Potential And Confirmed Updates For Balatro Version 1.1
February 15, 2025
Fairly recently, LocalThunk offered a bit of insight on his future plans for Balatro. The lone developer confirmed that they have quite a lot on their plate, as Balatro Version 1.1 will have both new content and balance changes. Now, the game is unlikely to see some drastic overhauling, but LocalThunk made it clear that he recognizes some flaws in the game's design. Here, we'll be exploring both the confirmed changes coming to Balatro, as well as potential ones.
Confirmed Balatro 1.1 Updates: Blue Stake And Matador
In Balatro, the Blue Stake difficulty modifier makes it so that players have -1 Discard during their run. While this isn't necessarily the worst thing in the world, this effect kills the viability of a lot of Jokers in the game. Trying to win on the higher difficulties effectively forces you to play with a more limited set of cards. LocalThunk doesn't seem to be super fond of that interaction, and so, some form of change is coming there.
Matador is an incredibly bad Joker. The card allows you to earn $8 if your played hand triggers the Boss Blind's ability. That might sound pretty okay, but there really is no guarantee that you'll be able to take advantage of the effect. Only some Boss Blinds actually trigger Matador. It can be pretty confusing, which mostly just results in players never picking it up. Matador will get a much needed revamp in Balatro 1.1.
Potential Updates To: Bad Card Generators
There are a few Jokers in Balatro that specialize in giving you cards, if you meet their respective condition. Unfortunately, this archetype of Jokers is one of the worst in the game, and their value only gets worse on the highest difficulties. Big changes are necessary, if these Jokers are to be anything more than just empty filler.
8 Ball just seems like the kind of Joker that would do something cool. Instead, it has a 25% chance of giving you a Tarot card when an 8 is scored. The Joker's randomness innately makes it terrible. Imagine building towards having a bunch of 8's and then not getting a single proc through the course of a round. 8 Ball is just not really worth having at any point during a run. 8 Ball has already had a change of effect, though, which might discourage further revision. Maybe a new Magic 8 Joker could be introduced as a sort of "upgrade" of sorts?
Séance doesn't need to communicate with the dead, because it already is a dead Joker. Straight Flushes aren't easy to make at all, and getting a random Spectral card for the effort is hardly game-changing. Séance isn't even a convincing addition to decks that are already dedicated to Flush hands. Spectral cards fit tonally for this Joker, but asking for a Straight Flush is just too much.
Superposition is a Joker that naturally discourages players from using it. You need to play an Ace within a Straight poker hand just to get one random Tarot card? Yeah...no thank you. The reward just isn't good enough for how much the Joker already expects out of you. I'm not sure how much better the Joker could realistically get, though. Receiving an Ace card (maybe enchanted?) might be slightly better, I guess. Improved consistency sure would be nice, even if that's naturally hard to do when playing Straights.
Potential Updates To: Bad Mult Jokers
There are a few Jokers in Balatro that specialize in giving you cards, if you meet their respective condition. Unfortunately, this archetype of Jokers is one of the worst in the game, and their value only gets worse on the highest difficulties. Big changes are necessary, if these Jokers are to be anything more than just empty filler.
Flower Pot is a Joker that has the potential to be a run-defining card. Reality isn't so kind, however. x3 Mult definitely sounds great, but playing a scoring card of every suit in your poker hand is easier said than done. By default, that already limits you to playing Two Pair, Straight, Full House, Four of a Kind, and Five of a Kind hands. At the very least, Flower Pot should offer x4 Mult for that kind of increased effort. This kind of change would also indirectly make Wild Cards a little bit better. Nothing wrong with that at all.
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Hit the Road is the Jack-equivalent of Baron and Shoot the Moon. This Joker is supposed to help Jack-oriented decks reach some ridiculous numbers. Its effect is a lot more niche, in comparison, though. Hit the Road gains x0.5 Mult for every Jack discarded in a round. First of all, resetting after every round already sucks. But that aside, 99% of decks just can't rely on this effect. You need to not only draw your Jacks, which most decks cannot reliably do, but also discard them. This Joker doesn't need much to be better on average, but it could really use some tuning.
Red Card exists as a potential crutch for White Stake wins. That's about all it's good for, and, even then, it's not a fun way of playing the game. Permanently gaining +3 Mult when a Booster Pack is skipped is an effect that is not worth dealing with on most difficulties. You can use your money in so many better ways, making this Joker one of the worst in this game. Red Card might be more interesting if it had a completely different effect. Maybe with a penalty of -1 Joker to actually more directly reference red cards in sports.
LocalThunk has a lot to ponder over with Balatro 1.1. A new version leaves the potential for major changes. It's also totally possible that very little gets updated. After all, new Jokers are being added in, and balancing them is already going to be quite the headache. But no matter what ends up happening, even greater times await Balatro.
