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This time I'm taking a look at some Doppelkopf packs. These packs have 48 cards, but they are actually made of two 24-card packs. Thus, the packs have A, K, Q, J, 10, 9 in each suit twice. Doppelkopf is a very good game, developed from Schafkopf. In Doppelkopf, or Doko as it's also known, there are four players and usually the two players who have the club queens play together against the other two. It's a complicated game, but for serious card players, Doko offers interesting challenges and is highly recommended.

You can also use the Doko pack to play Pinochle and of course, split it to make two packs for playing Schnapsen...

ASS Doppelkopf Deutsches Bild. This Doppelkopf pack from ASS (here's a tip: if you search for their home page, search for Altenburger...) has German suits and pictures. That is, the four suits are hearts, acorns, leaves and bells. The court cards are king, ober and under. The obers and unders have the correct suit symbols: ober is marked with a suit symbol in the top corner and under in the bottom corner. However, all cards have indices as well (courts are K, O, U). The cards are also double-headed.

Highlights of the pack include the very beautiful aces. Shown below is the ace of hearts, but the others are just as decorative. The court cards are rather fancy as well. The theme is old-fashioned country-side style, as suits the symbols. Under of acorns is falconer, for example, while under of leaves brandishes a milk jug and a hoe. The bells are all very high-and-mighty figures, even the under wields a sword and a book. Very beautiful.

The pack also has six cards with the official rules of tournament Doppelkopf - in German, unfortunately. The cards come in a clear two-part plastic shell, which is fairly functional but needs a rubber band to stay shut. All in all, this is a handsome and useful pack, and a good choice if you wish to play Doppelkopf with the German pictures - which of course limits the potential users quite a bit outside Germany.

Piatnik Doppelkopf Franz. Bild, No. 182419. This Piatnik pack has French pictures, which means it has the standard suits: hearts, diamonds, spades and clubs. The indices are German, though: K, D, B, and actually, the pictures are German as well. You see, in the Anglo-American standard courts, king of clubs represents Charlemagne (see Ron Decker's explanation) who holds the globe. In this pack and other German packs, it's the king of hearts who holds the globe. Also, here king of spades can be recognized as David, as he has his harp. In the Anglo-American standard pattern, the harp is not always visible.

The art here is very elegant and pleasant. The cards are of high quality and packed in a simple cardboard tuck box. Given the French suits, this is easier to approach than the pack with German suits, so if you're looking for a pack of Doppelkopf cards, here's a good pick. Of course, if you don't play Doppelkopf, this pack won't have much use either and the value of the pack is in the art. If your collection doesn't yet have a pack with the German-style courts with David as king of spades, that might be a reason enough to get this pack.

This time I'm taking a look at some Tarot packs that are perhaps better suited for enjoyment as art, not as playing-cards.

Modiano Tarocco Siciliano. The first thing one notices is the small size. The cards are as wide as typical Bridge cards, but even shorter. Thus, they are a lot smaller than Tarot cards usually are. The pack has just 64 cards. The suits (Italian symbols, but the card design bears signs of the Portuguese pattern - according to Dummett and McLeod this pack is the sole remaining representative of the Portuguese pattern in Europe) have cards 5-10 and the four court cards with coins having also 4 and ace. The jacks are female. Pip cards have indexes, while court cards are fairly easy to tell apart.

There are numbered trumps from 1-20 and two unnumbered trumps, Miseria and Fool. Miseria depicts a beggar with the text Miseria on top. The trumps have fairly typical pictures, but in unusual order and with some curiosities. For some reason I found the Hanged Man card rather disturbing: usually he is hanged from the foot, but in this pack he's hanged from his neck with his back turned to the watcher. The Sun shines over a fight, too - the art is beautiful, but rather strange at times. There's apparently some remains from Minchiate influences as well.

For most people this pack will be a curiosity only. There are several games known from Sicily, where it seems they play a different kind of Tarot in the different villages. Dummett and McLeod document several games in their book (A History of Games Played with the Tarot Pack), but none of those descriptions are available on Pagat. I'm going to make some effort to try at least one of the games, the pack is curious enough to guarantee that, but for most people that's not an option.

So, while the pack is perfectly functional for playing - the cards are clear enough, the material good and so on - for most people the value of this pack is in the art. I would recommend the pack for that use as well, as the cards are beautiful and the trumps are curious and fairly unusual. Also, if you want a pack of Tarocco Sicialiano cards, this is your only option, nobody else makes these cards anymore.

Jean Noblet Tarot de Marseille. Tarot of Marseilles is one of the major styles in Tarot cards, and the source where most occult Tarot traditions draw from. The pack designed by Jean Noblet in 1650 is a fine example of the style. There is one remaining copy of the pack in Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris. Fortunately it is nearly complete, missing only few pip cards from the swords. This reproduction by Jean-Claude Fornoy is based on the original cards, faithful to the original line drawings and with new, bright colours.

Fornoy has done well. The cards are beautiful, real works of art. The trumps are particularly pretty. They are Fornoy's favourite, as well. From his boutique, you can buy either a full 78-card pack or just 22 trumps, hand-coloured. I have the full pack, but I believe the hand-coloured trumps are quite a wonderful piece of work, as even the full pack is very beautiful.

I wouldn't recommend these cards for playing the game. The pip cards are somewhat confusing, as is usual with the older designs. There are small indices in the cards and the court cards have names on them, so it's not impossible to use this pack for games - after all, that was the original purpose why it was made in the first place. A bigger problem is the sharp corners of the cards and even though the material seems sturdy, I have a feeling the cards might get scuffed fairly easily and frankly, this is a pack I'd rather keep in fine shape and enjoy as a piece of art, not as an object in use.

Included with the pack is a small leaflet with few pages of information on Tarot and Jean Noblet and 60 pages of fairly pointless psychobabble. Those into card-reading might find that interesting; I got nothing out of it. I would've preferred to have more historical information, as that is always interesting.

(My scanner isn't doing justice to these cards; the colours are much better on the actual cards.)

As a new feature I'm going to review playing-cards. There are quite a few different packs available and finding information about them is hard. So, here's something and more to come, especially if I get any encouragement.

Piatnik Tarock 54 Blatt Nr. 1935. This is an Austrian-style 54-card Tarock pack. That is, 22 trumps and 32 other cards. As usual, there are king, queen, knight and jack in each suit and 7-10 in black suits and 1-4 in red suits. Cards have no indices, but the court cards are easy to tell from each other and with pip cards, the lack of indices is only problem for the black cards. In most games the pip cards are almost completely insignificant, so it often makes no difference whatsoever whether you hold eight or nine of clubs.

The trumps have Roman numerals. To me this seems more authentic for some reason than just numbers. The pictures show vaguely Eastern European countryside life. The cards are printed well and pictures have beautiful colours. The cards are slightly oversized compared to regular Bridge or Poker cards and of typical Piatnik quality.

This pack is identical to pack number 1936 except for the backs. 1936 has a subtle line pattern, this has baroque ornaments in blue and white. 1936 is my current favourite pack for 54 card games, and for all practical reasons 1935 is just as good.

Carta Mundi Jeu de Tarot - 78 Cartes. This pack has no identification number or other details, but the back pattern is called Versailles so if you search for that, you should be able to find a whole family of backs with the same design. The pattern is blue and gold floral design, but apparently there is also a red and gold variation available. I'm not sure if there's a red and gold tarot pack, though.

In any case, this is a full 78 card pack, that is 22 trumps and 56 cards otherwise. All cards bear indices in four corners; court cards have French indices (R, D, C and V). The trumps have what is apparently a French standard pictures, but here the pictures look better than in the other French tarot pack I have. The colours are better. The trumps are numbered with Arabic numerals.

Included with the pack are the rules and a scoring card for French Tarot. The card quality is excellent. This is a very good pack for playing almost any Tarot game and my standard suggestion to people who wish to buy exactly one Tarot pack and thus want maximum versatility.