Which tarot decks do you have? ... and why?

[CallofKhufu]

I don't have any yet, but I ordered Vampire tarot and Secret tarot.

I ordered vampire tarot since it looks awesome and it's `dark' without being too `cartoonish', and the Secret tarot, since it's more traditional and has nice renaissance imagery.

I didn't want the standard raider deck since everyone has it, and Thoth isn't that appealing to me. The imagery looks over-complicated and for me this might weaken the overall impact of each card.

I think magic is triggered by a realization reaction associated with seeing the tarot image, so I think the more awesome and direct the image or symbolism, the better. : )

[izi]

You could always just go to a gothic-industrial club for thrills. I had a copy of the Rider-Waite tarot, I fished it out of a dumpster behind Barnes and Noble...used it for a while and grew to like some of the art. it just got scattered about and I began tossing it out the window around Memphis, thinking someone might be surprised by finding a tarot card in odd places, at the zoo, on the sidewalk, etc. It was at the time the Discordians were doing the Glitterbomb operation so in line with that. I also had a copy of the Cat People Tarot which I used for years. I ended up burying in my backyard That was my favorite deck. I also had some others, Phoenix Cards, which were for past life recollection, they were cool, also the Osho Zen Tarot with high quality artwork though poor symbology and biased pictures. I had a Chinese Tarot that is out of print now with very pretty art I gave to a relative who is Chinese and getting into Tarot. I found all of these decks unsatisfying. The Thoth deck is ugly and needs reworking, however it is the best we have. I have seen a few very beautiful decks come out lately but none of them bring anything to the table that you cannot find in a nice print to hang on your wall. There is no meat on the bones, and the meanings are lost....

I don't have a tarot of my own now, though I sometimes look at m1thr0s's Thoth deck for reference, since we are working on the Mutational Alchemy tarot. I find that much of the time, without even looking at Thoth, my imagery will begin with some of the same pictography.

The MA tarot is going to redefine much of the way we view things in the occult, that I am sure of. And the art is way better.

[vreeswijk]

I've had my Thoth deck for 9-10 years now and I love it. It's the only tarot deck I've owned up to this point and factored heavily in my studies during that period in the past when I was very active. It aided me in studying from a qabbalistic/symbolic geometry standpoint. I used the Major Arcana to study the paths on the Tree of Life and used the Minor Arcana from more of a symbolic geometry standpoint. Now that I've picked them up again after neglecting them for about 8 years I'm quite amazed at what I notice now compared to what I noticed then. Being kind of a scientific airy type person I like the "symbol overdose" and feel content to think that I can take each card as deep as I can/want to. I will admit though that much of the actual art is rather low in skill, almost on a beginner level but other cards seem to show a higher level of artistic ability. Could this have been intentional? :confused:

One day I might get a Marseilles deck just for the historical value. I'm not sure if it was ever published (or even completed) but I wouldn't mind having or at least seeing the cards designed by Alejandro Jodorowski that can be seen in "The Holy Mountain". Seeing that he seems to have kind of disowned the cards he designed and put all of his faith in the Marseilles deck I'm assuming that he never had is deck published.

[Thenoblesavage]

I've got a Scapini deck sitting on my book shelf collecting dust. It is very pretty though so that's good. On a simi-related note, does anyone know what deck Solitaire uses in Live and Let Die? That would be a nice one to have for the giggles.

[CallofKhufu]

Is the symbolism of the Thoth deck very strong?

Concepts are continually broadcast into the ether simply by being written on a page and tarot cards are strong because a picture tells a thousand words.

I finally got my vampire tarot today. I felt tremendous psychic energy emanating from the cards. I then had to put them away it was too strong. I did my first reading for my ex. she said i was very good for a beginner and she told me how to do it and then asked me what i saw. It was amazing but i think readings need to be done rather rarely. This stuff is very powerful. Vampire tarot deck is very very powerful, lol.

[CallofKhufu]

I've got a Scapini deck sitting on my book shelf collecting dust. It is very pretty though so that's good. On a simi-related note, does anyone know what deck Solitaire uses in Live and Let Die? That would be a nice one to have for the giggles.

I have seen it around. `Tarot of the witches'.

http://www.google.com/images?num=12&hl=en&safe=off&q=tarot%20of%20the%20witches&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&biw=1024&bih=651

[Thenoblesavage]

Wow the vampire tarot is quite cool looking. I dig how the fool is Johnathan Harker.

[Thenoblesavage]

Also thanks for the heads up on the live and let die thing.

[Samyama]

Where's my copy of the Mutational Alchemy Tarot again? :D Well I suppose to have it somewhere in the future... my future self tends to whisper that down the line anyway.