Trick or Treat - a Halloween Playing Card Deck by Sam O'Dell

[SRO]

[Honeybee]

Is that tricolor pip a candy? Not a fan of that one. If still basing pips on the traditionals, I think that one needs reworking and I would lose the tail on the cat to make it more clearly a spade while the heart pip needs to be orange (with black eyes not visa versa) so that it is not confused for a spade

[SRO]

The tricolor pip is candy corn, which is a traditional Halloween candy in the U.S. The ace of hearts is a stylized black bat - basically a heart with bat wings - and I felt like it was important to keep the pips the same color as the ace. It probably would have helped for me to include a picture of that ace, but I'll be sure to do that in the full promotion page. Also I felt like the placement of the eyes in the hearts gives enough directionality to the pips to not mistake them for spades easily.

I don't think a cat without a tail is much of a cat (unless you're a Manx owner) and I'm willing to have that departure from the exact shape of a spade. I appreciate your feedback!

[Honeybee]

The ace of hearts is a stylized black bat - basically a heart with bat wings - and I felt like it was important to keep the pips the same color as the ace.

IMO it is FAR more important to create a useable deck. A black heart upside down looks like a black spade, if orange - not so much
The reason I suggested the cat without a tale is that at first take, I was not sure whether it was a spade or a club (being on the Ace gave it away)

[kevork]

I have less of an issue with the hearts themselves, but the similarity between the heart pips and the spade pips can certainly lead to confusion for this deck.

[Strag]

I don't think a cat without a tail is much of a cat (unless you're a Manx owner)

I feel seen!

And no, I don't own a Manx cat, but there are loads around the neighborhood. And I also frequent one of our pubs known as... the Cat With No Tail!

[Honeybee]

Do you ever see the Manx Missile there?

[Strag]

Yep, in fact played poker with him once. He wasn't particularly good at poker, but does ok with the cycling I suppose.

[Honeybee]

Yeah, I suppose 35 Tour de France stage wins is OK

[Harvonsgard]

Neither a good trick nor a good treat for me. It's nice to see the all custom work though.

[SRO]

IMO it is FAR more important to create a useable deck. A black heart upside down looks like a black spade, if orange - not so much

One of the things I struggle with is getting too attached to the original design/concept. I might have dug my heels in more, but then my wife said y'all have a point. So I redid the pips like this (and the bat is just going to have to be dark red as well). I still like what I originally did, but I need to make a habit of gritting my teeth and redesigning when necessary. I'm thinking I also need to reshape the candy corn pip and maybe put an outline on the club pip as well.

[SRO]

Neither a good trick nor a good treat for me.

You do realize I'm going to have to roll your yard for that, right?

It's nice to see the all custom work though.

Thanks! It took more time than it might look like. I'm still very new to Illustrator and Photoshop.

[SRO]

I have less of an issue with the hearts themselves, but the similarity between the heart pips and the spade pips can certainly lead to confusion for this deck.

I ended up reworking 3 of the 4 pips in the deck.

[Honeybee]

A couple of other little things. What are the clubs? By that I mean, the little triangles in them AND why orange for a traditional black suit - orange is more accepted as a substitute for red. If they weren't orange then the hearts/bats could be orange instead of red and you would have orange substituting for the red suits and black for the black suits. I guess I would be going for simpler/more playable and more of just the black and orange halloween theme colors

The indices themselves could also be orange for the orange suits and black for the black suits. I guess I am a little traditional and wanting consistency - at present we have an orange outline around black for the spades, orange around yellow for the clubs, black around the 3 colors for the diamonds and black around red for the hearts.

Good luck. Apologies for being so opinionated LOL

[SRO]

A couple of other little things. What are the clubs? By that I mean, the little triangles in them AND why orange for a traditional black suit - orange is more accepted as a substitute for red. If they weren't orange then the hearts/bats could be orange instead of red and you would have orange substituting for the red suits and black for the black suits. I guess I would be going for simpler/more playable and more of just the black and orange halloween theme colors

The clubs are supposed to be part of a jack-o-lantern face, I can see how the little triangles wouldn't come across as eyes, so I changed them - and that's why they're orange. The club ace is 3 jack-o-lanterns and some pumpkin vines that approximate the shape of a club. I couldn't think of another traditional symbol of Halloween to make a club out of. It would probably have been easier to just do orange and black colors like you're suggesting for aces, pips, and indices, but I am trying for all custom art because I want to do something that's new, not derivative (like my first Kickstarter deck turned out to be).

The indices themselves could also be orange for the orange suits and black for the black suits. I guess I am a little traditional and wanting consistency - at present we have an orange outline around black for the spades, orange around yellow for the clubs, black around the 3 colors for the diamonds and black around red for the hearts.

Good luck. Apologies for being so opinionated LOL

I've got it a little more uniform now. I replaced the candy corn pips, indices, and colors with a black widow spider that I could then make red numbers/letters with. So the variety has been reduced. And I've appreciated your feedback and the other feedback I've gotten. It's by no means a perfect deck but it's much improved after suggestions. I'd rather have to make some changes and have a more playable deck with broader appeal. Until I'm an elite artist and designer - and I never will be - I need opinions other than my own.

[Honeybee]

I would keep thinking of alternatives for the clubs
Looking at the first image below, I wonder whether a little tweeking couldn't make the clubs your bats and the hearts your jack-o-lanterns - then you would have black for clubs and orange for hearts
Alternatively, you see a lot of halloween pics with black jack-o-lanterns and orange eyes

Maybe forget the indices outlines - improve playability by simply making them red (or orange) for the red suits and black for the black suits
(The outline you have on that 8h is thicker than what you used on the new diamonds and therefore makes the 8 look black)

[SRO]

You've seen the progression of some of the deck, so I won't post more pictures. I do have an image of the tuck case and a half-brick box (which I've never done before) and I think I did a decent story.

http://kck.st/4gyCy8t

[JazzBaloo]

I agree with a lot of Honeybee suggestions. The colors need be more consistent to be playable imo. Gl with your campaign.

[JazzBaloo]

I might have missed it but who are you printing the deck with? I didn't see it on the campaign.

[SRO]

You've seen the progression of some of the deck, so I won't post more pictures. I do have an image of the tuck case and a half-brick box (which I've never done before) and I think I did a decent story.

http://kck.st/4gyCy8t

[SRO]

Dongguan Tongheng. That's the printer that I've seen used in some recent very successful Kickstarters and they've been great to work with.

[kevork]

Dongguan Tongheng. That's the printer that I've seen used in some recent very successful Kickstarters and they've been great to work with.

I believe that's Jackson's printer.

[SRO]

It is, but I didn't want to appear to be name dropping or imply I have any association with KWP (other than being a big fan). I emailed their customer service and asked who their printer was. They were really nice and provided it.

I did ask to have the same cardstock and finishing as KWP gets, so that will be a definite plus.

[GandalfPC]

[SRO]

Thank you for posting these. I have further updated the images on Kickstarter so that people can see more details on the cards.

[Honeybee]

I have seen decks that have original pips but keep the indices traditional - I reckon that could have worked here and improved the playability of the diamonds and spades.

[SRO]

You know, I am having a little trouble parsing out what you mean by "playability." If it means that the various suits are easy to distinguish, i think I've made a very playable deck
I don't think you can mistake any one pip or index for another. I sincerely think that game play would be easy with these cards.

I am not trying to be difficult. Your input about the original black hearts and how they could be mistaken for spades was valuable and I'm very happy I altered that suit. I'm also very happy with ditching the candy corn for the spider.

It seems to me that "playability" is serving as a substitute for "nontraditional colors that I don't like." After my first Kickstarter (deservedly) flopped, i read a lot about deck design, but I never read that hearts/diamonds and spades/clubs absolutely must be the same color and were essential to playability. Honestly, I think that my pips are more easily distinguishable than a lot of decks where all pips and indices are the same color.

I've changed the card back because someone on Reddit told me that a one-way card back is very jarring. I can see how a color you don't like could also be jarring - but I'm not sure that's universal enough to use the word "playability."

I don't suppose it matters. The pledging has ground to a halt at 23% and I'm skeptical that putting traditional indices in there would give me an additional 77% funding. I can see that people simply aren't interested in the ideas/decks i have. I am going to have to learn how to seriously upgrade my court card and card back art. At this point, I'm on the fence about whether I'll try this again or whether I'll make designs I like and just get a couple of copies from MakePlayingCards at a time for my own use.

[kevork]

I don't suppose it matters. The pledging has ground to a halt at 23% and I'm skeptical that putting traditional indices in there would give me an additional 77% funding. I can see that people simply aren't interested in the ideas/decks i have. I am going to have to learn how to seriously upgrade my court card and card back art. At this point, I'm on the fence about whether I'll try this again or whether I'll make designs I like and just get a couple of copies from MakePlayingCards at a time for my own use.

Hopefully you continue to create things that bring you joy, as that is art. Whether others like it or not is a bonus.

I like that you're taking in feedback but also going with what you like. If you decide to go with MPC, it'll be really cool to have a deck in your hand that you created.

[Honeybee]

I am sorry this campaign was not funded
I am just one 'traditional' collector

I won't bore you with my thoughts on what might have helped other than to say that I think most people expect either a non-revoke 4 different colors deck or a 2x2 color deck eg black x2 and red or orange x2. Not both red and orange or else you end up with a 3 color deck which I have never seen before and IMO (only) confuses and reduces playability

Going for a Halloween deck had you working to a tight time frame - take your time, aim for next Halloween even
Good luck and enjoy yourself
Have a look at GandalfPC's avatar above - that is a one off deck he designed and had printed for himself

[mulrich]

There were a couple things I'd have done differently (assuming I had any artistic talent to do artistic things) but I think the deck idea in general is fun. My bigger hesitation in backing is the delivery will happen in January which isn't quite peak Halloween season. Not much could be done about that given how production works.