Obtaining Spade cheat cards for cheating in blackjack
 

Ahoy!

I've just read most of the other threads in this sub-forum. Very nice guide on blackjack, but I disagree with the 490 vs. 500 and the double down seems to never work (guarantees dealer will suddenly cheat) in my experience, anyhow.

Anyway,

I have hit a wall. My lvl 40 pirate only recently started playing the card games seriously. (In the past, I had just played the bare minimum for the various quests.) So "Edward Edgemenace" has 525 cheat cards.

The problem?

They are almost no spades in all those cheat cards. Five are low spades, 520 are hearts, diamonds or clubs.

I'm trying, for the sake of completeness, to get them all. The only times I've gotten spades, are from Black Mack quests, but the last few dozen times I've done his dumb quest, they've been hearts/diamonds/clubs. And his quest is annoyingly time-consuming. My level 40 player, hunting level one gravediggers? Ugh - make me run back and forth for a minute, why? For another stupid nine of clubs? :piratear: Arrr!

Help!

Anyone know how to get spades?

i dont know what enemies did ya usually train on vterans and officers work usually

Chris nailed it when it comes to the spade explanation, no need to go any further on that.

Having played a bit of the game in Vegas (without cheat cards... rats!!!) probably helps. hehe Not sure of course, what 100% of your tactics were, but I never double down if the dealer is showing a 10/face card. Seldom double down if they are showing an 8 or better for that matter. If the dealer is showing a middle card, like a 4-7 then I "swap" out a card to get "11", and double down. Works for me at least 2/3rds the time. I'll often do the swap irregardless of the dealers hand, but only double down if the likelyhood of the dealer hitting 20 or 21 is not good (when showing mid range cards like 3-7, which also tend to turn into BUST hands).

The old saying is ALWAYS true: There is no such thing as a sure bet.

I learned about the various glitches after level 40. So grenades and staff I leveled up "normally" the hard way on Kingshead. I helped countless people get their grenades.

Less than 1% of the cheat cards I got were spades. And what, about 5% of officers/veterans even have cards. 13 X 100 = 1,300. 1,300 x 20 = 26,000. So, I should kill 26,000 more veterans and officers? Even with the invisible & invincible KH glitch, AND scripting to automate hack, slash, cleave, flourish, thrust, sweep, that is a month of continuous running, at six veterans per minute. They didn't honestly mean for them to be THAT rare, did they?

I'd like to know what happens to the cards that get swapped out. When I replace a two of spades with an ace of hearts, why don't I get to keep that two of spades in my inventory? At least then, I could go lose a lot playing "2 gold piece ante" blackjack and get the cards I want (assuming I had a bunch of cards to begin with.)

How do u know which are cheat cards and why do u need spades?

Typing "U" will tell you how many total you have. Playing blackjack and attempting to swap a card will identify which ones you have.

Why spades? Just for completeness.

Update:

I'm not sure why, but this is bugging me more and more. I grabbed a piece of paper and a pencil, to jot down the apparent frequency of treasures and cards. After the 1st 500 kills (all sorts of different things on different islands - don't ask) I've found that "plunder" is awarded very close to 10% of the time. Cards are awarded very nearly 2% of the time.

Of the eight cheat cards I got this evening, FIVE of them were spades. Four of those were 2 of spades, one was a 3 of spades.

I am beginning to suspect that the spades themselves have extra code, to increase their relative rarity. I suspect that code is broken, resulting in 99% of spades being 2 or 3. (I have 2, 3, 6, 7, 9 and 10 of spades. The others I'm pretty sure I got from "Black Mack" quests in Rowdy Rooster on Port Royal.)

I also noticed that attacking only French Undead on Isla Cangrejos, got me ZERO treasures and zero cards. I assume the same happens for Spanish undead on Cutthroat. Once I noticed the pattern, I did another 50 French undead - still zero.


Well, paper and pencil in hand, I'll head back to Kingshead now...

Really?
They're rare?
I'm missing no cards from spades or any cards for that matter.
In fact i keep getting mroe and more of them.
So instead of just one certain card i'll have two without it showing me when I use them to cheat. (But I hardly ever cheat.)

Is there even a difference with spades and the rest?

The only difference is that of the name and weather or not there are a few spades that you can use to get a full house.
I have had 4 spades that were all mixed up but if you counted them in order and you had one more you could have a full house.
Oh that was the best 2k I ever won.
Other than getting a better had with the 1/4 chance of spades and teh card names themselves there is no difference.

You can use all the same cards and why spades are more rare than the other
cards are beyond me.

Give me a screen-shot please, of your 2GP blackjack hand, ready to swap a card with a spade.

Update: today, I got the Jack of spades and the four of spades from Black Mack. I am very pleasantly stunned.

Id want to see a screen of anyone claiming to have all the spades as well.

I have 5 pirates, all play blackjack for gold, all have had 100's of cheat cards, each of them that had 100's of cheat cards never had spades over a "3". With the exception of 1 or 2 face cards, and an occasional ace i'd gotten fighting stumps or EITC assassins.

Spades are definately a rare commodity in the cheat cards. This subject has been brought up before, and came to a similar conclusion regarding the rarity of spade cards. It cannot just be coincidence.

I have read of a few that said they had full decks, this was the guy that was on the leaderboard for killing enemies .. like forever.. so maybe he did exactly what Ed mentioned played constantly for a month.. hehe

Update: Again, from a "Black Mack" mini-quest, I got another spade. Less than 1/2 from himi are spades, but they are rarely 2s or 3s (that I get ALL THE TIME from elsewhere.)

As far as I know, automating kills in Kingshead won't do the trick (invincible or not) because kills seem to only give 2s and 3s (spades.)

I've now got 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, ___, 9, T, J, ___, ___, ___. Only missing 8, Q, K, and A.

From a slightly larger sample size: About 10% of kills result in a "plunder" drop. About 3% of kills result in a "cheat card" drop.

Update: Wow, four spades in the last 24 hours...just got the king!

The problem I have with the Black Mack quest is I have to play Poker in the first place. hehehe Im just not good at poker..

Well, THIS poker - yeah, I understand that! I get through the quest by bluffing the first two hands. If that doesn't work, stand up to reset the NPCs and sit back down and bluff again. Bluffing only works on the first two hands...and only about half the time.

Yea i too want a full deck of cards

Aye, sven's been a few cards short of a full deck for sometime. been hanging out with scary mary lately too. :laughks2:

My pirate used to have like 270+ cards, and no where near a full deck.

He must have been picking up those cards, you and a few others been droppin!

Update: as of today, I have 789 cheat cards, all the hearts, diamonds and clubs. I have ten spades: 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, __, 9, T, J, __, K, __. All the recent cards that have filled the gap have been from "Black Mack" mini quests...but I just did 21 mini-quests in a row with no new cards. 10 to 30 minutes each quest (subject to a near infinite number of interruptions.)

Update: just got the queen of spades. My 2GP blackjack swap now looks like this: http://i476.photobucket.com/albums/r...7_12-27-12.jpg

So close now, it hurts!

ok, so you got the Queen, how many total cards do you have now?
Wondering how many more you had to get before you got the Queen, you had 789 cards before.

804. Yes, all one by one from Black Mack, I think. Let's see. When I remember to write them down on my scrap of paper here...hmmm. I must've gotten a handful from urchinfists or molusks. In the last four days: ah, js, 4s, jd, th, 5h, 5s, jh, 6h, qc, 3c, ks, ad, 7s, 4h, 7s, 9h, qh, 6h, 3d, 8c, qc, 9d, td, qc, 6d, 6s, 9h, 5d, 8d, tc, 4d, 7h, 3s, kc, 9h, td, 3s, qd, 7d, ks, jd, 3s, 9s, 8h, qs, 5s.

Wow nice set of cards
i think the most i ever gotten was 2 in 1 day lol :laughks2:

OK, now up to 810. ac, 5c, jd, 2c, 4h, 4c. Only a couple interruptions, so those six were close to optimal speed. :-(
Looking at timestamps here - yup - 15 minutes average.
I can see them making the quest convoluted, to prevent automation and whatnot. But the rewards on each round here, are quite lacking!

Since then: 3d, 5c, 3h, 5h, qc, 5c, ks, js, 3s, 9c, qs, 5h, td, 8s. Yay! http://s476.photobucket.com/albums/r...8_10-57-11.jpg

Only one to go, now...http://i476.photobucket.com/albums/r...8_10-57-46.jpg...but I think it may be a doozie.

kc, 2s, ad, 5h, 5s, qs, as. Switching to a busy ideal server seems to have helped.

http://i476.photobucket.com/albums/r...18_14-15-7.jpg

Total now is 830 cheat cards.

http://i476.photobucket.com/albums/r...8_15-28-16.jpg

which building is he in?

[singing] "It's the ace of spades"

My level 40 pirate only has 4 spades. They are very rare.:)

As explained above, it's not that they are very rare. You can only get 2s and 3s from defeating enemies; the rest of the spades are only available from doing the Black Mack quest in Rowdy Rooster on Port Royal.

As of right now, I have 1,205 cheat cards. No way to tell how many of each, but I do have a complete deck. :-)


Addendum 4/28/2010: The new inventory system does display cheat card breakdowns now...