You didn’t get out an actual deck of cards to try it out, did you? Think about it… if the red cards are in 2, 4, 6, etc. (all even positions) or in 1, 3, 5, etc. (all odd positions) in a 2-card system, you’d either stay in the same location the whole time or change locations with every single card pair.
If you apply this logic to a 1-card approach, what would be the difference? I tried to hint at it above…
…and the chances of it showing up in a 1-card system are 100%. You got 26 red cards, so you will change locations 26 times, all the time. This is probably the worst system ever, because it focuses on the wrong aspects of the shadow system.
The point is not to half the number of images to deal with less of a system to initially memorize. The point was to bring 16 down to 8, so that you could use the 0 - 9 major system whilst still using card pairs. So, what you really want to do is use twice as many instead of half the images.
The ONE-card version with 104 images (PHASE II)
Let’s actually look at the cards in pairs BUT then encode them individually. The benefits here are twofold:
- We’ll be able to use card pairs (the major one)
- Twice as many images (less redundancy)
Example (same as above)
2 of clubs, 9 of hearts, ace of diamonds, 9 of spades, ace of clubs, 2 of diamonds, …
L1: LN, LP, MT, MP
L2: PT, PN, …
…so here we look at the first pair and get “L” for the combination clubs/hearts and use that as our first consonant for both 2 and 9 to get “LN” and “LP”. The red card is in second place, so unlike in the same example in the original post, we don’t change location. Next we look at diamonds/spades and get “MT” and “MP”; however, this time we do move to the next location after placing BOTH cards because the card pair started red.
If you compare this to the example in the original post, you’ll find that you don’t have SOUP…SOUP anymore. The 9 of hearts is now “LP” and the 9 of spades is now “MP”, so there’s far less redundancy and also, the 9 of hearts didn’t automatically make you change locations because of its red-ness since it was in second position.
Of course, “soup” still exists… but only if the 9 of spades is followed or preceded by another spades or if the 9 of hearts is followed or preceded by another hearts. But there are 7 other things now that if could be instead of soup when compared to the 26 image system in the original post.
Conclusion
The first post was meant as a gentle introduction. It was also supposed to show you, that you can quickly run down the wrong pass. This is not meant in a condescending way, but sometimes you gotta get things wrong first. This system here (104 images) you could actually use and it gives you good practice into reading the card pairs in the actual Shadow System and also allows you to get your feet wet with variable items per loci.
So, if you’re unsure about putting in the effort of creating 1,326 images for a full 2-card system. Then give the above a shot. Shuffle up a deck of cards a handful of times with the approach describes in the first post (26 images) and then a few more times with this one (104) images. This is hard to see in theory, so please do yourself the favor and just take out some cards and try it for real.
And again, if nothing else… I hope this helps you to understand Lance’s post about the Shadow System somewhat better.