Jasper Reviews: Skyrim Tarot
AND HERE WE ARE WITH THE DEAD HORSE TO BEAT! You may recognize this deck from the 38-link masterpost where I compare it to the Neopets Tarot and drag it to filth. Alternatively, you may have heard of it from @khajiit-reads's First Thoughts post. In either case, it's time to set up my favorite punching bag.
Also, will I ever be able to take a photo that's somewhat centered? Unlikely!
Please note that there are things that I just do not know, so there will be things that I miss. Please check the tier list page on my blog for the categories and other decks that I have ranked. All six main categories are judged on a 1 to 5 scale, with 1 being the worst and 5 being the best.
This pip deck is based ever-so-loosely on either the RWS Tarot or the Tarot of Marseilles. The guidebook refers to its inspiration only as "the original tarot deck" on page 5. I assume RWS inspiration since that's what most modern decks are based on and due to factors outlined below, but there is very little overlap artistically. Likewise, while there is very little overlap with the Marseilles in terms of the figure-depicting artwork, both of them are pip decks that just depict that number of things.
The guidebook equally obscures it; it refers to the original suits as Wands, Coins, Swords, and Cups. Coins were used in the Marseilles while the RWS used Pentacles, but Wands were used in the RWS while the Marseilles used Batons. The Major Arcana, at the very least, all seem to be RWS-based instead of Marseilles-based due to the usage of Magician instead of Juggler, High Priestess instead of Womb or Popess, Hierophant instead of Pope, Strength being 8 and Hermit being 11 instead of vice-versa, and Tower instead of House of God.
So with all of this in mind, I am going to progress through this review as though the Skyrim Tarot is a pip deck based on the RWS rather than a Marseilles-style deck.
Appropriation Versus Appreciation: 5
This deck manages to (at least from my research) completely dodge appropriation. The symbolism used here is pretty exclusively that of the broader Elder Scrolls universe instead of taking solely from singular real-world cultures.
The only blatant bullshit going on is referring to this as only having a "twist" on the tarot formula given what all is chucklefucked up in here.
This is a rough one and most of what I used to beat it to death. On one hand, the art style is super consistent, with a lot of interesting usage of white or lighter-colored lineart. However. Numerous characters are not depicted in Skyrim whatsoever (looking at Saint Alessia on the High Priestess, gods that don't have much to do with the plotlines scattered through the Majors and one of the Courts, Sotha Sil on Temperance). Several in-Skyrim choices are completely fucking baffling.
Man, why is Skjor depicted as fighting a bunch of snakes?
And while the pips do somewhat match their Courts, it's less than it should be, as some Court cards have design elements that belong to other suits (the daggers on Aela's Queen of Arms card, the swords depicted in the Arms suit looking completely different from the ones in the Courts, and the Voice Court leaning more into the cloud and word iconography instead of the horns that make up the pips).
With the exception of the Roman numerals at the top of the Majors in the artwork, every card's label is cohesive: a small banner across the bottom with Nordic-inspired knotwork at the ends and the name of the card labeled simply.
You can tell that they belong to the same deck mostly due to the art style and the shared green border and the Bethesda stank on all of it. The artwork isn't bad, I must clarify, it's just...not really consistent with the theme.
Look, we're already in a bad place with this being a pip deck, that already brings it low. In most of the cards, it relies on you knowing the character depicted and having the same view of them and their lore as the writer.
With the Court cards, it lists out a bit of what each Court is like and hopes that you'll look at the character depicted and go "yeah, that sounds like them". It also just blatantly lies about them. Yeah, sure, Mercer Frey, leader of the Thieves Guild who betrayed the previous generation of Nightingales and has been stealing from the Guild itself, is totally of sound work ethic. Totally. Sure. Yeah, he fits the reversal, but you'd think they'd pick someone who fits the upright version too.
With the Majors, it's so scattered because it can't decide whether to focus on normal Skyrim NPCs (Cicero, Farengar Secret-Fire, Elisif the Fair, High King Torygg, Jon Battle-Born and Olfina Gray-Mane, Arvak, Ulfric Stormcloak, Paarthurnax, Olava the Feeble, Esbern, Mjoll the Lioness), characters from the broader Elder Scrolls lore (Saint Alessia, Sithis can be in this category too, Sotha Sil, Mnemo-Li), Divines (Julianos, Talos, Akatosh; honorable mention to Kyne being in the Court of Voice), or Daedric Princes (Mephala, Sheogorath, Azura, Nocturnal, Meridia).
Overall, it tries to combine a bunch of characters together based seemingly on the author/designer's interest in those characters (cough, check out that Elder Scrolls credits list and you'll see why Sotha Sil is here). The author, being a designer and writer for the Elder Scrolls Online, has more work put into what seems to be some of these characters over others, thus making connections more obvious to her that don't actually come through in the guidebook. Speaking of...
It's really easy to look up and find cards in this guidebook, and each Court and Minor card gets a full art addition of the card itself so you can match them visually. The Majors get a whole page of meaning and their art on the opposite page.
The actual information there is where things get shaky, though. The Minors and Courts get a few short sentences for both upright and reversed meanings, making this a very basic deck. It wins back flavor points for keeping it stylized as though you are adventuring.
For the information therein, it gives a nice little introduction, explains the format of its overall deck, outlines the suits nicely, and then, after all of the card meanings, gives a few suggestions for caring for your deck and how to prepare for doing a tarot spread. It's simple but straightforward.
The spreads themselves are rather simple.
We start with a generic three-card spread named for Stendarr for your "simplest questions" that goes "how do you feel", "what have you not considered", and then advice.
Then we have a five-card cross spread named for Arkay for "moving on" that goes "what you need to leave behind", "why it needs to end", "what you gain from leaving it", "what wisdom you've gained", and "what's waiting for you after this".
Finally, we have a seven-card spread layered with two on top, three in the middle, and two on the bottom named for Akatosh and is about reflection and looking forward that goes "past events leading up" times two, "recent event that triggered the change", "current state", "what direction you're going in", and "most likely outcome on current path" times two.
They're basic, but they function. Not the worst starters for a beginner reader picking up a new deck, but not offering much to an experienced reader.
I think it fundamentally illuminates tarot reading rather than mystifying it. This deck's guidebook is trying to encourage you to read, especially with it, instead of sitting pretentiously on a shelf. I also wholly support the writer's notes about gender expressions in tarot readings.
Don't get me wrong, this deck pisses me off, but that's because I love the Elder Scrolls series and see how it could have been better. I am, however, incredibly biased because I am fundamentally a fan of this series and I bought this deck because I am.
Were this, say, the Fallout Tarot, I'd be meaner because I'm not as much of a fan of that as I am of the Elder Scrolls, and the two have very similar problems (based on flipthroughs I've seen of the Fallout Tarot).
I tried giving this deck a 2, but I couldn't. It's at minimum a 3.
This is based on the idea that this deck is RWS-based.
Paarthurnax taking a nap on The Hermit card is everything to me. And I stand by my opinion that the Six of Spells is the best pip card in this deck.
Just gonna transcribe what I said about the Skyrim Tarot in the Final Thoughts post of my Neopets and Skyrim comparison series.
On the other hand, you have the Skyrim Tarot, which isn’t completely Skyrim and isn’t even good as a tarot deck. It’s a pip deck with rather repetitive art in the minors, the courts are a mess even with the suits renamed, and it just feels like someone played through Skyrim solely doing the Stormcloak Rebellion side of the Civil War questline, maybe the Companions questline, a bit of the Main Quest, and absolutely nothing else. There are inexplicably St. Alessia and Sotha Sil on the major cards. Todd Howard made me have to reckon with Michael Kirkbride writing and illustrating canon Sotha Sil mpreg. So much of this could have been solved by either broadening the deck up to general Elder Scrolls, or by actually focusing on Skyrim; either cut the Skyrim-specific stuff and go back to the more broad parts, or cut the Daedric Princes across most of the Majors and focus in on the game itself. The main thing this deck has going for it is that it is aesthetically cohesive. And the sleepy Paarthurnax card. That’s about it.
Final Ranking: 21/30, B Tier
HOW????? HOW IS IT LITERALLY EQUAL TO THE RWS?????
