Balatrois a prime example of one of those games that is super easy to understand and super addicting, but critically, it’s hard to truly master. To get through ante 8 on all the different decks and stakes within the game, you’ll need to know all the Jokers inside out, know your hand types in your sleep and even then the RNG might take you down for no reason. It’s a tough game and it’s only made tougher when you play the Challenge Mode the game has to offer.
Balatro Patch 1.0.1 Adds new Mechanics and Ante Scaling
A new Patch for Balatro has Dropped.
BalatroChallenge Mode is a series of pre-build scenarios where the player will need to take a pre-build deck, usually with eternal Jokers already onboard, and need to find a way to beat Ante 8 despite the handicap the game has given you. It leads to the player playing in ways they would have never considered otherwise, and helping you make heads or tails of the many challenges at hand, I have created this handyBalatroChallenge Mode Guide.
So here’s the thing: you won’t have access to Challenge Mode right away inBalatro. Before you gain access to this menu, you’ll need to win on white stake or higher with at least five different decks.
After this, you will then be able to access challenge mode when starting a new run. You won’t have access to all the challenges right away, but you will begin with 5x Challenges, and with each complete challenge, you’ll gain access to one new one.
How to Beat Each Challenge In Balatro
To be clear, there are infinite ways to theoretically beat each challenge as luck, synergies and RNG come into play a lot. There tends to be a clear preferred strategy that the game is trying to push you toward, however, so I’ll do my best to highlight each one for you to give you the best chance of success.
The Omelette
Best Strategy In A Nutshell
Hold Your Eggs, Then Get Economy Jokers
Best Jokers
Swashbuckler
In the Omelette, you can’t make money the way you normally do. You don’t make any money from leftover hands, nor do you get anything from beating blinds. Your only means of making money is by selling your Egg Jokers and replacing them with select Economy Jokers.
The best strategy here is to try and survive the first ante with no purchases, as this will increase the sell price of all your eggs. At this point, sell one Joker, free up that space and try to get a mult+ Joker onboard. This will help you get through Ante 2. Or alternatively, hold out for a Swashbuckler Joker and keep your Egg Jokers indefinitely.
Throughout this ante, do your best to try and find an Economy Joker to help you generate cash. Remember, Satellite, Golden, Rocket and Interest Joker are banned. So try to go for something like Credit Card, Delayed Gratification or Business Card. Plus, Vagabond is also great if you want to embrace financial turmoil and be better off for it.
15 Minute City
Embrace The Straight And Avoid Face Cards
Devious Joker
This one is easy, provided you embrace what you have at the start. You have an Eternal Ride The Bus and Shortcut Joker. Plus, the deck has been altered to remove all Aces, threes and twos. This basically means, with the use of Shortcut, if you have a full hand of number cards, chances are you will be able to play a Straight, which will up the +mult of your Ride The Bus.
You’ll need to supplement this with at least one good +mult as your Ride The Bus grows and a chip builder like Hiker, Odd Todd, Banner or Devious Joker will work a treat. Then, to see it home, get your hands on an XMult joker and you’ll beat this one with no problem.
But on the off chance that you don’t win. Another thing to consider is using Tarot Cards to destroy Face Cards within the deck to make the draws more consistent. This, along with the strategy above, should be more than enough to see you through.
Rich Get Richer
Build Cash, Establish Economy, Then Splurge On A Solid Strategy
Rocket/Golden/Satellite
To The Moon
This challenge is one where stacking cash is essential. To begin with, you can focus on +Mult to get you through each hand, allowing you to retain your funds without spending in the early shops. Doing this will allow you to make the most of your Vouchers, Seed Money and Money Tree, as this will grant you much more interest per round.
By about ante 3, you’ll want to have at least $50, allowing you some room to spend cash on Jokers. You should prioritize economy Jokers like Rocket, Golden Joker and Satellite to generate spending money for each round. Then, when you earn enough through your Jokers, you can build your chip and +mult as needed without worrying about the chip limit, as the Vouchers on deck will gradually increase that limit.
Also, during this run, look for cards that work well with large amounts of cash, such as Bull, Bootstraps and To The Moon.
On A Knife’s Edge
Always Have A Spare Joker To Sacrifice
Stuntman/Wee Joker
The gimmick of this challenge is that you have a Ceremonial Knife Joker which is pinned in place, meaning that no matter what, this Joker will always consume at least one Joker per round. This means you’ll always need to have a spare joker for this one to eat to keep up a consistent strategy. So the best thing to do early is to get two cheap jokers on board.
After this, you need to try and maintain enough cash flow until you work out an economy strategy, because if you ever find yourself in a position where you may’t afford a throwaway Joker, you risk losing the run there and then. Then, once this is established, you’ll want to focus almost entirely on Chips, as the +Mult from Ceremonial Knife will pretty much cover you all the way through.
Ideally, you want to have a Joker like Rocket or Cloud 9 that gives passive cash without needing to jump through any hoops. And then you’ll ideally want chip builders like Stuntman, Wee Joker or Hiker to get by. Also, I would suggest something like Burglar to increase your chances, because more hands usually means more points. Especially if you can get Stuntman on board.
X-Ray Vision
Play Into Smaller Hand Types, Add Extra Hands Where Possible
Burnt Joker
This is a challenge that mainly revolves around creating a solid strategy through jokers and cutting down your deck to negate the confusion that the deck’s gimmick brings. This deck will hide 1 in 7 draws, so building into smaller hand types is ideal to avoid any guesswork. So get a decent economy joker on board and then start investing in small-hand Planet Cards.
After this, you’ll want to get up a decent Joker strategy. you’re able to pretty much go with anything that presents itself. For example, I went with a Brainstorm and Stencil Joker combo, but the main thing here is building consistency. Alongside Planets, try to use Tarot Cards to destroy unwanted cards, and also make use of Card Packs to add effects to cards, because if you need to guess at any point, this will often dig you out of a hole.
Finally, just to add some extra insurance, vouchers such as Grabber and Nacho Tong work a treat. In short, anything you can do to ensure you have a worthwhile hand to play, even if it’s turned facedown, is a good move.
Play It Like The Abandoned Deck, But Treat Deck As Face Cards
Ride The Bus
Trading Card
Smiley Face/Scary Face
This one looks intimidating at first, but it is actually one of the easiest challenges on this entire list. The gimmick here is that you only have cards from 2 to 9, but all are considered Face Cards. You also have a Business Card, which offers a better economy than your usual blinds and interest. It sounds like a punishment, but actually, it’s a blessing.
Because the deck is already depleted, you can cull the deck and play consistent hands. You can lean into the secret hands that score more, or you can lean into Jokers that work well on the Abandoned Deck. Good examples include Wee Joker, Cloud 9, Walkie Talkie and Ride The Bus. Then you can also lean into Face Card Jokers like Smiley Face and Scary Face.
There isn’t a lot of nuance to this challenge, and even with the most basic deck management, you should be able to beat this one in a handful of tries. But if you really struggle, try to play for a trading card, and then you will have full control of what your deck looks like.
Luxury Tax
Always Spend Your Cash,
Credit Card
Golden Joker
Up next, we have the luxury tax, a challenge that punishes you for having money. Generally speaking, there aren’t many clear-cut strategies that won’t work here, but there are some things you should do to increase your chances of success. Firstly, unless you have $4 or less, spend what you have, even if it’s a useless re-roll, because in the early stages, you want access to your full hand.
Second, you’ll want to try and play jokers that work well with less cash. For example, getting a Credit Card and then spending an additional $20 to leave you on negative money will give you an extra 4x cards per hand, which will make playing consistent high-scoring hands easier. Then you can also take Jokers like Vagabond, which will always give you a Tarot Card for every hand.
If you’re still struggling, I would also suggest getting a decent economy Joker like Golden Joker, as this will give you some cash to spend every turn without pushing you into the positive. Essentially, stay poor, and you’ll find this one pretty easy.
Non-Perishable
Use Madness. Simple as that
One word. Madness. The Madness Joker is the easiest way to win this challenge by some distance. But just in case it doesn’t pop up for you, the general strategy for this challenge is to take Jokers that synergize with one another, but remember two things. You can’t get rid of them, so don’t take the first thing that comes along. And two, if you choose a strategy, really lean into it from the first moment you can.
That being said, though, due to the fact that Madness is such an effective XMult card, and the fact that other Jokers can’t be destroyed, using Madness pretty much trivializes the entire challenge. So feel free to play this legitimately, but with Madness you can get this one out of the way fast and move on to the next challenge.
Build into High Card and Embrace the Stone Card Invasion
Driver’s Licence
Unlike the last challenge, Medusa is a much more particular challenge that you will need to approach in a rather specific way. The best way to go about this one is to try your best to play into High Card, as this will allow you to play every hand with all Stone Cards, because before long that’s pretty much all that will be in your deck, so there’s no point in trying to fight it.
This will ensure that your Chip total is taken care of, so you just need to focus on getting a decent +Mult and XMult Joker on board. Great options include Hologram Joker as you can a new card every Blind, Stone Joker as you will be abundant with Stone Cards whether you like them or not, and Driver’s Licence is a good option because Stone Cards count toward the Enhanced Card goal.
10 Best Jokers To Use In Balatro
These are most consistent Jokers in the game!
You can use Burnt Joker to increase the score provided by High Card with ease. Or if you’re feeling like a rebel, you can also use Vampire to completely negate the Stone Card production and free yourself up to use more complex hand types. Lots of options, but they all start with embracing low-card hands and getting a good +Mult on board.
Double or Nothing
Play Low-Card Hands, Use Tarot Cards To Revive Debuffed Cards
Card Sharp
This looks like a seriously intimidating challenge, and it can be tough to get your head around if you don’t start building around its gimmick early on. But if you get up ahead of steam, it’s not too bad. What I would suggest for this one is to play into smaller hand types to ensure that you have access to your cards for as long as possible, and note that you’re able to also apply effects to cards with Tarot Cards to bring them out of their debuffed state.
Secondly, I would suggest playing into Jokers, which scales and is completely independent of the cards being played in your hand. Jokers like Stuntman, Acrobat, Card Sharp, Fortune Teller, Ride The Bus, and Green Joker all work amazingly here.
Then lastly, I would suggest you take a voucher or a Joker like Burglar that increases the number of hands you can play per round as a form of insurance. If you don’t get out ahead of this one, it can drag you down quickly, so establish a strategy that you grow each round and you should be able to make it through this one.
Build a Strong Strategy Quick, Don’t Be Afraid to Replay First Ante Until Happy
We move into the second half of these challenges with Typecast, a challenge that can be approached in pretty much any way you like, so I mainly won’t be telling you things you should do, but more things you should avoid doing. That being said, one thing you should do, is try to establish a strategy early, because when it rolls around to Ante 5, you’ll be locked in, and the Jokers you have on board will need to see you right through to the end.
Good ways to get up ahead of steam are taking vouchers like Hieroglyph and Petroglyph to give yourself more time to build a strong strategy. Then, if you’re able to add extra hands through Grabber or Nacho Tong, you’ll be sitting pretty when the Eternal Stamps get handed to you.
But there are some important things to avoid. Do not take any jokers that can be destroyed or gradually deplete, because when they are destroyed, they can’t be replaced. Plus, although it might be tempting, don’t use skip buttons unless you have a very strong early build. Negatives and Polychrome Jokers help a lot here, but it’s a risk that can leave you in an awkward situation. But long story short, get five Jokers you are confident with in the first half of the game, and you’ll be fine.
Establish A Strategy Fast, Use Cartomancer or Celestial For Free Options
Much like Typecast, this is a challenge where you need to establish a strategy quickly, or you’ll pay through the nose later. As you progress through the rounds, everything will cost $1 extra, increasing after each blind. You do have a Credit Card to help you initially, so be sure to make use of it and get as many decent Jokers as you can on board. Oh, and before you ask, no, you can’t use Clearance Sale and Liquidation; they’re banned.
There are some Jokers, however, that will prove useful in this challenge. Celestial Joker is a godsend, as this will allow you to build into a particular hand type without too much financial turmoil. DNA Joker is great for building hand types without needing to pay for Card Packs, and Vagabond is excellent for getting Tarot Cards without opening packs. Plus, those Tarot Cards sell for lots more in this challenge, making them a valuable asset even if you don’t want to use them.
Basically, the key to success here is finding ways to save money through your Joker choices. But also remember to pick Jokers which scale, because you won’t want to be chopping and changing them too often, because it will cost you a fortune. Oh, and don’t be afraid to restart this one a few times until you get a Joker you like right off the bat, because the earlier you get into a rhythm, the easier this run will be.
Bram Poker
Lean Into Vampire Wholeheartedly, Buy Lots of Playing Cards
This run is actually a lot harder than it looks. You would think starting with an eternal Vampire Joker would be a blessing, but because this Joker was nerfed, it’s not as good as it used to be. This challenge really wants you to lean into the Playing Cards in the shop and constantly feed your Vampire Joker, and while you’re able to support it with other jokers, that’s exactly what you will need to do.
The difficulty comes from the fact that you won’t have access to as many Jokers as the shop will be dominated by Playing Cards. So if you can get an economy Joker to facilitate re-rolls, you should take it. Other good options include Splash Joker, so you can action all enhanced cards regardless of the hand you choose to build into. Then, if you can get your hands on a Hologram Joker and Certificate of Excellence Joker combo, this challenge becomes a piece of cake.
Keeping your cashflow up is key so you can keep enhancing cards regularly, so Rocket or Golden Joker will help you achieve this. But the best advice I can give you is to do not hesitate to take a Joker, as there won’t be many options to pick up Jokers in this challenge.
Establish a Basic Strategy and Skip As Many Blinds As Possible
Hallucination/Space
I remember looking at this one before hopping in for the first time, thinking, how the heck could I make this work? Well, the answer is actually simple. You need to accept the fact that unless you play into High Card and get very lucky, you won’t be able to play every single Blind in this run, because you will simply run out of cards. You’ll need to play enough hands to get some good jokers on board, and then you’ll need to trust that your skip bonuses will carry you through.
In theory, with all those Glass Cards in your possession already, you just need a basic Chip, +Mult, and XMult strategy to see you through, and then some Planet Cards to play into smaller hands. But you can also use your Oops All 6’s Jokers to ensure that pretty much every Wheel of Fortune Tarot Card grants an effect. Also, Jokers like Hallucination and Space Joker work well in this setup.
Then, to put the cherry on the cake, if you can get Glass Joker, Throwback Joker, or Hanging Chad, this will help you stack those XMults and make this one pretty trivial. In short, play as few cards as you can, skip as many rounds as you can and stack those chips on the Boss Blinds!
Forget Obelisk, Make Use of Marble Joker
Up front, here is what the game wants you to do. It wants you to play a particular hand in the opening rounds while building into another with planets or Jokers, and then when you’ve built up one hand as the most used hand by some distance, you then switch to a stronger hand halfway through and ride the XMult wave that Obelisk grants you. But, I’m not going to suggest anything like that.
I suggest that you completely disregard Obelisk because you have a Negative Marble Joker anyway, meaning you still have 4 slots to work with. What I suggest is making the most of the Stone Card given each blind, then getting something like a Hologram or Stone Joker on board. Plus, I would suggest playing into Pair or High Card to ensure you play as many of those Stone Cards per hand as possible.
A good way to build into High Card is with the Burnt Joker, the Telescope Voucher, and the Celestial Joker. Then, you can solidify this strategy with something like Card Sharp or Constellation. There are lots of ways to win here, but the best advice I can give you is to disregard Obelisk. It sucks.
Survive Early Rounds With a Decent +Mult, Then Buy Every Planet Card Available
Chaos The Clown
I’ll tell you right off the bat, if you don’t play this one in a particular way, you will struggle. The key to success here is to utilize the Constellation Joker in your possession as much as you can, which means taking some starting Jokers to keep you afloat, and then spending pretty much everything else on Planet Cards.
The initial rounds will be rough, so try and get a nice +Mult Joker on board to tide you over, but when you get through a couple of Boss Blinds, Rocket Joker will kick into gear, and you’ll have more money than you could ever need to spend on Planet Cards. Try and play one consistent type of hand, but when any Planet Cards pop up in the shop, grab them without hesitation, and don’t be afraid to reroll if you need to, because you’ll get more than enough cash if you clear the next round.
That’s really all there is to this one, just verify you have a decent scaling +Mult card, and something that ups your chip count for extra insurance. But, at the end of the day, if you do this one right you’ll have a Constellation Joker giving you a 10X mult, and it’s harder to lose than win by that point.
Five Card Draw
Build High Card
Half/Abstract
This one is a very generous challenge that seems tough, but if you focus on low-card hands, you’ll ace it in no time. The +4 Mult will get you through the early hands, and when you get the chance, you should lean into Planets and Jokers that suit a High Card build. So Jokers like Half Joker, Burnt Joker, and Stuntman all work a treat.
Then you’ll want to try and find a solid economy Joker and a +Mult that works well with High Card or with loads of Jokers because you have additional slots. So, things like Supernova or Abstract work nicely here. But in all honesty, if you can get enough Planets on High Card, your Card Sharp will carry you through here.
If you struggle, I would try and re-roll until you get Burglar and then double down with Mystic Summit. This will give you a boatload of hands to play, meaning that even if the build isn’t solid, you’ll probably scrape through anyway. Just focus on small hands and you should be fine with this one.
Golden Needle
Use Your High Discards and Low Hands To Your Advantage
This is where the challenges ramp up in terms of difficulty, so brace yourself. In this challenge you lose $1 for every discard you use, and you only get one hand to play each round. There’s no way to get more hands because Jokers like Burglar and Vouchers like Grabber are banned, and while the Credit Card Jokers helps, once you are in debt, it’s hard to recover.
You’ll need to play a strong hand from the beginning just to get off the mark, then from there you need to get an economy joker and a +Mult Joker as fast as possible, otherwise you’ll be up to your eyes in debt before you know it. A good thing to know is that even though you only have one hand, you can still take Hieroglyph, which can help get you up and running.
From there, it’s about riding your luck and leaning into Jokers that suit your situation. Jokers I found super successful in this challenge were Banner due to the high discards. Dusk, because every hand is your last hand, so you may use this to re-trigger every card you play. And Acrobat, because, again, you only have one hand, so this effectively has the same effect as Cavendish.
Unless you get really lucky, this will take a number of tries, and the RNG gods will need to be in your corner for you to pull this off. Just get +Mult and Economy going and see where the run takes you, and if it’s not looking good, don’t waste your time; just restart and try again.
Duplicate a XMult Joker, Ideally One That Scales
Ancient Joker
A challenge that truly lives up to its name. To succeed here, you’ll need to have a tight strategy that will work with very few Joker slots. The good news here is that there are no restrictions on what’s allowed, and you’re able to get away with skipping the first ante, so if you see a Polychrome or Negative Tag, you shouldn’t hesitate to take it.
There are a lot of synergies that will carry you through this challenge. But what works most consistently is duplicating an XMult Joker. For example, I used an Ankh Spectral Card to duplicate my Ancient Joker, then got a Seltzer Joker and skipped every Ante expect for Boss Blinds to race to the finish. But there are lots of other options. Showman is a great ally when trying to pull this off.
If duplicating Jokers proves hard, other good options would be an Economy Joker, +Mult, and Constellation/Vampire Combo. Or you could go for a High Card, Stuntman and Card Sharp build. The possibilities are endless, but if you want an easy time here, I suggest trying to duplicate via Spectral Cards, Showman, or Invisible Joker.
Play Complex Hand Types, Establish Economy Via Interest, Duplicate Steel and Glass Cards
No Jokers, Sorry!
Then, to finish us off, we have the hardest, nastiest, most diabolical challenge thatBalatrohas in its locker. The Jokerless Challenge does exactly what you would expect and forces you to play without Jokers. This means to succeed here, you’re going to have to rely on Tarot Cards, Spectral Cards and Standard Packs to get by.
The key here is to save money in the early rounds to accrue interest, because without money to spend, you’re beaten before you’ve started. The best way to start strong is by restarting until you get a good voucher like Telescope or Hieroglyph in the shop, as these will allow you to get out ahead of yourself and make some cash.
Then, as for end-game strategy, you should try to play into strong hands, like Flush Fives, Straight Flushes and 4/5 Of A Kinds, and cull your deck to make it as consistent as possible. Planet Cards alone won’t cut it, however, and you’ll need to get some Red Seals, Steel Cards and Glass Cards in on the action.
Basically, you need a lot of luck to go your way here, because you’ll need a lot of Death Tarot Cards and solid Vouchers throughout. So don’t be surprised if you only make it to Ante 3/4 most attempts as this is to be expected. But when you get a good run, hold tight and don’t let go!
Every Deck In Balatro, Ranked
Which one brings the fun factor?
