back on my Zarcana BS again, this time I'm trying to sort as many products that claim to be tarot card decks as possible into whether or not you could play Zarcana with them.
For the uninitiated, Zarcana is a (very old and obscure) tabletop game where you build the "board" out of tarot cards. It is designed to work with a classic "Rider-Waite" style of tarot deck, which has 78 cards. Not all tarot decks have that, and of those that do, many are stylized in such a way that it is hard to play Zarcana with them.
Thus, there are many (gorgeous!) "tarot" and "oracle" decks out there that one might unsuspectingly buy for a great deal of money and then get home and find out they can't play Zarcana with them, or it's a lot harder than they thought. tragic. ask me how i know.
So I am making a master list of tarot decks and whether or not Zarcana can be played with them, and if so, how well. It's under the cut bc its a lot.
Feel free to message or rb with any cool tarot decks you know of that I missed - there will be many, this is an ongoing project.
Criteria
No "oracle decks" - when a product says "oracle deck" instead of "tarot deck", what it's telling you is that it makes its own rules and does its own thing, and is not the traditional 78-card deck we know and love. no shade, just not what we lookin for
Has to have at least 78 cards - 22 Major Arcana, 56 Minor Arcana. sometimes people add extra ones but like you can just not use them, as long as all of the normal ones are there you're fine.
The suits have to be similar to or intelligible as - cups/chalices, wands/staves, swords, & pentacles/coins/disks. You can still technically play as long as there's 4 suits, but I'm taking points off if it's too hard to tell which of those categories they belong in, since that's very important in Zarcana.
They have to have easily readable names and numbers, and for Minor Arcana, the number should be written in plain text or integers as well as Roman Numerals. It's ok if they don't have the Roman Numerals, but they should also say them in plain language. I majored in the study of Ancient Mediterranean history and I'm still terrible at decoding Roman Numerals. Look it's easy: six (6) of cups. If it just says VI I'm biting you.
If one or two Major Arcana names is a little different from Rider Waite, that's fine as long as it's easy to tell which one it means - e.g. "Fortitude" for "Strength" (ily star spinner tarot deck), or if it's a widely recognized alternative - e.g. "The High Priest" for "The Hierophant". If you have to look at the number to figure out which one it is, that's points off.
They can't be itty bitty or gigantic. If there's a normal version, a pocket version, and a mega version (like the official licensed Buffy The Vampire Slayer Tarot Deck), I'm just counting the normal one. If there's only one version and its miniscule, that's points off. Bigger than average is ok, just not humongous. you still have to be able to hold them like a hand of cards.
There's this one guy. Lo Scarabeo. he's done 8.5 billion tarot decks and almost all of them look boring af. I'm not doing those. I also do not wish to know more about the various funko pop themed tarot decks (yes, you heard me correctly). those go to jail.
for some of these I list author/illustrator and some I don't. this is usually to distinguish the plethora of "angel" or "fairy" or "nature" themed decks from each other. there's only one Mean Girls tarot deck - look it up if you want to know more about who made it. if its unclear which decks any of these refer to lmk.
Any basic copy of the classic Rider-Waite deck gets a pass. not "inspired by" or "in the style of" I mean the actual thing.
I did this by first writing down all the ones I own and have played with, then all the ones I took pictures of in bookstores as potential presents for my Zarcana-playing friends, then went through the entire Barnes & Noble catalog of tarot decks and copied them all down. Still working through THAT list, this is just what I have so far.
Yes - I've seen enough of the cards, or pictures of enough of the cards, to intuit that these would work well, though I haven't played with them personally.
Everyday Tarot by Brigit Esselmont
Mythos Tarot: Guidance from the Greek Gods
Midnight Magic: A Tarot Deck of Mushrooms
Buffy the Vampire Slayer Tarot Deck and Guidebook (while two of the suits are renamed, they are very easily traceable - scythes = swords, stakes = wands).
Vintage Tattoo Tarot by Alyssa Wilson
The Phantomwise Tarot
Mystical Realm Tarot by Lisa Porter
The Tarot of Curious Creatures: A 78 (+1) Card Deck and Guidebook
Beetlejuice Tarot by Casey Gilly & Abigail Larson
Goddess of Love Tarot: A Book and Deck for Embodying the Erotic Divine Feminine
DIY Tarot: 78 Customizable Blank Tarot Cards to Create Your Personal Rider-Waite Deck by Editors of Ulysses Press - you make it yourself - can't go wrong with that!
Spheres of Heaven Tarot Deck - look, my friend recommends these, and they're gorgeous, but I do have to say that the Minor Arcana don't have words on them - they have the number at the top (not in Roman Numerals yay!), and a tiny symbol at the bottom to clarify which suit is represented. The art is usually easily intelligible as one of the four suits, but it's still worth noting imo.
Yes, technically (you can use them, but you might have some issues e.g. hard to read, confusing names)
The Tarot of Light and Shadow by John Matthew & Andrea Aste - numbers are only written in Roman Numerals, and are kind of tiny.
Animal Guides Tarot: A 78-Card Deck and Guidebook by Radleigh Valentine - suits re-named after the 4 elements
Angel Tarot Cards: A 78-Card Deck and Guidebook by Radleigh Valentine - suits re-named after 4 elements, some Major Arcana names changed, bad vibes
Alice in Wonderland Tarot by Minerva Siegal - some Major Arcana renamed
Oriens Animal Tarot - readability is eh
Back to the Future Tarot Deck and Guidebook - they renamed the suits to Back to the Future Things like "Flux" and "Clocks"
The Wizard of Oz Tarot Deck and Guidebook - renamed the lovers to “the kindred” so it can be Dorothy and Glinda, suits renamed to Oz-themed things
Mean Girls Tarot Deck and Guidebook - It’s actually pretty good but they do rename 2 suits to "Flames" and "Plastics"
Macabre Tarot by Sam Rook - some suits renamed
Good Omens Tarot Deck and Guidebook - Suits are renamed to demons, angels, humans, and VESSELS?? cmon man i like good omens why you do me like this.
Light Seer's Tarot by Chris-Anne - readability is pretty rough, it's a handwritten font in different places on each card, so while it looks extremely cool it's kinda hard to keep track of.
Necronomicon Tarot Deck and Guidebook by Christopher March & James Bousema - has some renamed Major Arcana. not for the faint of heart - very gory!
Secrets of Paradise - Major Arcana are written in Spanish (the directions and everything else is in English) which is fine by me but maybe not for everyone.
Botanica: The Tarot Deck About the Language of Flowers - not very readable or well-labeled.
The Essential Tarot: A 78-Card Deck with Guidebook by Chloé Zarka Grinsnir - good, but Minor Arcana only have the numbers in Roman Numerals
Tarot for You and Me: A Queer Deck and Guidebook - of course I'm not docking points for changing around the genders of some of cards (e.g. The High Priestexx), but because while it is a lovely thought, changing wands, swords, & pentacles to lanterns, flags, & plants isn't very easily traceable. still gorgeous art.
Yes, probably - haven't seen (enough of) the cards to give a solid recommendation, but have the correct number and general type
Necronomicon Tarot by Ann Stokes & Donald Tyson [yes, there is more than one Necronomicon Tarot. this one's from 2007, the other's from 2023]
Black Tarot: An Ancestral Awakening Deck and Guidebook
Ancient Egyptian Tarot Card Pack by Robert Falconnier
Angel Tarot by Travis McHenry
Occult Tarot by Travis McHenry
Flower Child Tarot: Deck & Guidebook
Broadway Tarot: See your future up in lights
Clueless Tarot Deck and Guidebook
Cosplay Cats Tarot Deck and Guidebook
World of Warcraft: The Official Tarot Deck and Guidebook - it looks like Major Arcana aren’t numbered? Uncertain.
Anime Food Tarot: A Deck and Guidebook Inspired by Popular Japanese Animation
Anime Tarot Deck and Guidebook: Explore the Archetypes, Symbolism, and Magic in Anime by Natasha Yglesias
The Anime Tarot Deck and Guidebook by McCalla Ann, Mercenary of Duna (Illustrator) [yes, that's 3 different anime inspired tarot decks]
The Cosmic Slumber Tarot
Anne Stokes Gothic Tarot Deck
Queer Tarot by Ashley Molesso & Chess Needham
The Cook's Tarot by Judith Mackay Stirt
The Luna Sol Tarot by Darren Shill & Mike Medaglia
Jane Austen Tarot by The Book Shop Ltd. [very very little information online, all i knows is there's 78 of em]
No, there's not enough of them
Illuminated Playing Cards by Caitlin Keegan - they combined major & minor arcana so you can use it like a playing card deck too. this also gets rid of Pages since normal playing card deck only has Jack Queen King.
Starlore Arcana: Constellations for Tarot, Astrology, and Cartomancy - it's just the Minor Arcana.
A Jane Austen Tarot Deck: 53 Cards for Divination and Gameplay - you have no idea how much it pains me that I can't play Zarcana with these.
Immō vērō (inquit [P. Cornēlius Scīpiō Āfricānus]) hī vīvunt, quī ē corporum vinculīs tamquam ē carcere ēvolāvērunt, vestra vērō, quae dīcitur, vīta mors est.
M. Tullius Cicerō in suō Somniō Scīpiōnis (cap. xiiii)
In fact ([Scipio Africanus the Elder] said), those who have flown out from the shackles of their bodies, as if from a prison, live, while your ‘life’, as it is called, is death.
Marcus Tullius Cicero in his Dream of Scipio (chapter 14)
Mundus ut appāruit Scīpiōnī somniantī, ex Macrobiī Commentāriīs in Somnium Scīpiōnis sēlēctus (fōns: Wikimedia Commons)
