Decks You Wish You Hadn't Bought?

decan

I recently bought the Llewellyn Tarot because I had found its art beautiful and because of its unconventional approach concerning the Trumps with celtic legends.
Well, I can't say it is an uninteresting deck but in a way I regret my purchase.
Maybe it is because it looks too romantic (for me), or because its imagery concerning the Trumps very often move away from the Trumps in the Rider-Waite, or because of the edges, well, it doesn't work with me, it's too bad.
 

CharlotteK

I love the art of the Wildwood deck, and enjoyed reading the book, but for some reason, readings don't make so much intuitive sense to me as other decks.

Some of the art in the Sacred Isle deck makes me cringe a little bit.

I have only chosen to read with the Robin Wood deck once. I should move it on I suppose. I keep thinking I'll make more of an effort to connect with it but can never be bothered, so of all of them that's probably the only one I actually regret buying.
 

PenPendragon

Decks I wish I hadn't bought

I have bought many decks I wish I hadn't. Can't remember them all. Eventually give them away. Short list below:
Viscounti Deck, Old English, Morgan Tarot (hippy B/W), Llewellyn Tarot, Mystic Fairy, The Ancestral Path, Oracle of the Grail, and recently, The Tarot of Delphi and the Mucha Tarot.

Tarot of Delphi, even though I'm a figurative artist and nudes are my forte, I find many of the paintings in this deck offensive due to the naked barely
adolescent girls and sameness of (19th century) saccharine sweet re-imagined 'Classical' nudes. Many figures show the worst of later European art academies...heavy on technique, fluffy on content when applied to Tarot.
Mystic Fairy... felt to me just delicate drawings, no drama or action, little meaning.
Llewellyn... I read the Mabinogion but doesn't resonate with me in Tarot images, interpretation. (perhaps it would be meaningful to a Welsh lit. scholar?)
Mucha Tarot... not original Mucha drawings, lines in some suits too thick, muddy dark colours in two suits. Haven't even shuffled that deck. Feel stupid for buying it.
Pen
 

Tarot dance

...Well, here is a small list...fortunately, of the decks I wished I had not bought or traded for ....& others that I have not listed here...I have been able to pass them on to others who would appreciate them...


Chrysalis Tarot – (Thought I would love it but didn’t…Sold it)

Ludy Lescot – (Same thing, thought I would love it but could not relate to it all…Sold it)

Karma Sutra– got in a trade (Sits in my tarot cabinet and just gathering dust...)

Decameron Tarot – Got it in a trade (Same thing, just collects dust & takes up room in my tarot cabinet...)

Lord of the Rings (I think I had just saw The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies...that's my only rationale I can come up with, well that & it was just a dumb decision...)

Pocket Goddess (it was $5 but I have never even opened it)

Tarot de Paris – InSpira Ed. (I think I was daydreaming of visiting the Louvre that day…:cool:

I Am One Tarot (I was looking at this deck last night, I just don’t get it…)
 

Sigrdrifa

Rosetta tarot.

Yes I know, I'm probably the only one to mention this deck here. I bought it on a whim when I heard it was about to get sold out. It had been on my wish list for a while, I figured this one might help me get into Crowley style decks better. Long story short: it didn't. Apparently I really am a RWS gal. :/
 

RiverRunsDeep

Rosetta tarot.

Yes I know, I'm probably the only one to mention this deck here. I bought it on a whim when I heard it was about to get sold out. It had been on my wish list for a while, I figured this one might help me get into Crowley style decks better. Long story short: it didn't. Apparently I really am a RWS gal. :/

No, you are not the only one. Another RWS gal here, and Rosetta is on my "for sale" list.

Some others I wish I hadn't bothered with:

Black Cats Tarot and Tarot of the White Cats. I love, love, love cats, and thought that meant I would love all of the "cat" tarots. Silly River.

Tarot of the Dead. I love dark decks, but apparently not "all" dark decks. Do you see how I didn't learn my lesson with the "cat" decks??

Tarot Egyptien Grand Jeu Oracle de Dames. There is no excuse for this one. Every time I come across it in my collection, I am surprised to see it. Why did I buy this??
 

rylla

The Kabbalistic Visions: The Marini-Scapini Tarot. I like the artists works, I knew I'd need the book to make sense of the cards and my hope of reading the book was to finally get some deeper insight about the paths the major arcana is placed on the tree of life. I.e. why a particular major arcana is placed between X and Y and how that path reflect the meaning of the card. Instead there are lots of reference to hebrew letters which is of absolutely no interest to me. I don't deny their significance is just that is something I am not willing to spend time to understand or learn about them. So I ended up with an useless deck for me.
 

NightMagic628

I wish I'd gotten a Centennial Rider Waite instead of the normal US Games edition in the yellow box. Not sure the Centennial was even out when I got my RWS, though. So there's that.

I kind of feel the opposite. I don't want to prematurely say I regret buying the Centennial cards but I didn't realize just how dreary they look in person. The videos I had watched on Youtube made them look slightly muted but in person they look so dark...at least to me. I really want to connect with them better and then maybe I'll feel differently.

Also I was reading that there was a mistake with the Strength card and they put green around the lion's mane and it shouldn't have been there. I know that's not a big deal and I think the reason it's bothering me is because I just don't like the general feel of the deck.
 

empress's dress

I love Robert M. Place but I really regret buying the Buddha Tarot. I just feel like every message it imparts is obvious or harsh. I want to stress I am not saying this will happen for anyone else with this deck. I am so disappointed by it. I don't feel like it offers anything educational or uplifting. I feel like i am being scolded or told to chill out by just about every card. And only if I do one of those two things something good may come of it. It just isn't working for me.

Also the Tarot of Trees. Here is a deck that actually was wonderful and then it just lost all its appeal one day. I don't understand. I don't get how it's messages all became bleak, claustrophobic and hopeless to me, but they did. I never had that happen with a deck before. I put it aside. Again I know of people who love the deck and find it a joy to read and inspiration. I think at one point I did.

Funnily enough about the Tarot Mucha which someone mentions they regret buying above. I actually really like it not because it is true to Mucha but because it quotes the Mitelli Tarocchini deck and I think that is amazing. Its renditions of the coin court cards are fantastic winks to such a beautiful deck that is hard to read because it lacks 2-5 pips and is a deck with only 64 cards.

Don't normally like sharing what I really don't like. But Robert Place is really for me just about the best thing sliced bread when it comes to tarot. It was so strange not to connect to one of his decks.
 

Ebony

I have the shapeshifter tarot and don't much like it. I got it so long ago I don't remember the details, but I do think I got it on sale. I don't think I would have bought it otherwise. I saw someone on Youtube that trimmed it and it seems that makes the deck look much better. I may do that as right now the dark blue boarders make the art on the cards look washed out and faint. Just not very appealing to me as it is right now. I would have to know how much I paid for it to know if I truly regret buying it though! If it was just a few bucks I suppose its okay.