Ramen is an Uncommon Joker that provides Multiplicative Mult to all hands played. When first acquired, it serves as a middling, but overall unconditional X2 Mult. However, as luck favors the user less and the rounds drag on, this Joker decreases in power, losing -X0.01 Mult per card discarded. Ramen cannot maintain or go below X1 Mult; once 100 cards are discarded, it will automatically destroy itself, with the text "Eaten!" flashing on the screen when it does.
The Mult decrease triggers both on the player's per-round discards, and cards discarded by other sources - this is currently limited to The Hook Boss Blind, which discards 2 random cards from the player's hand before each hand is scored (leading to a Mult decrease of about -X0.06 Mult, assuming an average of 3 hands are played). It will not trigger if the played hand in a round contains a card(s) that did not score, as they are not considered to have been discarded. This Joker's sell value is also never decreased regardless of its current Mult value, so it is advised to sell it once it reaches or goes below X1.25 Mult, at which point its scoring assistance will be minimal.
Ramen has extremely limited utility past Ante 8 due to its middling base power and reverse power scaling. However, in the absence of another Multiplicative Mult Joker, it can still serve most builds very well.
Synergies[]
Decks[]
Green Deck: Perhaps the most obvious synergy exists with this Deck; conserving discards for money gives a mild source of income to compensate for the extra hands required to capitalize on Ramen's power.- Blue Deck: The extra hand every round makes it less punishing to play 'throwaway' hands as makeshift discards that also ease a bit of scoring tension, which better preserves this Joker's power.
- Nebula Deck: With Ramen skewed more towards easier-to-find hands in desperate need of scaling, the built-in Telescope Voucher this Deck provides makes it a natural choice.
- All Decks with consistency-based bonuses allow them to form better hands in the absence of discards, which helps make much more out of Ramen than usual. These include the Painted Deck (+2 hand size), Checkered Deck (only Hearts and Spades in Deck), and especially Abandoned Deck (no face cards in Deck), which can very easily leverage the fast scaling of Straights with the Saturn Planet Card in tandem with this Joker. Even certain Erratic Deck seeds can lend themselves well to consistently finding high-performing hands.
- Red Deck: This Deck has anti-synergy with this Joker, as it encourages the player to discard more to find better hands.
- Black Deck: Even worse than the above is this Deck, which suffers from -1 hand per round. This forces more dependency on discards, while disallowing liberal use of 'throwaway' hands. Prioritize looking for other Multiplicative Mult Jokers.
Poker Hands[]
This Joker works best with weaker hands that can be more reliably made without discarding (or by using a hand as a makeshift discard), such as High Card, Pair, Two Pair, and Three of a Kind. To that end, this will force the player to become more dependent on Planet Card scaling than with most other builds, as all these hands are very weak at a baseline. Three of a Kinds should be prioritized if possible, as they have slightly more base + Mult, and gain twice as much through Venus than the others do (through Pluto, Mercury, and Uranus, respectively).
Jokers[]
This Joker is the only Multiplicative Mult Joker that objectively gets weaker over time (with the only exception to this being one with a Perishable Sticker). On top of its already average X2 Mult multiplier, it is best used in the earlier Antes as a 'transitional' Joker to be used while saving up money to gain more dependable sources of scoring.
The following Jokers synergize well with Ramen:
- Any Common Joker that can provide consistent shots of + Mult will benefit a build with this Joker greatly, allowing rounds to be solved faster, and as a result, more money to be conserved for longer-term options. Some of the better options include Abstract Joker (which is viable even in the later Antes), Popcorn (itself a temporary addition), and Half Joker, Scholar, and Walkie Talkie (which are all Jokers that can easily be built around while still being strong).
- Banner: Providing +30 Chips to all hands played for each unused discard, these two can cover both sides of the equation with almost any hand in the early game. The -1 discard malus inflicted by Blue Stake and higher makes this a less viable combo in the later difficulties, but still worth considering.
- Blue Joker: Providing +2 Chips to all hands played for each card remaining in Deck, this essentially beats out Banner on the higher Stakes, and can go even higher by adding cards to the Deck, albeit this is ill-advised in combination with this Joker due to an absolute need for consistency.
- Delayed Gratification: This unorthodox economy Joker richly rewards the user with $2 for each discard the player has at the end of the round, as long as no discards were used during the round. This can much more quickly help the player access more build stability when combined with the unique property of this Joker. Much like Banner, however, it is far less viable on Blue Stake or higher, as it essentially becomes a Golden Joker with an inconvenient activation condition.
- Green Joker: A steady-scaling Additive Mult Joker that gains +1 Mult for every hand played, but loses -1 Mult for every discard action (including The Hook Boss Blind's effect, which effectively stalls its scaling for one round). This is the only other anti-discard Joker that ignores the amount of remaining discards, making it far more effective on all Stakes. Adding onto this, its Additive Mult pairs extremely well with the Multiplicative Mult this Joker gives, allowing them to comprise a respectable amount of your score alone, even into the late-game!
- Astronomer: One of the few effect Jokers that Ramen has synergy with, making Planet Cards and Celestial Packs in The Shop free. In doing so, it becomes easier to lean on poker hand level scaling, in the event that scoring Jokers prove too inaccessible due to bad luck.
- Space Joker: With each played hand having a 1 in 4 chance to have its level upgraded before scoring, it can serve as a source of long-term scaling, especially while playing the large number of hands per round this Joker encourages.
- Burglar: An amazing partner with this Joker, replacing the player's discards with 3 extra hands at the start of the round. This effectively turns Ramen into a X2 Mult with no drawbacks, which, with enough Additive Mult, can serve well even into Ante 8 when it otherwise would not. It also enables synergy with Mystic Summit, which normally has anti-synergy with this Joker, giving a respectable shot of +15 Mult to more easily clear the Blinds.
This Joker has anti-synergy with the following Jokers:
- Drunkard and Merry Andy: The extra discards these two provide are absolutely useless in a Ramen build, except when considering the potential presence of Banner or Delayed Gratification. Using 3 Joker slots for such a combination can badly dampen scoring, so these should be avoided regardless of how well they can mesh with the other two synergistic Jokers.
- Faceless Joker, Mail-In Rebate, and Trading Card: These Jokers will never give their payout unless you start debuffing this one. Money does lead to better scoring, but the risk of depreciating Mult even a little is huge.
- Troubadour: While its hand size bonus provides opportunity to more consistently find hands with higher base Mult, it has a debilitating -1 hand per round penalty, meaning it forces more dependency on discards that would weaken this Joker.
- Burnt Joker: Though a source of much-needed level scaling, it does this through discarding the poker hand in question, which actively worsens this Joker.
- Hit the Road and Yorick: The power of these cards both depend on discarding large quantities of cards, meaning they will both greedily slurp your Ramen right up. The latter of the two is usually worth keeping over this Joker, however, as it has the potential to reach very high X Mult values if acquired early.
Vouchers[]
- Grabber and its upgraded counterpart Nacho Tong provide an extra hand with each acquisition, giving more opportunities to find higher-scoring hands to play.
- Telescope guarantees that the Planet Card for the most played poker hand will always appear in Celestial Packs. Due to the very low base Mult of High Card, Pair, and Two Pair, this is a must-grab in any build keeping Ramen for the long-term.
- For similar reasons, Planet Merchant and Tarot Merchant, as well as their upgraded counterparts Planet Tycoon and Tarot Tycoon, are also possible considerations, albeit not as strongly recommended since they take notable Shop space away from Jokers, which should be the main source of scoring anyway (unless using the Painted Deck).
- Hieroglyph should be avoided while using this Joker, as its -1 hand per round penalty increases dependence on discards.
Trivia[]
- This Joker is part of the group of "Consumable" Jokers that count down in some way with usage. The other Jokers in this group are Ice Cream, Popcorn, Seltzer and Turtle Bean.
In other languages[]
| Language | Name | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Chinese (Simplified) | 拉面 | |
| Chinese (Traditional) | 拉麵 | |
| Dutch | Noedels | |
| French | Ramen | |
| German | Ramen | |
| Indonesian | Ramen | |
| Italian | Ramen | |
| Japanese | ラーメン | |
| Korean | 라면 | |
| Polish | Ramen | |
| Portuguese (Brazilian) | Lámen | |
| Russian | Рамен | |
| Spanish (Spain) | Ramen | |
| Spanish (Latin America) | Ramen |
