The game of Hermit’s Arcana is a one-player solitaire/patience game using a tarot deck, based on the game 22 Offerings which was created by David Llort. The rules have been changed slightly and an additional divination section has been added, if one wants to use this game as an aide to practicing tarot readings.
The goal of the game is to honor each of the Major Arcana before running out of Minor Arcana cards. Each Major Arcana can only be honored by completing a certain condition.
Preparation
To play, you will need a 78-card tarot deck which has 4 suits of 14 cards each (Ace, 2 through 10, and 4 court cards) in its Minor Arcana as well as 22 Major Arcana. These rules assume the Waite-Smith deck format. Other formats can be used, but you will need to decide which of the cards in use match to which cards in the rules. This is especially important for divination; attention should be paid of roles and/or sexes change between formats.
You will also need a space to play. It should be at least eight hand-widths wide (across from you) and six hands tall (away from you).
To begin setting up the game, separate the Minor Arcana and Major Arcana into separate piles and shuffle each pile. You should cut and turn each pile at least once, so that roughly half of the cards will be relatively reversed. Set the two piles in front of you and to the sinister1, the Major Arcana on top (further away). There should be space for five cards spots to the dexter of the two piles, as well as space for one card spot below (towards you) the Minor Arcana pile. This will be enough space to play.
The Major Arcana pile is called Fate (or the stock), while the Minor Arcana pile is called Chance (or the deck). Each Major Arcana card is also called a Sigil (or foundation card). Each Minor Arcana card is called a table card. Of the Minor Arcana, cards numbered 2 through 10 are called numbers, while the court cards (Page, Knight, Queen, King) are called figures. The Ace counts both as a number (1) and a figure (Ace).
The four spaces to dexter of Fate form the altar (or foundation row). The fifth space to dexter in that row is the honor pile, where honored Sigils are placed face-up. The four spaces to dexter of Chance and the four spaces below that make up the table. The fifth space to dexter from Chance is the heap (or discard pile), where discarded table cards are placed face up.
Whenever there is an empty spot either on the altar or on the table, it should be immediately filled from the appropriate pile (Fate for the altar, Chance for the table).
When taking any operation on many cards at once, such as filling many empty spots, the correct order is to deal with Sigils before base cards. Further, when interacting with the altar, one should go from sinister to dexter. When interacting with the table, one should begin with the sinister-most spot on the top row, then go dexter to the end of the row, then go down to the bottom row, and go sinister to the end of that row; in other words, the first card will be the sinister-most on the top row and the last card will be the sinister-most on the bottom row.
When drawing a card from either deck, cards should be drawn horizontally (turning the card dexter over sinister or vice versa) so that their orientation, whether regular or reversed, will be preserved.
Objective
To win the game, you must honor all 22 Sigils. You lose the game if you run out of potential maneuvers. After you finish the game, you can score your performance.
Play
On each round, you may make one maneuver. The round is made up of three stages:
- Morning Stage (or Opening Stage)
- Maneuver Stage
- Evening Stage (or Ending Stage)
During the Morning Stage, anything caused by a card on the field (altar and table, primarily) takes place (e.g. Death “waking” on the third turn if drawn initially). During the Evening Stage, draws and reveals take place, as well as any immediate after-effects of your maneuver.
Maneuvers
During the Maneuver stage, you may make one of the following maneuvers (if otherwise possible):
- Banish: Discard 1 table card, then remove 1 Sigil of your choice. Certain Sigils cannot be banished (Death, Temperance, the Devil, the Tower). You cannot banish a Sigil that has cards offered to it.
- Devote: Offer 1 table card to a Sigil; you cannot offer more than 1 with this maneuver. Certain Sigils cannot be devoted to.
- Exalt/Bind: Complete a Sigil’s ritual to honor it; this is the only way in which you can offer multiple table cards with a single maneuver. If you exalt/bind a Sigil with no cards offered to it beforehand, return 1; if no cards were offered before but all cards you offered were facing the same way as the Sigil (regular or reversed), instead return 2. Certain Sigils are apophatic (or obscure), which means that they can be exalted/bound but they never give the extra benefits.
- Ground: Discard all cards on a single row from the table.
In addition, before drawing new cards, a player can Shift 1 card whenever they perform a maneuver, moving 1 table card to an empty spot on the table.
Note: It is possible to lock a Sigil in an uncompletable state through the Devote maneuver. This happens if the Sigil’s ritual cannot be completed with the offered cards and the other table cards available. If this happens, the game cannot be won.
Operations
Operations are the elements of the maneuvers.
- Discard: Move a table card to the heap.
- Draw: Draw a card from the top of a pile and place it into play face-up; usually refers to drawing from Chance.
- Honor: Move a Sigil to the honor pile. Any cards offered to the Sigil go to the heap.
- Offer: Move a table card from the table onto a Sigil.
- Return: Turn a card from the altar, heap, table, or honor pile face down and move it to the bottom of its deck.
- Reveal: Draw a card from Fate and place it on the altar face-up.
Rituals
These are the rituals whose conditions must be satisfied in order to honor the Sigils.
| Order | Sigil | B | D | A |
| 1 | I The High Magician | X | X | |
| 2 | II The High Priestess | X | X | |
| 3 | III The Empress | X | X | |
| 4 | IV The Emperor | X | X | |
| 5 | V The Hierophant | X | X | |
| 6 | VI The Lovers | X | X | |
| 7 | VII The Chariot | X | X | |
| 8 | VIII Strength | X | X | |
| 9 | IX The Hermit | X | X | |
| 10 | X Wheel of Fortune | X | X | |
| 11 | XI Justice | X | X | |
| 12 | XII The Hanged Man | X | X | |
| 13 | XIII Death | X | ||
| 14 | XIV Temperance | X | ||
| 15 | XV The Devil | X | ||
| 16 | XVI The Tower | X | ||
| 17 | XVII The Star | X | X | |
| 18 | XVIII The Moon | X | X | |
| 19 | XIX The Sun | X | X | |
| 20 | XX Judgement | X | X | |
| 21 | XXI The World | X | X | |
| 0 | 0 The Fool | X | X |
If a Sigil is Banishable (B) then it can be targeted by the Banish maneuver, and if it isn’t, then it can’t. If a Sigil is Devotable (D) then it can likewise by targeted by the Devote maneuver and hold offered cards, and vice versa. If a Sigil is Apophatic (A), it does not return extra cards when using the exalt/bind maneuver.
List of rituals
| Order | Sigil | Ritual |
| 1 | I The High Magician | 3 consecutive number cards of different suits |
| 2 | II The High Priestess | 3 Pentacles numbers |
| 3 | III The Empress | 3 Cups numbers |
| 4 | IV The Emperor | 3 Swords numbers |
| 5 | V The Hierophant | 3 Wands numbers |
| 6 | VI The Lovers | 1 Queen & 1 King or 1 Knight & 1 Page or 1 Queen & 1 Knight, must be of different suits |
| 7 | VII The Chariot | 1 Ace & 1 King or 1 Ace & 1 Queen or 2 Knights, must be of different suits |
| 8 | VIII Strength | 2 figures of the same rank |
| 9 | IX The Hermit | 1 Wand figure and 3 non-consecutive numbers of different suits (not Wands). When honored, you may search your heap for 1 card and return it. |
| 10 | X Wheel of Fortune | 4 consecutive number cards |
| 11 | XI Justice | 1 Wand number and 1 Sword figure |
| 12 | XII The Hanged Man | 1 Pentacle number and 1 Cup figure |
| 13 | XIII Death | When Death is revealed, count the number of figures on the table. Return that number of cards from the top of the discard pile to the bottom of the deck, then discard all figures from the table. Death is then honored (Death fruitful). If there are no figures on the table, instead return the top card of the discard pile to the bottom of the deck, then Death is honored (Death fruitless). If Death is revealed as part of the initial four Sigils, it does not “activate” until the third round. |
| 14 | XIV Temperance | If Strength has been honored by the time Temperance is revealed, Temperance’s ritual is the same as Strength’s ritual (Strength triumphant). If Strength has not been honored by the time Temperance is revealed, Temperance is honored when Strength is honored (Strength tempered) or when The Hermit is honored (Strength abandoned). |
| 15 | XV The Devil | If The Lovers has been honored by the time The Devil is revealed, The Devil’s ritual is the same as The Lovers ritual (Devil fooled). If The Lovers has not been honored by the time The Devil is honored, The Devil is honored when The Chariot is honored (Devil fought) or when The Lovers is honored (Devil triumphant) |
| 16 | XVI The Tower | If the Tower is on the altar, whenever any other Sigil is honored, the Tower is instead honored and the other Sigil remains on the altar. |
| 17 | XVII The Star | 2 figures of Cups or Pentacles |
| 18 | XVIII The Moon | 2 figures of Wands or Swords |
| 19 | XIX The Sun | 3 figures of the rank Ace, Page, or Knight. When honored, look at the top card of the discard pile. If it is a number, return 2. If it is an Ace, return 3. If it is a Page, return 4, If it is a Knight, return 5. If it is a King or Queen, return 6. |
| 20 | XX Judgement | A pair of figures and a pair of numbers, each from the same two suits. When honored, return 2. |
| 21 | XXI The World | A set of number cards that adds up to exactly 21. When honored, return 4. |
| 0 | 0 The Fool | As a maneuver, return 3, then discard all table cards except 1 |
Scoring
Scoring the game is optional. When scoring, each honored Sigil counts for 10, while each card that remains in Chance counts for 1, so that a completed & won game will always score at least 220 points before scoring the strange Sigils.
Each strange Sigil scores points normally, but can further add or subtract points based on certain conditions.
| XIII Death | Add 10 points for each figure removed by Death |
| If no figures were removed by Death, subtract 50 points | |
| XIV Temperance | Strength triumphant: 0 points |
| Strength tempered: 50 points | |
| Strength abandoned: -50 points | |
| XV The Devil | Devil fooled: 50 points |
| Devil fought: 0 points | |
| Devil triumphant: -50 points | |
| XVI The Tower | If no table cards are discarded because The Tower is honored, subtract 50 points |
| 0 The Fool | When The Fool is honored, subtract 10 points for each card fewer than 3 that is returned. |
| If no cards are returned because The Fool is honored, instead subtract 100 points total. |
An esoteric victory is a game when one doesn’t honor all 22 Sigils but does manage to get 220 points or more.
Divination
The divination section will be provided in a download at a later date. Check back to this page for a link when it is available.
- Dexter/sinister will be used here for “strong side”/”weak side”. If right-handed, dexter is your right hand and sinister is your left. If left-handed, vice-versa. ↩︎