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Ender's Review: The Ultimate/Essential Gaffed Bicycle Deck (Magic Makers)

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EndersGame

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The Ultimate Gaff Deck aka Essential Gaffed Bicycle Deck (Magic Makers)

A good deck of assorted card gaffs

Overview

The publisher Magic Makers has referred to this deck either as "The Essential Gaffed Bicycle Deck" or as "The Ultimate Gaff Bicycle Deck", but the different terminology refers to the same deck.  The features an assortment of gimmicked cards for doing a range of different magic effects. It was originally available from the publisher separately as a stand-alone product, or bundled together with a teaching DVD, which is the main way it's available today.

Packages

Magic Makers have released this gaff deck together with a DVD in one of two packages:

1. Ultimate Gaff Deck Kit: This includes a DVD featuring magician Kris Nevling teaching 13 tricks with the cards from the deck.

2. Ultimate Gaff Bicycle Deck with Bonus DVD "Marty Gram's 3 Classic Card Tricks": This includes a DVD featuring magician Marty Gram teaching just 3 tricks with the cards from the deck, namely his versions of Million Dollar Monte, Wild Card, and MacDonald's Aces.

The deck itself has a very good collection of gimmicked cards, allowing you to do a wide range of the most popular packet effects like Wild Card, MacDonald's Aces, Color Monte, Ultimate 3 Card Monte, Stand Up Monte, Twisted Sisters, B'Wave, and even Jim Pace's The Web. In addition to the gaffs required for the above-mentioned effects, there's also some double backers and double facers. So as far as the cards themselves go, with gaffs included here you'll be set with most cards you'll need for performing many different tricks. If you already know how to perform these and similar effects and are just looking for a new set of cards, this is the deck you want.



Impressions

So should you opt for this deck in one of the packages that includes the Kris Nevling teaching DVD or the Marty Gram teaching DVD?

1. The Kris Nevling DVD (Ultimate Gaff Deck Kit) has the advantage that it covers 13 tricks you can do with these gaffed cards, including all the above mentioned ones. However it has the disadvantage that it feels like a poor home-made attempt to teach magic, not very different to a kid doing a youtube card trick tutorial. While Kris is a very good magician, in this particular DVD he comes across as very unrehearsed, especially in his patter and teaching, and the result is uninspiring and mediocre as best.

2. The Marty Gram DVD has the disadvantage that it only covers three tricks (Million Dollar Monte, Wild Card, and MacDonald's Aces). That's a fine option if you already know how to perform the other tricks like Wild Card, Twisted Sisters, and The Web, but if you're needing teaching materials for those, then this product won't give you that. Then you might want to opt for the Ultimate Gaff Deck Kit instead, or an alternative.

If you're considering one of these packages due to the inclusion of a teaching DVD, I'd instead recommend picking up "Packet Killer", which comes with a similar deck of assorted gaffs, but has a fantastic instructional DVD featuring Simon Lovell. It is a much better video, and uses the proper names and routines for the classic effects, and the best product of this time.

Recommendation

In short, if you're just looking for an assorted gaff deck, this is a good one, but only if you already have access to teaching materials for the many tricks you can use these cards for. If you want something that comes with an accompanying DVD and need the teaching materials as well, Simon Lovell's "Packet Killer" from the same publisher is superior to both the Kris Nevling and Marty Gram DVDs; but both of these are worth picking up if you come across them for a good price, if only for the excellent collection of gaff cards in this deck.



Want to learn more?  Visit the publisher's page here:
- Ultimate Gaff Deck Kit: http://www.magicmakersinc.com/p-667-the-ultimate-gaff-deck-kit.aspx
- Packet Killer: http://www.magicmakersinc.com/p-190-packet-killer-45-tricks-with-special-bicycle-deck.aspx
« Last Edit: August 11, 2017, 10:30:30 PM by EndersGame »
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