A question/discussion for you all...im familiar with both the the si stebbins stack and the stay stack, but my knowledge of both is not as in depth as some of you here. my question is this, which stack has more applications to it?...in other words, which would be more beneficial, a memorized si stebbins or a memorized stay stack(after a fourth out faro from US NDO)?

I don't understand your question, since neither the Stebbins' nor the stay stack are memorized.

Which is more useful?

That would depend on what your intended application would be.

I have a stay stack memorized...i can memorize a si stebbins stack. I'm wondering which stack has more built in effects.

What you really want to know is which has the more built in effects THAT YOU WOULD PERFORM. and there's only one person who can answer that.

Yea youre right...back to the drawing board...

Let me rephrase the whole thing...which has more built in effects? Si stebbins or a stay stack?

Dear Mnemonist.

Refering to your first question: “which would be more beneficial, a memorized si stebbins or a memorized stay stack” it might be of interest for you to know that there is a staystack in every deck. Here below you’ll find a description of the idea of a hidden staystack that I published some years ago in the Electronic Grymoire. I do not know if the idea will be useful to you but it is at least interesting to know the concept of a hidden staystack and it does give you something to ponder about in your considerations, which deck you should use.

The Hidden Staystack

In the book Mnemonica Juan Tamariz describes the effect “Prodigious Memory”, where after thoroughly shuffling the deck is cut into two halves. Spectator selects one. The performer studies this halve for a few seconds, goes to another room, and from there he calls out the cards and their respective positions.

Going to another room is motivated with the statement that one cannot possibly see the cards from there. This motivation is a good rationale to cover up the fact that a staystack is being used and that the performer is consulting the other half for the needed information.

Now, it will not be everybody’s cup of tea, to leave the room during a performance. Let alone, if you want to perform the effect in a streetmagic-performance.

Of course the same effect could be obtained, with a memorised deck and false shuffles. In that case, you don’t even have to consult the other half.
But if you want to do this effect f.i. within the context of the beautiful routine “The Rite of Initiation” by Luis Garcia Soutullo, as suggested by Mr. Tamariz (see Mnemonica pages 170-171), where you start by showing a deck in new deck order, do several effects while you’re doing faro-shuffles between the effects and do end again with the deck in new deck order. In this scenario, you cannot use a memorized deck, at least not so easily, because of the alteration of the order of the deck, caused by the faro-shuffles. With a hidden staystack however, it is possible.

So what’s a hidden staystack?

Well there are two kinds of hidden staystacks. Let’s start with a mathematical hidden staystack.

For explanation purposes, let’s stick to the example of a new deck order. The new deck order for the hidden mathematical staystack is slightly different from the Tamariz new deck order. With Tamariz the order is, from the top down, Ace through King of Spades, Ace through King of Hearts, King through Ace of Diamonds and King through Ace of Clubs.

For the mathematical staystack the order is, Ace through King of Spades, Ace through King of Hearts, (and here comes the difference) Ace through King of Diamonds and Ace through King of Clubs. So the last two suits are reversed. Or in other words every suit runs from Ace to King.

Now, where’s the staystack in this order?
If you do give an ace a value of 1, a king 13, a queen 12 and a jack 11, you will see that every staystack pair of cards, ( the top and the bottom card, the second from the top and the second from the bottom, etc.) gives a total of 14. You will also see that a staystack-pair always consists of a spade card together with a club card or a diamonds card together with a hearts card.

So now you can compute, quite easily, the identity of the other card of the staystack-pair. F.i. The mate of 8 of spades has to be the 6 (14-8) of clubs.

Just as with the normal (twin)staystack the cards of a staystack-pair keep being in the same relative position to the top and the bottom of the deck after each faroshuffle. F.i. if one card of a pair goes to the 5th. position from the top.after one or more faroshuffles. The other card of the pair will be at the 5th position from the bottom. This also works with off centre faro shuffles.

Going back to the effect “Prodigious Memory” you start by spreading the two halves separately on the table. Pretend to memorise both halves. Spectator selects one half and keeps this to him/herself.

You mime gazing in deep concentration (looking at the same time to the face up half in front of you though) and are able to recite the order of the half the spectator is holding. Since the staystack is hidden, it won’t be apparent, that you’re gaining the information from the cards on the table. Even if one would surmise that you are looking at the cards before you, it remains an amazing feat of mental dexterity. And why wouldn’t you look at the cards in front of you as a safety-measure to avoid making mistakes? Of course it adds to the effect and lessens suspicions of you looking at the cards, when you recite at high speed. Therefore it is wise to practice the computing of the cards. This won’t take long, as the calculations are easy and after some practice you won’t have to calculate but immediately know when you see a jack that the other card must be a three.

So if you are going to use a memorized deck you could make sure that there is a hidden mathematical staystack integrated in the stack you are going to use. Because of the nature of the hidden staystack, the stack will have to be of the rosary type or as Mr. Allan Ackerman calls it the tetradistic stack. With this type of stack there are four banks of 13 cards, where each bank does have the same numerical pattern and the suits follow a set order like chased or showcode. Si Stebbins is an example. If the top and bottom cards from a deck in Si Stebbins order are a queen and a 2 the same arithmetic as given above for new deck order applies to this stack. But this time hearts relates to clubs and spades to diamonds.

If you’ve got a three and a king as top and bottom cards, the total of a staystack-pair is 16. In that case an ace does have a value of 14, a king 13, a queen of 12 and a jack 11.

With other combinations of top and bottom cards of a deck in Si Stebbins order it is getting too complicated for practical use to construct a mathematical staystack.

Looking for other applications of the mathematical staystack, how about this memory demonstration. After having given the deck a couple of (faro)shuffles, you start to hand out (staystack)-pairs of cards to several spectators by taking each time the top and bottom cards of the deck and pretend to memorize each pair. When sufficient pairs of cards have been distributed for a convincing display of memory, you ask each of the participants in random order to show you one of the cards of his pair and you immediately tell him the other card of his pair.

I discovered the mathematical hidden stack when I was looking just for fun at a deck in Si Stebbins order to see whether the order of the deck did have the characteristics for the formula of the mathematician Johann Carl Friedrich Gauss for obtaining the sum of a lineair string of numbers, In other words was the sum of the numerical value of the first and the last card the same as the sum of of the 2nd card from the top and the 2nd card from the bottom and so on for every pair of cards, that do have the positions: x from the top and x from the bottom. I was pleasantly surprised, to discover that it did. I must add that I was lucky for at that moment that the deck did have a 3 and a king as top and bottom cards.

Mnemonic hidden staystack.

After having worked out the details of the mathematical hidden staystack, it dawned on me that there is a hidden stack in every pack of cards (provided it’s a deck with an even number of cards), no matter what order the cards are in, if you are going to use mnemonics for the relationship between two cards of a staystack pair. In Al Baker’s book ‘Ways and Means” there is a detailed explanation of how to do this with his description of the effect “A Miracle of Memory” This implies that you can add the hidden mnemonic staystack feature to the memorized deck you might possibly already work with.

For other applications of the hidden staystack we’ll have to wait and see if anyone comes up with other ideas.

Ferry Gerats

Thank you ferrrymagic for such an in depth description...ive found out a way to get from si stebbins to a stay stack, so its an all in one!..."prodigious memory" is such an awesome effect. great to hear more of your ideas!...im going to have reread your post...hahahah