Oracle

Thinking...about the purpose of the 12 animal symbols, what they represent, and popular methods for divination. Ideally I'd like this to be a sort of background thing that exists in not just this one, but a number of related worlds, that I can refer to occasionally as an easter egg.

3 Dice

3 dice (D12s), 2 coins. Dice determine the augurs, coins are modifiers to determine how the result should be interpreted.

The symbols are called "augurs" (rather than omens) as they aren't a phenomenon to be read. They're more like guides, themselves offering advice to the reader; in casting the dice you call for help, and certain augurs will answer your call. Each one has a specific set of perspectives and associated themes/meanings.

The dice...typically 3, though larger or smaller spreads are fine, should be read as a whole, although some variants assign single dice in the roll for certain aspects depending on the question (e.g. first die for the past, second die for the present, third die for the future). I like to imagine there are multiple ways of creating spreads, some more mainstream than others, but all somewhat adaptable.

The coins function similarly to jiaobeiwhere the meaning is dependent on whether the coins land heads/heads, tails/tails, or heads/tails. Not entirely sure where to take this yet, though. Current thought is that heads/tails represents "you can take this result at face value", while the other two represent a more optimistic or pessimistic view, or suggest rerolls for more information...

Augurs and Omens

I do like that the tarot has the minor arcana, though, and I'd really like to be able to incorporate something like that - the augurs being the most recognisable symbols, with smaller ones that dilute the odd laser focus that this world seems to have on these 12 symbols. Maybe some other aspect...maybe omens that are simpler symbols, with augurs being the perspective from which the symbols should be interpreted.

In which case...a spread would be an undefined amount of symbols, again to be determined via dice roll, plus a roll to determine the augur. The coins can still be used. 3 D20s, 1 D12 and 2 coins? That will probably be a minimal spread. A normal spread would require rolling 3 times separately - I imagine a proper fortune teller setup might have 3 dice trays and enough dice to roll all 3 of them, but it's possible to just roll them in sequence.

So...I'll need to write up 20 omens and 12 augurs. I think it may be a bit on the low side given popular? decks and etc. have 30-50+ cards, runes have 24...but it's combinatorial, so there are a lot of possible results.