So when I'm building my deck, the backs of all my cards show the Tops logo. I've been buying cards from multiple casinos whenever I can. Shouldn't the backs of some of the cards reflect this? Am I not looking in the right place? What?

I would also very much like to know the answer to this question.

... not to mention how this frikkin' game of caravan works, or is supposed to work.

AHA!

I talked to a friend and he showed me that indeed it looks like some of his cards do have different looking backsides from the other cards.

And that you use the @$$#%& arrow keys to play, not the "move" keys or mouse. Ha ha ha, oh you designer are a bunch of jokers ... a tutorial would have been nice, since I can not read your mind.

Huh! Any insight on how he made that happen?


Haha. Yeah, that was a little weird. I still don't understand about half the Caravan interface. But I know enough to win loads of caps, so I guess I'm doing something right!

In my game I only see TOPs cards as well (PC)

The key parts that I have found to winning Caravan are using Kings to double a cards number amount (value) in a stack, which can turn a 10 and an 8 into 26 with a King on the 8 or you could also play a 9 and an 8 with the king on the 9 for 26. Kings can also be placed on an opponents stack to double the value of a card in their stack to bust that caravan by increasing the stacks value over 26.

Jacks are used on cards to remove cards, either yours or the opponents, and work very well to destroy your opponents stacks to extend the game so you can win.

Queens on a card switch the direction of the way the stack is going, so if you have queens you can plan a more complex stack or use it on your opponent to force them to only be able to play a higher number card that would bust their stack, assuming their stack was going down.

Jokers are like dropping a nuke on the game, it doesn't seem to matter where you put the darn thing, it may switch the rows of you and your opponent, discard random cards, remove whole rows(caravans), but I still keep them in the deck.

I won one game with a joker when we had both already gotten 3 full caravans of rather high numbers and we were kinda stalemated. Dropped a joker on his side, cards start flying, I win.

Use the arrow keys to move the cards both to stacks and up and down the stacks, and for the face cards you can place them along side another card to buff/debuff, enchant, augment, remove, or... nuke.

The only thing I have done to my deck so far is remove all of one suit in the numbers but not the face cards. I think this makes it a little leaner and heavier on the buffing cards, which IMO have a greater affect on the game.

Hope that helps.