The Cover

[RPGPundit]

A tarotician like yourself will probably object to the use of precise defintions on the pip cards but I was trying to make it usable by non-practionioners so meh

Well, the best tarot deck ever made, the Thoth deck, has keywords on the minor arcana. They're very limited in utility (like baby training wheels), and used for too long become counterproductive, but there they are.

The bigger issue I have with yours is that the keywords you're using seem to be wrong, or at least extremely odd.

RPGPundit

[jibbajibba]

Well, the best tarot deck ever made, the Thoth deck, has keywords on the minor arcana. They're very limited in utility (like baby training wheels), and used for too long become counterproductive, but there they are.

The bigger issue I have with yours is that the keywords you're using seem to be wrong, or at least extremely odd.

RPGPundit

Wrong ... hmmm.... I took my meanings from my tarot books, mostly Rider-Waite but Wikipedia has the Rider waite interpretations to hand.....

So take Ace of Swords -
The card indicates decisive ability and cutting through confusion, taking a radical decision or standpoint and the ability to see through deception, and expose it.
I label this Perspicacity which is a pretty decent 1 word synonym.
 
4 of pentacles refers to a lover of material wealth, one who hoards things of value with no prospect of sharing. In contrast, when the Four of Pentacles is in reverse it warns against the tendency of being a spendthrift

I label this Avarice again a pretty decent 1 word synonym I think.

10 of swords
In its upright or positive light, the ten of swords represents absolute destruction, being pinned down by a multitude of things or situations. The person lying on the ground, defeated and bleeding, may also represent a feeling of hopelessness and being trapped by emotions or mental anguish, since swords represent strife and the mind.

I label it Destruction .... reasonable I think

5 of Swords
The figure in the foreground suggests victory, potency, and ample preparation or confidence. Also suggests unwilling or unnecessary contributions from losing parties. Also, is the defeat card in the deck. The ragged-looking sky implies a torn celestial plane.

Now here I have to say I might have been more contentious as the card itself is a mixed message. The classic Rider-Waite image being the guy collection swords as his enemies slope off in the background. Sucess for him but defeat for them.
I went with the Defeat reading because the app I wrote to do readings could only deal cards face up. In order to deal reversed cards I would need to have saved all the images reversed and it would have made the app hard to use so I drew on the negative connotation here to give the overall deck a range of good and bad but with a hint toward the bad as at the end it was a game device to try and foreshadow dramatic tension.


So overall ... I would defend my choice of keywords.

[Kuroth]

I always rather liked the game's English cover, finding it evocative of the world's atmosphere.  It is no more or less close to Zelazny's written work than the Avon paperbacks' covers, which were popular.  

The discussion of using Tarot in Amber is of particular interest, since a friend completed a tarot deck with full original art for a full deck, not just trumps.  I recall the illustrations in Amber Role Playing having some tarot type imagery, but not actual rules for using them.

[RPGPundit]

Wrong ... hmmm.... I took my meanings from my tarot books, mostly Rider-Waite but Wikipedia has the Rider waite interpretations to hand.....

So take Ace of Swords -
The card indicates decisive ability and cutting through confusion, taking a radical decision or standpoint and the ability to see through deception, and expose it.
I label this Perspicacity which is a pretty decent 1 word synonym.
 
4 of pentacles refers to a lover of material wealth, one who hoards things of value with no prospect of sharing. In contrast, when the Four of Pentacles is in reverse it warns against the tendency of being a spendthrift

I label this Avarice again a pretty decent 1 word synonym I think.

10 of swords
In its upright or positive light, the ten of swords represents absolute destruction, being pinned down by a multitude of things or situations. The person lying on the ground, defeated and bleeding, may also represent a feeling of hopelessness and being trapped by emotions or mental anguish, since swords represent strife and the mind.

I label it Destruction .... reasonable I think

5 of Swords
The figure in the foreground suggests victory, potency, and ample preparation or confidence. Also suggests unwilling or unnecessary contributions from losing parties. Also, is the defeat card in the deck. The ragged-looking sky implies a torn celestial plane.

Now here I have to say I might have been more contentious as the card itself is a mixed message. The classic Rider-Waite image being the guy collection swords as his enemies slope off in the background. Sucess for him but defeat for them.
I went with the Defeat reading because the app I wrote to do readings could only deal cards face up. In order to deal reversed cards I would need to have saved all the images reversed and it would have made the app hard to use so I drew on the negative connotation here to give the overall deck a range of good and bad but with a hint toward the bad as at the end it was a game device to try and foreshadow dramatic tension.


So overall ... I would defend my choice of keywords.

Waite was a member of the Order of the Golden Dawn; however, the order prohibited any of its members from revealing their secrets (even, theoretically, the hebrew alphabet; which wasn't so much a secret as an alphabet).  So Waite was in a pickle when he made his deck; he couldn't actually write the accurate stuff about the hermetic attributes of the cards, and chose instead of obfuscate (a crime for which Crowley later nicknamed him "Dead Waite").

By the time Crowley produced the Thoth deck (near the end of his life, 1939-43) he was beholden to no one, and so was able to produce a deck and book that basically revealed everything.

Now, most titles or keywords are not particularly useful in readings except as sorts of "training wheels", even then they can sometimes be counterproductive; but there are titles and keywords nevertheless (which BOTH Waite AND Crowley accepted and worked with, but which Crowley printed accurately and Waite did not, choosing to make up bullshit instead).

The Aces are just the roots of their respective elements; they represent, if anything, the start of new movements in their elemental sphere, and have no shorter keyword as such.  The Ace of Swords would be "The root of the powers of Air".

The 4 of Disks is about the creation of stability; which can also sometimes lead to stagnation if ill-dignified. Its title is "Power".

The 10 of Swords represents the utter stagnation of the mental faculties, when you can't let go of something long finished, like "beating a dead horse". Its title is "Ruin".

The 5 of Swords is in fact "Defeat", because it represents a mental effort that has come to naught through lack of commitment; being unable to put together enough mental unity to create stable momentum in your plans, so you end up snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, as it were.

RPGPundit

[jibbajibba]

Waite was a member of the Order of the Golden Dawn; however, the order prohibited any of its members from revealing their secrets (even, theoretically, the hebrew alphabet; which wasn't so much a secret as an alphabet).  So Waite was in a pickle when he made his deck; he couldn't actually write the accurate stuff about the hermetic attributes of the cards, and chose instead of obfuscate (a crime for which Crowley later nicknamed him "Dead Waite").

By the time Crowley produced the Thoth deck (near the end of his life, 1939-43) he was beholden to no one, and so was able to produce a deck and book that basically revealed everything.

Now, most titles or keywords are not particularly useful in readings except as sorts of "training wheels", even then they can sometimes be counterproductive; but there are titles and keywords nevertheless (which BOTH Waite AND Crowley accepted and worked with, but which Crowley printed accurately and Waite did not, choosing to make up bullshit instead).

The Aces are just the roots of their respective elements; they represent, if anything, the start of new movements in their elemental sphere, and have no shorter keyword as such.  The Ace of Swords would be "The root of the powers of Air".

The 4 of Disks is about the creation of stability; which can also sometimes lead to stagnation if ill-dignified. Its title is "Power".

The 10 of Swords represents the utter stagnation of the mental faculties, when you can't let go of something long finished, like "beating a dead horse". Its title is "Ruin".

The 5 of Swords is in fact "Defeat", because it represents a mental effort that has come to naught through lack of commitment; being unable to put together enough mental unity to create stable momentum in your plans, so you end up snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, as it were.

RPGPundit

Not everyone thinks Crowley is the being the middle and the end.
Your tarot skills are not in question but they come from the crowley traddition.
A lot of people thought Crowley was an egotistical cunt.

So your claim effectively stems from the fact that Waite's deck produced in 1910 (?) is deemed less authoritative by Crowely fans than his deck produced 30years later.
Meh......
My study of the tarot is limited to a few years at high school and a bit at Uni as part of my degree. My take is that it references the same free association concepts that Jung thought were referenced in Psychoanalysis or in riding a train through Russia and trying to read the Cyrilic place names.
In short in doesn't matter what is on the cards so long as something is on the cards. As as a Game tool is pretty decent I reckon and it looks nice

And again i woudl say that the Toth Deck is not the greatest ever Tarot Deck. I would actually say that any serious practicioner would create their own deck using their own imagery but again YMMV.

However, I will not directly attack your religion so I bow to your faith on the subject.

[RPGPundit]

Not everyone thinks Crowley is the being the middle and the end.
Your tarot skills are not in question but they come from the crowley traddition.
A lot of people thought Crowley was an egotistical cunt.

The latter is true (that many people thought that, in any case) but its really not relevant here, because I'm not actually talking about a position depending on Crowley; I'm taking the position depending on the Golden Dawn. Crowley was a minor member in the GD (in his youth), whereas the older Waite was a major player there.  So the point has nothing to do with Crowley, it has to do with the fact that Waite explicitly accepted the GD-attributions, and yet felt he could not publicly present these in his deck or book, and chose to play a shell game with the public instead.
Crowley is only at all relevant to this discussion because, many decades later, he DID publish the GD-attributions, which were the ones that Waite actually worked with but did not publish.

So your claim effectively stems from the fact that Waite's deck produced in 1910 (?) is deemed less authoritative by Crowely fans than his deck produced 30years later.

No. My claim stems from the fact that Waites' deck produced in 1910 is less authoritative from the point of view of the Magical Order and system that Waite participated in one form or another for most of his magical career.
In other words, its that Waite didn't actually believe in what he had published with his book and deck.

However, I will not directly attack your religion so I bow to your faith on the subject.

This is in no sense a question of religious faith but of historical record.

RPGPundit