Blog Archives - We Heart Games https://weheart.games/category/blog/ Board game design & freelance game art Thu, 02 Nov 2023 18:44:05 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.8.1 https://weheart.games/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/cropped-WHG-logo-square-single-orange-32x32.png Blog Archives - We Heart Games https://weheart.games/category/blog/ 32 32 How to make a papercraft sliding deck box https://weheart.games/sliding-deck-box/ https://weheart.games/sliding-deck-box/#respond Mon, 13 Mar 2023 04:43:35 +0000 https://weheart.games/?p=7843 I saw this video for making a papercraft sliding deck box and wanted to make a template for it. The template includes PNG, PDF, and Affinity Designer 2 files. The deck box fits 24 cards and a couple rule booklets, with room to spare. The cards are sleeved, with two sheets of paper and one […]

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I saw this video for making a papercraft sliding deck box and wanted to make a template for it.

The template includes PNG, PDF, and Affinity Designer 2 files.

The deck box fits 24 cards and a couple rule booklets, with room to spare. The cards are sleeved, with two sheets of paper and one playing card in each sleeve.

As usual this is free, but if you feel like supporting what I do, here’s my ko-fi page. ๐Ÿงก

Keep playing,
-Mike

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A “Board Game Design to Publisher” Roadmap https://weheart.games/board-game-publisher-roadmap/ https://weheart.games/board-game-publisher-roadmap/#respond Thu, 01 Sep 2022 14:58:06 +0000 https://weheart.games/?p=6896 These are the steps I follow when I’m working on a board game design and I think it might be “publisher-worthy”. Sometimes I give games away for free on itch.io, but sometimes I’ll be working on a game idea that is telling me it can go farther. 1. Share the game! Share a link to […]

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These are the steps I follow when I’m working on a board game design and I think it might be “publisher-worthy”. Sometimes I give games away for free on itch.io, but sometimes I’ll be working on a game idea that is telling me it can go farther.

1. Share the game!

Share a link to a Dropbox (or similar) folder that has the rules, PNP, and anything else necessary to try it, such as a link to a digital version. Many first-time designers are hesitant to do this, fearing their game will be stolen. The risk of that is basically non-existent, and publicly posting something actually puts your flag in the ground and gives you something to point at to say, “Look! I was working on this game.”

The goal is to get as much feedback as you can to evolve, refine, build, and cut things out of the game. If you share the game around and listen to the feedback you get โ€” you don’t have to follow it all, but definitely listen to it all โ€” your game will improve. Promise.

Working on a game in isolation is denying yourself so many other perspectives and possibilities for improvement. You’re also denying your game the buzz that can tend to build around games that are in development. Many BGG WIP threads have been a powerful marketing tool for the game they feature.

2. The sell sheet

If you get consistently positive feedback from playtesters, and you feel like the game is pitch-ready, start working on a sell-sheet. This is something that you should also include in that Dropbox folder, because iterating and refining that is just as important as iterating on the game.

A good sell sheet is an art unto itself; there are other articles out there that will be able to better describe how to make one. Get feedback from other designers; this is important.

Don’t forget to keep playtesting.

3. The pitch video

Then you’ll want to start working on a script for a 2-minute pitch video.

A 2-minute script is hard to write! It should include:

  • Your name, name of game, type of game, # of players, length of game
  • Very quick overview of the game. Introduce the game without talking about rules.
  • What makes the game special/different; what’s the best part of the game.

Again, get feedback on this script before you even record it.

I record the voiceover first, then record video (using a PNP version OR a digital version, whichever gets the point across, doesn’t matter). Look at your script and record video clips that will go with each section of the voiceover. Sometimes I even play the VO on my computer while I record the video, if I think timing of gestures & movements will be important. I find doing the VO and video separately helps me concentrate on what I’m doing with my hands when I’m recording the video, and also prevents fumbling over my words and/or actions.

Import the VO and the video clips into a video editing tool and splice them all together. Sometimes clips will need to be sped up or slowed down to match the VO; that’s ok. Add text and other visual callouts such as arrows and circles only where it’s helpful to do so.

Include a way to contact you and a link to your PNP/digital version in the description of the video.

Also: keep playtesting.

4. The email

Come up with a good “cold opener” to put in your emails. This is a 2-3 line elevator pitch that describes the game. Could be very similar to your pitch video script, but can be a bit more casual.

Hello!

[game name] is a [game type] game for [player count] that plays in [game length]. What makes it different is [standout feature].

If that sounds interesting to you, here’s a link that has a sell sheet, PNP, and digital version: [link], and here’s a 2-minute pitch video: [direct YouTube link]. If you would like to see the game in more detail, I’d be happy to schedule a time to show you the digital version.

Thanks for your time!
-[your name]

5. The publisher

Look for a board game publisher that is making games “kind of like” your own. You can do this on BGG by searching for similar mechanics and themes using their advanced search, or you can pay (it’s not much) for access to Cardboard Edison’s publisher directory. They list pubs who are actively looking for submissions, what their submission process is, and even what types of games they are looking for. Well worth it.

If you’re in a game design community, ask around to see if anyone knows of any publishers who might be interested in the type of game you have. A personal recommendation is very valuable!

Keep an eye on Twitter; publishers sometimes post a call for submissions, sometimes with the specific type of game they are looking for. If you can catch someone who’s actively looking for what you’ve got, that’s an excellent โ€” though naturally rare โ€” opportunity.

Make a list and start sending those emails! I’ll even keep a spreadsheet of who I’ve contacted and when, so I know when to follow up with a polite reminder, if I haven’t heard anything back in a week or two. If I don’t hear back after that, I don’t follow up again.

Make no mistake, this part is work. It can be a long road, and discouraging to get rejection letters. Just know that everyone gets them, and your game might not be a good fit for certain publishers; that doesn’t mean you should give up! Expect to get many “no’s” before you get your “yes”.

6. Design contests

If you’ve gotten your game this far, another way to get publisher attention for a game is to enter it into a contest. There are a few that happen regularly, and BoardGameGeek has a whole forum dedicated to design contests. Many publishers keep an eye on the results of these contests.

Sometimes publishers host contests themselves, with specific requirements. The chances your game will fit those requirements are small, but it’s good to look around just in case.

I wish you all the best on this journey!

If you have questions or comments for me, feel free to contact me. I’m also on Instagram and Discord.

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Designing In Dreams https://weheart.games/designing-in-dreams/ https://weheart.games/designing-in-dreams/#respond Fri, 29 Apr 2022 12:41:00 +0000 https://weheart.games/?p=6096 While designing In Dreams, the cards have evolved significantly since our first prototype; here’s the journey we took to arrive at the design we finally landed on. All art by WOMBO Dream, used with permission.The In Dreams crowd sale is coming soon; sign up here to be notified. Version 1 The first mockup I ever […]

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While designing In Dreams, the cards have evolved significantly since our first prototype; here’s the journey we took to arrive at the design we finally landed on.

All art by WOMBO Dream, used with permission.
The In Dreams crowd sale is coming soon; sign up here to be notified.

Version 1

The first card design for In Dreams

The first mockup I ever made had 6 numbered variants on it, laid out in a table below the main prompt. On the back: just the location and a number from 1 to 6.

The draw pile would sit with the location side face-up. To generate an encounter, you’d look at the number on the top card of the deck to determine how many prompt cards you’d draw for this encounter. You’d flip a card for a prompt, then look at the number on the next card on the draw pile โ€” this indicates the numbered variant for the card you just flipped. This way you’d get a random variant for each card.

Problem 1: After you flipped the second card, you didn’t have an easy way to tell at a glance what your first variant was, so you’d have to write each one down as you went โ€” or peek at the other side of the card next to it.

Problem 2: Each location had a fixed number of prompts that would always occur at that location. That didn’t line up with the kind of variability we wanted.

Problem 3: Six prompts for a single encounter felt like a lot for a player to manage; at that point it was just information overload.

Aside: the first working title for the game was “Dreamscapes”.

Version 2

The first card design for In Dreams

While we liked the idea of more possible variation on each card, six prompt cards in one encounter didn’t feel right. We brought the variants down to 4, and I lined them all up on the left edge of the card.

This is when I had the seed of a breakthrough โ€” even though it won’t look like it at first.

My next idea was to make a printable play sheet with spaces for each card along the top, and a solid line running through all of them. The rules would go on the rest of the page, with space for players to make notes about their character and their progress, if desired.

A draft of a play sheet for In Dreams.

The idea being that you would place your cards so that the chosen variant would lay across the line, so that you could easily see which variant had been selected for each card. Here the first card is using variant #3, and the second card is using variant :

Placing the cards on the play sheet.

Problem: Technically, players could use any line on a table or piece of paper, but now we felt we needed to include a printable PDF with the game. Our goal was to have the game be completely self-contained in a deck of cards. Back to the drawing board!

Version 3

The line on the paper was a good starting point, but we needed a way to do it without any other components. This is when our wonderful little arrow arrived:

The third card design for In Dreams

I moved the variants to the right edge of the card, and added an arrow to the left side of the card. I also added the number to the front of the card. Now you could position your second card so that the arrow pointed at the variant indicated by its number!

We had a variant selected for each prompt simply by positioning a card next to it, and the entire encounter was readable just by looking at it; no need to write down each prompt. This felt like a Very Big Moment… but we weren’t quite finished yet.

Problem 1: It still felt a little bit finicky. If your cards got jostled at all, it would be easy to lose track of which variant was which.

Problem 2: We started to feel like drawing an encounter with just one prompt card was not giving the player enough to work with. It also isn’t enhanced by the wonderful way our prompts chain together; we feel that this ‘chaining and combining of concepts’ is a big part of what makes In Dreams special.

Version 4

I was able to “feed two birds with one scone” when it suddenly hit me that the arrow did not need to stay in the same position on every card…! It seems so obvious in hindsight.

The fourth card design for In Dreams

This solved the first problem from version 3 by making it very obvious how the cards should be lined up… just make sure their bottom or top edges are all lined up! The arrows will all point at their selected variant.

It solved the second problem by completely disconnecting the arrow from the number on the card. The position of the arrow has nothing to do with the number, so we could remove the number 1 from all cards and strictly have a range of 2-4… and we could still keep all four variants.

At last, this design simply felt right.

Events

With the card design basically locked in, we started exploring ways to spice things up a bit… something to add some unexpected extra flavour to an encounter. This came in the form of an entirely new mechanic: Events.

We decided to add “suits” to each card, which would give us a way to hook new mechanics into the cards:

The suits for In Dreams

We assigned each of the suits meaning โ€” something that could potentially be applied to an event:

Interpreting the suits for In Dreams

While we ended up removing this from the game, we have plans for using the suits in different ways in the future, and we look forward to all the ways players will interpret and integrate the suits in their own add-ons for the game. For now, we wanted to keep everything “in the cards” as much as possible, to remove the need to disengage from the game and look up a table in a rulebook.

With suits on the cards, we could use them to trigger an event with the following rule:

If any two adjacent cards have the same suit, draw an event from the event deck.

Creating the event deck

We explored the possibility of having event tables in the rulebook; drawing cards and using their numbers to look up an event. Again, this didn’t feel right because it took players out of the game. We decided to make a whole new deck of cards to handle events.

We really wanted to continue to use the mechanism of chaining cards to create a unique combination, so I pulled together the first mockup for a possible event deck:

The first draft of the Event deck design.

The deck is on the right; you’d draw a card, flip it, and place it on the left. Then you’d draw another card and just slide it over into the space between the main Event card and the deck. Now you’ve got a chain where one of three events from the leftmost card is chosen by the middle card’s arrow. The middle card has three options for the “tone” of the event, and one of those is chosen by the arrow on the top card of the event deck.

I didn’t love this design; there was just too much visible at once for my liking, and 95% of the card on the right is irrelevant. I started to wonder if we were going to need a separate box that could hold the event deck; a box that was only big enough to show the left side of the cards:

The second draft of the Event deck design.

I really didn’t want to add another component to the manufacturing process, and give players something else to lose โ€” or get smushed, as those kinds of boxes tend to do!

I knew I had to find a better way.

The third draft of the Event deck design.

Now we’re getting somewhere! Each card points at one of the three options on the other card. There are three unique events on all 18 event cards, and six different “tones” distributed evenly between the three positions โ€” it is a truly random tone assigned to each event.

Aside: 54 events and 6 tones combine to create 324 unique events in a deck of just 18 cards.

I still wasn’t quite satisfied with the design, though. I wanted the arrows to be more obviously tied to the boxes on the opposite card…

It just needed one more change:

The fourth draft of the Event deck design.

With a black arrow for the black boxes and a white arrow for the white boxes, there is a much clearer visual connection.

Thanks!

Thanks for sticking with me! I hope it was helpful, even if only as a demonstration that a “simple” design takes a great deal of time and care to get it to a point where it seems like it couldn’t have been made any other way.

-Mike

We don’t have comments, but feel free to start a conversation with me on Twitter or Discord.

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How to export .OBJ files from Blender to Tabletop Simulator https://weheart.games/how-to-export-obj-files-from-blender-to-tabletop-simulator/ https://weheart.games/how-to-export-obj-files-from-blender-to-tabletop-simulator/#respond Tue, 24 Nov 2020 02:07:58 +0000 https://weheart.games/?p=5539 When exporting your 3d models from Blender for use in Tabletop Simulator, sometimes the results are less than ideal. There are a few things to be aware of to ensure your object shows up correctly. Mesh position Make sure your model is centred over the world origin in Blender. If it’s not, your object will […]

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When exporting your 3d models from Blender for use in Tabletop Simulator, sometimes the results are less than ideal. There are a few things to be aware of to ensure your object shows up correctly.

Mesh position

Make sure your model is centred over the world origin in Blender. If it’s not, your object will rotate around that point in TTS, which will feel weird for your players.

Poly count

If TTS is taking a performance hit when your model is imported, make sure you don’t have an overly-detailed model. The simplest way to reduce the number of polygons in your model is to add a Decimate modifier. Reduce the Ratio value to “simplify” your model as much as you can without destroying its appearance!

A good rule of thumb is to stay under 20k triangles. You can see the number of triangles in your model by clicking the Viewport Overlays popup near the top-right of the 3d panel, and selecting Statistics:

This will show the stats for your model at the top-left of the 3d panel:

Shading

Sometimes a model with sharp edges will have shadows on some faces, once you import it into TTS. This can usually be solved by following these steps:

  • Select your model, press Tab to enter edit mode, and go into Face Select mode.
  • Press A to Select All.
  • Right-click on the model and select Shade Smooth.
  • Press Tab to exit edit mode.
  • In the Modifiers tab, add an Edge Split modifier.

This is often enough to solve any weird surface shading you get in TTS.

Note: if your model has bevelled or rounded edges, this step should not be necessary.

Normals

The normal for any given face is perpendicular to the face itself. The direction of the normal defines which way each polygon is facing.

Sometimes during modelling, a normal will be flipped accidentally. It can be easy to miss, while working in Blender. For example: on this cube, the normal on the front face is flipped, but you can’t tell by looking at it:

When I import this model into TTS, the problem presents itself. The “backside” of faces simply don’t show up at all:

Here’s how to check your normals in Blender, before you export the model:

In the Viewport Overlays popup near the top-right of the 3d panel, select Face Orientation.

This displays all normals that are facing you in blue, and normals facing away from you in red:

Orbit around your model and make sure all faces are blue.

One quick way to fix normals is to tab into Edit Mode, press A to Select All, then press Shift + N (Mesh > Normals > Recalculate Outside).

If that doesn’t give you the desired result, select each backward face in Edit Mode and press Alt + N > Flip (Mesh > Normals > Flip).

Colliders

TTS will generate a box collider for your model, unless you specify a custom collider. Keep custom colliders as simple as possible (under 255 triangles is recommended).

If you want to create a bowl, something with slots or holes that other components fit into, or any other concave shape, you must create a collider, and select the “Non-convex” checkbox in TTS. Further, this type of object must be locked for TTS to respect concave collision.

Further reading on colliders at the TTS knowledge base.

Export Settings

These are the export settings I use for TTS; I’m only listing the changes I made from the default OBJ export settings:

  • Select File > Export > Wavefront (.obj)
    • Tip: right-click on this menu item and select Add to Quick Favorites; now you can select an object and press Q to quickly export your model.
  • Optional: select the Selection only checkbox (this only exports the currently-selected model(s)
  • Under Transform, change the Forward popup to Z Forward so your models are facing the right way.
  • Under Geometry, select the Triangulate Faces checkbox. This is essential; TTS requires that all models are made of triangles.

At the top of the Export panel, you can click the [+] button to save these settings as a preset, so you don’t have to set them manually from memory every time.

Export your .obj file; it is now ready to be imported into Tabletop Simulator!

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How to make a card game with InDesign and Data Merge https://weheart.games/datamerge/ https://weheart.games/datamerge/#respond Mon, 04 May 2020 16:17:00 +0000 https://weheart.games/?p=5378 This tutorial will teach you how to create cards for a Hearthstone-style game. We used this technique to make our latest 54-card game, In Dreams. It makes iterating on the card design and updating art & text a snap. Making all but the simplest card games is a huge task. Adobe InDesign has feature called […]

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This tutorial will teach you how to create cards for a Hearthstone-style game. We used this technique to make our latest 54-card game, In Dreams. It makes iterating on the card design and updating art & text a snap.

Making all but the simplest card games is a huge task. Adobe InDesign has feature called Data Merge that can make managing the design of a deck of any number of cards much easier.

With this template, easily add new cards to your game by simply adding new rows to a spreadsheet.

Note: This tutorial is an extension of what I learned from Daniel Solis; you can read more about his method on BGG, watch his detailed video series on this topic on Skillshare, or his excellent Card at Work playlist on YouTube.

If you don’t have InDesign

Some similar card-building alternatives that I’ve discovered since writing this post:

Here’s how it works:

  1. Create the card artwork in Illustrator.
  2. Lay out a card template in InDesign.
  3. Make a spreadsheet. 1 row = 1 card.
  4. Import the CSV of your spreadsheet into InDesign.
  5. Connect each element in your template to a column in your spreadsheet.
  6. Create custom card backs.
  7. Generate all the cards and export as PDF.
  8. Lay out the cards for print.
  9. Lay out the cards for Tabletop Simulator.

1. Create the card artwork

You don’t have to have finished artwork to get started, but I’ve found that it’s very helpful to do a basic mockup of your card layout in Illustrator before doing anything else. This will help you figure out exactly which elements need to be on each card type, approximately how big they should be, and where on the card they live.

NOTE: In the sample project, I’ve included card templates for both Illustrator and Photoshop; which one you use is a matter of personal preference. The instructions below are for Illustrator. If you use Photoshop, export all your assets as PNG files using Adobe Generator.

Open Adobe Illustrator and create a new document:

Standard playing cards are 2.5″ x 3.5″. Add 1/8″ bleed around all four edges of your card, making the total size 2.75″ x 3.75″.

If you are planning on doing a printed version of your game, set the Color Mode to CMYK. If you are only doing a digital version, set the Color Mode to RGB.

In the Preferences, set the Grid to have a Gridline every 1″, with Subdivisions set to 16:

Turn on grid snapping by selecting View > Snap to Grid.

Zoom in on the top-left corner of the document and drag off some guides in these positions (hold Shift while creating the guides so they snap to the grid):

The outermost 1/8″ is your bleed, and should be an extension of your border. This will get cut off after it’s printed.

The next 1/8″ is your border. There shouldn’t be any information critical to your game here, but some games use borders with different colours to differentiate card types.

The rest of the document is your safe zone, where all of your card art will be.

Don’t forget to zoom in on the bottom-right corner and create the same guides there.

For the purposes of this tutorial, I’ve made a very basic card layout. Note that the area in the middle is transparent. The artwork for the card will go here, on a layer behind everything else.

Aside from the artwork, we’ve got a place for the card’s cost (blue hexagon), the card’s attack (red) and defence (green), the card’s title (top blue rectangle), the card’s type (middle blue rectangle) and the card’s description (bottom blue rectangle).

We could export this whole layout and save it as a single graphic, but that doesn’t give us much flexibility. What if we had cards in our game that don’t have a cost? Or don’t have an attack or defence stat? Let’s separate those objects so that later on, we can easily turn them on or off.

Using Artboards to export multiple graphics

Illustrator allows you to create multiple artboards in a single document. The Artboard Tool is in your toolbar, and looks like this:

When you click the Artboard Tool, the current artboard is highlighted. At the top of the screen, you’ll see a Name field. Change the name of this artboard to Card-Basic.

Switch back to the Selection Tool and drag the cost, attack, and defence shapes off to the side:

Switch back to the Artboard Tool and click once on the hexagon. It will automatically create a new artboard that is exactly the size of that shape. Change the name of that arboard to Cost.

Do the same for the attack and defence shapes, naming them Attack and Defence.

Export as PDF

You’re ready to export your graphics as PDF files! Select File > Export > Export for Screens.

Under Export to: click the folder icon on the right to set your destination for the exported files. I recommend creating a folder called Links inside your project folder for your game. This will hold all your graphics for every card, as well as the spreadsheet for the InDesign Data Merge.

Make sure the exported file type is PDF, as shown in the screenshot above.

That’s good enough for now! Let’s move on to adding the data for each card to a spreadsheet…

2. Lay out a card template in InDesign

Open InDesign. Create a new document named Cards that’s the same size as the Illustrator file you just made: 2.75″ x 3.75″. Set the Margins and Bleed to zero.

Save the document into the same folder as your Links folder, so that the InDesign document and the Links folder are side by side.

Import the artwork you created for the card template by selecting File > Place… (or drag and drop your image onto the page). Start with Card-Basic.pdf. After you select the file you want to import, it will show a small preview of the file next to the cursor. Hover over the top-left corner of the page and click once to place the file:

This will import the image at its full size; it should now fill the page. Double-check the Transform panel to make sure the top-left corner is at 0,0.

Import the rest of the artwork, and position it over the background artwork. This will be easier if you turn on the same grid settings that you used in Illustrator.

All of this artwork will appear on top of the card artwork that shows through the transparent area in the middle. Let’s head over to the Layers palette to make a separate layer for the card artwork, since it will be behind everything else, but we’ll still need to get at it later.

Double-click Layer 1 and change its name to Card Basic. Create a new layer, drag it below Card Basic, and name it Artwork. Then lock the Card Basic layer.

Use the Rectangle Tool to draw a box behind the open area in the middle, overlapping the edges a bit:

You’ll want to make a note of how big this box is, so that you can create your artwork at the exact right size, at 300 dpi. My box ended up being 2.25″ x 2.125″, so my images for the art will be 675 x 639 pixels. If you’re not sure how to get that number, the easiest way is to open Photoshop, create a new document, and set its dimensions to the measurements of your box, in inches, and set the dpi to 300.

There are some sample images for demonstration purposes included in the sample template files.

The final step in making this template is to make the required text boxes. In the Layers panel, lock the Artwork layer, and unlock and select the Card Basic layer.

Use the Text tool to create a box over the blue rectangle for the title:

Type some sample text in there; the longest title in your spreadsheet is a good test for the font size. Align centre, choose a font, and set the size to be as big as will comfortably fit.

Select the text box with the Selection tool and select Object > Text Frame Options. Change the Vertical Justification > Align to Center.

Create and format text boxes for all the remaining spaces:

If you want to have inline icons in your text boxes, check out this written tutorial and this video, both by Daniel Solis.

Good enough for now; time get some real data into a spreadsheet.

3. Make a spreadsheet

You can use whatever spreadsheet software you want, as long as it can export to a CSV.

Each row of your spreadsheet counts as one card. Each column holds a different bit of information about the card.

Each cell of the spreadsheet can hold either text or a reference to an image. To make a column into an image reference, you must add the @ character before the name of the column.

Add these column headings to your spreadsheet:

  • Card Name
  • @Card Background
  • @Artwork
  • @Cost
  • Cost Stat
  • @Attack
  • Attack Stat
  • @Defence
  • Defence Stat
  • Card Type
  • Description

Fill in a few rows of the spreadsheet with whatever stats you like. Make sure the columns that start with @ have the name of an image. Feel free to colour-code the cells in your table, to make it easier to read:

Note that I left the @Attack and Attack Stat cells empty for the second card. This will show how optional fields work, later.

Export your spreadsheet as a CSV, and save it into the Links folder you created earlier.

IMPORTANT: All the images referenced by your spreadsheet must be in the same folder as the CSV.

4. Import the CSV into InDesign

You’ve got artwork, a template, and a spreadsheet; let’s start bringing them together!

Switch to InDesign and select Window > Utilities > Data Merge to open the Data Merge panel.

Click the menu button at the top right, and choose Select Data Source… Find and select the CSV in your Links folder. The Data Merge panel now shows your column headings!

Notice how the text fields have a text icon and the image fields have an image icon. If your field has the wrong icon, check to see if you included the @ symbol at the beginning of the column name.

5. Connect the template to your spreadsheet

In the Layers panel, lock the Card Basic layer and unlock the Artwork layer. Using the Selection Tool, select the rectangle you created for the artwork. In the Data Merge panel, click the Artwork item. The box is now linked to that field of the spreadsheet:

It’s as simple as that. Select an element on the page, then click the matching item in the Data Merge panel.

Note: when you are linking text in this way, you need to highlight the text itself โ€” rather than selecting the entire the text box โ€” before clicking the relevant item in the Data Merge panel.

In the Layers panel, unlock the Card Basic layer and link the rest of the elements on the page. When finished, your page will look something like this:

It’s not much to look at any more! That’s why it’s good to do all the layout with your actual artwork and text before hooking it up to the spreadsheet.

But here’s where the magic happens. You can preview your layout with all the data from your spreadsheet, without generating a new PDF, or even creating more pages in your document.

In the Data Merge panel, click the Preview checkbox:

Your entire card layout is now shown, with all the data pulled from the spreadsheet! ๐ŸŽ‰

Use the navigation buttons to move between the rows of your spreadsheet, previewing each card:

Notice how Smith doesn’t have an attack stat? That’s from back in step 3, where we left those two fields blank. You can build a lot of flexibility into the look of your cards by separating the visual elements into their own graphics; you can then control their visibility in the spreadsheet.

Making changes to the spreadsheet

If you make any changes to the spreadsheet โ€” whether it’s changing one cell or adding whole new columns or rows โ€” you need to export a new CSV, and overwrite the old one in your Links folder.

Switch to InDesign. in the Data Merge panel, click the menu button in the top-right corner and select Update Data Source.

Now InDesign will have the latest data from your CSV.

6. Create custom card backs

What about the backs of the cards? With everything I’ve covered already, you’ll see how easy it is to add card backs to all your cards โ€” whether it’s the same back on every card, or custom backs for each one.

First you’ll need a graphic to put on the back of your cards. I’ve included one in the sample project called Card-Basic-Back.png.

Add a new column to the end of your spreadsheet and call it @Card Back, and paste Card-Basic-Back.png in the field for each of the cards.

Save your spreadsheet and export a new CSV to your Links folder.

Switch to InDesign and update the data source, as described at the end of the previous section.

Adding card back for each card is cleverly simple. In the Pages panel, create a new blank page. Import the art asset for the card back, ensuring it is sized and positioned to fill the page.

With the artwork selected, go to the Data Merge panel and click the new Card Back item, at the bottom of the list. That’s it!

When you generate your card PDF, page 1 will be the front of the first card, page 2 will be the back of the first card, page 3 will be the front of the second card, and so on.

Let’s do that now!

7. Generate the cards and export as PDF

This stage is a two step process:

  1. Generate a merged InDesign document that has all of your cards on their own pages.
  2. Export the merged document as a PDF.

Generate a merged file

To generate the file with all of the cards, click the Create Merged Document button at the top-right of the Data Merge panel:

This opens a dialog box:

Leave all the settings at their defaults and click OK. InDesign may spin for a bit, depending on the size and complexity of your deck.

If you have any overset text โ€” that is, text that’s too long for the text box you made for it โ€” you will see a report showing you which objects need adjusting. You’ll need to either make the font smaller, the make text box bigger, or shorten the text in your spreadsheet for the overset items.

Important: What you’re looking at now is a completely separate and new InDesign document that was created when you did the data merge. Note the document title: Cards-1. Each card is on its own page. All template items have been converted into regular items, using the data from the spreadsheet.

Export as PDF

Select File > Adobe PDF Presets > [High Quality Print]…

Export your Cards-1.pdf file to the same folder as your InDesign document. After you choose your export location, you’ll see the big Export Adobe PDF dialog box. Don’t change anything, just click Export at the bottom right.

Note: When you’re finished exporting, the Cards-1 InDesign document should be closed and not saved. Any time you need to generate a new PDF, follow these steps:

  1. Open your Cards.indd document.
  2. Update the data source, to ensure you have the latest CSV.
  3. Generate a new merged document.
  4. Export the PDF from the merged document.

You’ve got cards!

If you are working with a publisher, check with them to see what format they want your cards in โ€” there’s a chance this PDF is exactly what they require from you! Congrats, you’re “done”!

Export as PNG

If you want to upload your cards to a print service like The Game Crafter, you’ll need to export your cards as PNG instead of PDF. Select File > Export. In the next dialog box, change the Format popup to PNG. In the dialog box after that, make sure the Resolution is set to 300, and Anti-alias is turned on.

Taking it further…

If you want to create a print-and-play document yourself to share with your friends and family, or post on a website like PNPArcade, read on. I’ll show you how to lay out your cards so that people can print them on their home printer… and if you’re really ambitious, how to import them as a digital deck in Tabletop Simulator.

8. Lay out the cards for print

The document you have now isn’t ideal for printing on a home printer. The sample project comes with some more template files that you can plug your Cards-1.pdf file into. The layout work is already done!

Note: I’ve gotten a few print-and-play games from Button Shy Games. I’ve appreciated the way they lay out their games the most โ€” including the 8-panel rule sheet that folds down to 2.5″ x 3.5″ to match the cards themselves. The template I’ve provided matches their layout. Please check them out and buy their games!

The Cards-Print.indd Template

The included Cards-Print.indd is fully set up for an 18-card, double-sided deck. Open it to continue.

If you put your Cards-1.pdf into the same folder as this file, InDesign will tell you there are some missing/modified links. Click Update Modified Links. This tells the file to use your new Cards-1.pdf in all the places that reference it.

The first thing you will see is a blank instructions page; I’ll get to that in a minute. If you don’t need this page, feel free to delete it. If you plan to use it later, leave it in and exclude it from your PDF when you export it.

On the next few pages, your cards are laid out into a grid with six cards on each page, with crop marks already set up, as shown in the example image above. Alternating pages have the card backs for the previous page.

Here’s an example of how the cards are laid out:

The pages for the backs of the cards are laid out in right-to-left order, so that when you flip the page to run it through the printer again, the correct card back is printed on each card.

Some tips for using Cards-Print.indd:

  • Check out the Layers panel. Feel free to turn layers on and off as you see fit! There are separate layers for:
    • crop marks
    • internal crop marks (some people like them, some people don’t)
    • card numbers
    • instructions
    • the cards themselves
    • page numbers
    • guides
  • Have a look at the Pages panel to see the Master Pages that are used in the document. This is where you’d go to remove the url for this blog post, that shows up on the right side of the card pages.
  • If you don’t need card backs, you can delete those pages without affecting anything else.
  • If you have more cards in your deck, you will need to duplicate the last two pages, then re-link each card. To relink a card:
    • With the Selection tool, click on the card, then select File > Place…
    • This opens the file dialog. at the bottom, look for the Show Import Options checkbox and make sure it’s selected. Choose your Cards-1.pdf and click Open.
    • You’ll see a dialog box that lets you choose which page of the PDF you want to insert. If you don’t get this dialog box, that means you didn’t select the Show Import Options checkbox in the previous window.
    • Choose the card you want to import on the left side, then click OK. You’ll need to do this for each card.

Setting up your Instructions

Part of the instructions in this file are shown upside-down, so I made a separate file for them, to make it easier to lay them out โ€” no need to work upside down! Open Instructions.indd:

The guides show where the page gets folded, and each panel is labelled. Open the Layers panel, and you can toggle the Page Labels (hide me) layer. Lay out your rulebook and export a PDF called Instructions.pdf into the project folder.

Now you can open Cards-Print.indd, update the links, and your instructions will automatically be laid out in the right place.

Note: This is admittedly a pretty small space to squeeze an entire rulebook into. If your game needs more room for rules, delete the instructions page and lay it out separately on a standard 8.5″ x 11″ page.

Export as PDF

Select File > Adobe PDF Presets > [High Quality Print]…

Choose a location for your Cards-Print.pdf file. Again, you’ll see the big Export Adobe PDF dialog box. Don’t change anything, just click Export at the bottom right.

Now you have a print-ready file that you can send to others! Congratulations!

9. Lay out the cards for Tabletop Simulator

If you’re looking for a way to playtest your game digitally, Tabletop Simulator is an excellent choice. I’m not going to cover how to use it in this tutorial, but I will show you how to export your cards to a custom Tabletop Simulator deck.

Open Cards-TTS.indd. Update modified links, if prompted. Your cards should show up like this:

In Tabletop Simulator, cards need to be formatted without bleed, on a single image, and not more than 10 rows wide and 7 rows tall. If you need more cards, you can duplicate the cards that are in this file and relink them, as described in the previous section.

Note: I’ve included the card backs on page 2 of Cards-TTS.indd. If you don’t need backs or you only have one card back for the entire deck, you can delete this page. Tabletop Simulator allows you to upload a single image to use for all the backs of a deck. The following instructions will assume that you are using custom backs for your cards.

Export as JPG

Select File > Export… and make sure the Format popup at the bottom is set to JPG.

Make sure the Resolution is set to 300 and Anti-alias is turned on:

Adding your deck to Tabletop Simulator

Open Tabletop Simulator. Open your game if you already have one, or create a new, empty “Single Player” game (it doesn’t matter at this point if your game is multiplayer or not).

From the toolbar at the top, select Objects > Components. In the Components window, select Cards, then Custom Deck.

  1. Paste the URL for your card fronts into the Face field.
  2. Select the Unique Backs checkbox if your cards have custom backs.
  3. Paste the URL for your card backs into the Back field.
  4. Set the Width and Height fields to the number of cards in your uploaded artwork. Using my 18-card sample, you’d set the width to 10 and the height to 2.
  5. The Number field is for the number of cards in your deck. Set it to 18.
  6. Click the Import button to add your deck.

Some additional tips

  • You can easily host your art files on Dropbox, but you must change the end of the URL from “dl=0” to “dl=1“.
  • To make sure you always have the latest version of your graphics, go to Menu > Configuration > Game and turn Mod Caching off. This will force Tabletop Simulator to re-download your art files every time you open your game.

Further reading

There have been many posts about creating card games as custom Tabletop Simulator mods. I recommend these ones:

I hope this tutorial and its accompanying template files were useful to you! If you do use them to make something, I’d love to hear about it! Find me on Twitter, or join the conversation on the BGG Forums.

Take care!
-Mike Berg

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Keu from NYKRA as a minifigure https://weheart.games/keu-from-nykra-as-a-minifigure/ https://weheart.games/keu-from-nykra-as-a-minifigure/#respond Sat, 07 Jul 2018 17:37:53 +0000 http://2018.weheart.games/?p=3737 NYKRA website

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