Pros and Cons Thread Enabling+De-enabling

Alta said:

I have this deck and love it, but:

Pros:

- to my eye the pictures chosen are perfect. I have been using this deck daily for better part of two months now and every day I like it more. The images are selected thoughtfully.

- I have the smaller size, which won't affect you because she no longer makes the large size. I find I can still see the images in good detail, and my eyesight is not that great. I really like the card size, it is roughly playing card size.

Cons:

- when I bought it she was still selling the decks laminated. To me, the lamination is perfect. BUT: she no longer does this. On her site she says that the cards are durable and smudge-proof but I would wonder about that. If you could find one, get an older copy that was hand laminated. I riffle shuffle and have doing so for two months and the cards are perfect.

- the deck is expensive, no doubt about that.

- some of the images seem slightly out of focus. Doesn't bother me but I have seen others comment on this negatively so you should know.

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Thanx Alta, I know the size wouldnt bother me, and I just adore the images on these cards, but now I am wondering about the finish, it would be great if I could get my hands on an older copy but you dont often see these on the market. If anybody has the newer durable and smudge-proof ones I'd love to hear what you think of them.

Golden Dawn Magical Tarot

Asbestos Mango said:

I'm finding myself drawn to this deck in spite of some negative reviews, and I feel like it would make a nice addition to my Thothy subcollection.

Anybody have this deck who can tell me the pros and cons of it?

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It would indeed make a nice addition.

Pros; thorough, well-thought out deck, good book, quality cardstock, bright colours, substance for study. One of those self-contained, complete tarot kits which are always nice to have.

Cons; not pretty, a bit daubed and gaudy.

Grigori recommended it to me and overall I do think it is one of the best Thothy decks out there. Or rather, "Golden Dawn that helps with your Thoth studies" kinda deck. Via the book more than anything you get a sense of where the Thoth came from.

How about the shining tribe?

How about the shining tribe? ([url="http://www.aeclectic.net/tarot/cards/shining-tribe/]here[/url].) I've been wondering about this one for a while. So lay it on me: is it insightful and awesome, or totally lame (I can't tell...)?

Shining Tribe (Shining Woman in first edition)

I'd think this is a love it or hate it deck

Art. Primitive, raw, emotionally impacting. Or, School kid art, completely detracts from the idea of the deck.

Size and cardstock and book. All good, but one of those horrible Llewellyn big boxes.

System. Rider-Waite. Or...in truth you have to look at the titles to know which card you have in your hand.

Female focused, particularly the first edition. Toned down in the second edition.

This is a set for members that enjoy studying decks rather than one used for reading for strangers in a pub.

The idea behind this thread is brilliant. I'd love to see the silly one and the mean one become distant history, sour tastes we can't quite remember the source of.

Place's Vampire Tarot

Was gifted this deck and like it, for the most part.

Pros: the artwork (which readers seem to really like or not like), I like the kind of almost comic book simplicity to it, cardstock (after I shuffled it about a million times), coloring (I like the starkness and then the bits of color here and there, lots of black and white)

Cons: SIZE, I like to be able to see the images, but I would have liked this better without the borders and then maybe the images just a bit smaller so I could more easily shuffle,
cardstock (yes I know I have that as a pro, but when you first get it, the cards stick together like a brick)

Shining Tribe

Ok...The Shining Tribe is one of those decks I HAD to have, because I fell in love with a couple of the cards.
I waffled between the pros and cons for so long, that finally I sold it.

The art, on one day was raw and primitive and very deep and satisfying...the next day is was childish and I couldn't see anything.

So I would say, straight up

Pros...a deck worth studying and you will get some amazing insights from it.
Cons...if you don't have time to study it, it's not going to do much of anything for you.

Shining Tribe

I had quite an intense period with this deck. I wandered on to other decks, just because I am poly-deckeous, not because there was anything wrong.

Pros:

- the accompanying book is awesome, but then, it WAS written by Rachel Pollock. She gives a few paragraphs about the image and her inspiration for each card and then Divinatory meanings. Very well done.

- the cardstock is excellent and the decks are nice size to handle. Not really small or really big.

- a lot of the cards are about 'energy movement', that is, from level to level, or from being to being and etc. I find that easy to relate to. I gave some very intense readings with this deck.

Cons:

- sort of depends on how you feel about primitive art based on real primitive art. She took inspiration from cave drawings, did not copy them.

- some of the images are puzzling without the book, though I found after checking with the book a few times that I could 'get' the flow of the images.

Now this is a personal reaction:

I found that I could read these cards intuitively fairly soon. I did have to look the cards up at first but her choices are consistent and easy to master. However, the art may stand between you and reading with the deck. I suggest that you look at online scans carefully.

H.R Geiger tarot

How about the H.R Geiger tarot? I love his work, but I can honestly say I have not looked at the deck past the pictures offered here in the review...yet I bought it, sight unseen from a member here. Will I regret it or love it It will be a while until I get it ..

Shining Tribe

I bought the Shining Tribe set in a bookshop in Glastonbury because it was on special offer for clearance. I then spent every evening in our cottage for the duration of our visit puzzling over it. I did some really great readings with it and wrote them in my journal. When I got home with it, I vowed to myself to continue to study it, tucked it into a red velvet bag, and haven't touched it since, except to do one reading exchange reading with it because I felt a sudden impulse to use it.

Pros: The book is amazing and Rachel Pollack encourages you to do draws with the cards in one hand and the book in the other. The implication being, I suppose, that eventually you will get into the groove of the deck and no longer need the book. In conjunction with the book, the deck is wonderful and gives excellent readings that are resonant and even profound.

Cons: It's really deeply unattractive. I'm sorry, but Rachel Pollack can't draw, and says so herself. Some of the cards do have a sort of primitive beauty, most others are just either really hideous or entirely cryptic. Between the unattractiveness of the deck and the work you have to put in to use it, I almost invariably go for a different choice when selecting a deck for a reading.

Shining Tribe & Place Vampire

Thanks all for the Shining Tribe info... I think I will hold off (unless I can somehow get one via trade ) as I'm pretty busy with getting into Marseilles decks for the first time, as well as getting into a few thoth-y study groups.

...it's still quite intriguing though

Re: the Place Vampire, I found that trimming the corners made a big difference to how comfortable they were to use. My pros and cons for this deck are:

Pros: theme integrated wonderfully into the traditional tarot (RWS) symbolism, excellent artwork, companion book is fantastic, and despite some unknowns in the courts (that require looking up details in the book), I've found it reads really well. REALLY well. On a wide range of questions.

Cons: the sticky lamination (but somehow trimming the corners helps a bit), cards are a bit unwieldy.