Witch Tarot

!This page is currently a work in progress!

For my Final Major Project of Game Design Year 2, I decided to design a collection of Major Arcana Tarot cards. There was much more emphasis on the research and narrative here than the actual art and cards, so in only did three, but I'd like to continue in my own time.

Narrative

The main rule of the narrative is it has to follow that of the tarot cards. Each card covers a specific beat of the story, that can be clued together. The first draft had almost no religious subtext, but I wanted a closer link to actual pagan culture largely so my research would be relevant, so it became much more closely linked to Pagan and Christian cultures and conflicts in the revision. 

This is a fantasy setting with real world historical ties. There's two main religions, based on Christianity and paganism, especially in how the two feel and act towards each other (or did, in the 1600-1800s). The pagan side worship the old gods of the earth and gain powers and blessings through them, the christian side worships the god of the sky/heavens. Although they don't get powers from it, they very strongly believe in his blessings and control of everything while earthly worshippers only really thank them for magic and harvest. The heavenly worshippers also view the sky god as superior to the earth gods, believing he lives in an upper pantheon while the earth gods are in the lower. Hence, they think earthly worshippers should 'ascend to the upper pantheon'.

Ginger, Moira and Calum were childhood friends until the monarchy raided their villiage. Ginger has much stronger powers than any of her peers and tried to protect them, seeing her powers she was instead taken away and baptised into a saviour, becoming a witch for the monarchy, though primarily using her powers for healing, having her own ward within the hospice that she almost single-handedly cares for. Seeing their friend get taken away, Moira vowed to get her back, while Calum vowed to overthrow the monarchy entirely. Together, they went on to become the pillars of the revolution.

The High Priestess to Hierophant cards depict as Ginger gets older and transitions from a beloved pet to no more than a tool. With her conversion, there came a peace treaty prevention official attacks to the earthly worshippers, but it's incredibly superficial and made to keep Ginger on a leash above all. It's only a matter of time before an attack escalates and kickstarts the already long since brewing revolution. Moira comes to the castle to warn Ginger in the lovers card, but Ginger refuses to run. While that place used and imprisoned her, it was nonetheless her home and place of those who raised her.

Moira swears she'll save her anyway, but amidst the destruction and chaos, Ginger finally makes up her mind to abandon the hospital and disappears, knowing that she too had become part of the very thing they'd all sworn to destroy.

After this I'm not entirely satisfied with the current story, but I didn't have time to fix it during the project, so take it with a grain of salt. 

Despite Moira playing a bigger role in the revolution and likely being a better fit overall, Calum takes over the kingdom, and instead of relinquishing the kingdom back to people as he swore, he slowly turns into a dictator himself. Moira tries to talk some reason into him, but is cast out (the tower). In her exile, she finds Ginger again and convinces her to go back with her. They take back the throne, and leave it empty.

Character Design

Moira

I'd originally planned Moira as a pretty dark, quiet Wiccan, contrasting Ginger being a naive optimistic sun, but at some point their roles ended up slightly switching. Moira became much more fun, which made sense to me as she's such a free character despite her darker themes, while Ginger became more sullen and quiet which also makes sense for her raising. Ginger does still appear as some radiant deity to the kingdom, but it is a role and identity crafted for her by other hands. With Moira, she can be as grouchy as she wants. 

Modern Wicca has no clothing conventions aside from the stereotypical witch concepts, so I could largely do what I wanted here, making my work harder rather than easier. I'm happy with what I ended up with, she has a mix of old common clothes, witch aesthetics and maybe a little bit of pirate in there too. She is more round and healthy than her counterpart.

I redesigned Moira after doing more research, I wanted her to fit the nouveau style more, so she has long, thick, free flowing Mucha-typical hair. I started thinking of her more as a wayfinder, and wanted her to seem more like a searching wanderer, so I incorporated more Slavic, tribal designs. They did look too warm, so I toned down the fur. I was also very wary of her looking too similar to Ginger, which I was probably needlessly nitpicky with, hence me removing the low fur. The last design is a mix of my favourite elements from each.​

As for her reference sheet, I did colour her after Ginger, as much of her is based on Ginger’s scheme. I already had a specific idea of what I wanted her colours to be and most of it has actual significance, so I didn’t want to change it. ​

I wanted her hair to be the same colour as Ginger’s robes, but it was too light and I couldn’t make it work. It was important that she had red hair due to its biblical connotations, representing the blood of Christ and therefore rebirth, holiness most importantly salvation. It shows what she represents for Ginger but works really well for both characters as it also serves to symbolise the inherently sacrificial selfless roles women are often placed in. 

I know it’s incredibly like her skin colour, which is usually not recommended, but I think it works very well for her here, and they’ll be more distinct in shading. Other than that, green and blue represent her more earthy/natural side, as well as blue having more biblical connotations with divinity, faith and heaven. I may repeat some of this on Ginger’s side.​

Ginger

Ginger is a Pagan converted to Christianity, acting as a kind of royal spell caster. She is made out to be a pure, 'cleansed' version of pagans that they all should aspire to be. She is referred to as not a witch, but a saviour. Having been raised into this all, she's become very docile and obedient to her 'family' (the monarchy). She has plenty of practice with acting the part they want her to be. I'm sure someone like this must also have a sort of quiet gnawing rage that slowly chews away at them too.

She was a bit easier to design, I mostly took reference from priest robes, but also depictions of Mary and Jesus. Hence, her final appearance has an outer priest type robe, with a light dress underneath similar to what Mary is often depicted wearing. 

Final Process