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Author Topic: Creating Your Own Divination System  (Read 2975 times)

TheGreenWizard

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Creating Your Own Divination System
« on: May 30, 2020, 11:47:19 am »
Tarot.Tea Leaves.Coffee Grounds.Auspicy.Astrology.

These are just some examples of divination systems that people use to commune with the supernatural and the Divine alike. However, I'm wondering if anyone has ever created their own divination system, where the symbols or tools that one uses has their own unique meanings, and thus, the system can only be used by the user.

For example, my friend created a system with deer antler tips (tines). Each tine has a unique energy and meaning; as such, the system is not replicable, i.e., I could do this system, but my set of tines will have different meanings than hers.

Has anyone ever done this?
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Re: Creating Your Own Divination System
« Reply #1 on: May 30, 2020, 12:41:06 pm »
Has anyone ever done this?

Not exactly, but I've been using a creativity-helping app called Story Dice to generate random simple images that I divine from for years now. A lot of them have taken on very personal meanings.

I have thought of making my own divination methods--custom dice would be delightful--but I haven't put together a full system yet.
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Re: Creating Your Own Divination System
« Reply #2 on: May 30, 2020, 03:22:23 pm »
Not exactly, but I've been using a creativity-helping app called Story Dice to generate random simple images that I divine from for years now. A lot of them have taken on very personal meanings.

I have thought of making my own divination methods--custom dice would be delightful--but I haven't put together a full system yet.

Rory's Story Dice are great!  I've looked at the app, but I also have the physical dice (and a TON of other dice)  I really enjoy using dice for divination, I tend to prefer symbol based dice, though I've read several versions that use regular numbered dice (I've been trying to come up with a workable system for a full poly set, but I keep getting stumped on the d20...that's just a lot of sides to remember!)  One of my favorites though is to use what are called Fate dice (it's a d6 with two +, two -, and two blank sides), kind of a simple yes/no system (but it gives a bit of range, you can have every thing from 'very much no' to mixed yes/no and a true neutral)

I have been using a few kinds of charms as divination for a while.  I love jewelry charms, and toss them over card readings for extra info.  I also got a bunch of those tiny memory charms, for a portable daily divination (grab a pinch of charms, put them in your necklace, and then you can give it a shake throughout the day for a quick tune in...so the whole day will have a different set of charms, but at any point you can consult that day's charms and some may stand out more than others)
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Re: Creating Your Own Divination System
« Reply #3 on: May 30, 2020, 10:40:19 pm »
For example, my friend created a system with deer antler tips (tines). Each tine has a unique energy and meaning; as such, the system is not replicable, i.e., I could do this system, but my set of tines will have different meanings than hers.

I have a quote deck that I designed quite a while ago (version 2 dates from 2009, and version 1 was 2005...) where the divination is done via quotes on cards. There are three layers of meaning: what the words say, what the words mean in the context of the book, plus the reason that quote is so meaningful for me.

(They're all from books I know well enough I can pretty much flip to the place where the quote is.)

You can read a list of the quotes here (there are some sequential numbers missing: those are what I removed from version 1) 

There's a few things I've thought about adding since then (for the curious, some things out of The Goblin Emperor are on the list, for example.) I haven't been reading with it as often as I used to, but I do still usually run it in tandem with Tarot, and it gives me a different layer.

It is, however, totally impossible for people who are not me to read with it, though some of my longtime friends with significantly overlapping reading tastes can make a stab at it. (Um. All three of them, these days, maybe?)
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Re: Creating Your Own Divination System
« Reply #4 on: June 02, 2020, 07:42:11 pm »
I have a quote deck that I designed quite a while ago (version 2 dates from 2009, and version 1 was 2005...) where the divination is done via quotes on cards. There are three layers of meaning: what the words say, what the words mean in the context of the book, plus the reason that quote is so meaningful for me.

(They're all from books I know well enough I can pretty much flip to the place where the quote is.)

You can read a list of the quotes here (there are some sequential numbers missing: those are what I removed from version 1) 

There's a few things I've thought about adding since then (for the curious, some things out of The Goblin Emperor are on the list, for example.) I haven't been reading with it as often as I used to, but I do still usually run it in tandem with Tarot, and it gives me a different layer.

It is, however, totally impossible for people who are not me to read with it, though some of my longtime friends with significantly overlapping reading tastes can make a stab at it. (Um. All three of them, these days, maybe?)
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arete

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Re: Creating Your Own Divination System
« Reply #5 on: June 03, 2020, 07:15:02 am »
However, I'm wondering if anyone has ever created their own divination system, where the symbols or tools that one uses has their own unique meanings, and thus, the system can only be used by the user.
There is a big list of divinations. if someone isn't satisfied with the options we currently have, then, I suppose, they can create their own method. Personally, I wouldn't recomment it, because the user/owner might become self-absorbed. But that's just my opinion.

TheGreenWizard

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Re: Creating Your Own Divination System
« Reply #6 on: June 03, 2020, 02:07:15 pm »
Not exactly, but I've been using a creativity-helping app called Story Dice to generate random simple images that I divine from for years now. A lot of them have taken on very personal meanings.

I have thought of making my own divination methods--custom dice would be delightful--but I haven't put together a full system yet.

It would be interesting to see how a Freddy Mercury inspired divination system would work (and look like)! Though, I feel that your story dice are an example of this already, given that the images have personal meanings for you (and therefore, the system will be different when used by someone else).
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TheGreenWizard

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Re: Creating Your Own Divination System
« Reply #7 on: June 03, 2020, 02:09:56 pm »
Rory's Story Dice are great!  I've looked at the app, but I also have the physical dice (and a TON of other dice)  I really enjoy using dice for divination, I tend to prefer symbol based dice, though I've read several versions that use regular numbered dice (I've been trying to come up with a workable system for a full poly set, but I keep getting stumped on the d20...that's just a lot of sides to remember!)  One of my favorites though is to use what are called Fate dice (it's a d6 with two +, two -, and two blank sides), kind of a simple yes/no system (but it gives a bit of range, you can have every thing from 'very much no' to mixed yes/no and a true neutral)

Ah yes, the dice. I'm familiar with both sets - the poly dice I feel like you could assign a specific use for each polyhedron shape, and then build from there. So maybe a d20 is for more comprehensible readings, while a d4 is more for a scale of yes to no?

Fate dice... ugh. (Sorry I have baggage with the Fate system overall - so I won't comment on that).
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Re: Creating Your Own Divination System
« Reply #8 on: June 03, 2020, 05:59:43 pm »
It would be interesting to see how a Freddy Mercury inspired divination system would work (and look like)!

I can't help imagining that it would involve musical notes (on a D12 maybe?).
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Re: Creating Your Own Divination System
« Reply #9 on: June 03, 2020, 06:07:37 pm »
I can't help imagining that it would involve musical notes (on a D12 maybe?).

When I was a music major and taking 20th century theory and composition, I once did a chance-driven musical piece based on a tabletop rpg session (Earthdawn, in this case). I no longer have my notes from it, but it was something like each character had an assigned range of notes, the dice rolled determined the duration, and the number on the dice determined the actual pitch within the character's range.

Having the multiple axes turned out to be very handy and interesting.)

(And then someone did 44 points of damage with a d4 weapon, and I had to figure out how to depict that consistent with the rules I'd set out, but that's gaming for you.)
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