Ah yes, Black Deck. The bane of every Gold Stake player's existence. I used to struggle a lot with it, but I happen to enjoy it a lot after several revelations. Dare I say, it has become one of my favourite decks to play now.

In this guide, I will try to explain my tricks to make Black Deck a bit more bearable. Keep in mind that you're still playing one of, if not the hardest deck on the hardest difficulty though. Success is by far not guaranteed.

The Black Deck gives you one additional Joker slot, at the cost of one less playable hand.

The extra Joker slot means that your strength increases by 20%*. This extra slot could be some econ, that one missing chip Joker, or some xMult. The possibilities are endless.

As a tradeoff, you lose one hand, reducing your overall scoring by 25%*. In addition to that, you also lose one Dollar per round, which adds up over time and can severely harm your econ, and you can't rotate through your deck as much, meaning that a lot of plays become less consistent.

Overall, we can calculate that the Black Deck is 1.2 * 0.75 = 0.9 as strong as other decks* (before including the other decks' upsides, of course).

*This is a VERY rough approximation, and only for comedic purposes. Realistically, the extra slot will multiply your build's power by way more, and the one less hand will mainly be noticeable in early blinds, while in later blinds, it often only means that you see less of your deck each round.

My method on beating Black Deck is based on two revelations.

1. Small Blind costs you money.

2. The sixth Joker slot is expendable.

This is something that I've realized when I had a run with very strategic blind skips. It's also based on an observation from other people playing Gold Stake, where they are broke and likely couldn't buy anything worthwhile from the shop if they wanted to, but they still play the blind instead of skipping to avoid the rental tax.

The most you will get from Small Blind is two Dollars as opposed to three Dollars on other decks, plus some interest. This means that if you have one rental Joker, you don't even break even anymore, or rather, you rely on interest to break even. And keep in mind that the rental fee comes before interest. More often than not, skipping early Small Blinds is optimal. It could give you money, a free Joker, a free booster pack, or even a free shop.

There's also econ Jokers, gold cards, gold seals, lucky cards... If you can reliably make use of them, feel free to play the blind, especially if the Skip Tag isn't great.

This is something that I've learned when during my Completionist++ grind, I took Jokers for a ride that didn't fit my build, yet they didn't grief me either. They just were there, while the rest of the lineup was sufficient to win the run. And honestly, think about it. All other decks (except Painted, and Anaglyph and Ghost are likely to have negatives) have 5 slots. If these are possible, then Black Deck must be possible even with mid Jokers, since you have more Jokers.

What you likely want is to rush through early blinds. If you have one or two Jokers that one-shot the blinds and they aren't scaling Jokers like Ride the Bus or Squimbo, it will pay dividends later. Because of that, don't be afraid to pick up a scoring Joker that falls off in the late game, even if it's eternal or rental. Rental Jokers can and probably will screw over your econ though, so I recommend seeking out econ first before considering it. You will have to assess it on your own for each rental/eternal Joker though.

Even if it's a weak Joker to the point that it's more like 0.5 Jokers than a fully utilized slot, it is half a Joker less to worry about in the late game, leaving space for more mult, chips, xMult, econ, utility... If all other Jokers are good, it's 5.5 Jokers in your lineup. If four Jokers are good and the fifth Joker is something mid, the sixth Joker can also be mid, and you're at the equivalent of five Jokers. And if it is a good Joker, you can just slap another good Joker on top of your build without being forced to trade one of your other Jokers for it.

Either way, you don't need to worry about replacing the Joker that falls off or doesn't even contribute to scoring until you have filled all your slots. And once you've filled all your slots with (likely) strong Jokers, the weak Joker has done its job by bailing you out in the early game. If it's eternal it can stay (not that you have a choice), and if it's not, you can sell it to unlock maximum performance.

Long story short, most of the time, I think of the sixth slot as a buffer for when you transition from your early-game build to mid-game, and then to late-game, or an extension in the shape of econ/utility that doesn't compromise your scoring by occupying an otherwise precious Joker slot.

If you made it through the first blinds, you usually win. Six Joker slots (and it doesn't even include negatives if you happen to stumble across them) means that you can score higher with each hand. Even if it's not xMult, additional scoring Jokers often have a multiplicative boost on your scoring. Even a basic chip Joker could accomplish something like 1.5x more points. Now imagine if your chip Joker takes up a Joker slot you normally wouldn't have, allowing you to have more scoring Jokers, or an econ Joker that enables higher scoring in other ways.

The strong lategame is the main appeal of Black Deck. Suddenly, all the suffering through early blinds is justified.

From my experience, if you can beat Small Blind, you can probably beat Big Blind more often than not. I pay a lot of attention to whether skipping specifically the Small Blind of each ante is worth it, because Red Stake makes it so you barely get any money after defeating it, compounded by the fact that Black Deck has an additional punishment of one less Dollar per round. Also, because of the missing Dollar, I think that besides Anaglyph (obviously), Black Deck is the deck where skips in general matter the most.

• There's a money tag (at worst, it's 4$, and at best, it's 25$ after the boss. Both compared to 2$)
  
• There's a freebie (free special Joker is preference, but Coupon Tag is amazing)
  
• There's a Charm Tag (also preference, a Mega Arcana Pack can have some good stuff)

This is merely a guideline. I just think that playing the Ante 1 Small Blind is rarely worth it because you only get 2$ at most. A lot of it is preference too. Feel free to adjust it to your likings.
Also, the main issue of a free special edition/rarity Joker is that the Joker may be perishable/rental, and therefore not worth keeping.

• You're low on money and have no econ in your build (Jokers, card enhancements, consumables...), or a rental Joker in your build
  
• The skip reward kinda rocks and there's no particular reason to play the blind (such as scaling, econ beyond the blind's inherent rewards, visiting the shop...)
  
• WIP

• You're unsure whether you can beat Big Blind (since it's no longer a two-shot beyond Ante 1)
  
• The skip reward kinda stinks and rentals won't drag you down too much
  
• You want to visit shops (mainly because you need new Jokers)
  
• WIP

Again, personal preference, and it will not always apply. You have to judge for yourself whether playing the blind is better than skipping it.

I will probably restructure and add to this guide when I feel like it or have something to add. For now, my biggest priority was to provide you with my two revelations. Any further information is more or less a bonus.

Things to do:

• Skip Tags
  
• Jokers
  
• Vouchers (maybe?)
  
• everything tbh

Besides the above list, I probably have a lot more advice to give, but they are all incoherent thoughts that I find difficult to put in a coherent manner. Doesn't help that anytime I come up with something worthwhile to add, my ADHD ass gets distracted and I lose my train of thought or I get lost in a bunch of new thoughts emerging from that one thought.

There's still a lot of experimenting left to do. Recording statistics, such as win rate, consistency etc. Might try to achieve a decent win streak playing only Black Deck, so I can validate that I'm not talking out of my ass. After having these revelations, I need to prove that they are valid as well, after all.

Feel free to also provide your own advice in the comments. I'm always eager to learn more insights.

Here's a link to my other "guide" (which is just a hall of fame for Gold Stake runs), which include a few Black Deck runs. Warning, it's a huge guide though.
https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3476962798