Café de Nuit

I'm curious how many of you actually use curses and Tarokka as described in the PHB and DMG. It seemed to me that a great deal of time was spent detailing a curse system that I found myself doubting I would actually use. Likewise, while I love the idea of Tarokka, and I have often considered using real Tarot cards in a rpg, I'm not entirely sure how feasible the Tarokka reading is. It seems that it would require a great deal of preparation. I'm just curious if others have experience with these GM devices.

My GM just stacks the deck. We know he does it, but it doesn't ruin the effect it gives our game.

I agree to some extent on curses. I've never really had much use for them, except as a story element. But I guess the idea is that if NPC's can use curses, PC's need the rules too.

As for the tarokka, I love them and use them as often as I can. You can either stack them or wing it. winging it is hard, and risky, but can be very rewarding. Remember that the secret of tarokka and tarot is the vagueness of the "meanings". Even if you don't remember the "real" meaning of a card, you can usually find some element in the imagery that makes sense, just by looking at the pictures or the name.

In our ill-fated Ravenloft Larp ("Ravenlarp") I played a Vistani fortune-teller who would give a card reading to one player that everyone voted on at the end of the night. Despite the fact the game eventually fell apart, it was still a lot of readings. I'm biased, of course, but I think they worked out well. I didn't have time to stack the deck so I always just had to wing it. Being an NPC, I was in cahoots with the GM, so I usually knew enough of what was going on "behind the scenes" to find a way to match a drawn card to something that was actually going on in game. Being in cahoots with the GM also meant anything that showed up in the "future" card slot could be worked into the game as an event by the GM.

One time I didn't know a PC that well and also drew complete gibberish. I just shrugged and read the card meanings straight, and the GM and I agreed we'd probably just ignore it. Next game the player blew up his own embassy and came back after game to tell me how accurate the reading was. *shrug*

When my 2E campaign was in between adventures, I would occasionally offer freeform Tarokka readings. I wasn't stacking the deck, and the players understood that whatever the cards predicted wouldn't necessarily happen immediately, just "soonish." Basically I'd use the cards to give myself ideas for story wrinkles to toss into the campaign down the line.

Interesting, that would work too IMC as it's extremely freeform: I throw many hooks at the players during a game (nothing better for atmosphere, when they hear stories and superstitions, some true, some not), and then I try to develop those that pick their interest.

The readings would help in this, adding another layer.

Joël

I do not mind giving Tarokka readings (in RL, I make a little money on the side giving tarot readings, so it's fairly easy for me to stage a Tarokka scene, given I know what's ahead for the players and also how freeform interpretations can be) but the players actually have to go looking for them. In the tradition of Ravenloft, I sometimes decide various points of the current adventure based on the results of a reading, but my players have little interest in Tarokka. (On the other hand, I can buy off a night offering tarot reading to them-go fig)

Curses are such an intrinsic part of the game that not only do they often form backstory, my players watch their wording, lest the Dark Powers fulfill any spoken desire-though unless it's a plot point, the curse system only goes into my determining if a player's curse, even unintentional, will be granted by the Dark Powers. Nothing more fun than watching players scramble to fix a situation they created...

I almost always do tarokka readings but with a stacked deck. I sometimes use curses but not as often.

Like many others I've never really tried using the tarokka decks. While I thought the idea was kind of cool, I just didn't see the need for them outside of using them as a prop. As Gonzoron said, even if you don't know the actual divination of the card, it's easy enough to create something that somewhat coincides with your story line. Curses to me add great flavor to a game, but unless they are playing some sort of Vistani type character, the players really wouldn't have all that much interaction with them, outside of maybe being affected by one. LOL!

It's often fun to take the Tarroka idea from I6: Castle Ravenloft and have multiple goals/ locations/ items determined by the cards.