Blueprint and Brainstorm in Balatro: Master the Joker Copy Combo

Blueprint and Brainstorm are two of the most talked-about Jokers in Balatro, and for good reason. When placed correctly, they can copy the effects of your most powerful Jokers and push your score into territory that feels almost unfair. The tricky part is knowing exactly how to arrange them, especially when you add Mime and Reserved Parking into the mix. This guide breaks down the positioning logic so you can stop guessing and start scaling.

How Do Blueprint and Brainstorm Actually Work?

Before getting into placement strategy, it helps to understand what each Joker does at a mechanical level.

Blueprint copies the effect of the Joker directly to its right. If you move Blueprint around in your Joker slots, it will copy whichever Joker sits immediately to its right at the moment scoring is calculated. According to the Balatro Wiki, Blueprint combines well with virtually any other Joker and effectively doubles its effect when stacked correctly.

Brainstorm, on the other hand, copies the effect of your leftmost Joker, regardless of where Brainstorm itself sits in the row. This distinction matters enormously when you start building around it. You can read the full mechanical breakdown on the Brainstorm wiki page, which also notes that unlike Blueprint, repositioning Brainstorm does not change what it copies since it always references the leftmost slot.

Joker order changes everything

What Is the Best Joker Order for This Combo?

Positioning is everything here. The general principle is that xMult Jokers (those that multiply your score rather than add to it) should sit to the right of +Mult and +Chip Jokers. This is because additions happen first, and then multipliers are applied to the accumulated total. Placing an xMult Joker early in the chain wastes its potential since there is less score to multiply at that point.

For a Blueprint and Brainstorm setup, a strong baseline order looks like this:

1. Your primary scaling Joker (leftmost, since Brainstorm copies this)
2. Any +Chip or +Mult Jokers
3. Blueprint (positioned to copy your highest-value xMult Joker to its right)
4. Your highest-value xMult Joker
5. Brainstorm (copies the leftmost Joker, doubling your primary scaler)

xMult chain with Blueprint active

Should You Use Reserved Parking With This Setup?

This is where the community debate gets interesting. Reserved Parking gives you $1 each time a face card is held in hand without being played. It is primarily an economy Joker, not a scoring Joker, so the question becomes whether you should dedicate a Joker slot to it or use that slot for something that directly boosts your score.

The comparison that comes up most often is the Baron situation. Baron gives x1.5 Mult for each King held in hand, which means splitting it across multiple positions (one on Mime, one on Reserved Parking) can produce different outcomes depending on your hand composition. The same logic applies here.

For most runs, the answer depends on how much gold you actually need. If you are already hitting the $25 interest cap regularly, Reserved Parking is generating diminishing returns and you are better off replacing it with a scoring Joker. Keeping $25 in the bank maximizes interest at +$1 per $5 held, so once you have that locked in, Parking loses much of its value.

Economy vs. scoring Joker tradeoff

How Does Mime Fit Into the Blueprint and Brainstorm Setup?

Mime retriggers the held-in-hand effects of all cards once, effectively doubling any Joker that triggers on cards held rather than played. This makes it a natural partner for Jokers like Baron (Kings held) and Reserved Parking (face cards held).

When you have Mime alongside Blueprint and Brainstorm, you need to decide whether Mime is doing economy work (retriggering Reserved Parking) or scoring work (retriggering Baron or a similar held-card Joker). Running both Blueprint and Brainstorm already uses two Joker slots, so every additional slot carries a real opportunity cost.

A practical approach: if your run has strong economy already, use Mime to retrigger a scoring Joker instead of Reserved Parking. If you are cash-strapped heading into the shop phase, having Mime double Reserved Parking triggers can fund key purchases that set up your late-game.

Key Principles for Scaling Joker Runs

Beyond the specific Blueprint and Brainstorm positioning, a few broader principles keep these runs consistent:

• Prioritize Jokers that scale over time. A Joker that grows stronger each round is almost always more valuable than a flat bonus Joker, especially in later antes.
• Deck fixing accelerates everything. Removing unwanted cards with tools like the Hanged Man or Death tarot cards tightens your deck and makes your target hands more consistent.
• Plan around boss blinds. Check what the upcoming boss blind does before committing to a hand type. Some boss blinds punish specific play patterns, and knowing this early lets you adjust your Joker order or hand strategy.
• Avoid building for Full House. According to experienced players in the Balatro community, Full House is one of the hardest hands to build around reliably. Pairs and flushes tend to offer more consistent returns.
• +Mult before xMult in the Joker chain. This is the single most impactful positioning rule. Adding before multiplying always produces a higher result than multiplying a small number first.

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