"Wait, Is This Deck Used?"
Rewind to December 2016 and I had just ordered some new additions to my ever-growing collection of playing cards. Specifically, a selection of David Blaine decks which marked the start of my journey into custom playing card design. Later additions would include Monarchs, Killer Bees, Madison Rounders… the list goes on. Having previously only experienced a variety of Bicycle decks, I recall eagerly awaiting the delivery and being equally excited as to what playing cards produced by one of my favourite magicians had to offer. The packaged arrived and inside were Black Gatorbacks, Black Lions and Black Lions: Blue Edition. I grabbed the Black Lions deck, admired its matte finish, black embossing and foil detailing and carefully opened the silver tax stamp to remove the cards.
To my surprise, the deck was shuffled!
Filled with a combination of panic and confusion, I spread through the deck, counted all the cards to make sure I wasn’t the victim of a scam and set about rearranging them in new deck order to reassure myself that they were actually brand-new and hadn’t been previously used. Thankfully everything was accounted for. So I took to Google:
“Is it normal for some decks of cards arrive shuffled?”
The answer: Yes, sometimes magicians use stacked or intentionally mixed trick decks. I climbed down that rabbit hole faster than I opened the package.
What Is a Stacked Deck?
As it turns out, my Black Lions weren’t shuffled in the conventional sense, although to laymen this may appear that way. They were in a very specific, predetermined order called Mnemonica. Arguably the most well-known and widely used stack in the world.
The benefits to stacked decks are plenty, including the ability to instantly know the position of any card without visible counting or peeking. It’s important to note at this point that there are actually two main types of card stacks: a memorized stack and a mathematical stack. The latter follows a set sequence that requires a degree of mental arithmetic to successfully identify any chosen card but is nevertheless one of the most popular due to how quick it is to learn. It’s not without its limitations however, as the discerning onlooker may notice a cyclic pattern and the pressure of performance can lead to a lapse of calculation speed and therefore smoothness during card acts.
By contrast, memorised stacks require you to learn the exact position of all 52 cards (which is as daunting as it sounds) Arguably the two most popular are Aronson Stack and Mnemonica Stack. My experience with Aronson is limited, but The Daily Magician posted an article which covers the stack in detail including a comparison between Aronson and Mnemonica, which some readers may find interesting. Whilst ‘stack-specific’ effects can be a decision-making factor, with Aronson favouring gambling routines, most effects are achievable regardless of your preferred stack, so my best advice is to pick one that feels most comfortable, and natural to you, and master it.
Why Mnemonica is the Gold Standard
What I didn't appreciate until I actually sat down with the book, Mnemonica by Juan Tamariz, is that the sequence isn’t just 52 cards in a random memorable order. Tamariz engineered the sequence itself to allow even a new deck to be arranged into stack through a sequence of run offs and faro shuffles, creating relationships that make certain effects self-working. The "work" of a routine is largely baked into the order itself, which is why this single stack can support such a wide variety of effects without ever threatening the illusion that the deck is genuinely mixed.
This engineering also has a knock-on effect: with so many magicians already practicing and using this exact order in performance, there are decades of published routines, workshops and teaching material that all assume you're speaking the same language. Learning Mnemonica isn't just learning one book's worth of tricks, it's buying into a shared library of existing material, which made it far easier to find resources when I inevitably got stuck in my learning process than it would have been with a more obscure or self-made stack.
How I Learned Mnemonica
There is suggestion that the stack can be learnt in as little as three to four hours, but I must say that in my experience this was more like thirty to forty hours. The book presents a total of five memorisation methods aimed at helping to speed up the process, which are fantastic but should, as the literature suggests, be used in conjunction with one another to maximise efficiency.
I like to think of myself as a largely visual learner, so immediately gravitated to ‘The Visual Method’ of memorisation outlined. Whilst the process helped me feel invested in learning the stack, I found recollection of a given card and its position almost impossible. It was only when combining this with ‘The Auditory Method’ which involves recording yourself elaborately singing the name and position of each card, did the stack finally start to stick. Likely helped by my listening to the recording every morning and evening for a week as I drove to and from the office.
One additional method that I found to be truly game-changing was the Learn Mnemomica mobile app by Samuel Gherman. To my knowledge this specific app has since been discontinued, though Stack Guru and Stack Memory appear to offer similar functionality. The app essentially gamified the process and drastically changed my relationship with the stack. You’re initially presented with multiple choice answers and, quite crucially, aren’t exposed to the full stack until much further on, allowing you to work through batches of cards at a time and ensure you master each section through 3-star completions for speed and accuracy, before progressing further. From asking you what card is at a specific position, to those that appear before and after it, the app-based method provides digestible memorisation sessions that can be easily implemented at the start and end of everyday to confirm your knowledge.
So What You Can Actually Do With It?
Once memorised, the stack not only unlocks a plethora of stack-dependant routines but also gives you the ability to elevate effects that would otherwise not require stack memorisation such as Triumph and Any Card at Any Number, making them appear even more impossible. Some other notable mentions that can be found in Mnemonica by Juan Tamariz are:
Gambling demonstrations where a spectator can name any poker hand, you proceed to deal to three or four players, and the specified hand is there. What’s particularly impressive is the deal can be executed whilst leaving the stack unaltered and without the need to execute false deals, passes or switches.
All of a Kind – someone in the audience selects a card with absolute freedom, does not show its face and you proceed to find the three remaining matching cards in the deck after a seemingly failed first attempt that is redeemed through a single magical gesture.
Everything in Order is a beautiful finale to any card art which does as it says, returning every card back to new deck order. A seemingly impossible feat after a number of effects have already been performed in Mnemonica or stay-stack order.
Hands-off effects such as Mnemonicosis are also fantastic, where a spectator locates a card that they have named, all by themselves (with mild encouragement and guidance, unless luck is on your side)
Is Learning a Stack Worth It?
The pay-off is absolutely worth it, but it isn't for the faint-hearted. Whilst the majority of Mnemonica's effects require a handful of supplementary sleights - it pays to know a pass, a false shuffle (this is a necessity), a false cut and the ability to faro shuffle - at the very least, you'll be able to blow minds with the divination of any card with nothing but a glimpse at a key card.
Sleights and routines aside, the process of learning Mnemonica (or any stack) is a must for any card enthusiast, not least for the jaw-dropping routines it unlocks, but also for the nuances along the way. From performance technique, language, tone and misdirection, that all help continue honing your craft.
Looking back, that mild panic over a "shuffled" Black Lions deck back in 2016 ended up sending me down one of the most rewarding rabbit holes of my time in cards. So, if you ever open a deck and find it in an order that looks suspiciously deliberate, don't reseal it and ask for a refund, you might just be holding the start of your own thirty-hour obsession.
If you'd like to skip straight to the deck itself, here are a few of our decks that ship in Mnemonica stack order, straight out of the box.
