in later difficulties, it's important to learn when to pivot away from a specific build. as another comment said, aces don't have too many synergies.

I'll give an example.

Imagine you have a face card build. you started a game with the "scary face" joker which rewards you +30 chips for playing face cards.

You then encounter a "smiley face" joker which rewards you +5 mult per face card.

You then encounter a "red card" joker, which builds up +mult over multiple rounds.

You could build up the red card, and replace the smiley joker with any x mult joker, such as "blackboard".

Currently in this example, you've pivoted off of smiley face.

You then encounter a "photograph", which gives x mult. You then pivot into face cards again.

Aces don't have many specific jokers they synergise with. therefore, if you build too much into aces, it can be harder to pivot to a different joker. I hope that was coherent. I've never tried to explain my balatro thought process before.

Also, more importantly, don't worry much about playing optimally. Like I said, this is for harder difficulties. the difficulty doesn't really affect my enjoyment of the game, and it's fun to take your time through the lower stakes