Balatro

Here's what you need to do for this achievement: to get a Gold Sticker on a Joker, it must be on your team after beating the Ante 8 boss on a Gold Stake run (the hardest difficulty level). Thus, every single one of the 150 Jokers in the game (some of which are quite useless) must be present at the end of one of your wins. Also, the game doesn't seem to register this achievement right away; even after collecting all the stickers, I had to win another Gold Stake run before it triggered.

Just a warning to start with: this is a massive investment of time, and it may ruin your enjoyment of the game. Balatro is balanced around White Stake, not Gold Stake, and I really don't know why the dev forced you to play so much on Gold Stake (which is far more RNG dependent and is much less flexible on Joker configurations) for completion. It's a small blemish on an otherwise wonderful game.

With that said, there's an exploit I found which does help a fair bit with the time investment. I don't know when or if it'll be patched on Xbox (which at time of writing is still stuck at 1.0.0b, which sucks because there are numerous balance patches we're missing). I'll update this solution if it gets patched out. But, for the moment, here it is. I've confirmed that the exploit no longer works. You'll have to earn the Jokers and Gold decks the slow way now. (On the plus side, some balance changes are coming which should make Gold much less annoying.)

Here are a few more tips that will be useful, even when doing Completionist++ the "correct" way:
- Like in most roguelites, you can cheat a little by making "checkpoints" using offline save techniques. If you load a game, go offline, play a little, delete your local save, then go back online and restart the game, you'll recover back to the point you loaded. This can let you preview a seed (particularly helpful to know what Jokers and deals might be coming up), or even fish for new Jokers near the end of a run.
- I mostly used the Checkered deck, but I've heard the Plasma, Ghost, and Abandoned decks are also a lot easier to win Gold Stake runs on. YMMV.
- Cavendish is a Joker that can only spawn after Gros Michel (the banana) destroys itself. Fortunately, Gros Michel is a great early-game Joker anyway, and Cavendish is almost a run winner by itself, so just be sure to buy Gros Michel when you can.
- Madness can coexist with eternal Jokers (and still powers up). Similarly, spectral cards that destroy Jokers will still work but won't destroy your eternals. It's interesting that eternal Jokers, usually a pain, have this minor benefit too.
- The Lucky/Stone/Gold/Steel/Glass Jokers can only spawn if you have cards of that type in your deck. You should use lots of Glass (and some Steel) cards anyway, as they're great at saving runs when you can't quite hit the blind target.
- The Legendaries are a pain. It actually took me 22 Soul cards to finally collect my 5th. If (like me) you get to the end of Completionist++ and are still missing them, the way to farm them is to constantly restart, looking for the "Mega Arcana Pack" skip tag on the first two blinds. Keep doing this until one of them has a Soul card. I was able to get one every 30-60 minutes this way, but it was very boring. I believe that this has been patched, so you're now guaranteed to get a Legendary you need a Gold Sticker for. You probably won't need to farm.

Here's what you need to do for this achievement: to get a Gold Sticker on a Joker, it must be on your team after beating the Ante 8 boss on a Gold Stake run (the hardest difficulty level). Thus, every single one of the 150 Jokers in the game (some of which are quite useless) must be present at the end of one of your wins. Also, the game doesn't seem to register this achievement right away; even after collecting all the stickers, I had to win another Gold Stake run before it triggered.

Just a warning to start with: this is a massive investment of time, and it may ruin your enjoyment of the game. Balatro is balanced around White Stake, not Gold Stake, and I really don't know why the dev forced you to play so much on Gold Stake (which is far more RNG dependent and is much less flexible on Joker configurations) for completion. It's a small blemish on an otherwise wonderful game.

With that said, there's an exploit I found which does help a fair bit with the time investment. I don't know when or if it'll be patched on Xbox (which at time of writing is still stuck at 1.0.0b, which sucks because there are numerous balance patches we're missing). I'll update this solution if it gets patched out. But, for the moment, here it is. I've confirmed that the exploit no longer works. You'll have to earn the Jokers and Gold decks the slow way now. (On the plus side, some balance changes are coming which should make Gold much less annoying.)

Here are a few more tips that will be useful, even when doing Completionist++ the "correct" way:
- Like in most roguelites, you can cheat a little by making "checkpoints" using offline save techniques. If you load a game, go offline, play a little, delete your local save, then go back online and restart the game, you'll recover back to the point you loaded. This can let you preview a seed (particularly helpful to know what Jokers and deals might be coming up), or even fish for new Jokers near the end of a run.
- I mostly used the Checkered deck, but I've heard the Plasma, Ghost, and Abandoned decks are also a lot easier to win Gold Stake runs on. YMMV.
- Cavendish is a Joker that can only spawn after Gros Michel (the banana) destroys itself. Fortunately, Gros Michel is a great early-game Joker anyway, and Cavendish is almost a run winner by itself, so just be sure to buy Gros Michel when you can.
- Madness can coexist with eternal Jokers (and still powers up). Similarly, spectral cards that destroy Jokers will still work but won't destroy your eternals. It's interesting that eternal Jokers, usually a pain, have this minor benefit too.
- The Lucky/Stone/Gold/Steel/Glass Jokers can only spawn if you have cards of that type in your deck. You should use lots of Glass (and some Steel) cards anyway, as they're great at saving runs when you can't quite hit the blind target.
- The Legendaries are a pain. It actually took me 22 Soul cards to finally collect my 5th. If (like me) you get to the end of Completionist++ and are still missing them, the way to farm them is to constantly restart, looking for the "Mega Arcana Pack" skip tag on the first two blinds. Keep doing this until one of them has a Soul card. I was able to get one every 30-60 minutes this way, but it was very boring. I believe that this has been patched, so you're now guaranteed to get a Legendary you need a Gold Sticker for. You probably won't need to farm.

I'm writing this guide as an addition to SnapDrgon's guide as I think there should be a better explanation on how to actually *win* on the gold stake, aside from what deck to use. Everything that is relevant in SnapDragon's guide still applies but what specific strategies can help you win gold stake runs? This will be a long read but I want it to be comprehensive enough where you can have an easier time getting those gold stickers!

First, I must give a massive shoutout to the user DrSpectred, who runs the Balatro University YouTube channel here -> https://www.youtube.com/@drspectred I've watched him a ton while playing this game and found his insight immensely helpful, so a lot of ideas presented in this guide are based on his explanations and strategies. Definitely go check him out if you want to see some insightful high level Balatro gameplay.

A good method for trying to get gold stickers is to make a winning build, then slot in any jokers you need gold stickers on. Meaning, get a good set of 2, 3, or 4 jokers that you can win the run with so you have 1-3 slots available for remaining jokers you need stickers for.

What are some jokers that can make runs easier to win? The answer in large part is scaling jokers, which are jokers that grow when certain conditions are met. For example, Runner, Square Joker, and Castle are scaling chips jokers. While Red Card, Green Joker, Supernova, and more are scaling +Mult jokers. Then there's the scaling xMult jokers of Constellation, Hologram, Vampire, Campfire and more.
Scaling jokers are imperative to gold stake runs because the score requirements scale pretty high. So you want to use jokers that can grow alongside the score requirements so you can stay afloat and get to and beat the ante 8 boss. I believe that the scaling xMult jokers are most important but you can very well use flat xMult jokers like The Duo, Card Sharp, Cavendish, Blackboard, etc. if your +Mult is high enough.

So what strategy did I use when going into a run? I played pairs. Yes, pairs! Believe it or not, playing pairs is a very viable strategy because you can (almost) always play a pair. What makes pairs viable is the ease of playing the hand, as well as the ability to grow the level of the hand via Mercury planet cards or Burnt Joker. You can also play a pair with three other random cards as a way to discard them to find better cards you want. When you level up the Pair it gains 15 chips and 1 mult, not great on its own but it will add up quick, especially if you use a handy tool in the Blue Seal.

At the time of writing this, Blue Seal cards give you the planet card of the final hand played when you win the round, if you have the Blue Seal card in your hand (so long as you have room for the planet card in your consumable slot). For example, if you win the round with a pair then you will get a Mercury card. You can reach really high level hands with Blue Seals and playing pairs makes it easier to hold Blue Seals in your hand, which makes it easier to get the Mercury cards. The Telescope voucher helps level up your most played hand as well.

What if you can't draw the Blue Seal cards consistently, though? Shape your deck! Shaping your deck is imperative in a deck builder game. Use the Hanged Man tarot card often on cards you aren't using like lower ranking cards or face cards if you're using Ride the Bus. Also use the Death tarot card to create copies of the Blue Seal cards. Spectral cards like Cryptid and Immolate are very good for creating copies of a card you want or thinning your deck, respectively. Always take Immolate if you get it early in the run or even if it's partway through and you get a draw of cards you don't mind getting rid of.
A general rule I followed was to not add too many cards to the deck because it'll make it harder to draw the cards you actually need, it's a much better idea to delete cards (this goes double if you're playing higher ranking hands like straights, flushes, or four of a kind, etc). The exception to that is if you get Hologram which benefits from adding cards to the deck but if I had Hologram then I was committed to playing pairs. Since pairs are so easy, it doesn't matter as much if cards are added to the deck. It just makes it harder to draw Blue Seals or Gold cards and such. Though you can still delete cards to offset the additions, Hologram does not decrease when you delete cards. Also, add [I]good[/I] cards to the deck like Blue or Purple Seals, or a holographic lucky card, or a red seal gold card, stuff like that. Don't add a plain regular card into the deck unless your build calls for it, like snagging more 2s to grow the Wee Joker.

When it comes to the deck choice, I would recommend the yellow deck. I used the yellow deck for all of my gold sticker hunting. The reason for that is the additional money at the start of the game makes it much easier to get a run off the ground. You want to try to win the first round in one hand with a high straight or flush or better. This gives you $19 going into the first shop with the yellow deck, meaning you can always buy the guaranteed Buffoon Pack that's in the first shop and still have $15 to use or save for interest. This allows you a better opportunity to buy the ante 1 voucher if it's something you want like an extra hand or increased hand size.
Money is essential in this game as it opens a lot of doors for you. You can buy Celestial Packs and Arcana Packs to help level up and build your deck to how you need, or use the money to reroll the shop for better jokers or other support cards. You want to stay at or above $25 for the most part as that's where interest caps, you get $1 of interest per $5 you have, resulting in an extra $5 when you win a round with $25 in your pocket (unless you're playing on the green deck).

As for other decks, I see people recommending the anaglyph deck. I think it's a decent deck at first but has diminishing returns as the fewer jokers you need gold stickers on, the less likely you are to get them when using the negative joker skip tag. You also need to get the negative skip tag, which doesn't always happen. On top of that, the negative joker has a chance to be a rental, which will strip you of $3 each time you finish a round with it in your joker slots. Rentals aren't as desirable because money is crucial, one or two is okay if you can afford it but you have to focus on keeping your money up to compensate. I rarely took rental jokers, especially early in a run.
Checkered deck is also good though you don't HAVE to play flushes, pairs work all the same ;)
If you want to use the plasma deck then seek out chips jokers. It is easier to get a high number of chips from jokers in ante 1-8 and since the number gets balanced, having a ton of chips equates to having a lot of mult as well. Bull, Runner, Blue Joker, Stone Joker, Castle, Arrowhead, Stuntman, jokers like that will get you through the plasma deck.
Erratic Deck can be fun if you build accordingly to the strengths of what you have. I believe I got the gold sticker on The Family with this deck.
Abandoned deck makes it very easy to find straights. Straights are a very good strategy as well, in general not just for this deck. The issue is that it's tough to always get a straight but it's easier on this deck. The Saturn planet card is very good giving 30 chips and 3 mult per level.
Ghost deck is good as well with the free x1.5 mult on the first good joker you grab. My only recommendation would be to use it on a joker you plan on keeping for the entire run. Even though you need a gold sticker on an okay joker, that doesn't mean you have to or should keep it around because it's polychrome. So try to use it on one of the good scaling jokers you like.

Some other general tips:
Don't skip too often. There aren't that many skip tags that are worth missing the shop for. Shops are generally where you're going to grow your build the most. When I did skip, it was usually an investment tag in ante 1, as the $25 early is very helpful. I also skipped for an orbital tag on the hand I was playing if I felt that hand wasn't high enough level yet. Some exceptions to this are the anaglyph deck using the double tags for negative jokers, or if you are in ante 7 or 8 and don't want to risk your glass cards breaking or trying to finish with Gros Michel or Seltzer or some joker that can disappear.
Another tip for attaining gold stickers, you CAN get gold stickers on jokers that are debuffed by the perishable sticker. So if you have a perishable Gros Michel and it becomes debuffed after 5 rounds, you can still get a gold sticker on it so long as it's in your joker slots at the end of the ante 8 boss.

Look at how many points you're scoring by ante 6 or so. That's when you want to starting closing in on the pace to reach the ante 8 boss score of 400,000 (unless you get Violet Vessel, then you'll need 1.2 million points, Yikes!). Say you only have 4 hands in your run, you want to shoot for each hand scoring somewhere in the 100,000 point range. Pay attention to what cards and hands you're playing to attain the score as well. Are you getting 100k with glass cards? What do you get without glass cards? Or how many points do you get when you play a two pair versus a straight? Whatever the situation, you want to make sure you're able to score 400k points with the number of hands you have and know what hands and cards you need to get that score. You can check each boss at the start of the ante by pushing the back button, that can help you prep for what's to come.

Going back to the idea at the start of the guide, getting a winning set of jokers then slotting in the jokers you need gold stickers for. I tended to look for the jokers I needed in ante 7 or 8. Reroll the shop as much as you can (without dropping under $25! [Unless it's the last shop]) to try finding some you need. Feel free to pick up one or two you need before then, of course. You can also pick up helpful tarot cards in the last shop to make the boss blind easier, Justice being the most helpful.

As for you cheese enthusiasts, there is one cheese method I used a decent bit when playing this game. Say you made a mistake and want to make a better play or choice. If you quit out of the game entirely back to the Xbox home menu, then load it up again, *sometimes* you will be reverted back in time a bit. I say sometimes because if you do it too late then it'll update to where you just were, but even when I quickly quit out I occasionally did not get reverted to an earlier point. You can do this in the middle of the round to replay a hand or discard more efficiently or make a different decision in the shop. It was helpful cheese but not the most consistent.

Those are the biggest points I wanted to highlight. I know that is a lot to read and I appreciate it if you've read all the way through! There are so many strategies and joker combinations you can use, that's part of the appeal of this game. Everyone will find what they like and create their own play style. See what works for you but don't be afraid to try some other jokers or strategies. Also don't be afraid to pivot strategies mid-run, if you're building for one thing but a better setup comes your way, you can shift into that new setup. Feel free to leave your thoughts and strategies in the comments!
Thank you for reading my essay about this wonderful game, I hope it was of some help to you.
Happy hunting those stickers!!!