Tarot Deck Creation Question

draque said:

Although there are only 3 suits in the minor arcana, I did not simply remove one of them. They are organized by element, each with a Patron figure in the Major arcana. Fire represents action and material. Wind represents thoughts and plans. Water represents emotion and relationships. As with the major arcana, I took stock of the function of all the cards in the 4 traditional suits and tried to make sure that each was somehow addressed (again, sometimes with a single card, sometimes spread across multiple cards). So while the suit of water in my deck is similar to the suit of cups in a traditional deck, you'll find things in it that are not in cups, and you'll find things in the suits of fire or wind that would typically be in the cups.

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Most oracles are not that complex. They usually don't try to be as comprehensive as a Tarot. Why? Because there's a limited amount time that is reasonable for readers to invest in one unique system.

Readers put years into learning Tarot systems, and this allows them use and appreciate many decks. If you're asking readers to learn an entirely new system that is as complex as traditional Tarot, you'll probably be disappointed.

That's why, in general, popular oracle decks tend to be less complex and more intuitive, and popular Tarot decks tend to use more familiar/traditional Tarot structure.

I just had a thought. If I included 14 additional cards and instructions on how to add those/remove some of the other cards to allow my deck to act as a typical Tarot set in addition to the Oracle deck that I've come up with, would that increase the interest of people here?

Making it modular like that would slightly increase my costs, but would not ultimately post a huge problem to me. It would mean that I would have to come up with some new imagery, but that's very doable.

It would also mean that some of the major arcana would have unfamiliar figures on them... although I suppose that's common when dealing with custom Tarot decks.

Let me know your thoughts, I'm looking to put something together that both meets my creative requirements and which people will want to enjoy!

I'm not sure it'd be for me personally, but some people may appreciate the novelty of it being something original to stand out in their collection, if the cost is reasonable and they find the imagery appealing. Some readers may prefer to read it intuitively anyway, or just want it for the artwork.

Spectre Made Flesh said:

...some people may appreciate the novelty of it being something original to stand out in their collection, if the cost is reasonable and they find the imagery appealing. Some readers may prefer to read it intuitively anyway, or just want it for the artwork.

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Agreed. It could be more of a collectors item but probably not much in the way of profit.

As reall said, "don't invest more than you can afford lose."

Oof... even with the deck including cards allowing it to be used as a traditional Tarot deck, do you really think that the modular nature of it would hurt people's willingness to try it that much?

I'm not looking to get rich or something, but if it seems like it would be impossible to even recover some of the production cost through sales, it's making the decision to move forward more difficult. : \

Once you know production costs to do a small run of the deck you could do a Kickstarter to fund it, which will tell you if there is interest before you invest any money of your own.

If you use a POD service like Printerstudio, it won't cost you one red cent.

Printing isn't really my main concern so much as the artwork is. I know the artist who's doing these for me, but she's a professional, and even if she's giving me a good price for her time/work, it's still the primary expense.

Probably going to do a kickstarter for it once she's finished the first bit of the Major Arcana, though.

Definitely sobering to get the perspective of people who have done this before, though. I have a pretty specific vision of what I would like to do, but I'm trying to keep my head on straight as well, though.

draque said:

Printing isn't really my main concern so much as the artwork is. I know the artist who's doing these for me, but she's a professional, and even if she's giving me a good price for her time/work, it's still the primary expense..

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If you have a rough idea how much the artwork will cost, then you can develop an estimate of how many copies you'd need to sell to at least cover the cost of the art.

Next, look at other campaigns to see how many copies they sold.

There are of course many other details to consider, but this comparison will get you moving toward some rough ball park figures.

McFaire said:

If you have a rough idea how much the artwork will cost, then you can develop an estimate of how many copies you'd need to sell to at least cover the cost of the art.

Next, look at other campaigns to see how many copies they sold.

There are of course many other details to consider, but this comparison will get you moving toward some rough ball park figures.

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Wow, looking through these, I'm getting so many ideas about how to explore funding! It had never occurred to me to study what these campaigns had done, but seems totally obvious now. Thanks for the tip! :3