Digital Mapping-inspired Deck [CARTOGRAPHICA]

[ivanrogov]

I recently started designing decks. First one stalled due to licensing. So here is my first design without those restrictions. Inspiration comes from my job and some other graphic design projects I've done. Pips and general layout are done, but haven't complete any one suit yet. Probably some minor issues, but I can touch those up. Courts are still pending and will feature work from my other major project. Back design is also still in works.

[Justin O.]

Why break the pips up into a two sided design split across the middle of the card when the background is one sided and takes up the whole card?

[ivanrogov]

One reason for the one-sided background was to maintain the same proportion/area as the pip. I did a quick mockup of a more normal pip arrangement, plus one with a two-sided background. I also worked up a possible AoS card.

[Don Boyer]

One reason for the one-sided background was to maintain the same proportion/area as the pip. I did a quick mockup of a more normal pip arrangement, plus one with a two-sided background. I also worked up a possible AoS card.

I'd go easy on the custom pip work - they don't need to have maps on each and every one of them.  It's overkill when added to the background design.  Do something different, perhaps less obvious - make them look like markers on a digital map, perhaps, while still retaining the standard pip shape?

Any thoughts on the back design?  How about the tuck box?

One set of suit pips is plenty for a spot card - more than that and it looks cluttered and confusing.  Tweak the pip configuration if you feel the need to, but use the proper number of pips for better functionality.  I'd also suggest a more narrow font for the indices - a wide index forces a card player to spread his cards further apart in his hand to see all the indices, increasing the chances he'll flash a card to an opponent.

[ivanrogov]

Don,

Thank you for the comments. I've named the deck "Cartographica" [altered the thread name as well]. I reworked the pips, indices and corrected the binary. I drafted a back [shown on the tuck case]. Tuck case is still draft. I used USPCC's template, but haven't decided on printers yet.

[Don Boyer]

Don,

Thank you for the comments. I've named the deck "Cartographica" [altered the thread name as well]. I reworked the pips, indices and corrected the binary. I drafted a back [shown on the tuck case]. Tuck case is still draft. I used USPCC's template, but haven't decided on printers yet.

Get quotes from Expert and Legends - both companies maintain a company topic here, but you can message them through their PCF Agent accounts using the PM system here.  They do excellent quality work, in my opinion better than USPC, and usually for a fair amount less than USPC would charge.  You'll have fewer problems with things like registration and rough-cut edges.

Fiddle a little with the index size.  You want to strike the right balance between large and small - too small and it's hard to read, too large and it's a jumbo-index deck.  For a standard deck of cards, the value is usually twice the height of the suit pip, and both are the same width, narrow.  If you can't get a consistent width with the values, take the widest one you have (probably the 10), center the suit pip below it and use that as the pip location for all the rest of the cards.  This will give them a uniformity and consistency  needed for a good, easy-to-read index.  I'd suggest using a plain pip in the index, too.  Ease of readability is the most critical function of the index.  The rest of the deck can look crazier than a bat out of hell, as long as the indices are clear and quickly understood.

[John B.]

I am not a huge fan of the back, but I am like how the face cards turned out.

[ivanrogov]

Recent changes to the deck. Mostly refining the 10 card at the moment.

[Magasaki]

I think the mapping idea is great but you could perhaps run a bit further with the concept and look at other cartesian types of map rather than accepted land masses. People map all sorts of different things with different techniques which would be great for this project. Maybe different suits could all be used for a different type of map but with each number showing matching areas so that the cards all show something new?

[sprouts1115]

@ivanrogov - I'm trying to figure out what the "1010" is in the top right corner and visa versa.

[Don Boyer]

@ivanrogov - I'm trying to figure out what the "1010" is in the top right corner and visa versa.

The original deck concept included binary numbers in the corners that aren't indices to represent the value and suit.  "1010" in binary is 10 in decimal.

Recent changes to the deck. Mostly refining the 10 card at the moment.

I think you've swung the pendulum too far in the other direction!  The pips are fine, but the background looks a tad plain.  Perhaps a little more of something is in order, such as Magasaki suggested about using more map types.  Put some grid lines on your maps.  Get closer - we're seeing a multi-continental scale here, but why not smaller?  Show nations, pick current maps, pick historical maps, etc. - but use the updated "digital map" style of presenting them.  In fact, your maps need not even conform to a real-world location.

Ever look at a Google Map when you're searching for something a little generic, like "restaurants" or "drug stores"?  All these little markers drop from the sky and land on your map, and touching each one causes a window to pop open with the details of that particular restaurant or drug store.  Picture this - you can use traditional or non-traditional pip arrangements, but what if the pips were a bit smaller, and used as part of the map's features?  Instead of a bunch of restaurant names, you could provide "coded data", such as four alphanumeric characters, to label each point, things like "F46T", "E3W2", "0L6G", "DSN8" and so on, with each pip being a marker with one of those labels.  Use the same font as the indices, maybe provide a label for the map similarly encoded, and you'll have something that looks a lot like a military, scientific or government digital map.  I think it would provide a cool effect.

I like the size of the index - but I also tend to like smaller indices.  Try somewhere between 25-50% larger and see what looks better.  It a matter of finding that sweet spot for the size, small enough to not be unwieldy, large enough to not require reading glasses.

Your binary numbers are only showing the value.  Try this format:

0000.00

To the left of the decimal is the value, to the right of the decimal is the suit.  Assign numbers to the suits - perhaps something like 01 for spades, 10 for hearts, 11 for clubs and 00 for diamonds.  For me, it's natural to use those numbers - spades have one point, hearts have two "lobes", clubs have three lobes and diamonds have four points.  As you can't make 4 without an extra digit in decimal, diamonds get 00 instead of 100.  Also, you have just the right amount of digits; not too many nor too few.

A King of Clubs would be the largest number: 1101.11
An Ace of Diamonds would be the smallest: 0001.00
Seven of Spades: 0111.01
Eight of Hearts: 1000.10
etc.

If you wanted to be very clever, you could use this same system to create a marking system for the card backs - but if you were to make a marked version, I'd make it a stretch-goal add-on rather than the main product.  Many card players will not touch a marked deck or a one-way back.

[ivanrogov]

Reviving an old design and thread. I started making some tweaks to the design.

For diamonds, I'm working with a star map theme (diamonds are somewhat star-shaped). For the clubs, a subway theme (three lobes are kind of tunnel-esque).

I know this won't be a deck for card players necessarily, but might attract collectors.

[Don Boyer]

Reviving an old design and thread. I started making some tweaks to the design.

For diamonds, I'm working with a star map theme (diamonds are somewhat star-shaped). For the clubs, a subway theme (three lobes are kind of tunnel-esque).

I know this won't be a deck for card players necessarily, but might attract collectors.

If you make it attractive enough, it should sell.

I'm not sure if I like the idea of the suits having such radically different faces on them.  You might be trying to jam two very different deck themes into the same deck.  Subway maps are very different from star charts.  If you found a way to make them visually similar, that would be one thing, but to have them look so different - picture holding a hand of these cards while playing a game and think of how easy it would be to know what all the cards of the same value would look like.  They won't look very similar at all in this design, and that works against you.