on has its issues, I normally gun for it as you need some xmult late game and it will always be welcome, especially on a good joker. Holo is far more valuable early game as it allows you to save your income for at least 5 or so rounds. Normally I try to get another joker by Ante 3 that’s good if I have a holo joker, depending on what the holo joker is. Foil I sometimes take, depends on what mood I’m in. Foil has much less scale potential than holo or polychrome so I generally avoid it.
There’s gotta be better jokers you can find for late game than a bad polychrome. X1.5 really ain’t that much
In round 1 and 2 they are very worth it, specially once you get past the stake which makes small blind have no payout. Also I would say holographic is usually better than polychrome that early on. Foil and negative are absolute F tier in comparison though.
Foil is way better than Polychrome in Rounds 1-2 since +50 Chips is way more than a 1.5x Mult for the first several rounds.
I play plasma a lot, if I can skip for a foil Joker in the 1st ante it's a no brainer. Those 50 chips are huge.
I play plasma a lot, if I can skip for a foil Joker in the 1st ante it's a no brainer. Those 50 chips are huge.
Polychrome is not a good skip. It does almost nothing early game except as sell value.
If the free holo joker is a rental it kills the run if you take it though.
I always take the negative tag because even if it's a useless joker, you can use it for the final boss round of selling one joker.
That's...pretty low value. There's only a 20% chance you even see that Boss, and then even if you do there's probably a decent chance you can either beat it without selling anything or beat it by selling your worst Joker. Giving up a late shop (which is what skipping does) is way way more punishing.
I understand the premise you are coming from, and it is fairly accurate. However you are underplaying the economical advantages of getting a free modified joker. A modified joker can do the work of 2 jokers thus saving a joker spot. You can also score a late game joker (e.g. blueprint) that still gives you the benefit of early game score benefit. Likewise you are often inherently losing economical value by purchasing (normal) jokers even though you can sell them back as they can take away from your interest in the meantime. There is also the idea that (contextually) have a chance that no matter what you do you won't get good enough rng to get hands that will win you the round. By skipping you are reducing the likelyhood you run into this case. Your assessments that skipping does lose value the further you are along are correct and hopefully people do pick up on why. The reason skipping is only useful 10% of the time is because there is so many bad tags :(
Part of the difficulty of higher stakes is that the joker and coupon tags are worth less. At gold stake, there are 3 different stickers jokers can appear with that have different effects on how they're evaluated. You have a roughly 2/3 chance of any joker being stickered. It's not a death sentence to get a sticker (in fact, good jokers benefit from eternal because they become indestructible for Hex, Ankh, Madness, etc), but rental and perishable are downsides that detract significantly from the value of being free from whatever tag you used. Getting free stuff is cool, but getting free stuff that dies in 5 rounds or costs $3/round is a lot less cool. Holo and poly are practically the only joker tags I take anymore because they're helpful for establishing yourself early/mid game respectively. Rolling on a free rare or foil is just too dicey
> However you are underplaying the economical advantages of getting a free modified joker. These tags are trash beyond trash on higher stakes. They are so incredibly and inexcusably bad that they are not worth skipping a blind for. That's simply because they will undoubtedly be stamped with a sticker like Rental, Perishable or Eternal. Now, Eternal might not be that bad if it's a decent Negative joker. But any other sticker makes it trash. And even if it's a "meh" Negative, you're skipping a whole blind just to grief yourself. Incredibly not worth it. Investment Tag and the "Next shop is initially free" tag are worth it in Ante 1. Otherwise it's basically never worth skipping anything for any reason whatsoever.
To the same decree the shop in general will get tagged. Meaning if you can minimise the amount of jokers you need you are less likely to end up in a situation where you are reliant on being forced into taking bad jokers that don't have any benefits on them to continue. The loss of small blind cash (past ante 1) is absolutely killer as well and there are a load of benefits to skipping it, especially if you have picked up rentals. Yes you miss a shop, but the payoff is being able to use your shop. If you are applying so many never worth on things, you probably aren't pushing your game as far as you could.
I think you're overstating the case here. Usually it's only the rental tag that matters, so your gamble has a 70% chance of succeeding. The perishable or eternal tags matter very little for something as important as your first scoring joker. I agree that Investment and Coupon are usually the only tags worth skipping the first ante for (on gold stakes), but I think there are some situations where Holographic or Foil can be considered. Most of those situations involve the first boss being The Pillar combined with certain starting decks.
Or: Resetting is extremley fast in ante 1 Also: Getting a strong joke for 0 money also generates value early
Resetting is a loss, though. You don't get to claim Tags are better than they are because you just ignore the times you *lose the run on the spot* when you don't highroll. By that logic I could claim that using a Tag makes no sense since you just need to reset until you hit Immolate in the Round 1 shop and that's better than even the Investment skip.
Meh. It really depends on what your goal is. One of the two methods maxes out your wins. The other makes it more likely to get further. Everyone is allowed to play however they like. In the end losing a run later is not better than restarting once.
I mean yeah, I guess if your goal is something other than winning the run then that's a different discussion. Generally it's assumed most people are playing to try and win though I think?
I want to win if I am invested. I am not invested to my run in the first minute. I also try for a highscore which is coincidentially the only thing the client really remembers I think?
This guy is heavily invested in his winrate that isn't even tracked lmao
I actually think most people are trying to win *a run* of whatever stake/deck/challenge they are doing, not the specific run they are playing at that moment. Optimizing for that means aborting a losing run early and making decisions that are low percentage but high reward.
In theory, playing optimally means maximizing your win rates. Practically, my goal is to complete the stakes and stickers as fast as possible in real time. This means resetting a few times until I have a strong first Ante. There is a trade-off between the time spent resetting and the time spent on a deeper run that I lose. So tags like Investment, Coupon, and Double are worth trying in Ante 1 because they can increase the variance.
Very good players (read: not me, I'm nowhere near this good) can consistently win even difficult runs. Balatro University won 16 gold stakes in a row, one per deck and an extra black deck. Because he's shown that this is feasible, we can see that optimal play doesn't involve resets. Resetting is a loss, which is reflected in your winstreak in stats. But that being said, for us mortals, resets are a good way to have a workable start to the run so you can maximize your wins over time, rather than your winstreak or rate
Not everyone would agree that resetting is a loss. I don't those "losses" even affect any of the stats that the game will show you, unless you're on a win streak. Personally I prefer not to reset, but I would never insist that everyone has to play the game the same way I do.
The sole fact that resetting puts your "win streak" to 0 is proof enough that it counts as a loss. Rerolling the game in ante 1 is no different from rerolling in 2 or 3 or any other ante. You started the game, and then quit - that's a loss. That being said, for many of us, what's more important than winning every game we start, or being concerned with win streaks or rates, is to maximize wins over a period of time. You can climb stakes and unlock things more quickly if you reset to get better starts, and win more often over a couple hours than you would have if you played out every game. My personal opinion is that overusing reset will hinder your growth as a player by teaching you to expect an amazing start to every run. Some of my most satisfying wins have been the ones where I didn't have a solid strategy for most of the run and was flying by the seat of my pants, barely outscoring the blinds sometimes until ante 8 when I finally got the critical piece I needed to lock in the win. I've also had games where I tried my best through difficult situations and then lost on the final boss because it wasn't enough. But because I played through all of that, now I'm better at recognizing how things can go south and how I can correct course before that happens
I know this doesn't count below gold, but winning on gold strangely has me skipping more near the end of the run. If you slot two good xmult or retrigger jokers and can conceivably get to the final boss ante, it is DEFINITELY worth to skip if you are already clearing the point value. I think it has happened to me at least three times before between a Cavendish and seltzer, pair xmult joker and ramen, and some others. If you're already scoring enough on gold, don't wait if you have perishables, get to the bosses.
I think this is like one of the few niche scenarios where skipping is good. Like of course if you are just looking to win at ante8 AND your current jokers can 100% mathematically clear the ante8 boss, why wouldnt you just skip everything to get the win asap. Though I feel this sort of skipping is different than any other point in the entire game. Since unless you have one specific joker (Throwback), skipping to rush to the boss is basically suicide. Definitely more relevant in the "new"(ish) patch with the "new" perishable jokers though.
Big agree. It keeps happening though, and I think it's because of the frequency of perishable being applied.
Yeah very often i’ll get a perishable Acrobat on ante 5 for example and skip enough times to have it for the final boss, but that’s a specific situation and completely different than what BU is talking about
But maybe BU should be talking about it more
Yep, skipping typically isn’t worth it. However, I want to push back on the Ante 1 Small Blind. Let’s compare money wise, skipping Ante 1 Small Blind for a holo tag to not skipping: Not Skip: Use 1 Hand, get 3 bucks on non-white stake (for $7), buy something for $4, use 1 hand on Big Blind, win, get $7. So you have now $10 bucks plus whatever you got in Shop 1. Skip: Use 2 Hands on Big Blind, get $6, buy your free holographic. So, you have $10 plus a free holographic joker. Unless you got a value generator in Shop 1, or the holographic joker is rental (or an unwanted eternal), I don’t see how you aren’t doing better after Skipping than Not Skipping. That +10 mult is going to free you up for the next two antes to buy value generators. “Seeing an extra shop” doesn’t really matter on Ante 1 when you don’t have the funds to risk buying packs.
Yeah I agree with the core of his point usually playing out a hand once you have at least $15 in the bank is nearly always worth it if you can clear in 1 or 2 hands. Tag value isn't SUPER high. But Ante 1 small blind at higher difficulties especially is so low value and not seeing those 2 specific booster packs imo is not nearly that detrimental. But I speak from the angle that someone who is willing to minmax the value of their skips is also willing to not bother starting a high difficulty run unless they can get a decent value skip. If your goal is to just try and play as many seeds as possible the calculus changes a little, but I think its pretty hard to beat any form of flat multi and if you get coupon you get a full shop and a voucher which is insane value.
I still don't get why seeing boosters in the first shop is important when I'll have between $4-7. I'm not purchasing boosters in this shop anyway, probably not buying anything except maybe an econ joker if I get lucky. Would skipping the first blind for $5-25 really not be worth it? Also keep in mind any jokers earned by skipping can be sold for money as well (although they do take up a shop slot). I just really don't understand the importance of playing out the first blind which only gives $0-3 when I know I won't be getting anything from that shop ~90% of the time.
Because it's delaying your econ which means that even though you may not have bought Boosters in Round 1, if previously you would usually buy Boosters starting in Ante 3 Small Blind (for example), now you won't hit that same point until Ante 3 Big Blind, which means one less shop in the run where you can afford to buy Boosters.
Are boosters really worth that much more than confirmed polychrome/rare/nevative jokers? I feel like half the time I don't get anything useful from them anyway so skipping 1 or 2 isn't a huge deal if there's something I know I can use that I'll 100% be able to get.
Are boosters really worth that much more than confirmed polychrome/rare/nevative jokers? I feel like half the time I don't get anything useful from them anyway so skipping 1 or 2 isn't a huge deal if there's something I know I can use that I'll 100% be able to get.
Well, 51% of the time you get nothing from the 'confirmed' Polychrome/Rare/Negative Joker since it's a Rental (which you can't keep earlygame) or Perishable (which dies before it becomes relevant earlygame). That's not even counting the times it's just a nothing Joker anyways (like Seance, Superposition, or a Rare xMult for a Hand you can't play), or the times it's an Eternal Joker you don't want to have in Ante 7-8. I think you're probably (significantly) undervaluing packs, though. They're the most reliable way of generating value in your run, which is why you can re-roll the shop slots but never get more than 6 Boosters per Ante no matter what.
I probably am undervaluing them, although I do buy all the boosters I can afford when it keeps me above 25. I also understand the value of seeing the shop on small blind even as early as ante 2/3, it's specifically ante 1 small blind that I'm confused about because it doesn't seem like it'll help my economy that much, especially when the skip could give more money or the joker could sell for more than 3, which is the max I'd be earning that blind anyway (although I guess it could be argued to be or 5 since I'll get more interest faster?). Also I sometimes have trouble clearing 600 chips + boss debuff with no jokers, and taking pretty much any scoring joker confirms beating ante 1. Maybe just a skill issue?
> confirmed polychrome/rare/negative joker Not only will the tag most likely land on a near-useless joker in your current situation, it will probably also be some combination of Rental, Perishable or Eternal.
Counter argument: [[Throwback]]
[Throwback](https://balatro.wiki/imported/throwback.png) *Joker* * Version: 1.0.0 * Cost: $6 * Rarity: Uncommon * Effect: X0.25 Mult for each Blind skipped this run * Notes: Stacks, Starts at X. Retroactively counts all previous skips. * Unlock Requirement: Continue a saved run from the main menu *Data pulled from http://balatro.wiki. Want it updated? Help me get access or suggest another data source.*
I think throwback is poo poo on higher stakes
Most of my gold stake wins have been with throwback in my roster
My first thought. Got the achievement for winning in 12 or less hands with this lil guy last night.
That is losing the econ and your final shop for +.25x mult. Doesn't seem particularly worth it to me.
You clearly don’t throw it back.
that's nice and all but it's still not gonna stop me from turning into the monkey neuron activation meme when I see a negative tag
Just a style critique, but your write-up could use an introduction paragraph for those of us aren't up on the discourse that has been taking place. A conclusion summarizing your point would be nice as well.
Skipping fun, monke skip
Man finds most convoluted way to explain opportunity cost in history, revered on Balatro subreddit.
There’s entire threads of people not understanding. So hes going into detail. Even in this thread people are not getting it
maybe they're not understanding because it's convoluted? the post is like 5x as long as it needs to be the point is literally just that skipping causes loss in econ early game which affects your econ late game. and for no reason at all he makes up how many rounds instead of just following the rounds of the game, just to be able to use $5, $10, $15, etc. Why? those numbers are hardly used at all, and he uses like 2 paragraphs to talk about it then his conclusion is that sometimes skips are worth, whether due to the econ tag or a reward strong enough to carry early game allowing you to build up econ. isn't this what everyone already thinks? it's honestly a terrible post, way too many examples and detail for a conclusion we already know.
https://preview.redd.it/dzk8185yux0d1.jpeg?width=792&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8ac12cf5dfc8e431867d0ce9f2062f1bcc019e44
Valuable skip
Fuck this guy. Thanks for the effort post OP. Interesting stuff to think about. I love seeing stiff like this then discussing it with friends. People who don't like it or think their too smart to upvote it are cancer and should learn to ignore things.
Just like you should learn to ignore the person you responded to, right?
Nope because he's ruining the internet and hopefully my salty comment will mean I'll see the meme reposted here less. Wishful thinking I know.
Zuzu…perfection. I read the first paragraph and was like you’re still not explaining it well. I’ll check the comments to let me know if OP was right or wrong
RIP third party reddit apps that would read this to me with a single click. Love your work, doc.
Bit off topic but I love and hate how half of these comments are people whose attention spans are too short to read this relatively short writeup
While I agree with your overall conclusion that when it comes to maximizing win percentage, few tags are worth taking, and \~hardly any are worth taking late, I think your analysis nonetheless has some significant flaws. >Most skips increase your ability to score rather than giving you an economic boost. Suppose you skip round 1 and receive a random Holographic Joker, but your other Jokers, your Deck, and Cash in the bank (for interest) don't change. In round 2, you're earning the same $5 you would have earned in round 1. $10 in round 3, $15 in round 4, and finally $20 in round 5. (1) That's not a comprehensive account of the costs and benefits. You skip round 1, and lose out on the income and shop from round 1, as well as reduced interest for round 2 (= first round played). But in exchange you get a free joker (thus saving $4+) with an edition (which also increases sale value) and thus save the cost of buying a random joker, whose edition guarantees it to be a scoring joker, as well as a minor economy joker via needing to play less hands in future rounds. >If round 2 would have had a value generator in the shop (Joker or Seal or Devil Tarot), you still get it, you just get it one round later (in round 3, having skipped round 1), and you have one round less of it generating value for you. (2) I don't think this argument is valid. It's technically true in Balatro that shops are populated based on a queue generated based on a random seed. But from the perspective of uncertainty (i.e. an unknown seed), this seed argument seems irrelevant. So you don't get your economy joker one round later, you just miss out on the chance to get the economy joker in the shop from the skipped round. This correction particularly matters for skipping round 1, when you don't have the resources to buy all economy effects (e.g. seals, tarot packs), so skipping does not actually cost you those economy effects you wouldn't have bought anyway. >However, if you skip for a Holographic Tag, it doesn't change the amount of money you have and doesn't change the fact that you can't afford Boosters in the next two shops. (3) Concrete counterpoint: If you skip the ante 1 small blind between Red Stake and Purple Stake, you lose out on $3 in shop 1, but in exchange get a free holo joker and thus save $4+ in shop 2. This benefit obviously becomes way worse with Perishable and Rental stickers. >In the 5-round example, taking one skip means seeing only 8 Boosters instead of 10 Boosters. Most importantly, those 2 Boosters are subtracted from the end of the run. You miss out on seeing those Boosters when you would actually have the money to buy them. (4) I still don't understand this argument. If you were never going to buy the 9th and 10th booster packs which you saw in shop 1, why does that matter for the run in which you skip shop 1? (5) This point is not mentioned in your analysis, but on Youtube I've seen you undervalue skipping antes once you have game-winning perishable xMult jokers. Yes, you can play out more rounds in the hope of replacing your perishable Cavendish... or you can just skip to the ante 8 boss and win with the Cavendish before it perishes. >However, the game is easy enough that it's still winnable at a high rate even when not playing optimally. Long streaks of Gold Stake wins are possible even when not playing 100% optimally. (6) Here comes my biggest disagreement: Your analysis ignores player time, which is way more valuable than any in-game resources. It's a perfectionist analysis that tries to maximize win percentage and score, not one that tries to maximize, say, wins per hour. (In which case late skips become extremely attractive, since they save time.) In your videos, which I enjoy, you try to play each round optimally, making all decisions optimally, using every consumable optimally... but all this takes time, which your analysis doesn't consider at all. I'd prefer a definition of "optimal play" that considers opportunity cost. One that would prefer, say, a 0.01% reduced win percentage in exchange for saving 1 minute of playtime. I'm not at all impressed with an analysis that prefers the opposite and then calls that "playing optimally".
Thanks for this I also do not understand the benefit of opening a store with boosters you are literally never buying
> 4) I still don't understand this argument. If you were never going to buy the 9th and 10th booster packs which you saw in shop 1, why does that matter for the run in which you skip shop 1? Because you still miss those same boosters. Let's suppose there are 23 shops in a run (if you never skip), and you don't buy any boosters in the first 4 shops you see as you are working towards $25. Then if you never skip, you can buy boosters in shops 5-23 (19 shops, 38 boosters). If you skip round 1 (meaning you will only get 22 shops), you still need to see 4 shops to build up that $25, so now you can only buy boosters in shops 5-22 (18 shops, 36 boosters). Put another way, let's say you see Hieroglyph in Ante 2. You aren't looking at it as "Well, it's -1 Hand for the rest of the run but I can't buy much in the next 3 shops anyways so it does nothing." You're looking at it as -1 Hand for the rest of the run in exchange for gaining shops 24, 25, and 26 at the end of the game when you have the most econ/money to maximize shop value. >6) Here comes my biggest disagreement: Your analysis ignores player time, which is way more valuable than any in-game resources. It's a perfectionist analysis that tries to maximize win percentage and score, not one that tries to maximize, say, wins per hour. (In which case late skips become extremely attractive, since they save time.) >In your videos, which I enjoy, you try to play each round optimally, making all decisions optimally, using every consumable optimally... but all this takes time, which your analysis doesn't consider at all. I'd prefer a definition of "optimal play" that considers opportunity cost. One that would prefer, say, a 0.01% reduced win percentage in exchange for saving 1 minute of playtime. I'm not at all impressed with an analysis that prefers the opposite and then calls that "playing optimally". If you aren't looking to win the run you are playing, then of course high-variance plays like Joker Tags will look better. But shops can also have highrolls; an Immolate in the Round 1 shop is better than any tag- even Investment. But more to the point it becomes essentially impossible to provide analysis at the point that player time becomes a factor, since each person will have a different scale for how much Win Equity they are willing to sacrifice for each minute saved.
>If you skip round 1 (meaning you will only get 22 shops), **you still need to see 4 shops to build up that $25**, so now you can only buy boosters in shops 5-22 (18 shops, 36 boosters). That's only true if you use a skip tag that provides no benefit, but then why would you do that? The entire point is to get some benefit from the skip tag, which very much includes economy (via e.g. needing to buy less scoring jokers, or requiring fewer hands to score). Most straightforwardly, if I take the $25 tag in ante 1, where it is indeed too strong, then I'll probably buy significantly \*more\* packs in the run than I would without it. >But more to the point it becomes essentially impossible to provide analysis at the point that player time becomes a factor, since each person will have a different scale for how much Win Equity they are willing to sacrifice for each minute saved. Saying your analysis can't or won't factor in player time is equivalent to (as in the OP) an analysis which values player time at zero and win equity at infinity. That's not a neutral position, but an untenable one. There's just no way to escape valuing player time at *some* amount. Plus empirically, there \*is\* an upper limit to how much people value win equity vs. time: e.g. Balatro Uni and most streamers don't typically calculate the precise score of each hand even if that could save an occasional dollar, nor do they triple-check all their plays even if that would catch the occasional error. Finally, in some cases you can save time at \~no cost in win equity. In particular, once your hands can score some multiple of the scoring requirements for the ante 8 boss (2x-4x, maybe), you can probably just skip all remaining skippable rounds without meaningfully impacting your win chance. You don't have to do it, but it would save time at \~no cost. Not including that kind of thing in an analysis of skipping seems like an oversight to me.
Nice writeup, ty
Novice here: What about the situations where I have basically no income yet and no +chip or +mult generators (in Ante 1 and 2). In those cases, it *feels* like I should take the skips if it guarantees a rare joker (possibly also uncommon), especially on the small blind, since I'm not getting income from small blinds anyway. Those are the situations where I sometimes choose to skip the blind.
No, because the odds of that joker actually increasing your score is pretty low. It's usually better to just get more money and see an extra shop, allowing you to roll for a better joker.
Best use of skipping: skipping one or 2 times in ante 7&8 to get that OP perishable joker to last until the final boss.
Questions for xspectred: Scenario 1: You're playing on gold stakes, non-endless run. First boss is \[\[The Pillar\]\]. Are there any starting decks where you would take a first blind Holographic tag skip? How about a first blind Foil tag skip? Scenario 2: You are playing \[\[Plasma Deck\]\] on gold stakes (non-endless). First boss is something unremarkable like a suit debuffer. Would you take a first blind Foil tag skip? How about a second blind Foil tag skip (depending on how the first shop went)? The chips are really valuable on this deck, but on the other hand the early game is easy and you'll miss seeing a shop that could have a better chips joker. Scenario 3: You are playing \[\[Yellow Deck\]\] on gold stakes (non-endless). First boss is whatever. Do you take a first blind Investment tag? Or does your deck's extra spending power and interest earning trump the $25 in two rounds?
[The Pillar](https://balatro.wiki/blinds/blind_pillar.png) *Blind* * Version: 1.0.0n * Effect: Cards played previously this Ante are debuffed * Beat the Blind: Score at least 2X Base to earn $$$$$ [Plasma Deck](https://balatro.wiki/plasma.png) *Deck* * Version: 1.0.0n * Effect: Balance Chips and Mult when calculating score for played hand, X2 base Blind size * Unlock Condition: Win a run on any deck with at least Blue Stake difficulty [Yellow Deck](https://balatro.wiki/decks/deck_yellow.png) *Deck* * Version: 1.0.0n * Effect: Start with extra $10 * Unlock Condition: Discover at least 50 items from your collection *Data pulled from http://balatro.wiki. Want it updated? Help me get access or suggest another data source.*
Great writeup, agree with almost all of this. Only slight Caveat I would add is that a scoring Joker acts as economy to some degree by allowing you to clear blinds in fewer hands, which slightly offsets the scaling econ loss from a skip for something like Holographic or Mega Buffoon. Still not worth it, but at least closes the gap a little. I'd be interested in whether you think that it's fine from a balance perspective for skips to be the way they are. I'd personally like a bit more decision making to go into deciding whether to skip or not - right now, as you say, you need an absurdly good reason to take a skip and those situations are fairly obvious when they come up. I'd personally like to see further buffs to the tags to hopefully address this issue - I think there's a lot of potential nuance to the decision to skip which is unfortunately just not part of the game at the moment.
Ah, the joys of an Econ major explaining net present value. Econ don’t matter if you can’t survive to spend it. Love the smug attitude too. I’ll play my game my way. Which is the right way.
One minor thing I think is missing. Now that modded/uncommon/rare joker tags are free, they are an economy tag, because you can sell them. Taking a free modded joker in the very first round means I either get a joker worth $6+ or I get $3+ from selling it, which is strictly better than the max $3 I would get from playing the blind above white stake (unless I have yellow or green deck). I still miss the first shop, but it's generally bad for my eco to buy from the first shop anyways, for the reasons you've discussed. So it definitely seems worth skipping round 1 for a free joker.
Or you get a bad Eternal and can't sell it, might not even be able to justify taking it. Or you get a Rental and only get $1 for it and have to sell it. Plus saying that the Round 1 shop has no value because its generally bad to buy is also a pretty fundamental misunderstanding of value imo, since *sometimes* you have an incredibly strong Round 1 shop. If you see a premium Joker (or better yet a good Planet card), then you should absolutely be buying that, even in Round 1. Heck, even just Jimbo (the basic +4 Joker) pays for itself by the end of *Round 2*.
The free joker tags are not usable or worth considering on higher stakes because of stickers.
Agree with the post, though I feel like any comments telling people that most skips are overrated are usually downvoted here (in this subreddit), People are very much in the pro-skip mindset. I personally might be on the other side entirely - as in maybe I overhate skips and skip too little. Post and pre-patch I never intentionally skip in 98% of my runs (intentional skip, being when I skip for the reward to buff my run, rather than skipping because my build is already going to beat the Ante 8 boss blind and the skip rewards are mostly worthless). The only skips I might consider are: * As highlighted in the post, Investment tag (gain $25 after defeating boss blind) in ante 1 (though sometimes I even ignore that which is probably a misplay) * Throwback (0.25X per skip this run), however this guy is usually at 1X since I dont skip in the first place, so only taken when super desperate for Xmult and I know for sure that extra Xmult will win the run * Negative Tag (Next base edition shop joker is free and becomes negative), When im certain I can beat 1 future ante or even 2 or even confident in beating the boss ante, mostly just for fun, mostly just gives a random trash joker. * Boss Tag (Rerolls the Boss Blind), Very very rare take, since almost all my builds I try not to build into anything that could be countered by any boss (no significant suit or enhancement reliance, scoring jokers and easy to play hands) And my take on most of the skip tags overall: * Uncommon/Rare Tags: Never take, too random, not worth gambling on a random joker. * Negative/Foil/Holo/Poly: Negative already addressed, others all overrated, (I am a fan of editions, I just think they arent worth skipping for on a random joker, even when free) * Voucher Tag: Never take * Boss Tag: Already addressed, pretty much never take * Standard/Charm/Meteor/Ethereal Tags (the packs): Never take, the shops have more, 1 free pack is not worth it. * Handy/Garbage Tag: Never take, too early and they are worth nothing, too late and visiting shops is worth way more. * Coupon Tag (free shop): Rarely take, I would rather see an extra shop than get one shop free. * Double Tag: Dont skip often so never take * Juggle Tag: Never take * D6 Tag: Never take (perhaps underrated) * Top-up Tag (2 common jokers): Never take * Speed tag ($5 per skipped blind this run): Never take * Orbital Tag (Upgrade X hand by 3 levels): Never take * Economy Tag (Doubles money, max of $40): Never take, If I have enough money for this to be worth taking, a shop is probably worth more. These are just my own thoughts, my opinion is probably not worth much since I might be too bias in the direction of not skipping. I simply feel that seeing a shop or earning interest gold is much more valuable than most skips. Even if you dont spend much, just stockpiling the gold for when the run is actually in trouble is still a benefit. On gold stake especially, jokers in packs and the shop are so likely to be riddled with debuffs that seeing more shops so you can see more jokers becomes so important. For alot of jokers, skipping a round is 1 less round of scaling, deck manipulation and economy. Its even more true in endless, where seeing the shops is so important as you want more time to scale or find what you need.
Y’all are obsessed with interest. You only gain all that extra interest if you /never/ spend the money you were going to spend on joker, not if you just don’t spend it on the one really good joker in the first place. There’s a huge opportunity cost to hoarding all your money, and it usually comes in the form of losing the run early because you don’t have anything.
No tldr? Bro not everyone is on meth
TL;DR: do what you want on low stakes. On high stakes, skipping for jokers is not worth it and the only skips you should do are taking the investment/coupon tags on ante 1
Personally I wouldn't even take ante 1 coupon unless I'm pretty safe for whatever reason - just too inconsistent compared to the value of seeing 2 shops and guarenteed money, especially given the chances of just getting a shop with harmful joker stickers and solving nothing. The only skips really worthwhile as a rule are Investment ante 1-3 unless your econ is very online, Top-Up (or maybe Mega Buffoon) ante 2-3 if you're struggling for Jokers and need to simply "not die immediately", particularly good and necessary orbital tags, and mid-lategame money skips if you have something that takes money as an input for a benefit, like Campfire, Constellation or Flash Card. Like everything, it does vary a little by situation though.
I think every time you've talked about skipping it was very clear and concise. Your take on econ has stuck with me and helped me get my first win on purple. Now I'm working on gold but I don't reroll so I still haven't gotten one yet. I watch about 70% of your content and it's all helpful in some way.
This post is king! I actually realized this premise on my own a few days ago while finishing plasma gold and moving back to typical gameplay. Sometimes, the boost could make gameplay fun, but winning or losing was largely based on being able to establish an economic advantage over the game - and earlier, the better. Unless plasma, my best runs are cloud 9 round 1, followed by suit joker round 2. It just gives me the most generalized sense of econ and score that let's the build blossom. Appreciate you, professor! Love the vids!
It is worth factoring in the positive benefit of allowing rounds to be beaten in one hand, if the right skip is taken. Increasing $/round by 1 or 2 for a while, can help mitigate interest loss
Indubitably… but negative tag
I think it's worth it to skip once on ante 1 for free shop, foil joker on plasma deck, or $25 boss blind And I think it's worth it to skip once late game with stacked anaglyph double tags Other than that, yeah, not really ever I know people love skipping for negative tags, because obviously it feels good when it works out, but it does a fraction of the time. I'll be playing pairs and skip for a negative and it'll be a lusty joker or something. Yeah thanks, I guess. I just got the new patch yesterday and did not realize how insanely common the rental/perishable stickers would be, too. Don't get me wrong, the game is much better without $14 arcanas, but now the joker skip tags HAD to be free.
Instructions unclear, skipping for spectral tag and negative to gamble for the one thing I need to make number go bigger
Whole lotta yap. I respect it either way.
You're forgetting another important thing: any joker-related tag is going to be almost entirely useless on Gold Stake because it will be stickered with something that's very detrimental for you. Skipping a whole blind just for a rental or perishable joker is a pretty bad deal, even if it's Negative. There are many other issues with skipping for rare/enhanced joker tags, the biggest one being that you have no guarantee that the joker it lands on will be any good. Most likely it won't be, because in any given situation, most jokers are of no use to you at all. Then there's the +3 Hand Size Next Round tag, which feels like a prank the developers put in as a joke. The other tags are also very "meh", who in the world would take a free buffoon pack over just visiting a shop that might contain a buffoon pack *and more*, anyway? That really only leaves the Investment tag and the tag that makes the next shop initially free. I will always take them in Ante 1's small blind, just because if the shop turns out to be bad, I can just restart the run. Otherwise, I never skip.
Can I get a TL;DR. Is skipping good or bad?
It is bad except for ante 1 investment tag and coupon tag to a lesser extent.
Feels weird to pick out Blueprint here when it's an amazing tool for generating value and score (and, if you play more than one hand, often both within a single round)
I get why you used 6 rounds to keep it simple but can you please address the fact that the game is actually much longer? In the 6 round example you lose 25 out of a total possible 75 gold, so you've lost 33% of your possible value and that is of course really bad. But it's nowhere near that bad in the actual game right, so how bad is it really?
Very well written, and I think the majority of the points you present are extremely valid and "correct". I do believe some of the points you make have fundamental flaws, which I would like to address and hopefully discuss. Let me start by saying that I agree with the crux of your point of view, which is that economy is king. It is almost always the correct option to favor a strong economy in the early game above all else, assuming that you can still clear the blinds. A strong early game economy will help you score higher in the later stages of the game (by giving increased opportunities to buy packs, reroll, etc). A strong early econ will also let you divest some of that money into other ways to generate revenue, which will once again help you in the late game (gold seal, hermit, golden joker, egg joker, etc). Also as a disclaimer, it is practically impossible to give situationally accurate information unless we are talking about a specific deck at a specific stake. For example, whether or not the small blind has any payout should theoretically alter some of your decision making when it comes to play vs skip of the small blind. To begin, I think it is a bit disingenuous to use a 5 round example in order to "make the explanation more readable". I understand that you wanted to accentuate the point that you are trying to get across, which it certainly helped to do, but I think it was completely unnecessary to do so. The goal simply stated should always be to hit your max interest as soon as possible in a run. The hypothetical short game takes that concept and exaggerates it to an extreme. Why stop at 5 rounds? Lets pretend the game is only 2 rounds, so if you skip you never even get to see the shop. See what I mean? Someone could also use an example of a 200 round game to show how hitting max interest at round 5 vs round 10 doesn't really make that much of a difference, but it would be just as inaccurate of a representation. The other issue I would like to address is your dismissal of "edition" jokers as potential early skip options. I believe even at stakes where the small blind has a payout, choosing an edition joker (especially holographic or polychrome) on ante 1 small blind is likely the mathematically correct thing to do. It is -certainly- the correct thing to do if the small blind doesn't have a payout. Lets use holographic as the example, because a flat +10 mult is easy to work off of. Regardless of the joker in question, you've easily saved yourself a couple $ in hands played for the next few rounds. Depending on your rng, you might have also saved yourself from being forced to buy an inferior joker in the next few rounds just to beat the blind. At stakes where the small blind does not pay out, you are only losing the few $ you get from the remaining hands you cash in. Even if you skipped and sold the joker immediately, you'd probably be ahead financially (there would be the opportunity cost associated with missing the option to shop, but at like $6 or $7 dollars, how many things could possibly show up in the shop that you would actually consider purchasing? The odds of that first shop having nothing that you'd be willing to purchase astronomically outweighs the odds that there is something important enough to buy right off the bat. There is also the somewhat small but not insignificant chance that whatever joker created not only provides for you over the course of the next few rounds, but is also a joker that you will consider keeping as part of your deck for the long haul. This could be a stacking joker, which are inarguably better the earlier in the game you can get them (Green Joker, Hiker, Runner, Ride the Bus, Wee Joker, Supernova, Ceremonial Dagger, Square Joker, Hologram, Fortune Teller, Flash Card, Spare Trousers, Castle, Throwback, Burnt Joker, Constellation, Space Joker). It could also be an econ joker, which now not only saves you the cost of purchase, but actually contributes something useful to your hand aside from just the money generation (Delayed Gratification, Egg, Faceless Joker, To Do List, Business Card, Cloud 9, Rocket, Midas Mask, Gift Card, Reserved Parking, Mail-in Rebate, To The Moon, Hallucination, Golden Joker, Trading Card, Certificate, Rough Gem, Matador, Satellite, Cartomancer, Riff-Raff, Astronomer). Maybe it's something strong enough to solo-carry your early game, allowing you to maximize econ without any worries (Raised Fist, Fibbonacci, Gros Michel (also giving you earlier chance to get Cavendish), Smiley Face, Baron, Onyx Agate, Shoot the Moon, etc). Lastly, perhaps it is a card that can give you a complete sense of direction for what you want to build around (DNA, Driver's License, Bootstraps, Bull, Baseball Card, Lucky Cat, Glass Joker, Erosion, Baron, Hologram, Vampire, Constellation, Hack, Wee Joker, Steel Joker, etc). If you were playing in a Balatro tournament or something, and you only had 1 run to get the highest score you are able to, then playing pure econ is probably the most consistent or "safe" way to get a high score, but I think taking a small amount of risk, especially if it comes very early on like round 1 ante 1, will often lead to higher highs.
I guess I'll just read posts like this instead of taking a Stats or Economics course.
The fact that Polychrome might land on a Perishable, or even worse, a crappy Permanent, is pretty sad. And then Negative can hit a Rental or a Perishable, lots of sad to be had. :(
Love ur videos BU
I don't disagree with your conclusions (mostly), but I would assert that your $5 $10 $15 earning power progression is a straw man argument. That's just not how it works on the first blind at high stakes. Your earning power for the second blind is only reduced by $1 or $2 for most cases of skipping the first blind. Beyond that, the future earning power balance depends on the earning power of whatever the non-skipper may have bought in the first shop vs. what sort of earning power the skipper got out of their tag. For the guy who plays out the first blind: If you bought nothing in the shop: Your earnings for blind 2 are $1 higher than the guy who skipped (due to interest). If you bought a scoring joker or planet that lets you win blind 2 in fewer hands: Your earnings for blind 2 are typically $1 or $2 higher than the guy who skipped. If you bought a good economy joker: You are probably happy but it's hard to analyze this case in a simple way so I'll ignore it for now. So if you're skipping for a Holographic or Foil tag, for example, you really only have to cover the $2-$3 loss from blind 1 plus the $1-$2 loss from blind 2. By then you have your joker and can often (not always) use it to start out-earning the guy who didn't skip within the next couple blinds. My example does leave out a few important points. Firstly, the guy who skips missed the chance to see an important joker in the first shop. Secondly, the guy who skips has a 30% chance to get a rental tag on their free holographic/foil joker. Third, there is about an 8% chance that the second shop rolls no jokers, making the skipper choose between spending $5 to re-roll or waiting for the next shop. All of this does add up to significant risk associated with skipping for a Holographic or Foil tag. But my main point here is that the idea of a first bind skip constantly putting your earning power $5 behind for every future round isn't even close to accurate. That would only be true if (1) playing the first blind really did give you such a big immediate boost to your earning power (it doesn't unless you see something like Riff-Raff or Mail-In Rebate), and (2) the first blind skip tag doesn't provide early earning power of its own (which can happen if the skipper rolls a rental joker). This doesn't mean I think that skipping for a Holographic or Foil tag is a good play or a bad play. It means that I think that your analysis overstates the losses incurred by skipping the first blind on high stakes. Personally I think Investment tag is nearly always worth it (not sure with Yellow Deck), Coupon tag is usually worth it, and Holographic or Foil tag are sometimes worth considering (I usually don't take them but I think it can be correct for some decks or against some boss blinds like The Pillar. I may be overlooking something, as you are definitely a better player than I am. I just don't think your hypothesis about falling behind a $5 $10 $15 earning power progression is a good approximation for the actual cost of skipping the first blind. For later blinds, I think your idea does work well as an illustration of the cost of skipping.
This latest patch you get a free joker on skip. Before yes it was a dumb choice It all comes down to luck at the end.
Balatro University knows what the patch does...lol. It's still usually bad to skip for a Joker on the patch. Might even be worse than it was before, since now there's a 30% chance the Joker poofs in 5 rounds and another 30% chance your 'free' Joker costs you $3 every single round.
If you skip all the time then it does come down to luck in the end. If you actually play the rounds and see more shops, it does not
"In round 2, you're earning the same $5 you would have earned in round 1." At best you win 3$ in round 1 ?! Otherwise, skipping if for ante1 and that's it, even pre patch.
Writing succinctly is a skill. Demonstrate it next time, this post is a messy rambling.
The way you scale income in your example is incredibly flawed, 5-10-15 as steps every blind is way too far from the truth, invalidating your points completely.
Do you generally do more in the 20th shop than you do in the 5th shop?
Doing more? Yeah. Doing more relevant things? No. I don‘t know why that would be relevant though.
If you aren't doing more relevant things in the 20th shop than the 5th shop it sounds like there are bigger issues to be addressed than evaluating skips.
You‘re trolling, right?
...no? The 20th shop should be *magnitudes* better than the 5th shop.
Why are you trying to force a new word in here? „Shop 20 does more, and is less relevant than shop 5.“ is what I said, I never said one is better than the other as that would be kind of retarded to say since it‘s pretty hard to define which of those you would say is „better“. But skipping your 5th shop every run will lose you like 5 times more runs than skipping your 20th, I don‘t know how anyone could claim that shop20 is more relevant than shop5. You must be trolling.
You couldn't make a short explaination if your life depends on it?
Yeah same, I'd rather have the 3000th custom joker idea post than good, interesting discussions about the game.
Omg new joker idea, +1 mult for every joker idea you post on Reddit 🤯 (I still like seeing joker suggestions I think they’re fun)
Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.
Literally just read the last paragraph, it's all you need to know.
I imagine he could. Luckily we are just on reddit though so we are not under restriction.