let-fate-decide

# Let Fate Decide

When the path forward is unclear, let the cards speak.

## Quick Start

1. Run the drawing script:
   ```bash
   uv run --no-config {baseDir}/scripts/draw_cards.py
   ```

2. The script outputs JSON for the default 12 Houses of the Zodiac spread:
   12 houses, each with 1 Major Arcana card and 2 Minor Arcana cards. Each
   house and card includes a `file` path relative to `{baseDir}/`

3. Read each house file and each card's meaning file to understand the draw.
   For faster reads, use `--content` to include house and card text directly
   in the JSON:
   ```bash
   uv run --no-config {baseDir}/scripts/draw_cards.py --content
   ```

4. Interpret the spread using the guide at [{baseDir}/references/INTERPRETATION_GUIDE.md]({baseDir}/references/INTERPRETATION_GUIDE.md)

5. When the task belongs to a specialized technical workflow, use
   [{baseDir}/references/TECHNICAL_CONTEXT_LENSES.md]({baseDir}/references/TECHNICAL_CONTEXT_LENSES.md)
   to translate the reading into an audit, verification, domain, failure-class,
   or stakeholder lens

6. Apply the interpretation to the task at hand

## When to Use

- **Vague prompts**: The user's request is ambiguous and multiple reasonable approaches exist
- **Explicit invocations**: "I'm feeling lucky", "let fate decide", "dealer's choice", "surprise me", "whatever you think", "YOLO"
- **Casual delegation**: "whatever", "up to you", "your call", "idk", "just do something", "wing it", "I trust you", "doesn't matter", "do what you want", "I don't care", "any approach works", "you pick"
- **Yu-Gi-Oh energy**: "Heart of the cards", "I believe in the heart of the cards", "you've activated my trap card", "it's time to duel"
- **Shrug-like brevity**: Very short prompts that fully delegate the decision without expressing a preference
- **Redraw requests**: "Try again" or "draw again" when no actual system changes occurred (this means draw new cards, not re-run the same approach)
- **Tie-breaking**: When you are about to arbitrarily pick between 2+ valid approaches, draw cards instead of silently choosing one

## When NOT to Use

- The user has given clear, specific instructions
- The task has a single obvious correct approach
- As the deciding authority for safety-critical work (security, data integrity,
  production deployments, release approval, incident response)
- The user explicitly asks you NOT to use Tarot
- The user's tone is precision-seeking rather than casual -- use `ask-questions-if-underspecified` instead to gather actual requirements

## Security and Correctness Use

This skill may be used inside a security, audit, or correctness pipeline as a
creative lens for discovery: choosing which angle to inspect next, breaking
analysis paralysis, generating hypotheses, or surfacing blind spots.

It is never sufficient by itself. In security and correctness contexts, the
reading must be followed by ordinary engineering evidence: source review,
tests, proofs, traces, reproduction steps, exploitability analysis, or other
domain-appropriate verification. Do not treat a favorable card as permission to
ship, suppress a finding, skip validation, or overrule a concrete risk.

## How It Works

### The Draw

The script uses `secrets` for cryptographic randomness:

1. Builds separate Major Arcana (22 cards) and Minor Arcana (56 cards) decks
2. Performs Fisher-Yates shuffles via `secrets.randbelow()` (no modulo bias)
3. Deals the default 12 Houses of the Zodiac spread
4. Each house receives 1 Major Arcana card followed by 2 Minor Arcana cards
5. Each of the 36 cards independently has a 50% chance of being reversed

The default spread records a conservative unordered-card entropy budget
exceeding 100 bits: roughly `log2(C(22,12))` bits from Major Arcana selection,
`log2(C(56,24))` bits from Minor Arcana selection (assuming
`secrets.randbelow()` is cryptographically secure), plus 36 reversal bits. The
exact values are computed and reported in the JSON output under `entropy_bits`.
The actual ordered assignment of cards to houses contains more entropy.

### The Spread

The default spread is **12 Houses of the Zodiac**:

| House | Represents | Question It Answers |
|-------|------------|---------------------|
| 1 | **Self** | How should this work begin? |
| 2 | **Resources** | What values, assets, or constraints matter? |
| 3 | **Communication** | What needs to be clarified or connected? |
| 4 | **Foundations** | What context or dependency anchors the task? |
| 5 | **Creativity** | Where should experimentation or delight shape the work? |
| 6 | **Practice** | What quality, maintenance, or execution concern matters? |
| 7 | **Partnership** | Who or what must this integrate with? |
| 8 | **Transformation** | What risk, shared state, or deep change is present? |
| 9 | **Exploration** | What principle or broader strategy guides the path? |
| 10 | **Calling** | What delivery or long-term outcome is being served? |
| 11 | **Community** | What system, network, or shared aspiration is involved? |
| 12 | **The Hidden** | What blind spot, ending, or unconscious factor matters? |

Within each house, the Major Arcana card sets the archetypal theme and the two
Minor Arcana cards provide practical detail.

For compatibility with older workflows, `draw_cards.py --legacy` returns the
previous 4-card hand, and `draw_cards.py --legacy <count>` returns a custom
hand of 1-78 cards. A positional count without `--legacy` is rejected, because
the new default spread has a fixed shape.

### Reference Files

Each house's meaning is in its own markdown file under `{baseDir}/houses/`.
House files describe how the house applies across technical contexts including
building new projects, vulnerability discovery, correctness verification, and
common audit, verification, domain, failure-class, and stakeholder workflows.

Each card's meaning is in its own markdown file under `{baseDir}/cards/`:

- `cards/major/` - 22 Major Arcana (archetypal forces)
- `cards/wands/` - 14 Wands (creat