The Card Deck¶
This page is the authoritative catalog of the Boom Balloon deck. Every card's German name, English gloss, optical code, effect, and deck count is listed here; printed face values are shown in the card captions above.
The cards¶
The full deck, card by card. Printed face values are shown in the captions; see the catalog below for each card's optical code and effect.
Effect cards¶
Player cards¶
Others¶
What a card is¶
Every card is a printed rectangle with a machine-readable hole pattern:
- Physical size: 90 × 60 × 1 mm.
- Holes: 3 mm in diameter, spaced 10 mm apart.
- Code: 5 hole positions, so each card carries a 5-bit optical code (a hole present or absent at each position). The card reader scans this pattern as the card slides in. See the Optical Code System reference for the bit layout and mirror-handling rules.
The catalog¶
| German name | English gloss | Code | Effect | Count |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hochdruckgebiet 10 | High-pressure zone (deflate) | 1 | Deflates the balloon by 10 units. | 6 |
| Hochdruckgebiet 20 | High-pressure zone | 2 | Deflates the balloon by 20 units. | 6 |
| Kurswechsel 30 ↓ | Change of course (down) | 3 | Deflates the balloon by 30 units and reverses the direction of play. | 4 |
| Engelsbote 30 | Angel's messenger | 4 | Deflates the balloon by 30 units, but only at the start of the next round. | 3 |
| Blockierung | Blocking / miss round | 5 | The targeted player has a coin-flip chance of missing their turn. | 2 |
| Tiefdruckgebiet 10 | Low-pressure zone (inflate) | 6 | Inflates the balloon by 10 units. | 6 |
| Tiefdruckgebiet 20 | Low-pressure zone | 7 | Inflates the balloon by 20 units. | 6 |
| Kurswechsel 30 ↑ | Change of course (up) | 9 | Inflates the balloon by 30 units and reverses the direction of play. | 4 |
| Teufelsbote 30 | Devil's messenger | 10 | A coin-flip chance of a sudden, dangerous inflate of 30 units. | 3 |
| Weltuntergang | Apocalypse | 11 | Repeatedly inflates the balloon toward its bursting point. | 2 |
| Zwiegespalten 50 | Torn / fifty-fifty | 13 | A coin flip decides whether the balloon inflates or deflates by 50 units. | 3 |
| Berg und Tal 10 | Up hill and down | 14 | Repeatedly inflates and deflates the balloon by 10 units. | 3 |
| Yin Yang | Yin & Yang | 27 | Inflates the balloon almost all the way to its bursting point. | 1 |
| 1–5 Spieler | Player 1–5 | 15/17/19/21/23 | Picks a player as a target, or sets the game size at startup. | 1 each |
Deck total and the player cards¶
The full deck is about 54 cards: 49 effect cards (the play cards, or Spielkarten) plus 5 player cards (Spielerkarten), for 54 in total.
The player cards, 1 Spieler…5 Spieler, do two jobs:
- During play they act as target cards — you insert one to choose which player a target-based card (Teufelsbote, Blockierung, Weltuntergang) affects.
- The
2 Spieler…5 Spielercards additionally choose the game size when inserted at startup (see Rules → Setting up a game).
The Yin Yang card is a rare single wildcard that pushes the modelled volume all the way to the limit.
The Moduswechsel card
The Moduswechsel ("mode change") card shown under Others is not wired to any optical code and has no effect in the shipped firmware — inserting it does nothing. It's the leftover artwork for an unbuilt game-mode selector, originally meant to let players cycle through four play modes before starting a round. That feature was specced but never implemented; see Firmware Architecture → The unbuilt mode system for the full history, including how code 27 ended up going to the Yin Yang card's one-shot PushToLimitCard instead.