Hey everyone! I'm super happy to announce that the first meaty balance patch for Balatro is now live for everyone! Thank you so much to everyone in the community that gave feedback during the public experimental beta. If you have been a beta tester, this version is functionally identical to 1.0.1e - but here are all the changes made to the game since 1.0.0n: - Updated version of Love2D (the engine) - this fixes an issue on Windows and Steam Deck causing poor/stuttery performance for some...
Lots of great changes here! The standouts for me are:
Changed Rare tag - Now makes the rare joker free
Negative, Polychrome, Holo, Foil tags all make their respective joker free
Changed Orange Stake - Scrapped increasing pack cost
Added new ‘Rental’ mechanic, Jokers have a 30% chance to have a ‘Rental’ sticker (stacks with eternal/perishable), making them cost $1 up front and $3 every round
Changed the first shop in every run to always include a normal Buffoon pack as one of the pack options
Those and reducing the requirements for the early blinds definitely stand out to me, yeah. Reducing the early blinds is a very good change - I think most of my early losses aren’t necessarily because I’ve played badly, but rather because it’s too early in the run to have found something to build around or to put any combos together. This change makes you less beholden to RNG in the early game, and also allows you to think a little more about your endgame strategy rather than focusing on surviving right now.
What I think is a bigger early game changer than blinds (at higher stakes mostly) is guaranteed jokers, and free jokers from tags. In orange+ I found rare joker tags impossible to take on ante 1 because you can’t usually afford it and sometimes you can’t pay for uncommons too. It was easy to get unlucky and not have a joker by ante 2 which can make clearing the small blind tricky. Now with buffoon pack guaranteed and more tags giving a free joker I think you’ll more reliably have 1 or 2 going into ante 2
Lots of great changes here! The standouts for me are:
And of course:
Those and reducing the requirements for the early blinds definitely stand out to me, yeah. Reducing the early blinds is a very good change - I think most of my early losses aren’t necessarily because I’ve played badly, but rather because it’s too early in the run to have found something to build around or to put any combos together. This change makes you less beholden to RNG in the early game, and also allows you to think a little more about your endgame strategy rather than focusing on surviving right now.
What I think is a bigger early game changer than blinds (at higher stakes mostly) is guaranteed jokers, and free jokers from tags. In orange+ I found rare joker tags impossible to take on ante 1 because you can’t usually afford it and sometimes you can’t pay for uncommons too. It was easy to get unlucky and not have a joker by ante 2 which can make clearing the small blind tricky. Now with buffoon pack guaranteed and more tags giving a free joker I think you’ll more reliably have 1 or 2 going into ante 2