Modern Spellcaster’s Tarot

Modern Spellcaster’s Tarot

The Modern Spellcaster’s Tarot is a tarot deck designed for magick. The artwork and descriptions are integrated with magick and the deck itself can actually be used as a magickal tool. The deck has some similarities to the Rider-Waite-Smith system, however there are several notable differences, too. First of all, and probably most obvious since magick is the main focus, much of the symbolism is different since it is inspired from ancient Pagan mythos and witchcraft. The second major difference is that the suits don’t all align with traditional elements: Wands are Air and Swords are Fire (Cups are still Water and Pentacles are still Earth).

I wanted to get this deck almost immediately after I first started learning tarot. What drew me to it wasn’t the magickal component, but rather the diversity. It felt more real to me to see a deck with images that had people of varying skin colors, orientation, etc. I eventually got the deck after I started feeling more comfortable with tarot. I loved the cards so much that I would just sit there and keep looking through the whole deck. Even though there are some fantasy elements to the deck (with creatures, magick, etc), it felt very real and energetic.

The deck comes with a companion book which I feel is a bit lacking. The book starts off with a general overview of tarot but fails to really provide a good introduction for this specific deck. Each card has a colored image in the book with a description, reversed description, and magickal uses (Major Arcana also have divinatory meanings). The descriptions are poor in that they are just a list of keywords or phrases that one can associate with each card. This would be fine except for the fact that there is also no description of the magickal symbols in each card. I am not familiar with what many of these symbols might mean, therefore it leaves me relying heavily on only key phrases and I feel as if I am not quite capturing the full meaning of the card.

As a result of the poor descriptions in the companion book, I have found this deck to be challenging to learn to use. It’s not impossible, it just takes a little extra time. Surprisingly, the difference in suits and elements (Wands = Air and Swords = Fire) did not bother me much. I would recommend this deck to anyone who does have knowledge of ancient Pagan mythos or magickal symbols. If you do not have that much knowledge of these things but are still interested in the deck due to the diversity of it, I still would recommend it but will warn that it will take some time to get used to.

After owning this deck for a few months, I have found that I will use it only occasionally for tarot readings. Instead, I am more drawn to use it with tarot-inspired creative projects. I have not used the deck as a magickal tool, therefore I cannot make any remarks about that aspect of this deck.