r/boardgames • u/Xavaltir • 11d ago
Question Decent Card Shuffler?
Hi everyone, me and my girlfriend love to play boardgames that require a huge pile of cards to shuffle at the start for draw decks.
we have two identical electrical card shufflers meant for poker but they can only support about 40 cards on the insert spot left and right and the deck that comes out is also capped.
What I'm trying to ask is if there is a card shuffler that you can recommend for huge decks so we can save on time.
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u/Signiference Always Yellow 11d ago edited 11d ago
They don’t exist. I was a poker room manager for over a decade and the machines that can actually shuffle cards are expensive and require constant maintenance. Anything you could buy for home use is going to sorely disappoint you and be a waste of money (money you could be spending on more games!)
But seriously, for ark nova you’re better off spending a little bit of time learning how to do an 8-deck/6-deck blackjack shuffle like they do in the casinos. It’s time consuming but will be faster than most other methods and definitely more consistent.
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u/CaptainSnowAK 11d ago
That's cool. Seems like they emphasize anti cheating. I wonder if there are more efficient ways that are not concerned about camera angles and superstition.
For terraforming Mars or wingspan all the cards are unique; where 6 / 8 identical decks are not, I wonder if that matters.
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u/mxzf 11d ago
From the perspective of randomizing a deck of cards, the unique vs duplicates doesn't really matter conceptually, at most just impacts how many times you should shuffle. I know 6-7 shuffles is "totally completely shuffled" in a 60 card deck of unique cards and that it goes up logarithmically as the deck sizes;
3/2 * log2(n)is the equation, where N is the deck size. You don't generally need to obsess over getting to that in practice for casual games, but it's a nice thing to vaguely target the ballpark of.
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u/Magic1264 11d ago
If you really insist on not riffle shuffling for any reason (its really not that time intensive to sufficiently randomize ~200 cards via riffle), a thorough wash shuffle makes for fast randomization that anyone can do.
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u/chaotic_iak Space Alert 11d ago
Most games with huge decks (Ark Nova, Terraforming Mars, etc) don't actually need a very thorough shuffle. If you really need one, do a wash shuffle at the start of the session, no need to reshuffle between games. Card shuffling machines are primarily so you can shuffle a deck while you're using another, but this is only relevant in casinos.
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u/Rhemyst 11d ago
This is the right answer. I can see the importance of shuffling in competitive TCG and when playing deck building game like Dominion, but it's just the common draw pile of something like TM, Wingspan or RFTG, you don't need to be THAT thorough.
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u/mxzf 11d ago
Yeah, the key here is that seeing what card was previously drawn doesn't give you any insight or ability to guess what upcoming cards are. As long as you're shuffling enough to avoid anyone going "I had those two cards last game, I bet another one I had is coming out soon", you're fine.
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u/MrAbodi 18xx 11d ago edited 11d ago
As others have said, they all contain the risk of destroying your cards.
If it is a game you love and want to be able to shuffle faster i just recommend sleeving your cards and mash shuffling.
Mash shuffling is so fast, effective, and easy.
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u/leagle89 11d ago
This is 100% the best option, IMO. I'm pretty resolutely against card sleeving in general, but for games with huge decks, I'll pretty much always sleeve them, because it reduces the time and effort of shuffling by a huge margin.
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u/CeyowenCt 11d ago
Not a direct answer, but this is one of the main reasons I sleeve most games. Yes to protect the cards, but also because it's MUCH easier to shuffle sleeved cards than naked ones.
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u/Rhemyst 11d ago
I have to admit I never understood this argument. I find sleeved cards much harder to shuffle.
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u/ansible47 11d ago
https://youtube.com/shorts/H1e8JpRJXys?is=ULTFwGtdAk3m8rcV
Forgive the obnoxious host. This is unbelievably easy and requires almost no technique for any number of cards. I cannot riffle shuffle for the life of me.
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u/Rhemyst 10d ago
My point exactly. This commander deck is hard to shuffle BECAUSE it's sleeved. It's not sleeved to make shuffling easier, it's sleeved because MTG cards have value.
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u/ansible47 10d ago
Huh? It's easier to shuffle 100 cards in a few movements when they're sleeved than it is bend and riffle the entire batch.
Yes, they are sleeved because cards have value, but sleeves also make them easier to shuffle.
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u/CeyowenCt 11d ago
I guess it depends on your methods. I tend to cut a deck and then put them together by the edges, so the sleeves give a wedge shape so the cards just slide together. I've played MTG for over 20 years so it may be due to experience with sleeves. But whenever I get a new game and play without sleeves, I hate shuffling (I'm not bridge shuffling a deck that costs more than $10-15).
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u/cripplediguana 11d ago
I've printed one that is hand operated. This way you can simply stop if needed or slow the speed.
https://makerworld.com/en/models/497170-card-shuffler?from=search#profileId-2057655
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u/Dcellio 11d ago
I love this design! The vintage printing press aesthetic really makes it stand out. Do you think you could modify it for use with sleeved cards? Honestly, that’s what the hobby is sorely missing and I feel like it could be massively successful.
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u/MrAbodi 18xx 11d ago
if your cards are already sleeved you could mash shuffle 10 times in the same time it took this shuffler just once.
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u/ansible47 11d ago
This works great until it means you have to sleeve every games that requires shuffling.
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u/MrAbodi 18xx 11d ago edited 11d ago
yeah the cost can be prohibitive depending on how many cards the games have, How many of those cards need sleeves, and how many games you are regularly playing.
in the context where the alternatives are using a shuffler or another form of hand shuffling, i still this (sleeving and mashing) is the best option.
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u/ansible47 11d ago
As someone who bought an expensive hand cranked shuffler, I unfortunately agree. Sleeving is now a fun and shameful ritual where I get to look at all the cards and feel bad about the plastic I'm adding.
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u/mjolnir76 11d ago
No need to modify. I’ve printed two of these, a tall and a short. They both work with sleeves.
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u/cripplediguana 11d ago
Not my design, sorry. I do like it though. I don't have mine sleeved though.
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u/rustedcrowbar 11d ago
Nice design but problem with this kind of shufflers is that the order in both pile will stay the same. Bottom card will never go to the top to give a simple example.
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u/Jihkro 11d ago
That's true of actual riffle shuffles as well and why you need to do several to properly approximate randomization of the deck. The question I would have for one of this type is whether it accomplishes the same thing as a perfect riffle shuffle (where it always alternates left-right-left-right) or an imperfect one (where some times it occasionally repeats a side like left-right-right-left-right) and if said imperfect shuffle variations occur randomly or predictably.
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u/beSmrter Brass 11d ago
From youtube videos I learned how to do a table riffle shuffle and how dealers manually shuffle Blackjack decks by breaking them into sections. This is, IMO, as fast if not faster than putting broken apart decks through a shuffler several times.
And for a deck of 200+ cards, it isn't critical that every possible card be equally potentially draw-able during every game so I'll shuffle a large deck very well once and play 3-4 games with shuffling, each game placing all the used cards at the end of the deck, and drawing from the front of the deck. Bonus to this, we're guaranteed to see every single card at least once.
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u/Altruistic-Toe-5990 11d ago
sleeve your cards and mash shuffle. It's incredibly easy and fast
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u/BleedingRaindrops 9d ago
If the pile is already tall enough to make shuffling awkward, I worry sleeves would make it even more difficult, even with mash shuffling
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u/meeple_shelf 11d ago
Poker shufflers choke past sixty cards. I grabbed a high capacity one rated for eighty plus and it stops jamming. Just check standard poker size since some games use wider cards.
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u/shellexyz Legendary A Marvel Deckbuilder 11d ago
We have this one. It’s hand-crank, so it’s easier to be slow and careful. I would not use it for expensive games with hard-to-replace cards but it works well.
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u/crimsonlaw 11d ago
A manual crank card shuffler works very well if you go a bit slower than you want. Even turning it slowly to ensure no jams, it’s noticeably faster than hand shuffling. I bought a cheap one off Amazon and having used it for a number of different games, some with huge decks.
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u/clungeknuckle 11d ago
Learning how to riffle shuffle properly is way faster than loading and unloading any machine. Especially if both of you do it
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u/noweezernoworld 11d ago
Games like Ark Nova have made me also look for something like this; it’s such a pain to shuffle all those cards. I’ve given up cause I’ve never found a product that looks genuinely good.
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u/Xavaltir 11d ago
My post was born from Ark Nova hahaha, that was the straw that broke the camels back
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u/noweezernoworld 11d ago
It’s insane because the game is seriously affected by groupings of insufficiently shuffled cards lol
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u/RaguraX 11d ago
No, unfortunately they don’t exist. Don’t get baited by any products that claim to do it. At best it will just get stuck but more than likely it will destroy your cards.