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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Psion" data-source="post: 2010559" data-attributes="member: 172">Tarot MagicTarot Magic is a book in Mystic Eye Game's Arcane Mysteries series of books introducing new magic options for the d20 System. Tarot Magic details rules and idead for introducing tarot card themed magic to the d20 System.Tarot Magic is written by Andrew Thompson, with additional work by Charles W. Plemons III.A First LookTarot Magic is an 88-page perfect bound softcover book priced at $16.99. This is a reasonable price for a book of this size, and is identical to the format of a prior book in this series, Necromancer's Legacy.The cover of the book is by John Shannon, and depicts a cowled, robed woman with cards in one hand, in front of several illustrated cards against a starry backdrop.The interior is black-and-white with art by Frank Krug, Todd Morasch, and Scott Purdy. Of these artists, I find Scott Purdy's someone eeries style of artwork to be the strongest in the book.The interior body text is conservatively sized, but Mystic Eye continues to insist on using a somewhat uncomfortable to read san serif font, and uses annoyingly large indents. Other than this, the layout is nice and modestly compact, with interesting watermarks and stylish sidebar block shading.A Deeper LookThe table of contents is rather succinct, being stuffed at the bottom of the title page. In fact, I missed that there even was a table of contents on the first pass.The first chapters covers tarot cards in their more traditional role of divination. At the most basic level it provides some DCs for determining the reliability of tarot reading (if the GM really wants to allow it to have any reliability at all, but I can't imagine if you purchased this book that you wouldn't want to.) This is followed by a rather condensed treatise on the various patterns used in readings and what the significance of various cards are in that pattern. This comes with a table to allow the GM to generate card results with dice.Overall, this first chapter felt a little stuffed to me. The author tried to give a glimpse into tarot reading methods, but this section really sort of lacks something compared to the 2e Ravenloft Forbidden Lore boxed set, which came with simpler, more flavorful, and more campaign pertinent advice on using "tarokka" cards as a storytelling element in the game.The second chapter covers a tarot mage class and prestige class for use in the game. For those who aren't too fond of new classes (like me), the prestige class option makes a nice themed "specialization."The tarot mage core class is something of a blend of a wizard and sorcerer. They do not prepare spells, but can only cast spells that they own magic tarot cards for. Much like a wizard's spell repertoire, tarot mages have to have a certain number of cards at first level and then gain one every level, but have to craft more. Unlike a wizard's, these magic cards require a feat (that the tarot mage gets at third level) to craft further cards, much like a magic item.The tarot mage prestige class is a bit different from the norm; it does not continue to advance in previous spellcasting classes, but gains access to new levels of tarot spells as they advance rapidly. This lets them cast 9th level spell at 9th level in the prestige class, which could be as early as 14th level.The third chapter discusses tarot mage spells. It actually uses two different systems of magic using magic tarot cards. The first system allows the tarot mage to access different spells according to the magic tarot cards the character has access to. One card can correspond to different spells of different levels. This system seems perhaps a bit too flexible.The bulk of the book is new tarot-themed spells for use with the first system.The second system maps the sorcerer/wizard spell list to specific tarot cards. Each spell requires multiple cards, making it a bit more in-line with the power of standard wizards and sorcerers.The fourth chapter provides a small miscellany of magic items for use with tarot magic. This includes special cards, as well as special inks a tarot mage can use to enhance their cards.The fifth chapter is a "foul locale" in the tradition of Mystic Eye's foul locales books. This location provides a tarot mage encounter complete with NPCs and maps.ConclusionTarot magic tackles the issue of bringing tarot cards to the d20 system in a very simple and straightforward way, by tacking it on to the existing magic systems in various ways. Though this provides a little flavor, I feel like it could have done more to play up the mystery of tarot and fortune-reading in general instead of simply using it as a coat of paint on a theme-mage.Overall Grade: C+-Alan D. Kohler</blockquote>

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