How to Play a High Card Build in Balatro: Is it Viable?

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  • čas přidán 15. 07. 2024
  • High Card builds in Balatro are one of the most consistent and powerful ways to play the game. In today's high card tutorial, we go over the mechanics of a Balatro high card build including when to play it, how to play it, and what you should be looking for to make it successful.
    00:00 High Card Builds
    1:00 Three Keys to High Card Builds
    5:16 Playing a High Card Build Run
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Komentáře • 88

  • @ZainoTVLive
    @ZainoTVLive  Před 3 měsíci +9

    What build do you guys want a video on next?!

    • @andrewelkins6734
      @andrewelkins6734 Před 3 měsíci +6

      I've been trying to get a straight build going for a while and I never draw what I need! How do I know what to keep and what to toss in a straight build?

    • @ZainoTVLive
      @ZainoTVLive  Před 3 měsíci +5

      @@andrewelkins6734 This is going to be the toughest one to do, as I rarely get them online. However, I'll look into what is most optimal for the straight build!

    • @Thush007
      @Thush007 Před 3 měsíci

      It would be great to get a video on the best joker combinations please.

    • @askthepizzaguy
      @askthepizzaguy Před 3 měsíci +2

      four of a kind, which of course, is really asking about five of a kind at some point but you cant start off building five of a kind.

    • @gsofficial
      @gsofficial Před 3 měsíci +1

      Honestly, you are titling these videos as if they were guides, but they're just you giving a cursory summary of the topic and then the rest is just you playing a run.

  • @ManuBeker2
    @ManuBeker2 Před 3 měsíci +16

    Splash is also a FANTASTIC card for this build. You get high card but every card scores in a 5 card hand

    • @HavidadGaibey
      @HavidadGaibey Před měsícem +1

      Cant believe I never thought to use that in this context.

  • @jeang6588
    @jeang6588 Před 3 měsíci +11

    One thing very specific to this video is that Blueprint can actually copy Burglar! So if before selecting Blind you move blueprint around, you actually get +6 hands. Great for economy, or supernova.

  • @jrzee
    @jrzee Před 3 měsíci +22

    I spent multiple hours yesterday trying to get away from 5 played card builds (flush, flush 5, flush house) and couldn't really get anything going.
    I'll be keeping this as reference for today!

    • @tarriochu95
      @tarriochu95 Před 28 dny

      If you are lucky enough to find Double pair pants, you are in for a ride, i got that as my first card early and the run was insane. 4 card build basically

  • @expsharevideogames
    @expsharevideogames Před 3 měsíci +45

    Burnt Joker is ideal for a high card build imo. It is absolutely insane

    • @ZainoTVLive
      @ZainoTVLive  Před 3 měsíci +17

      100% another good point that I should have mentioned.

    • @benjaminjameskreger
      @benjaminjameskreger Před 3 měsíci +2

      That's how I did my first gold run except with pairs instead of high card. I still ran green joker because the one discard is still a net positive but searching for pairs with limited resources did lock me out of the bus and stuntman; wouldn't suggest it without hunting down square joker for chips.

    • @slmjkdbtl
      @slmjkdbtl Před 3 měsíci +2

      burnt + blueprint + brainstorm

    • @Permafrost1
      @Permafrost1 Před 3 měsíci

      Which is why it got bumped up to rare

    • @Wollemby
      @Wollemby Před 2 měsíci

      true i recently won a gold stake (blue deck) with burnt joker, playing only high card

  • @Nayson
    @Nayson Před 3 měsíci +6

    High Card builds can also be thought of as letting the Jokers score all the points. You can get it so that it’s possible to score tens of thousands if you only play debuffed cards on a boss round.

  • @Dookstone
    @Dookstone Před 3 měsíci +9

    Love me a good build guide! What Jokers and what consumables to look for to craft your deck are super helpful to keep in mind when you're learning a specific build type.

  • @markfowlermusic
    @markfowlermusic Před 2 dny +1

    Honestly if you get burnt joker fairly early there’s no reason to go with anything but high card. I’ve played almost 200 hours of balatro on ps5, I started out just doing flush runs and straight runs and mainly full houses as I found them fun, now after lots of experience and getting high stakes on all decks, black deck was pure RNG and luck on higher stakes though, I can easily say the game is almost 100% winnable with just concentrating on high card only. There’s no real reason to pick any other hands to concentrate on, I feel the game maybe needs an update to sort this out, for experienced players picking anything other than high card seems pointless to me, simply won’t be as effective, your tier list video also proves this.

  • @doublehh1674
    @doublehh1674 Před 3 měsíci +7

    One key strength of the high card strats is that you dont need consumables. Meaning that you can skip planet and arcana packs giving more money too look for jokers

    • @ZainoTVLive
      @ZainoTVLive  Před 3 měsíci +3

      100% I mean I still think grabbing Plutos are worth it, but other than that you can focus on just getting the needed joker set up

    • @doublehh1674
      @doublehh1674 Před 3 měsíci +5

      It depends Pluto's from the main shop are a definite grab, but 9$ pack Pluto's are not that worth as it's only around 1.5 square joker procs of chips and a single hand played of mult, assuming you use buss/green etc

    • @jessevandendoren
      @jessevandendoren Před 3 měsíci

      @@ZainoTVLive What about steel cards? Especially with Baron isn't it nice to make steel kings?

  • @ZaneDidIt
    @ZaneDidIt Před 3 měsíci +1

    I’ve been trying to make some high card builds for gold stakes so this video is perfect man! Thanks dude

  • @HanDeHanDieHanHeet
    @HanDeHanDieHanHeet Před 3 měsíci +1

    been stuck at some of the higher blinds due to the difficulty of hitting large hands, really didnt stop to give high card a honest chance due to closemindedness. thanks for clearing up the clouds, you helped me see the light. value is everywhere if u know where to look

  • @seth009eg
    @seth009eg Před 3 měsíci +4

    Thanks for this video, I won my first ever high card run after watching it. The jokers I used were all different from yours (except for supernove), but I liked the idea of having jokers for different functions and I tried and managed to do that. Shows how versatile the game is

    • @ZainoTVLive
      @ZainoTVLive  Před 3 měsíci +2

      Awesome! What jokers did you end up with?

    • @seth009eg
      @seth009eg Před 3 měsíci

      @@ZainoTVLive Perkeo, Marble joker, Raised fist, Supernova, Steel joker and blackboard with telescope and observatory. Many negative copies of pluto = profit

  • @nicholaspaton6834
    @nicholaspaton6834 Před 2 měsíci +1

    I know this is an older vid (3w old at time of commenting) but I want you to know you're the best content creator when it comes to Balatro right now. I got the game 2 nights ago and I've been HOOKED. Your tips have been a great help. Keep on, bro. Much love.

  • @idemiik574
    @idemiik574 Před 3 měsíci +2

    Good video my man!

  • @ConradParadox
    @ConradParadox Před 2 měsíci +1

    Great video! Thx!

  • @kenz6502
    @kenz6502 Před 7 dny +1

    Love you man

  • @LouisZephyr
    @LouisZephyr Před 2 měsíci +3

    good info it really helps out, as a newer player i don't know half the cards/jokers you're talking about at the beginning, could you put an image or something on screen when you mention them? keep it up

  • @terrydactyl2077
    @terrydactyl2077 Před 3 měsíci +2

    Defs gonna be interesting now with blue seals buff!

  • @rampdavidson6397
    @rampdavidson6397 Před měsícem +1

    I only had about an hour of time with this game before I won my first run, kinda accidentally. I pulled a Splash and Green joker and just kinda stumbled into a high card build

  • @Ghost.girI.
    @Ghost.girI. Před 3 měsíci +8

    I like that high card is viable and strong but I think it might be too strong. I do think that if high card was ever the most viable strategy it means that something's wrong with the game because it takes a lot of the skill, and decision making out of the game and it ends up revolving around only the jokers you get at that point.

    • @ZainoTVLive
      @ZainoTVLive  Před 3 měsíci +4

      I don't disagree with this, and I often have a rule on my streams that for high stakes run, I only do high card after x-attempts because its frankly kinda boring and a crutch. We will see what this massive patch changes in the game, I'm excited for it.

    • @doublehh1674
      @doublehh1674 Před 3 měsíci +1

      its not that high card is strong per se its that all other builds are inconsistent, you get way more easy value out of a 5oak build same with straights etc.. its just that high card is the most consistent, and probably will always be as not needing to draw specific hands means that bad rng will never kill you, its also most resistant to all boss variants

    • @andrewg3196
      @andrewg3196 Před 3 měsíci +2

      Yeah difficulty in this game is done completely backwards. Every restriction as you get to higher stakes takes away your ability to make decisions. I think instead they should give you more hands, more rerolls etc but raise the point thresholds a lot to make things more difficult. This way the difficulty goes up but you compensate for it by understanding the game better and making better decisions.

    • @ThaFritz
      @ThaFritz Před 3 měsíci

      It depends how you play, high card doesnt last long in endless, i enjoy trying to make the pivot happen at the right time with the right pace while using high card to secure enough points. Having said that, with baron and mime it is one of the strongest builds out there and i do hope for some change to the flow while leaving high card useful in some way

    • @andrewg3196
      @andrewg3196 Před 3 měsíci +2

      @@ThaFritz lol at "high card doesn't last long in endless". High card Mime Baron is the best endless build.

  • @terrydactyl2077
    @terrydactyl2077 Před 3 měsíci +1

    Thanks for making this! I was just asking you for it and here it is! It just for me wasn’t it? Coz I’m so special and cool?! Right?!?!

  • @prodbyANT
    @prodbyANT Před měsícem +1

    High card build with a few stone cards and some insane multipliers got me my first win, and now I wanna take it further. I'm not satisfied with beating the 100k boss, I need to score numbers no human being can even fathom.

  • @Rikolus8383
    @Rikolus8383 Před 3 dny +1

    I had to laugh, in two weeks of playing I have tried Wheel of Fortune at least half dozen times. Each time: NOPE. Nice to know it can work.....

  • @klaytontichenor7412
    @klaytontichenor7412 Před 2 měsíci +2

    9:10 Best Part 😩

  • @samuelgoodall8577
    @samuelgoodall8577 Před 3 měsíci +1

    Largely agree with this - ideally probably play even a little slower to get a bit more mult on supernova.
    I skip on celestial packs more when I am doing high card, saving my money for rerolls and jokers. Telescope makes it a bit better but wouldn’t use it if it took me under interest cap.

  • @saltysnake8523
    @saltysnake8523 Před 3 měsíci +3

    Wish I had that much luck with my Jokers on my runs. You killed it though, great guide.

    • @ZainoTVLive
      @ZainoTVLive  Před 3 měsíci

      Yeah it was kinda a silly good run with jokers.

    • @davidsass4859
      @davidsass4859 Před 2 měsíci +1

      Gotta remember these guys have hundreds of hours and have played thousands of runs. Sometimes you just get everything you need and sometimes you don’t get crap

  • @NubTactics
    @NubTactics Před 3 měsíci +3

    One of the things that also empowers high card builds is, perhaps counterintuitively, the lack of initial scoring power.
    A lot of scaling jokers require you to play hands to get the full benefit (square joker, the ones you mentioned in video). The weakness to that, naturally, is that if youre winning rounds in a minimal number of hands, you only scale those jokers by 1 per round.
    So a sort of hidden strength to high card build is that youre spending hands (1 dollar, you could say) as a resource to buff your scaling jokers by 1 mult at a time, which is very easy to do consistenly when high card doesnt score much and thus allows you to win in 3-4 hands as opposed to just 1

    • @ZainoTVLive
      @ZainoTVLive  Před 3 měsíci

      Very well articulated, I should have mentioned that in the video but you put it together really well.

    • @benjaminjameskreger
      @benjaminjameskreger Před 3 měsíci

      I think the opposite is true of high card.. if you're square, riding the bus, green, etc, you need to find more challenging hands every play to avoid winning in one hand. In contrast, if you build around one pair, you get to use high card, two pairs and trips as flat mult engines without worrying too much about telescope changing targets.

  • @nephel6158
    @nephel6158 Před 3 měsíci +2

    I personally think that early on, Square Joker is also Stuntman-tier for high card base chips, because usually by Ante 8 in Gold stakes, my Square Joker is more than 300 chips. If anything, I prefer Square to Stuntman because Stuntman makes me too strong when taken early, which gives my +mult jokers less hands to scale with. By contrast, Square's chip scaling is *just* perfectly matched with 1 +mult scaling joker to scale both at least 3 times per round all the way up to Ante 8(remembering to place your xMult jokers on the left until the final hands needed to win). Of course, this is only for up to ante 2. Anything after, Stuntman is obviously better.

    • @ZainoTVLive
      @ZainoTVLive  Před 3 měsíci +1

      I see your point, I wish square joker scaled a tad faster though.

  • @Clinkzies
    @Clinkzies Před 3 měsíci +1

    I heard that Wheel of Fortune hitting Supernova (earliest card purchased) is a 50/50.

  • @PaulWon
    @PaulWon Před 3 měsíci +1

    stuntman joker for that +300 chips and -2 hand size kinda crazy with high card build

    • @ZainoTVLive
      @ZainoTVLive  Před 3 měsíci

      Its one of the goat high card, cards

  • @armedjoy3045
    @armedjoy3045 Před měsícem +1

    Not sure i go baron on ante 6 with 64 card deck and no extra kings, but i get it being worth it for the video

  • @Kingcob7
    @Kingcob7 Před 3 měsíci +1

    I was surprised you took stone joker. I thought it was strictly garbaaage :D

    • @ZainoTVLive
      @ZainoTVLive  Před 3 měsíci +1

      If I'm playing high card just to win a run and have an open joker slot, im all for it, just gives me more chips and can beef up the other stone joker if we get it!

  • @RogueBones3
    @RogueBones3 Před 3 měsíci +1

    You can copy the extra hands from burglar with blueprint or brainstorm

  • @joelh2286
    @joelh2286 Před 3 měsíci +1

    What kind of Tarot cars are you looking for in Arcana packs? How do you whittle down your deck in high card?

    • @ZainoTVLive
      @ZainoTVLive  Před 3 měsíci +1

      It depends on what the end goal is, just winning the run or is super high score with baron or mime.
      Highscores I'm building everything into kings.
      Just winning, I'm looking for money, gold, hermit, temperance, stone, bonus cards. Maybe some chariots and lucky.

  • @geoffthomas5811
    @geoffthomas5811 Před 3 měsíci +1

    You passed on the Hieroglyph on Ante 5. Do you think it's worth going Hiero/Petro-glyph with these scaling jokers or is the -1 hand/discard too much of a cost?

    • @ZainoTVLive
      @ZainoTVLive  Před 3 měsíci +2

      I think -1 hand is too much of a cost for this run. Its situational, if it was getting desperate and I also needed to see more shops to get another Joker, then maybe. It could help save a high card build if you know a boss blind is going to be too many points, i.e. like we almost faced with The Wall.

  • @Joeynator3000
    @Joeynator3000 Před 3 měsíci +2

    Ugh, maybe I should try this...then again it seems like this game hates me 90% of the time. lol

  • @JeffWhartenby
    @JeffWhartenby Před měsícem +1

    When you play your high card with extra cards I assume you're milling for more stone/enhanced cards for the next hand, but why do you choose those? On ante 4 you play an A with a K, J, & 4 - are those random?

    • @ZainoTVLive
      @ZainoTVLive  Před měsícem

      Probably just random, want to make sure I don't accidentally play a pair

  • @Therisktaker3
    @Therisktaker3 Před 2 měsíci +1

    Seriously, it seems that’s every card that you needed just happened to drop. In my runs I get the most odd jokers that are the opposite of what I need, planet cards or tarots dropping costing me rerolls. I love these tutorials, but I swear they play like seeded runs. 😊

    • @ZainoTVLive
      @ZainoTVLive  Před 2 měsíci

      Yeah it felt lucky, but part of it is the benefit of this build and these Jokers being common

  • @Scio_
    @Scio_ Před 3 měsíci +1

    I'm still stuck on Purple with the Checkered Deck, and just can't get far trying to do High Card. I have to play Flush to survive, and still die before I get any synergy for High Cards 😢

    • @ZainoTVLive
      @ZainoTVLive  Před 3 měsíci +1

      Yeah, you're not always going to get the jokers needed, it took me 5-6 attempts to finally get a run going on checkered gold. Gold is hard.

    • @Scio_
      @Scio_ Před 3 měsíci

      Only six!! 😱

  • @terrydactyl2077
    @terrydactyl2077 Před 3 měsíci +1

    🐦 “wubwub wubwubwub”

    • @terrydactyl2077
      @terrydactyl2077 Před 3 měsíci

      This was posted on the wrong channel haha sorry. This would’ve made no sense at all here haha