Hermetic Tarot

First edition decks crop up on Ebay from time to time and the printing on these is crisp, clear and all you could want.

I don't know if they're planning a Chinese print run - that would probably be worth getting on the evidence of Chinese printings that we've seen in other decks.

I have an Italian, and it doesn't offend me as much as the Italian Hanson-Roberts or Universal Waite or Deviant Moon or . . . you get the idea. It's slick, but not overly obtrusive. It's a relaly lovely deck. The pips are fabulous.

\m/ Kat

teomat said:

I'm a bit curious about this deck and wonder if it would be a good choice to study the Golden Dawn system?

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I don't think its the easiest deck to study the system from. I'd lean more towards the Cicero's deck if you can find a copy (it's OOP, but coming back) or the Wang deck (not pretty, but fairly authentic). I find the Hermetic a difficult deck, as its uncolored and has a lot of very fine detail. Unless your already quite familar with the GD system and its magic, it's a very steep learning curve IMO. Though its a very useful deck and a lot of fun to research, still workwhile getting.

teomat said:

However people in this thread are saying that the current printing is pretty bad. If anyone has the Italian print, is it really as bad as they say? Or should I wait (and hope) for a possible Chinese print instead?

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It really is that bad, but its not unusable, just really annoying sloppy work. The worse thing is, its not consistently bad, its just some cards that are bad so they are even more glaring. I don't think its a problem with a printer, I think its a problem that happened before that. The artwork itself is pixellated and out of focus, which is more annoying than the plastic laminate I think.

If you could find one of the first editions that would be better, but the new one is acceptable enough.

I haven't seen an Italian one, but I got my 1st edition on ebay recently for a hefty $2.99, so I would keep my eyes open. They don't seem to be that hard to get a hand on, and its absolutely swoon worthy

Thanks for your responses everyone.

I don't think I'd mind the plastification too much, but I was concerned about the actual poor quality of some of the images. Sounds as though the problem hasn't been corrected since the Italian prints came out .

I'll have a look at the Wang deck, but it's not the most aethetically pleasing. I don't really mind the complexity of the Hermetic images as I don't think I could read with it anyway. However it does look very striking and I was hoping that it would be a good deck to learn the GD system.

I might just hold out for a while and see if US Games decides to do a Chinese re-print. As Wendywu says (and which I can certainly testify with my lovely Original RWS), the Chinese prints seem to be a lot better.

teomat said:

As Wendywu says (and which I can certainly testify with my lovely Original RWS), the Chinese prints seem to be a lot better.

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Alternately, I wonder whether U.S games willl use the transfer of printing to China as an opportunity to purge the catalogue and dispense with a few titles ...

Le Fanu said:

Alternately, I wonder whether U.S games willl use the transfer of printing to China as an opportunity to purge the catalogue and dispense with a few titles ...

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Oh my god! So I might have to choose between a shoddy printing of the deck or none at all!!! (I can't use ebay).

And they've already started transferring the RWS, Deviant Moon etc to China!!

This deck could already be vanishing before my eyes!!!

I could literally just have days left to get this deck!!!!!!!!

Or maybe hours!!!!!

Or minutes!!!!!

ARGHH!!!

Breathe...Breathe...

I bought mine, new, from Amazon in December 2009. Here is my review from Amazon:

"My deck came in today and I'm happy to report that the Quality Control is back. The graphics are sharp, the contrast is spot on, the deck is perfectly cut, the cards are glossy and they shuffle wonderfully.

It is also one heck of a deck. I picked up the energy straight away as I went through the cards prior to their first shuffle. I find mine is a potent deck; it holds many secrets and has many lessons to reveal.

I will use this one for in depth study but would be more than willing to use this deck for clients. I believe this is a great deck for transition into other esoteric decks such as the Haindl. I'm very pleased with the Hermetic and recommend other serious readers to give it a go, especially if you relate to black and white."

I would say to anyone interested in the deck to go for it!

Grigori said:

I don't think its the easiest deck to study the system from. I'd lean more towards the Cicero's deck if you can find a copy (it's OOP, but coming back)

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On the subject of the above deck, did the English version come with a LWB? Or is there a volume you could recommend to beginners?
I have the deck in it's Russian incarnation, no LWB at all. I also have the original(?) Hermetic deck, in the red box, so I could do with understanding what I'm looking at LOL

Still the Taschen book, or something else do you think?

Thank you kindly
Pathwalker

The Cicero's deck comes with a whacking great LWB - more of a Little Big Book, I'd say. Excellent value for money

Aside from that, Pat Zalewski's latest book is a mighty tome that is great for studying GD tarot ... The Magical Tarot of the Golden Dawn. Fantastic great doorstop of a book.... but very good.