After some play testing, I found players didn't like counting up the number of spaces to determine how many points the card was worth at the end of the game. So with #2, I included that number on the bottom portion of the card. I also added a random symbol on the card to help color blind players and also help people see the differences a little easier. I'm up to 4 elements to read/understand on each card.
I playtested with #2's card design for a long time. It's actually the design I released as the print and play version. I still didn't have a theme yet. I was considering keeping it themeless and #3 here is my attempt at making something "cool" yet themeless with various clipart. This version got very little play. I only have one copy of that version and by the time I went to playtest it, I had decided on the frog theme and had artwork coming in from John Ariosa.
I tested with #4 for quite a while as well. This used John's illustration, but I hadn't signed Luis up to do the graphic design yet.
#5 is the final layout. I worked with Luis Francisco for many weeks to settle on this. The design goals included minimizing the components, maximizing the clarity, and highlighting the illustration as much as possible. Each army's faction symbol, color and the spaces were all combined together into the spaces. The action number is differentiated into a symbol instead of a number, so it wouldn't be confused with the victory point number.
Till next time.
- Keith