I'm not sure how the totems really work, but I have an ugly face piece of clay about the size of a silver dollar, and maybe in dreams it would be smushable enough to change the expression to happy?

I read a fic where Mal had a Happy Meals wind-up dino that was broken IRL.

I'm not sure how Eames' totem worked. I get the principle, just not the application of his.

I can't remember any totems but Dom's and Ariadne's now.

I don't remember Eame's totem. Arthur's was a loaded die, so maybe his could roll any number in dreams, but, say, only came up six IRL? Motion seems to be a factor.

Ariadne's, with the hollowed chess piece, perhaps tipped over more easily IRL?

Arthur had a loaded die and Eames had a poker chip.

I can't figure out how the poker chip would work. Is it like a coin with two faces? Maybe it's brittle in dreams and can be snapped in two easily? Maybe it's like the top and can be spun indefinitely? Maybe Ariadne's chess piece can be balanced on it's head?

I didn't get the sense that there had to be a motion, just that it had to be in some way unexpected in a way that anyone other than you calling it up would not know about (The top is just damn silly. No one would expect a top to spin forever), which is why you don't let other people touch your totem, so that no one else knows its "tell"

I meant to post this after the second time I saw Inception, but the purpose of the totem is not to tell when you are awake. It is to tell when you are in your own dream, and not someone else's.

It is to tell when you are in your own dream, and not someone else's.

Why would Dom need to distinguish between his dream and someone else's at the end of the movie? Doesn't he need to know if he's awake or not?

I've been seeing the totem's as dual purpose. Or maybe that the original purpose is to be able to tell if you are lost in a a dream, but also the fucked-up worst-case scenario what-if of are you really awake?