I actually had something similar a couple of weeks ago. My initial model was just: val cards = for { rank <- 'a, '2, [...], 'j, 'q, 'k suit <- 'h, 'c

I actually had something similar a couple of weeks ago. My initial model was just: val cards = for { rank <- 'a, '2, [...], 'j, 'q, 'k suit <- 'h, 'c, 'd, 's } yield (rank, suit) val deck = scala.util.Random.shuffle(cards) which gives you something to play with to validate your model. It's not an api I'd choose to publish, of course, there are many better type-safe ones written here, though I'm sad none of them have used Unicode for suits (I know someone working on a dating app who used a method called ❤ to compare two users: so something like "if (sappho ❤ rhodopis > 95) { ... }") But my point is that Scala gives you the option, and is tolerant, of working in this slightly dirty way, and then lets you clean it up (and a type-safe compiler will flag up where you are using your old api). I don't know clojure well enough, so, what's the similar workflow there?