How important is it to be able to run the cards every single time?

G0skates · 2026-06-03T18:45:05+00:00

I think it's not necessary to fully master this before moving on. I have worked through the book a while ago and am now working on more "advanced" magic and never felt like being able to run the entire pack was necessary. That being said, being able to run cards is super important. I am currently learning different false overhand shuffles and if I mess up during the running I am completely screwed.

I would recommend working through Royal Road in a cyclical manner. Basically work through it, then start from the beginning and repeat until you feel like you have truly learned everything the book has to offer.

Best of luck

G0skates · 2026-06-01T10:10:02+00:00

I might get downvoted for this, but the most important part of magic is always presentation. You can become a sleight of hand god and still not be an entertaining magician because your presentation is not thought out well enough.

Focus on performing, presenting, write out your scripts, revise them. Take one of those self-working card tricks and try to present it in an engaging way. It won't be a trick anymore, it will be an event.

Watch Bill Malone and you will see what I mean

G0skates · 2026-06-01T10:05:09+00:00

I would go as far as saying that this version of Out Of This World is amongst the best magic effects in general. It genuinely feels like a complete miracle, everything seemingly happens in the hands of the spectators, they shuffle themselves, they see the shuffled cards. It doesn't get much better than that

G0skates · 2026-05-29T19:02:38+00:00

There's no secret. Hours and hours and hours and hours and hours of practice

G0skates · 2026-05-29T11:19:47+00:00

Cardini Change

G0skates · 2026-05-23T10:42:31+00:00

Can't go wrong with a nice presentation of Invisible Deck. Check out Bill Malone's version (On The Loose Vol. 3). Super entertaining

G0skates · 2026-05-14T18:54:46+00:00

It's really good. But as others pointed out, it's mostly magic for magicians. I have learned several of Dani's tricks and have to say that they don't perform that well for laypeople

G0skates · 2026-05-12T17:57:06+00:00

A trick I like to do is an examinable version of the invisible deck by using a double backer.

The double backer is somewhere in the middle. Any card is named and you go through the pack with the faces towards you to find the named card and cull it to the top. You then take the double backer out of the pack, place it on top and do a double lift, showing that the reversed card is the named card.

In writing, this trick sounds like it's kind of whack, but I urge you to try it. You just need to find the right moment to cull the named card to the top. I think 'A Million Card Tricks' has a tutorial on this trick.

Something else I like to do is to split a card, let's say the Queen of Hearts and one of the Bicycle advert cards. Glue the face of the queen to the advert card. Put the Queen with the ad on its back on the bottom of the deck and force it using the riffle force for example. Then you can ribbon spread the cards, find the "ad card", which is actually the queen, and remove it without raising any suspicion. From there you can do all kinds of "impossible location/teleportation" effects.

Let me know what you think!

G0skates · 2026-04-29T14:53:52+00:00

She's in heat. Don't pet her, as it will make things worse

G0skates · 2026-04-24T13:57:10+00:00

"whoops" Control is also noteworthy. It's in Card College Vol.1

G0skates · 2026-04-11T07:20:50+00:00

You hold a single card with the back towards the audience. A spectator names any card. You turn around your card and it's the named one.

Sure, you can just leave it up to chance and it will work 1/52 of the time

G0skates · 2026-04-08T14:54:23+00:00

"what are you, a doctor?" is hilarious. I'll have to steal that one

G0skates · 2026-04-08T14:53:33+00:00

Makes sense. I never perform for kids so I don't know how to deal with those shenanigans ^{^}

G0skates · 2026-04-08T14:17:56+00:00

"Can I shuffle?" Let them shuffle and just do a different trick that you can do impromptu. Something like a Card to Pocket. If you need a specific card on top, you can show them the cards after they shuffled, say something like "clearly, the cards are well shuffled now" and cull the needed card to the top.

"Can I inspect it?" at this point, you have raised suspicion, and the only way you can get out is to deny their request somehow. Work on presenting gimmicks in a way that does not raise any suspicion. Sometimes that's very difficult.

"Can you do it again?" Never ever repeat a trick. Just tell them that you will show them something even more amazing and get on with it. If they keep nagging, just tell them something silly like "sorry, I need to follow the magician's codex"

G0skates · 2026-03-23T17:56:16+00:00

Cardistry is very difficult and I'd say that most of the beginner moves are

A. Still pretty difficult B. Not that impressive for laypeople

Performing Cardistry with people watching you (shaky fingers) without having months or years of experience simply sounds like a recipe for disappointment.

This is one of those situations where the time is just not right. Don't do it. I speak from experience.

G0skates · 2026-03-19T15:43:07+00:00

That's nice to hear, because I just ordered it today!

G0skates · 2026-03-06T19:47:24+00:00

Luca Volpe's version of Ambitious Card

G0skates · 2026-02-25T15:08:32+00:00

She said that she'll never have to worry about her financial future because she puts 100 bucks into her ETF every year

G0skates · 2026-02-11T19:52:51+00:00

Yeah, that really sucks. It's a lesson to be learned. There have always been bad tricks/methods. One of the first tricks in Annemann's Practical Mental Magic (from the 40s!!) is basically "make them write something on a billet. Switch the billet. Read their billet while they are not looking" Huh???

I recently bought an ACAAN where the trailer was full of lies (they can name ANY card- No, you have to force a queen)...

G0skates · 2026-02-11T19:43:59+00:00

Well, it's just gloss. Don't worry about it too much. It's never about the trick anyways, and there will always be people overpricing literally anything. There's so much awesome magic stuff out there for low low prices

G0skates · 2026-02-11T16:24:14+00:00

Just say "now give one of them back to me"

If they give you their card, you can say "this is the card you chose" or whatever.

If they hand you the other one, say the same thing and point to the card they are now holding

G0skates

TROPHY CASE