One hand is pretty much objectively better than one discard 95% of the time in terms of drawing new cards besides for a few exceptions, that being discard synergies. If you have a mail in rebate, no cards for it in hand, and 1 hand to throw away for it and 1 discard use your throwaway hand first then actual discard second in case you draw free money, same with purple seals if you're expecting to go through a decent bit of your deck. Additionally, another instance where discards can be better than hands is against the eye, as the extra discard helps to find the oneshot hand and not get locked into something bad.

Originally posted by RazzberryMocha:

One hand is pretty much objectively better than one discard 95% of the time in terms of drawing new cards besides for a few exceptions, that being discard synergies. If you have a mail in rebate, no cards for it in hand, and 1 hand to throw away for it and 1 discard use your throwaway hand first then actual discard second in case you draw free money, same with purple seals if you're expecting to go through a decent bit of your deck. Additionally, another instance where discards can be better than hands is against the eye, as the extra discard helps to find the oneshot hand and not get locked into something bad.

get it but ....why? Like i get the synergies but why discards with one hand are better that using actual discards? Do you draw better cards?
Sorry but i'm a bit tired so i don't get this LOL i just thought that since hands give you money....leftover hands are good, instead of throwaway hands
i'm learning of course, i'm 180 hrs in this game but only blue stake with yellow and only recently unlocked Stuntman, and get to ante 12 in that same run, never get that far anymore LOL
thanks for the answer

I don't actually know what the instruction is, but I'd say:
- Obviously, a hand is better than a discard, because you get points and stuff when you use a hand. And, yes, because each one is worth a buck.
- That means you should use up the discard instead of the hand if you don't have a reason to use the hand.

Although in high stakes you get so few discards that it's really easy to run out of them and then be unable to activate discard-based jokers or purple seals when you want to. I haven't figured out whether I'm dealing with that well or not.

To paraphrase what Razzberry Mocha said, if for instance you have a mail in rebate, two hands remaining and one discard, and you have cards in hand that will win the blind, but none of the cards mail in rebate wants you to discard, it is worth it to use up one of your two remaining hands as a pseudo discard to pitch the cards you don't need to win the blind. The $1 you lose by "wasting" a hand is offset by the possibility of drawing one or more of the cards you need for mail in rebate. You will then still have that discard left and you could make $5-10 by using it, then use your final hand to win the blind.

Also in any instance where you have a scaling joker (Green, Bus, Square, etc.) it can often be worth it to "waste" extra hands every blind to scale them up. Particularly if you already have some money banked and you'll earn interest and aren't reliant on the money for leftover hands to be able to afford things in the next shop. Though this situation is much more of a judgement call and requires experience to know which is more important.

It is situational and you will learn it with experience.

In most case discard is straight up better. Discarding with hands should only be done if you're saving discards for a specific purpose (some jokers allow you to discard specific cards for a reward and you might want to discard with hands to try to fish that card out) or you ran out of discards and you have no other choice.

Originally posted by Stefandreus:

Originally posted by RazzberryMocha:

One hand is pretty much objectively better than one discard 95% of the time in terms of drawing new cards besides for a few exceptions, that being discard synergies. If you have a mail in rebate, no cards for it in hand, and 1 hand to throw away for it and 1 discard use your throwaway hand first then actual discard second in case you draw free money, same with purple seals if you're expecting to go through a decent bit of your deck. Additionally, another instance where discards can be better than hands is against the eye, as the extra discard helps to find the oneshot hand and not get locked into something bad.

get it but ....why? Like i get the synergies but why discards with one hand are better that using actual discards? Do you draw better cards?
Sorry but i'm a bit tired so i don't get this LOL i just thought that since hands give you money....leftover hands are good, instead of throwaway hands
i'm learning of course, i'm 180 hrs in this game but only blue stake with yellow and only recently unlocked Stuntman, and get to ante 12 in that same run, never get that far anymore LOL
thanks for the answer

Using a discard is better than using a hand, I was just saying in the context of, say, why red deck might be better than blue deck in some scenarios. I obviously didn’t mention that before and that’s my bad. But if you were to choose between one free hand and one free discard the hand is better in 95% of scenarios, but that 5% is really nice.

It honestly depends heavily on your setup

-Can you reliably win with 1 hand? Use your remaining hands as you please
-Will the boss blind punish you for playing the wrong hand? Discard
-Could you draw into Blue Seal? Discard
-Does your setup rely on Steel? Absolutely discard
-Are you using playing card? Discard 1 card
-Are you using DNA? Discard until you have your golden child, then play it, unless you're REALLY risking losing by not drawing strong
-Does every hand count? Discard into a better hand, and re-evaluate your setup

Do what I do:

Confuse the Play Hand button with the Discard Card buttons on a regular and predictable basis, even though the two buttons are separate and different colours. Then the analysis of of draw tactics won't matter so much, especially if you win the round in spite of patent user stupidity.

think when you using 3/4oak or flush with ancient joker (both strat require specific cards in deck and rest of deck is mostly worthless), fight against The Hook boss, and your hand dealt is pile of worthless cards.
you can discard them. but if you can't draw you want it's gonna cruel, pray for RNG to boss don't take away your aces or hearts in hand.
instead, just play 5 of garbage and work with boss for search card. and when you got some card wants to keep in hand, use discard to search rest of you want safely.

thanks to all for the explanations and examples, but in regard to economy, should i get to a point where leftover hands money isn't something i need, since i rely on interest...right?
maybe my question was confusing, i get that is all situational but part of it was this thing
but again, it may be only a thing in first antes, i don't know how much leftover hands impact on economy, maybe if you rely on them you have to improve at saving money

Originally posted by Stefandreus:

thanks to all for the explanations and examples, but in regard to economy, should i get to a point where leftover hands money isn't something i need, since i rely on interest...right?
maybe my question was confusing, i get that is all situational but part of it was this thing
but again, it may be only a thing in first antes, i don't know how much leftover hands impact on economy, maybe if you rely on them you have to improve at saving money

Unless if you're on green deck or haven't established interest don't rely on them. Extra money is nice but not terrifically impactful. It also helps to think of using throwaway hands as spending $1 that doesn't dip into interest (ex. It costs $1 to scale green joker once and $4 to scale red card by x3 that amount, so green joker is better value per dollar).

Originally posted by RazzberryMocha:

Originally posted by Stefandreus:

thanks to all for the explanations and examples, but in regard to economy, should i get to a point where leftover hands money isn't something i need, since i rely on interest...right?
maybe my question was confusing, i get that is all situational but part of it was this thing
but again, it may be only a thing in first antes, i don't know how much leftover hands impact on economy, maybe if you rely on them you have to improve at saving money

Unless if you're on green deck or haven't established interest don't rely on them. Extra money is nice but not terrifically impactful. It also helps to think of using throwaway hands as spending $1 that doesn't dip into interest (ex. It costs $1 to scale green joker once and $4 to scale red card by x3 that amount, so green joker is better value per dollar).

thanks...anyway, when playing hands with less than 5 cards obviously using it a discard is always the rule right? Like playing high card...always play it with other 4 unless you have some steel card or half joker
(i don't know if it's the entire point of this topic but i'm not so expert LOL)

Originally posted by Stefandreus:

Originally posted by RazzberryMocha:

Unless if you're on green deck or haven't established interest don't rely on them. Extra money is nice but not terrifically impactful. It also helps to think of using throwaway hands as spending $1 that doesn't dip into interest (ex. It costs $1 to scale green joker once and $4 to scale red card by x3 that amount, so green joker is better value per dollar).

thanks...anyway, when playing hands with less than 5 cards obviously using it a discard is always the rule right? Like playing high card...always play it with other 4 unless you have some steel card or half joker
(i don't know if it's the entire point of this topic but i'm not so expert LOL)

If you're playing any form of non five card hand you should try to incorporate bad cards in your hand into it to discard a few cards for free as long as it doesn't hinder you such as with half joker (ex. 10, 10, 10, 10, 2. Four of a kind plus removing a two from hand for free). Typically I throw in low value cards, cards that there are few remaining, or face cards if I'm playing ride the bus.

Originally posted by RazzberryMocha:

Originally posted by Stefandreus:

thanks...anyway, when playing hands with less than 5 cards obviously using it a discard is always the rule right? Like playing high card...always play it with other 4 unless you have some steel card or half joker
(i don't know if it's the entire point of this topic but i'm not so expert LOL)

If you're playing any form of non five card hand you should try to incorporate bad cards in your hand into it to discard a few cards for free as long as it doesn't hinder you such as with half joker (ex. 10, 10, 10, 10, 2. Four of a kind plus removing a two from hand for free). Typically I throw in low value cards, cards that there are few remaining, or face cards if I'm playing ride the bus.

yeah i like half joker but sometimes i forgot that it works with max three cards so i end up even losing lol
maybe it's good only for first antes or if you have a strong high card/pair