Your most UNREADABLE deck

[Alta]

Well, quite a few really. Some dark decks intimidate me, possibly because I am too imaginative, Vertigo, I am looking at you. I like bonebeach's comment further up: In the right mood, I can read with *anything*. In the wrong mood, I can read nothing. though in my case I would not say that even in the right mood can I read with anything.

Some decks have images that just refuse to jibe with my personal feelings about number and suit and some are too swirly, Paulina is number one in that category. Someone used to know said that 'decks like that just carry you right out of the image'.

I cannot read Kat Black's Golden to save my life. I have tried many times because it is so popular but the images just stare flatly back at me.

I have a personal idea of friendliness in decks and if the deck feels hostile and unresponsive, well, for my reality, it is.

 

[pickled pixie]

For me it's the Mary-El. I really wanted this deck to be my best friend but nope It didn't want to know...I still love it and still get something from it (can't put my finger on what exactly it is) but I can't read it for toffee

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk

 

[Myrrha]

There have been a few decks that I felt like even if I gave it more time I would never be able to read well with it Sometimes it is just that the deck doesn't make me feel anything, emotionally or intuitively. The Medieval Cat deck was one of these.

Joie de Vivre Tarot was unreadable because it felt like someone else's deeply personal art project, like trying to do bibliomancy with someone else's journal. It was already DONE, already art, already transformed into something personal so there was no room for me.

Sometimes there is too much going on, too many different colors, different people or different looks for the different suits. Mystical Cats was one of these. The Mystic Fairies and Tarot of Vampyres both have a lot going on and different colors in the different suits but they both read very well for me and seemed more coherant than the Mystical Cats. I'm not really sure what the problem was with Mystical Cats but I could never get beyond the book meanings and really read with it.

Golden Tarot (Kat Black) - I could never not see the source imagery. I've always loved that Simone Martini Madonna that she used for the HP so it was hard not to see her as Mary. Several of the angels in the deck are kneeling and holding lilies so I can't not see them as Gabriel making the annunciation, and so on. Even the art that doesn't have these associations is distracting to me.

Deviant Moon - I tried hard. I loved going through the deck and writing about the separate cards. Somehow they just didn't say anything to me in readings. I also really dislike that depiction of The Hermit and most of the Black moon-people being in a separate suit (not saying this is racist, it is just distressing to me and kind of jarring)

Sherlock Holmes Tarot - too logical, too much emphasis on thought processes, but really what was I expecting? Well done and very interesting but useless to me as a reading deck.

Dame Fortune's Wheel - I read this deck the way its creator suggested it be read, with cards given brief meanings and a row of cards interpreted like a sentence. This did give me some surprisingly accurate readings. I never felt like I had really gained insight from reading with it though. So not really unreadable just didn't give me the kind of readings I wanted. Maybe I wil try again with it sometime.

 

[FLizarraga]

I have a personal idea of friendliness in decks and if the deck feels hostile and unresponsive, well, for my reality, it is.

[emoji23] This made me laugh very hard, because it's very true.

 

[JuniperPress]

the Gipsy Tsigane Zigeuner. Love the artwork, but get nothing.

 

[Viridian]

The Cosmic Tarot. I love this deck so much and for years have been expecting it to be a "go to reader" but I just can't make it happen! I do keep trying... perhaps because of its cameo on Buffy the Vampire Slayer and because the images are so charming I just want it to say something to me!

 

[Myrrha]

The Cosmic Tarot. I love this deck so much and for years have been expecting it to be a "go to reader" but I just can't make it happen! I do keep trying... perhaps because of its cameo on Buffy the Vampire Slayer and because the images are so charming I just want it to say something to me!

The Cosmic Tarot is one where, for the Minors anyway, it really helps to understand the Thith Tarot. Many of the figurative images in the minors are posed to make the same shapes as the more abstract images in the Thoth.. There is quite a bit of hidden astrological symbolism. The Six of Swords, Four of Wands especially, it will be hard to see what is meant by the image on the Cosmic without being familiar with the Thith system. Plenty of other reasons why the deck might not work for you but if you love the deck it might be worth looking at the Thoth for background.

Which cards reminded you of Buffy?

 

[FaintlyMacabre]

I am amazed that people can pick just one. I have quite a few that lie doggo. Others where I don't think I ever really tried. I keep some around just because I like them. Others move right along.

The Victorian Romantic never worked for me and I was going to give it another chance but after all this fuss, I may just move it out when I get to that.

I haven't had much luck with the Prairie Tarot so far but then the International Icon never spoke to me either. They aren't on the "out" list yet though.

Diana

 

[Ivy Rhiannon]

Thoth for me. I just didn't connect! I love abstract art too, but the tarot just seems alien to me.

 

[Fizzgig]

Thoth and I don't get along at all, and the Chrysalis, although I love the imagery and could maybe get more from it if I got off of my bum and read up on who all of the very wise dudes depicted on there are.

I get really cross when the artists tell me how to read 'their' deck. When it comes to me, and I've spent time with it, it's what comes out of it for me and the querent that counts