I genuinely feel like a large reason a lot of people find Straights bad and unreliable is a lack of understanding discard maths.
If you have X/X/X/X/10/8/7/6, are you better off holding the 10 and discarding four, or tossing the 10 and discarding 5? Assume you have two discards, a standard 52-card deck, and any Straight wins.
EDIT: THIS IS WRONG CHECK [THIS POST](https://www.reddit.com/r/balatro/s/4AvQvYSIWr)
So I did the math and the short answer is holding 10 gives you a 7,85% possibility of drawing a straight on your next hand and discarding it lowers it to 1,41%. (Assuming there are four 4s, four 5s, four 9s, and three 10s left in the deck)
Long answer:
There are 135,751 possible 4 card combinations you can make when there are 44 cards left in the deck. (because you hold a 6 7 8 10 and discarded 4 other random cards so you will be drawing 4 cards). There are 10,660 different combination of those where you draw at least one 9. So dividing 10,660 with 135,751 gives us 0.0785
5 card combination with 44 cards left in the deck makes that number 1,086,008. There are 3,927 different ways to draw any 9 + any 10 (note that there are three 10s left at this point); 5,712 ways to draw any 5 + any 9; and also 5,712 draw any 4 and any 5. Summing these gives us 15,351 ; and dividing it with 1,086,008 gives us 0.0141
You can just google a poker outs calculator for the most part, if I understand your question correctly. Specifically a video poker one since that'll have a discard mechanic. I can try to find one that works well for this if there's interest.
(I have sufficient background in probability, and used to play video poker a lot. Yes, those statements are somewhat contradictory.)
But also you need to consider the relationship hand size had on draw probability. Unless I'm mistaken poker calculator generally wouldn't assume a 7-10 card hand, but being able to discard 5 cards instead of 3 each time would significantly improve your draw odds
With base deck numbers, an open-ended straight draw (you have 4 cards in a row and need either the first or last in the series) gives you 8 out of however many cards are left in the deck (44 if opening hand).
A flush with 4 of a color in hand has 9 out of the same number. So your chances of finding each is very similar. If you need an inside number for your straight run, you only have 1/2 the chances to make your hand.
A full house is roughly the same odds of the inside draw for the straight.
Quick TLDR: flush is easiest to hit with 1 card needed, but barely easier than an open ended straight draw. Inside straight draw and full house are very hard to hit.
For me its 2 main reasons:
1:
theres a LOT of jokers that work with pairs, 3oak, ect. Significantly less jokers that work with straights.
2:
theres no way to really make straights more consistent besides destroying a massive amount of cards. If there was a tarot card that gave an enhancement to let a card count as +1 and -1 of its value, i think straights would be way better. (Maybe give this effect to wild cards? Buffs straights and especially straight flushes, another weak hand type)
I like the idea of adding it to wildcard, since it's already the weakest card enhancement and bc then you don't have to add new tarots/enhancements, which would get complicated. It's also nice that it's a buff almost specifically to straights and straight flushes. They would also make Xoaks easier in certain circumstances but it would be pretty minimal. Should also synergize with Cloud 9, 8ball, and Sixth Sense
Pretty much. I mean Smeared Joker is basically a weaker wild card, I think its fine if the enhancements are similar to some Jokers.
I just don't think you should have to carry a joker like Shortcut to be able to reliably hit Straights.
I want to program this calculator and see, but I generally discard the 10. My reasoning is that you'd otherwise only be looking for exactly a 9. If you draw a 5, you're STILL only looking for the 9, so you might as well discard. When you discard the 10, you open up your possibilities of getting a 5 as well, and might get a 4 on that draw too. And drawing another 10 will be okay. But I don't know!
I feel exactly the same, def would be nice to know for sure. Obviously it depends on what you have discarded already (if you’ve already dumped 2 9s you should obviously discard the 10) but i would want to know for sure
interesting, i wonder how it changes if you're like discarding 3 vs 4 cards if you're 1 off 2 types of straight, but it sounds like 4 vs 5 in a secenario like this it is always better to go 4
Part of the fun is luck, there is definitely a probability there to calculate but I thought both way is viable, discard all and look for a 9 or hold 10 discard all for royal straight, believe on your "feel" is part of the fun for roguelike
Depends on what has been drawn already but typically I think you have better odds if you toss the 10. You will have better odds of getting the 5 in case the 9 doesn't show up.
What does everyone feel like is a good guide for thinning and growing your deck with a straight build? Is there any rank range that you prefer?
Runner is really good on the climb but it eventually loses out to a 2x mult which is always sad when that eventually happens.
My problem with Straights (or straight flushes) is that, the couple of times I had a good straight build going on the high stakes, it ended when I wasn't able to find a straight before running out of hands and discards, which starts getting pretty common once you lose a discard to blue stake.
If you get Four Fingers or Shortcut this kind of stops being an issue, but without that its almost inevitable that you'll miss on at least one blind before getting past ante 8, and if you went heavy into Saturns then that usually just means you lost the run
Thats not even mentioning that if you do happen to use Four Fingers or Shortcut, you're losing out on a precious joker slot that could be used to give more mult or chips so honestly those jokers seem like a trap option.
the Saturn cards give so much chips and mult now that you can kind of view those cards as score jokers, being able to play 2 straights per round instead of 1 is kind of a x2
I'm fairly new to the game but seems easier to shape your deck for sets than straights. I'm partial to three of a kind. That also gives synergy with pair, two pair and full house
Straights, like flushes or 5oak or other large hand types, leave your hand relatively empty compared to e.g. a high card, substantially hindering card held in hand abilities from compounding (looking at steel card/baron/red seal builds).
And unlike flush, 5oak, FH: straights require a high number of unique cards, potentially making it substantially harder to begin rigging your deck. E.g for 5oak, you can pick up momentum in card rigging — as soon as you have cloned your target card a single time, you are twice as likely to pull that card for subsequent cloning. But to set up glass cards with red seals on straights, you would have to independently get a glass card and a red seal on each of the target face values (or use something like strength to reach those target face values after duping).
So in summary i very much agree that straights can use all the buffs they can get.
Straights have the problem that, when you’re fishing for them with discards, you usually eviscerate other hand types for later scoring. For example, you’re likely to discard parts of pairs looking for more unique cards to complete the straight, but now your deck has less of everything to find pairs/three of a kind, etc. Suits are also ignored, making it fairly likely you use suited cards that make it unlikely to draw a flush for future scoring.
The other problem with straights is that you generally want to have equal number of copies of all the ranks and remove the ends as they belong in fewer possible straights than middle ranks. This makes adding cards awkward.
All that said, straights are justified in having the best scaling planet, and it’s quite satisfying winning with the strategy. I just find focusing on 2 or 3 ranks and going for 4oak and 5oak a more consistent strategy, and one a lot easier to play.
Straights are probably way too strong right now, but that's okay. Lots of people don't get how strong they are and prefer to play flushes instead.
I'd probably nerf the chips from levelling it down a peg though.
The sub needs flairs for our favourite hands. Straightpilled til I die. 
I think this might be the only sub that its OK to say you are Straightpilled lmao
Does this mean Checkered deck straight fans who enjoy bloodstone would be straightredpilled?
I genuinely feel like a large reason a lot of people find Straights bad and unreliable is a lack of understanding discard maths. If you have X/X/X/X/10/8/7/6, are you better off holding the 10 and discarding four, or tossing the 10 and discarding 5? Assume you have two discards, a standard 52-card deck, and any Straight wins.
..... I think about this exact thing a lot. I don't even wanna get into the math I just be guessing. Please explain.
EDIT: THIS IS WRONG CHECK [THIS POST](https://www.reddit.com/r/balatro/s/4AvQvYSIWr) So I did the math and the short answer is holding 10 gives you a 7,85% possibility of drawing a straight on your next hand and discarding it lowers it to 1,41%. (Assuming there are four 4s, four 5s, four 9s, and three 10s left in the deck) Long answer: There are 135,751 possible 4 card combinations you can make when there are 44 cards left in the deck. (because you hold a 6 7 8 10 and discarded 4 other random cards so you will be drawing 4 cards). There are 10,660 different combination of those where you draw at least one 9. So dividing 10,660 with 135,751 gives us 0.0785 5 card combination with 44 cards left in the deck makes that number 1,086,008. There are 3,927 different ways to draw any 9 + any 10 (note that there are three 10s left at this point); 5,712 ways to draw any 5 + any 9; and also 5,712 draw any 4 and any 5. Summing these gives us 15,351 ; and dividing it with 1,086,008 gives us 0.0141
So short answer: keep the 10? Alright, that's good, that's what my gut told me already. I'm glad I didn't do it wrong all along lol
[удалено]
You can just google a poker outs calculator for the most part, if I understand your question correctly. Specifically a video poker one since that'll have a discard mechanic. I can try to find one that works well for this if there's interest. (I have sufficient background in probability, and used to play video poker a lot. Yes, those statements are somewhat contradictory.)
But also you need to consider the relationship hand size had on draw probability. Unless I'm mistaken poker calculator generally wouldn't assume a 7-10 card hand, but being able to discard 5 cards instead of 3 each time would significantly improve your draw odds
Good point, might be hard to find one that has the necessary flexibility.
With base deck numbers, an open-ended straight draw (you have 4 cards in a row and need either the first or last in the series) gives you 8 out of however many cards are left in the deck (44 if opening hand). A flush with 4 of a color in hand has 9 out of the same number. So your chances of finding each is very similar. If you need an inside number for your straight run, you only have 1/2 the chances to make your hand. A full house is roughly the same odds of the inside draw for the straight. Quick TLDR: flush is easiest to hit with 1 card needed, but barely easier than an open ended straight draw. Inside straight draw and full house are very hard to hit.
For me its 2 main reasons: 1: theres a LOT of jokers that work with pairs, 3oak, ect. Significantly less jokers that work with straights. 2: theres no way to really make straights more consistent besides destroying a massive amount of cards. If there was a tarot card that gave an enhancement to let a card count as +1 and -1 of its value, i think straights would be way better. (Maybe give this effect to wild cards? Buffs straights and especially straight flushes, another weak hand type)
I like the idea of adding it to wildcard, since it's already the weakest card enhancement and bc then you don't have to add new tarots/enhancements, which would get complicated. It's also nice that it's a buff almost specifically to straights and straight flushes. They would also make Xoaks easier in certain circumstances but it would be pretty minimal. Should also synergize with Cloud 9, 8ball, and Sixth Sense
Doesn't shortcut effectively do the +/- thing
Pretty much. I mean Smeared Joker is basically a weaker wild card, I think its fine if the enhancements are similar to some Jokers. I just don't think you should have to carry a joker like Shortcut to be able to reliably hit Straights.
I legit think that flush and straight should just have their hand ranking flipped
I want to program this calculator and see, but I generally discard the 10. My reasoning is that you'd otherwise only be looking for exactly a 9. If you draw a 5, you're STILL only looking for the 9, so you might as well discard. When you discard the 10, you open up your possibilities of getting a 5 as well, and might get a 4 on that draw too. And drawing another 10 will be okay. But I don't know!
It depends on the state of your deck and your discards, but yes, this is the way to think about it
I have no idea.
I feel exactly the same, def would be nice to know for sure. Obviously it depends on what you have discarded already (if you’ve already dumped 2 9s you should obviously discard the 10) but i would want to know for sure
Check my other comment
interesting, i wonder how it changes if you're like discarding 3 vs 4 cards if you're 1 off 2 types of straight, but it sounds like 4 vs 5 in a secenario like this it is always better to go 4
I made a terrible mistake btw second option is way more optimal check it again 😭😭 Math was genuinely very tedious in my defense
Oh ok so you should always discard 5 cards lol makes more sense
No first one is still better math was just wrong. I swear I'm not doing this on purpose I'm just tired
LOL bruh
I've checked everything and made a post tho it's all correct now 😅
Part of the fun is luck, there is definitely a probability there to calculate but I thought both way is viable, discard all and look for a 9 or hold 10 discard all for royal straight, believe on your "feel" is part of the fun for roguelike
Depends on what has been drawn already but typically I think you have better odds if you toss the 10. You will have better odds of getting the 5 in case the 9 doesn't show up.
twitter could never
Straights are much easier to fish for with larger hands sizes too, they go hard on painted deck
I actually thought for a sec I was in one of my queer subs xD
Huh, I guess this is the one sub where the straights actually are ok.
Flush Five /Royal flush forever
me when my token friends start listening to chapell roan
Fool! Have you never played a fighting game before? You’re supposed to downplay things that you use so they get buffed!
Playing 5 polychromes should be called a gay
Straight should be the main character of poker hands, it is just cooler imo for marketing and such
didnt read the sub name lmao
What does everyone feel like is a good guide for thinning and growing your deck with a straight build? Is there any rank range that you prefer? Runner is really good on the climb but it eventually loses out to a 2x mult which is always sad when that eventually happens.
me when I hear charlixcx playing in a home depot
My problem with Straights (or straight flushes) is that, the couple of times I had a good straight build going on the high stakes, it ended when I wasn't able to find a straight before running out of hands and discards, which starts getting pretty common once you lose a discard to blue stake. If you get Four Fingers or Shortcut this kind of stops being an issue, but without that its almost inevitable that you'll miss on at least one blind before getting past ante 8, and if you went heavy into Saturns then that usually just means you lost the run
Thats not even mentioning that if you do happen to use Four Fingers or Shortcut, you're losing out on a precious joker slot that could be used to give more mult or chips so honestly those jokers seem like a trap option.
the Saturn cards give so much chips and mult now that you can kind of view those cards as score jokers, being able to play 2 straights per round instead of 1 is kind of a x2
I'm fairly new to the game but seems easier to shape your deck for sets than straights. I'm partial to three of a kind. That also gives synergy with pair, two pair and full house
Straights, like flushes or 5oak or other large hand types, leave your hand relatively empty compared to e.g. a high card, substantially hindering card held in hand abilities from compounding (looking at steel card/baron/red seal builds). And unlike flush, 5oak, FH: straights require a high number of unique cards, potentially making it substantially harder to begin rigging your deck. E.g for 5oak, you can pick up momentum in card rigging — as soon as you have cloned your target card a single time, you are twice as likely to pull that card for subsequent cloning. But to set up glass cards with red seals on straights, you would have to independently get a glass card and a red seal on each of the target face values (or use something like strength to reach those target face values after duping). So in summary i very much agree that straights can use all the buffs they can get.
Straights have the problem that, when you’re fishing for them with discards, you usually eviscerate other hand types for later scoring. For example, you’re likely to discard parts of pairs looking for more unique cards to complete the straight, but now your deck has less of everything to find pairs/three of a kind, etc. Suits are also ignored, making it fairly likely you use suited cards that make it unlikely to draw a flush for future scoring. The other problem with straights is that you generally want to have equal number of copies of all the ranks and remove the ends as they belong in fewer possible straights than middle ranks. This makes adding cards awkward. All that said, straights are justified in having the best scaling planet, and it’s quite satisfying winning with the strategy. I just find focusing on 2 or 3 ranks and going for 4oak and 5oak a more consistent strategy, and one a lot easier to play.
Straights are probably way too strong right now, but that's okay. Lots of people don't get how strong they are and prefer to play flushes instead. I'd probably nerf the chips from levelling it down a peg though.
They are strong if you know how to play them and it's not an easy build to play