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As some of you may have noted, the Plugged Nickel Playing Cards did not fund. I mean, sure, they have 15 hours left, but they're also like a third of the way there. So that's a bust.

What I would like to do is go back to the drawing board and redesign aspects of the cards. To that end, I would seriously appreciate any feedback anyone can offer. The more detailed, the better. I'm going to start with the number cards and work my way through the whole deck, trying to improve each card until I get something people really want to own.

Here's the eight of clubs.



I'm looking for anything at all that bugs you, that you would rather see changed, or that you actually like about the design. Please, bring the harsh.

Here are some things I'm thinking of doing right now:

1. Get rid of the barbed wire border, replace it with a thin, straight line with minor decorations. Maybe something that looks like old wood or chunks of metal or something.

2. Address the big pips. Something maybe a little more traditional, not as much barbed wire.

3. Bigger numbers, for clarification and easy reading.

Anything else you think I should do here?

I dont know about other people, but I think barbed wire is something that ties your theme together, and its having a coherent theme is important.

What I think might be a viable change is the rust colour used throughout the decks. Its too dark, and it makes the deck look dull, and you lose some details in the pips itself.

You can hardly see the barbed wire on the pips, you should make sure it stands out a little more, lighten the grey color. I like the barbed wire look, I don't think it has been done on any other decks.

I pretty much liked everything but the skull of a horse or what ever it was the skull of on the Ace of spades and the dice. Could not really figure out what it was. You should think about making it the skull of a buffalo or longhorn steer instead something we can recognize . Liked the barbed wire, so keep it please. Well that was my only beef was that skull. Hope you keep the dice. Liked everything about them except that horse skull. Buffalo skull would be better.

For the record, I still want a lot of barbed wire on these cards. I just don't necessarily want the border to be where it is. I agree that it should be a lot more evident on the pips, but the barbed wire border looked, I don't know, wavy, and a little cluttered.

I've tried again with this:



The barbed wire is more prominent in the pips now, but I actually want more of it. The pips are a LOT cleaner, which will give me a better opportunity to lean on the barbed wire coiled inside them. These aren't the final pips, either - if I still like them in the morning, I'll hand-draw that barbed wire and figure out a way to make it pop out better.

I still think the pips are too dark, the details could very well be lost in the printing process

I'd like to see lighter colored pips with a silver/light gray barbed wire. How about incorporating saloon swing doors as seen in westerns (on a card)?

Got it. I will work on more contrast in the details of the pips. The wire obviously needs to be a lot lighter.

Here we go, new pips. Lighter on the inside, with much clearer barbed wire.



By the way, thank you all for your help so far. I am already seeing a much better deck of cards, and the only card that's done so far is the 10 of clubs.

Hey, Much clearer!

The tiny skull inside the pip, it's barely discernible right now. Perhaps make it more visible or larger?

Here are the samples for the other three suits. Eoghann, you'll notice I leaned on the skull a little. I do like it better this way - thanks for the idea.







And lrw, I had a great suggestion about the ace skull - I'm going to do four different skulls, one for each ace. Longhorn, horse, wolf and buffalo, with barbed wire borders and tiny skulls and bullets and what-not. I'm going to look at possibly putting a longhorn on the ace of spades, since it's an iconic symbol of the Old West, though I can't make any promises just yet. But I am taking your suggestion into account, and I will be doing something about that lone skull thing.

Looking for any feedback I can get.

Work on the skulls is going gangbusters. I wanted to share the ace of hearts, though I am not planning on posting up the other aces, because I'm pretty happy with them so far.



Obviously it's not colored yet. Still need to swing by the shop that scans my large-format stuff and get it digitized.

So the last thing I need to cover is the jokers. I'm happy with the art card, although for both the art card and the jokers, I'll be swapping out the frame with the lighter wanted poster backdrop.



Just like before, I would appreciate full gallons of unfiltered feedback.

Those number cards are looking pretty great!

That ace looks fantastic, I almost don't want you to color it. Great line work.

About the jokers, would you consider adding some shadows to the coins? Give it some depth and dimension. As they are, I can tell they're coins, but they don't have that "feel" if you know what I mean.

Why not have the "Joker" at both the top and bottom of the jokers instead of having the plugged nickel logo. That can go on the Ad card. I agree with Eoghann, it just looks flat to me, and the thin lines is overshadowed by the grey of the coin, making it looks pretty plain. Perhaps also consider an aging effect on the coin, coins that old dont have a consistent colour to them

Love the new design on the Ace of Hearts !!!!

The updated black joker:



I think that about covers the redesign stuff for the wanted poster deck. I'm going to work on the rusted tin, see if I can't get that one tuned up so it looks better.

The Wanted Poster deck is all tricked out, laid in and ready to go to the printer. Huge thanks to everyone who helped me with that one. It looks a TON better, thanks to all your help.

So now I'm working on the Rusted Tin deck. Here's what I have so far, in terms of redesign:



Obviously, I'm using the same line art from the face card twice - the full deck will actually be right. I would love to get any feedback I can about how this looks, changes you would like to see, anything that bugs you, heartless criticism with no real point, and mean-spirited name-calling.

Come to think of it, I'll pass on the mean-spirited name-calling.

I've always wondered. The style on the courts, those aren't exactly bones, huh? Seems like corpses left out in the sun and their skin dried up like raisins. I find that pretty cool. Never understood the fangs though.

Eoghann wrote:Never understood the fangs though.

I think they're just canine teeth that are overly pronounced.

Eoghann, I honestly hadn't really thought of sun-dried tomato people, but now I think that's pretty awesome. Really, I just drew skulls and bones and stuff, and then drew a bunch of extra lines on them.

And yes, the fangs are canines. They are deliberately exaggerated to look more mean. These aren't just dead cowboys, or they would be mouldering in a shallow, Boot Hill grave. These are cursed cowboys who are too pissed to stay dead, so they carry firearms and dead flowers and grimace at people who are just trying to play pinochle.

Would you consider exploring that angle a bit further? More sun dried skin, giving them a mummy like appearance? I think it would tie into the theme splendidly. I'd post images of real mummies but they might be too graphic for the squeamish, so here's this:

Not that the idea isn't cool, but I already sent the Wanted Poster deck to the printer to have promo decks printed. Heck, at this point, if I started drawing everything again, we wouldn't see anything for another six months to a year. I'm not very fast at this.

No problem! Just throwing ideas.

The redesigned Wanted Poster deck is at the printer now, with an order for 24 demo decks. I want to send a bunch to reviewers and generally respected people, so that I can let people see that Liberty Playing Cards makes some mighty fine cards.

Any suggestions? I know of a handful of reviewers, but I want to cover a wide range. Art fans, magicians, cardists and general collectors - I want opinions from as many as I can get.

vixentorgames wrote:The redesigned Wanted Poster deck is at the printer now, with an order for 24 demo decks. I want to send a bunch to reviewers and generally respected people, so that I can let people see that Liberty Playing Cards makes some mighty fine cards.

Any suggestions? I know of a handful of reviewers, but I want to cover a wide range. Art fans, magicians, cardists and general collectors - I want opinions from as many as I can get.

Well, it depends on what you are looking for, simply feedback or do you want more exposure?

If you want feedback, most moderators here have had tonnes to decks go through our hands and are all of varying degrees of cardist and magician, and quite a few have been trying to helping designers who post in this section out. I think you can try magikfingers, Eoghann, montecarlojoe or even myself. Well you can try other designers if they are willing to give you feedback, Designkiller (Lorenzo) is a very good and friendly designer you can seek out, I think lotrek might be a little busy at the moment.

If you want to get the word out, try Ivan from kardify (been doing absolutely great work), Anthony (Sparkz) has a nice little website as well, Victor (wellllll, he does have a decent following and lets people know what he really feels), David (magic_othodoxy) (Good reviews, decent following as well i think?), Ashley Acton (thecardist) (decent uk following, but hes sponsored so i dont know if that would work out)

All in all, plenty of people for you to choose from. Just stay away from loopcuts and robert butler.

There are unspoken criteria that cards need to meet to satisfy the majority of people.


- Card Stock
- card Finish
- cutting registration
- tuck box stock
- tuck box design (some tucks don't allow the deck to slide smoothly into it, making a few cards pop out.)
- cellophane
- cellophane pull strip
- overall presentation of the deck

USPCC does well on almost all those criteria, hence the general consensus that USPCC is the way to go all the time. There are some up and comers that might be good enough on some aspects but fall short on others.

You will lose a good chunk of backers by going with Liberty. But it's good that you want to get more people involved to analyze the deck and help. Collectors will look mainly for the aesthetic portions. Players will require a sturdy stock that shuffles easy. Cardists and magicians will be the most demanding bunch. They require the best of the best. And for good reason. They really put those cards through the wringer.

I always look forward to seeing what other companies have to offer and try to make them up their ante. It's great that you will send out demo decks to get an idea of how the final product will look like and what can be done to really make it shine.

I will tell you that the tucks on the demo decks are not great. They are too thick and do not have a sealed bottom flap. Liberty will be making thinner tucks with a sealed bottom for the full run, but it was prohibitively expensive to get a custom tuck for just 24 decks.

The other stuff - finish, stock, and what-not - I think the cards will do just fine. I have a couple decks of Liberty cards, and they are nearly indistinguishable from Bicycle.

vixentorgames wrote: I have a couple decks of Liberty cards, and they are nearly indistinguishable from Bicycle.

That is a very loaded statement. There's a reason why Liberty isn't the top dog right now, same for MPC and other printers.

While I reproach the arbitrary rules and ludicrous amount of hoops USPCC makes someone jump, often directly being the cause of a project not making it into the world, USPCC has some pretty big shoes that not many can fill. While many other printers can come close, USPCC has a history of constantly hitting the mark in every aspect.

I would advise caution when throwing down such a statement. At least until you've got the opinion of several people, knowledgable in their specific fields to back that statement up. You might see them "just as good as Bicycle", but would a magician say the same thing? Or a cardist? Or a collector?

Well, that would be why I am sending them out for some reviews.