Tarot Cards
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A Card is a moderately common type of item which provides a special effect upon activation. Cards come with various properties:
- They are stored in the upper right item slot, used by pressing "Q" and are one-time-use only.
- You may only carry one card or pill at a time. Attempting to pick up a second card or pill will cause you to drop the one you've been previously holding.
- There are two types of cards in The Binding of Isaac: "Tarot Cards" and "Suit Cards".1
- "Suit Cards" are only found in Wrath of The Lamb. Similarly to Soul Hearts having a small chance to spawn instead of regular Hearts, they act like a special replacement for Tarot Cards, and have a 20% chance of spawning instead.
- Unlike Pills, a particular type of card will always have the same effect. However, all tarot cards share the same icon, and therefore cannot be identified until picked up.
- Suit cards use a separate icon.
- 1 Note that these are unofficial names. Technically, The Joker does not have any suit color.
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Acquisition
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- Spawned in rooms upon completion.
- Found in chests (both locked and unlocked, but not in red chests)
- Potential drop from enemies in their Champion Form.
- Reward from a Beggar.
- Reward from Slot Machines and Fortune Telling Machines.
- Might also drop when a machine is blown up.
- Only Fortune Telling Machines can provide Suit Cards.
- Offered in the Shop for 5 coins (3 coins on discount).
- Notice that you won't know which one of the 22 Tarot Cards you will get for your money.
- It will always be a Tarot Card, you won't find a Suit Card in the shop.
- The Deck of Cards, a spacebar item.
- Again, Suit Cards cannot be acquired from here.
- The Ace of Spades trinket increases the chance of finding cards.
- It also considerably increases the chance of getting Suit Cards instead of Tarot Cards.
ListEdit
Major ArcanaEdit
| Item Icon | Item Name | Effect |
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O The Fool | Teleports the player to the starting room of the current level, even if you use the card in the starting room.
TIP: This card has little use, but it can teleport you out of inescapable rooms like the Challenge Room and the Mom boss fight. It can also teleport you out of problematic rooms in a pinch. |
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I The Magician | Player's shots curve towards enemies and may turn purple until you leave the current room.
TIP: This effect is the same as Spoon Bender and Telepathy For Dummies; this card is useless in the case of the former and best used when the latter lacks charge. |
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II The High Priestess |
Summons Mom's foot stomp on a random enemy (targets the player if fighting Mom or if there are no enemies present), dealing massive damage — enough to kill most bosses and wiping half of Mom's own health if used on her. Acts as an explosion — will destroy rocks and can open secret rooms. |
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III The Empress |
Turns the player into a demon, increasing damage by 2 and speed by 1 until you leave the current room. |
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IV The Emperor | Teleports the player to the Boss Room. If used while fighting the boss, the fight will restart and the boss will be back at full health. (Will be the same boss, but could possibly change to a different colored version)
TIP: Always try to save this card for the final floor of your run; also keep in mind that you can use the inertia from running to take another card or pill into the boss room with you, if you're fast enough. |
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V The Hierophant | Spawns 2 soul hearts.
TIP: It spawns these rather than adding them to your life, as Balls of Steel does; use this to your advantage, if you can. |
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VI The Lovers | Spawns 2 full hearts.
TIP: It spawns these rather than adding them to your life; use this to your advantage, if you can. |
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VII The Chariot |
Grants you temporary invincibility, and causes you to damage enemies with touch. However, you cannot attack unless you're holding Mom's Knife. |
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VIII Justice | Spawns 1 random type of Bomb drop, Key drop, Coin drop, and Heart drop.
TIP: This can spawn anything dropped by clearing a room, like Troll Bombs, 1+1 Free, Soul Hearts, and nickels; with Wrath of the Lamb, you can also get Super Troll Bombs, Eternal Hearts, Golden Keys and dimes from using this card. Also, as with The Lovers and The Hierophant, it spawns these rather than adding them to your life and inventory; use this to your advantage, if you can. This card will spawn a specific kind of heart if a room forces it (full red heart in the womb-themed top secret room, eternal heart in the cathedral-themed top secret room). |
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IX The Hermit | Teleports the player to the Shop. If there is no Shop (or you are already in one), this will act as a random teleport.
TIP: This card can teleport you into a locked Shop, and you will open it without consuming a key if it does. |
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X Wheel of Fortune | Spawns a Slot Machine. In Wrath of the Lamb, this may also spawn a Fortune Telling Machine.
TIP: If you can, find a room with another Slot Machine, Fortune Telling Machine, or Blood Donation Machine to maximize gambling efficiency. |
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XI Strength | Makes the player bigger, increasing maximum health and damage until the player leaves the current room (same effect as Odd Mushroom (Large)). ??? receives a permanent spirit heart rather than a temporary maximum health increase, however this may be a bug.
TIP: This card is best saved for a room you're going to stay in for awhile, such as a challenge room or the boss room; it can also be used as a last-ditch healing effort. |
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XII The Hanged Man | Removes the player's body allowing flight over obstacles, spikes and pits until you leave the current room. If you have Brimstone, instead of removing the players body it will give them wings (All the same as single-use Transcendence).
TIP: This card is useless if you have any item that already allows flight, such as Transcendence (as Item), Lord Of The Pit, Fate, or the Holy Grail. |
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XIII Death | Damages all enemies in the room significantly.
TIP: This does the same thing as the The Necronomicon, and they can be devastating to enemies in the room if you use them in quick succession. This technique is best saved for Bosses, though; especially those that like to spawn lesser enemies. |
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XIV Temperance |
Spawns a Blood Donation Machine. |
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XV The Devil | Increases your damage until you leave the current room.
TIP: This does the same thing as the The Book Of Belial, and the effect does stack if you use both in the same room. |
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XVI The Tower | Spawns six troll bombs around the room.
TIP: This does the same thing as the Anarchist Cookbook, and they can be devastating to both yourself and enemies in the room if you use them in quick succession. |
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XVII The Stars | Teleports the player to the Treasure Room. If there is no Treasure Room, this will act as a random teleport. Randomly chooses a Treasure Room in XL floors.
TIP: This card can teleport you into a locked Treasure Room, and you will open it without consuming a key if it does. |
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XVIII The Moon | Teleports the player to the Secret Room. This card will open one random wall once inside the Secret Room, so you can leave even if you don't have any bombs available.
TIP: This card can teleport you out of inescapable rooms like the Challenge Room and Mom's room. It can also get you out of problematic rooms in a pinch. |
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XIX The Sun | Completely heals player, damages all enemies, and reveals the entire map and location of special rooms for the current level. (Same effect as XXI The World and a Full Health pill combined, though unlike a Full Health Pill, it will not heal ???.)
TIP: Try to use this card in an uncleared room or on the Boss, if you need to use it at all. |
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XX Judgement | Spawns a beggar. In Wrath of the Lamb, this may also spawn a Devil Beggar.
TIP: Try to wait until you get into a Devil Room or an Angel Room to use this card; if you do and give the Beggar enough money, he will leave behind an item specific to that room instead of a more random item. If you cannot get either before leaving this card behind, use it in the Curse Room or the Secret Room. |
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XXI The World |
Reveals the entire map and location of all special rooms for the current level. |
Minor ArcanaEdit
| Item Icon | Item Name | Effect |
| The Joker |
Transports you to the Devil Room. Exiting places you in the starting room of the floor. The Devil Room acts as usual: it may randomly contain Krampus, get replaced by an Angel Room and will contain a trapdoor to Sheol in Level 2 of Chapter 4. Therefore if you access it on a floor before fighting the boss, take the items inside and get regular access to it later in the boss room, the Devil Room won't contain new items. Also allows getting to the Devil Room in situations in which it would be otherwise inaccessable. |
|---|---|---|
| 2 of Hearts |
Doubles your Hearts (up to full health). If you have half a heart left, recovers your first two Heart Containers. (Spirit Hearts are unaffected.) Example: Given you have 7 Heart Containers, 2 Spirit Hearts and 2.5 Hearts left. Using the card will heal you for 2.5 hearts, so you will have 5 of 7 heart containers filled, and 2 Spirit Hearts. Useless for ???. |
| 2 of Spades |
Doubles the number of Keys you currently have. If you don't have any Keys, provides you with two. |
| 2 of Clubs | Doubles the number of Bombs you currently have. If you don't have any Bombs, provides you with two. |
| 2 of Diamonds | Doubles the number of Coins you currently have. If you don't have any Pennies, provides you with two. |
BugsEdit
- The Temperance card will sometimes appear with the wrong Roman numeral, namely XVI the number of Tower. It still has the same graphic and name otherwise.
TriviaEdit
- If you get killed by The High Priestess card via Mom's leg, it will show a Bomb as the cause of death on Isaac's Last Will.
- A Tarot Deck is a traditional deck of playing cards with 78 cards from the mid-15th century. Unlike a standard 52-card deck, the Aces are usually replaced by pip cards with the number 1. In addition, it also contains four suit cards with a Knight that ranks between the Jack and the Queen, as well as 21 trump cards with numerals from 1 to 21, as well as the Fool, which is unnumbered.
- Divinatory tarot originates from this. Here the 21 trump cards and The Fool are called the Major Arcana, while the remaining cards with the regular suits are called Minor Arcana. Cards from the Major Arcana are the most significant cards for divination.
- The "Tarot" cards in The Binding of Isaac are all of the Major Arcana cards from Divinatory tarot.
- Divinatory tarot originates from this. Here the 21 trump cards and The Fool are called the Major Arcana, while the remaining cards with the regular suits are called Minor Arcana. Cards from the Major Arcana are the most significant cards for divination.
- The tarot cards featured in The Binding of Isaac are likely based on the Tarot of Marseille and the Rider-Waite tarot, two of the most well-known divinatory tarot decks: The drawings on the tarot cards in The Binding of Isaac seem to be based on the art from Tarot de Marseille. However, this deck does not give a numberal to The Fool, and traditionally uses different names for some cards, also omitting for the thirteenth card entirely (XIII Death in-game). Tarot card names in the game are identical to the Rider tarot, and in this deck, The Fool is indexed with a latin 0.
- The card The Star is called "XVII The Stars" in-game.
- Like most traditional or divinatory decks, these tarot decks do not use the more well-known modern French suits (Spades, Hearts, Diamonds, and Clubs) in the Minor Arcana. Instead, it uses Italian tarot suits: Swords, Cups, Pentacles, and Wands.
- Therefore, the cards added in Wrath of the Lamb (the four pip cards with the number 2 and the joker) are not part of the Rider-Waite deck. Instead, they seem to be part of a standard-52 card deck ("French Deck") with Jokers, used for playing games like Canasta, Rummy, or Poker. The same goes for the trinket Ace of Spades. (The Ace of Spades is one of the highest-ranking cards in many games that use the French Deck.)
- This might be the reason why they cannot be acquired by activating the Deck of Cards item, which represents a divinatory tarot deck.
- The fact those cards from Wrath of The Lamb are not Tarot Cards becomes the most obvious when one compares 0 The Fool with The Joker, since they are the analogy of each other in the respective deck. Furthermore, The Fool is presumably the precursor of all Jokers, which can be considered the most famous type of wild card these days.
- Therefore, the cards added in Wrath of the Lamb (the four pip cards with the number 2 and the joker) are not part of the Rider-Waite deck. Instead, they seem to be part of a standard-52 card deck ("French Deck") with Jokers, used for playing games like Canasta, Rummy, or Poker. The same goes for the trinket Ace of Spades. (The Ace of Spades is one of the highest-ranking cards in many games that use the French Deck.)
Start a Discussion Discussions about Tarot Cards
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Found a "Temperance" Tarot Card that had a XVI on it instead of a XIV that the Wiki lists "The Tower" for.
9 messages-
Well all i know is when u press prtsc , it copys your screen, then you go to paint then right click and paste. Thats what i did when i got sac... -
By the way that wikia contributor was me. Just to let you know :3
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VIII Justice
4 messages-
That's quite odd. Might be because of the fact you were in the Library? Try using Cheat Engine and using VIII Justice in a Library again, and... -
Found out that it ain't just the libary, i found a second VIII Justice card, and used it, not considering seeing a beggar appearing again, ...
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