For collecting and fourishing I was extremely happy to pick this deck up for $3.75. When you talk about value and quality, this is a deck you want to have while it's available. Why pay $5 - 7 dollars for custom bee stock playing cards when you can the same quality with a traditional cut for less then $1 more then standard bicycle playing cards. This is a gem in the playing card collecting community.

They are cards. They are what they are. If you feel this style of cut is advantageous for you and your style/moves, then you should go for it. They don't do much for me. I prefer Tally Ho instead.

This is the deck you want. It fans amazingly, it feels great, and does everything just better than the common bicycle deck. Add to cart now.

The Richard Turner Gold Standard deck has many advantages.

1) more snap and sound because it has the bee deck structure.
2) long lasting quality
3) feels very natural and tough
4) comes with two identical jokers and a blank faced card. Because this fan so well, why don't you put it on the face of the deck, reverse fan and show all the cards blank? A fun little teaser:)

on the outside it cant be distinguished from a regular bicycle deck, which makes you able to use your gimmicks if you want to. Also, it's a nice, affordable gift and gets a classy appearance with the gold seal on the card case.

By the way, did I mention the written message you get from Dai Vernon?

The term: “Traditionally cut” references the process used to cut the cards. In fact, two methods can be used:
in the first one, the “classically cut”, used nowadays for USPCC's cards, the blade enters the back of the cards first and cut the card to the face.
in the second one, the “Traditionally cut”, the blade enters the face of the card and cut to the back.
The last one is so called “Traditionally” because this process was used until the last 15 years. But I have no information concerning the real reasons for this change.

By the way, what is the influence of this change of cutting process on card techniques ? In fact, as the blade enters the card, a soft round edge is formed due to localized plastic deformations resulting from the pressure of the blade before the cutting process occurs. On the opposite side of the card, as the blade leaves the card, a burr is formed due to plastic deformation of the paper on the opposite direction. Therefore, depending on the cutting process used, the burr is located on the face of the card (classically cut) or the backside of the card (traditionally cut). On the first hand, if the cards are used just for a friendly poker game, no difference can be seen. On the other hand, for a card mechanics, the burr have a great influence on the techniques used, and especially on Table Faros. When a table faro is performed, the deck is split in two blocks riffled together starting from the face of the deck up-to to the backside. When classically cut cards are used, cards are first contacting opposite side along the edge where the burr is located, preventing the cards to faro easily. Therefore, the burr must be soften and reduced in order to facilitate the faro. An alternative method is to place the deck face-up and perform the faro, but this is a quite strange method. This can be performed just for fun. For example, a one handed faro with classically cut cards is best performed while the cards are facing up. A in the air two hands faro is also more easily done when started at the back of the deck.

With Traditionally cut cards, those references are inverted. Table faro can be performed right out of the box, without the need of preparing the deck and reducing the burr of the cards because cards are first contacting along the round soft edge while cards are facing down the table. One handed faro can be done with cards facing down also, while two hands faro are done starting from the face of the deck (as we can see in old card techniques books). Behavior of the deck during riffle shuffle depends also on the cutting process used because while cards are riffled from the thumbs, the Gold Seal Bicycle cards are contacting the thumbs with the round soft edge. Contact between fingerprints and cards is soften, leading to a more fluid riffle. But this merely depends on the ability of the performer to use a light touch on the cards.

The second point concerning the Richard Turner's Gold Seal Bicycle cards concerns the high quality of the cut. Lateral sides of the cards are very soft. This also have an influence on faros and riffle shuffles.

Concerning the internal structure of the cards, the main point concerning the Richard Turner's Gold Seal Bicycle cards is that they feel like Bee cards. And in fact, they feel like Bee cards because they are Bees. The paper used comes from Bee stock. Concerning the thickness of the cards, they are slightly thicker than classical Rider Back cards, about 5 to 10µm.

The embossing pattern of the Gold Seal Bicycle cards is unique to those cards. The main objective of this embossing is to create the air cushion separation between the cards to reduce friction. But this embossing pattern is less deeper for Gold Seal cards to preserve the structural integrity of the cards because this embossing pattern drastically decreases the stiffness of the cards when too deeper. Concerning the card finish, I have no informations on this point.

Finally concerning the design of the cards. This one is exactly similar as the Rider Back cards. The box is sealed with a Gold Seal and a “Traditionally cut for the professional” Gold sticker is apposed on the card Box. Each box contains 52 cards + 2 non guaranty Jokers + one blank face card and one advertising card.