Hi there,
As Opie's RRTCM study guide is well known on these forums, I'm hoping someone can help me.

I'm currently working through the guide and have reached weeks 3/4, Hindu/Classic, etc.
However, in order to complete the four-week exercise, I need knowledge of the b******p force and palming. None of these skills are mentioned in the guide, so I'm uncertain how to proceed.

I'm contemplating just working through the chapters in order now, but this would mean abandoning the study guide.

Those of you who have already worked through the guide, how did you tackle this section, in order to perform 'all change'?

Thank you in advance for your help.

I don't understand the problem. Both palming and the blackslip force are covered in RRTCM. If you want to learn them, they are both at your disposal. Decide for yourself how to proceed, there is no right or wrong way that I am aware off.

Hi Cipher,

Thank you for your reply.

More specifically, the problem is: It seems to me that extra reading is essential to complete this study guide. I was confused that these chapters are not mentioned in the study guide, if they contain material which is required in order to complete the plan. I thought that others on this forum may have reached the same point and had similar questions. Also, I know that the guide is highly regarded and has served others well, so perhaps I am missing something obvious.

I'd like to explain that I'm a beginner and would like to be thorough as I learn. Encountering unknown techniques makes me wonder - which other chapters should I have read? For example, will I need to learn something else before I can palm / backslip?

If I decide for myself how to proceed, then I will go back to the beginning of the book and work through it, in chapter order, to make sure I learn correctly. I was enjoying working through Opie's guide, and was keen to see it through, so I posted to see if anyone else had any advice.

No big thing - as I say, I know that Opie's guide has served others well, so perhaps it's just not for me.

I appreciate you taking the time to reply and wish you the best.

A suggestion for you is finishing the study guide, while skipping anything that you haven't covered (or even trying the work-out what the sleight was without having read about it). When you are finished, go back and re-read RRTCM in its entirety. It shouldn't take you long, since you will have most the key concepts mastered. It will be like filling in the gaps. Also since you already might have an idea of how a certain sleight should look or function, you might be suprised to find out how Hugard and Braue teach it.

The way I handled it was by performing the tricks with the forces I already know. You will find that overtime you will favor one over another one. The force isn't the key because you can normally use any one you want. So just use the one you know and try out the trick. You might find that the trick works better for your kind of force.

I think that question is: Do you HAVE Royal Road to Card Magic? I haven't used the guide, but I assume it uses the book for it's basis of organization and teaching?

Anyone?

Hi Cipher and Andy,

Thanks a lot for your replies. I'm going to do as you suggest and work through the guide, then go back and work through the book again.
I am in no rush and looking forward to learning some new skills!

Hi Brad,

Absolutely, I have the book, and it's definitely needed to work through the study guide.

Have a good evening, all.

DonalP - you may want to complement your study with other sources. When I am learning a new trick or slight I typically look to several different sources for reference. A slightly different explanation of depiction may make a difference. In addition to books, you may consider videos too. When ever possible, I will complement a text with video.

Good luck,

Hudson

Hi 55Hudson,

Thanks for the tip. I do indeed watch videos, too. I found a YouTube channel by a user called Decksandcontests which I really find excellent.

I'm also saving up for the R. Paul Wilson DVDs, as I seem to learn better from video. I've spent so many nights agonizing over the same paragraph! Maybe it's a rite of passage...

Ad there any other video sources which you enjoy!

DonalP,
I find that the Card College series is particularly well written and organized. There are 5 books in the series at ~$35 each, but you can go a long way with only volumes 1&2. There is a DVD series that complements - 4 disks - covers the same material as Vol 1&2, but the books are so well written that I don't fall back on the DVD too often.

Harry Lorayne has also written a number of well regarded books, but they tend to be expensive relative to other sources.

Another thought is the Card Colllege Light series. These are self working tricks that you might want to start with while you are building your card skills. But honestly, there is more bang for your buck with the CC series.

Hudson

Donal,

People tend to tell new magicians to get Royal Road and work through it without skipping. The unfortunate truth is not just that this is bad advice, but that few seem willing to question it. There's no sane reason why you should have to work through chapters on the Pass or the Palm just so you can finally get to learn how to do the Slop Shuffle triumph, just because it's in a later chapter. It's nonsensical.

@Hudson - thanks, I've made a note and will check out the card college titles, they're now at the top of my list. I'm very tempted to buy the DVDs first, since I have found Royal Road a tough read and suspect that video is a more effective way for me to learn.
Having read some other threads on this forum, I get the impression that the Harry Lorayne books might teach both presentation and skills, so I look forward to checking these out, too. Thanks for your advice.

@The Burnaby Kid - I agree. I need to find a balance of learning basic skills but with enough fun milestones (e.g. being able to present good effects) to keep me motivated. I can understand that there is a need to earn your spurs through practice, patience and hard work, but I look forward to choosing my own path based on the advice in this thread.
I noticed 'Ye Olde Magick Blogge' in your sig and have been checking out the annotated guide to RRTCM. There's a list of suggestions for close up magic which I plan to work through. If you had a hand in that, then thank you!

Donal,

I wrote the Annotations. I'm glad if they're of any help, but keep in mind that they represent my own views. In the conclusion, I list ways that I personally would recommend reading through the book, but that's just because my hope is that a student who wants to get the most out of the book does so efficiently, and is able to start performing good tricks from it immediately, and doesn't get bogged down in some of the nonsense in, for example, the Key Card chapter. I could elaborate on that, but I'll leave it as an exercise for people to hunt what I think about that issue if they want to.

The weakness in the logic of recommending a page-by-page study of the book is pretty easily demonstrated, though. If the book is to be read entirely in order, then you'd have to learn the Pass before you learned a Tipsy Trick. A Tipsy Trick doesn't need a pass -- you could learn how to do it after you learn how to control a single card. I suspect it got put off later in the book mostly as a reward for people who'd made it that far.

One could argue that at least an understanding of the previous techniques is required, but that's flawed as well, as one could rattle off a list of magicians whose magic in general, and the performance of this particular trick specifically, was not hampered by the fact that they don't use the pass.

There's something to be said for not skipping around a book to pick-and-choose what you learn. That said, the book needs to hold up its end of the bargain on that front, and I don't believe Royal Road does. It's still a good book, but people who make blind recommendations about how to study it aren't helping.