Before anything, let me say 2 things:
This is my first actual guide, so don't take it too serious. And please feedback to me how it work when you use it.
- My native language is not English, so please don't care about my grammar mistake or something like that. But I really appreciate if someone can correct my grammar.
01. Explain some unclear rules:
- In this card game, you have to follow the direction of the first 2 card OR the suit of second card.
Example: you got 6 of diamond, and then 8 of heart. So you third card have to be 9 or 10 OR 6-7 of heart.
Because of this, I build my deck as below to improve my chance to get to 21-26 point in fastest way. 3 card per caravan (6-7-8, 7-8-9,6-7-9, 6-7-10,7-8-K, 6-10-K.......)
- The best and simple face card is J-K. Don't bother with other face card, they too complicated to make any use.
- You don't need to have 26 point, just more than 20 is enough. Focus on build 3 caravan of 21-26 as fast as possible.
- Pay attention to your opponent, whenever he got more than 20 in one caravan, focus build your two other caravans, you win when you got 2 better caravan. Beware, this only mean if you are experience enough
02. Build your deck and strategy- 30 cards only:
- starter deck:
4 cards of 6-7-8-9-10
5 cards of J-K. (it is very easy to buy one more J and K).
This deck help you have very high chance to got face card in your hand while minimum dead card ( card you have to discard in game-play). In fact, I never throw any card in my game.
Your first card: try to choose 6, 9 or 10 to become your first card and then build it up for 6 and down for 9,10. If you have to choose between 7-8 then go for 7 and build it up.
- improvised deck:
2 cards of 6-7-8-9-10 in same suit
2 cards of 6-7-8-9-10 in another suit
5 card of J-K
Now you have more chance to build up your caravan without care about direction.
- perfect deck:
4 cards of 6-7-8-9-10 in same suit and 5 cards of J-K
You can forget direction rule with this deck. Just pick any combination you like, as long as not 8-9-10 and 6-7-6
I put improvised and perfect deck just for the sake of completion. You really don't need them when you become a good player. I myself rarely found enough card for perfect deck, it is really hard to gather. Remember the rule of NOT having 2 duplicated cards, you can have 2 cards 7 of heart if they from different deck.
03. Use your face card:
+) Do not to use them if he has lower 20 point.
- You throw face card when your opponent have more than 20 point.
- He attack you with K, then defense with J.
- When you attack, if you can choose, pick K to attack because it often take 2 turn for him to get back previous point.
- Whenever you attack, put face card on highest number in his caravan.
- Try to keep 1 card of J, and one card of K to use in unexpected case.
+) Never let him get more point than 21-26. It is very dangerous, that's why always keep J,K in your hand for those case.
04. How to make money:
- Go to Novac and play with No-Bark. After you win, reserve-pickpocket him, to give him more caps to play. When you win, the caps you put in his inventory does not lost, so he will bet the same amount next time you play. Repeat until he get 50.000 -60.000 caps in his pocket.
- Do not pick-pocket the caps you put in his inventory.
- Do not let him have more than 60.000 caps. It may make your game crash, happen with me, PC version.
- Best time to reserve-pickpocket is when he goes to sleep.
- Be warn: he is quite nasty one, got a lot of face card to throw you. But with this strategy, you win for sure even with starter deck.
- After you give him 50.000 caps, you can earn 23-25k caps per game. 5 games and you swim in caps
05. My story:
- I got 200.000 caps in about 30 minutes. I start with about 5000, and starter deck.
- With so much caps, you can forget Jury Rigging perk which means no need to have 90 points in Repair skill. I only have 45, with Jumpsuit, it became 50 for me to make Weapon Repair Kit to repair your weapon on some long quest. I put skill points in repair only for some quest, not for actually repair or WRK.
- Easily pay NPC to repair your gear and don't bother steal the money back.
- Thanks to his pocket not reset, I can play him whenever my caps got below 30.000.
This guide comes from hours of playing, reading the rules again and again, so I will be appreciated if have more opinions about this. Maybe some ways to make it better?
You can win by this strategy better than fill your deck with 9,10,7 cause it is quite hard to get all the card you need because of duplicated rule.
EDIT: I consider it is best because it requires you invest nothing for the game, only your calculation. And you can use it right from start.