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On February 07 2013 02:55 Zocat wrote:Pay per illustration (or bulk) not per hour. Also check with your printing company/shop what format they require (especially what dpi) Show nested quote +On February 07 2013 02:02 UltimateHurl wrote:On February 06 2013 12:28 WolfintheSheep wrote:
Just a few comments about your plans:
1) The "in" thing for online art commissions is flat fee per work, obviously scaling with the quality that you're requesting. I'm not sure if you have an attachment to hourly pay (not sure why you would, but just saying), but it's something worth considering. It also allows you to decide against commissioning more art from that individual, and to protect yourself from inflated work hours.
2) Your 1 hour/image seems low. Obviously it will depend on the artist and the detail that you want, but you also must consider that "small art" like that on trading cards are usually larger works that are scaled down. It may seem inefficient, but it's much easier to create details on a larger canvas...makes the smaller image look nicer as well.
3) Is it a necessity to have one consistent artist doing all of the art? Take MTG, for example, that has dozens of artists doing a single set.
4) An artist's portfolio is not indicative of what you will actually get in the end. Not because they lied or anything, but because what you're paying them and the time they're spending may be vastly different than that gorgeous poster they display on their website.
My personal recommendations (take them or leave them), if you decide to go forward with this:
1) Hire an individual to do your card template. Someone who can making a nice picture and someone who can make a working TCG format are not necessarily the same people, and having a functional card design that looks good will probably be important to you.
2) Get multiple artists. Gives your cards more diversity, gives you a little more flexibility mid-project, and it will let you get your 96 pieces of art much faster.
3) Make sure you payment schedules/systems, deadlines, etc. are discussed beforehand. Not saying that you should be a hardass and run a tight ship, but you absolutely want to have some legitimate points in case you get into an argument. Word of warning, some online artists have been known to take money and run. As an artist I'd agree with most of what is said here, also when you are hiring artists look for the art at A4 or some similar size (i.e. big) because it's more versatile and when shrunk will look better  either way, 1 hour per image seems like a very low estimate. Good luck with it though! You cant say that's a low estimate. We have no idea what his style/demands are. It could very well be, that he's completely fine with Munchkin or even Order of the Stick quality. Just because he mentions the game(rules) is similar to MTG doesnt mean he wants to have the cards the same quality. For those who dont know: + Show Spoiler [Munchkin] ++ Show Spoiler [Order of the Stick] +
I should probably be clear: in an hour artists frequently don't get a polished/coloured piece finished. I could see those Munchkin illustrations taking more than an hour (not much, but enough that I wouldn't just say "oh that's no effort at all, an hour, that's all that's needed"). Order of the Stick has a huge following and a long history with that style, if you were to work to that level without a good reason then best case you'd be accused of ripping off Order of the Stick and worst just doing any good work a bit of a disservice.
But yeah, probably best to pay by the piece, not by the time, there are lots of artists in places like deviant art that price along the lines of "single figure, coloured: $X", you could easily shop around. Just search for "commissions"
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Katowice25012 Posts
I don't have any useful experience to add to this but the project sounds cool as hell, I hope it all works out. You should explain the game more in depth some time it sounds super fun.
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I agree ,this sounds neat you should kick-start it. I'm sure from TL members alone you could rally enough bucks to pay an artist for some sample work.
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Something like this?
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/yDGYVUl.png)
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That's some fine box art.
Still looks like MtG's font.
Contrast could use help.
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Calgary26004 Posts
I have been reading all the comments here, just from my phone while at work (TL is blocked at my new job). There's a lot of good advice. I'm going down a two different paths in parallel (online bidding and talking to Coag @ TL).
I will post the rules one day, but I'm going to wait until they're cleaned up a little bit more.
My goal was always to get TL members to help alpha test this game, but posting the rules and asking them to make ~300 cards themselves seemed dumb. One thing I've considered was instead of making 1 deck, making 6, and mailing any of the 5 to anyone that requested it, asking them to mail it back when they were tired of it and giving their feedback on the game. Kind of honour system alpha testing.
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On February 07 2013 10:51 Chill wrote:
I have been reading all the comments here, just from my phone while at work (TL is blocked at my new job). There's a lot of good advice. I'm going down a two different paths in parallel (online bidding and talking to Coag @ TL).
I will post the rules one day, but I'm going to wait until they're cleaned up a little bit more.
My goal was always to get TL members to help alpha test this game, but posting the rules and asking them to make ~300 cards themselves seemed dumb. One thing I've considered was instead of making 1 deck, making 6, and mailing any of the 5 to anyone that requested it, asking them to mail it back when they were tired of it and giving their feedback on the game. Kind of honour system alpha testing.
I vote for the Coag option... holy fuck all of his monsters and shit look epic and brutal and very unique. Also, I'd take a deck ;D and probably print a 2nd one so I have somebody to play vs.
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Calgary26004 Posts
On February 07 2013 11:34 aike wrote:Show nested quote +On February 07 2013 10:51 Chill wrote:
I have been reading all the comments here, just from my phone while at work (TL is blocked at my new job). There's a lot of good advice. I'm going down a two different paths in parallel (online bidding and talking to Coag @ TL).
I will post the rules one day, but I'm going to wait until they're cleaned up a little bit more.
My goal was always to get TL members to help alpha test this game, but posting the rules and asking them to make ~300 cards themselves seemed dumb. One thing I've considered was instead of making 1 deck, making 6, and mailing any of the 5 to anyone that requested it, asking them to mail it back when they were tired of it and giving their feedback on the game. Kind of honour system alpha testing. I vote for the Coag option... holy fuck all of his monsters and shit look epic and brutal and very unique. Also, I'd take a deck ;D and probably print a 2nd one so I have somebody to play vs.
The deck building and card drawing in this game isn't like Magic - there is one common deck everyone draws from. If there is ever a second edition or some sort of expansion, then I'll have to make rules about building the deck (like Dominion).
Basically, one deck is enough to play
I also should have mentioned you can play with multiple people at once. I put 2-4 in the instructions but we've played with 5 before. 5 was a little too much and made everyone be super passive and defensive, so I liked 4 as a max. I feel like with a little experience and collusion you could play with 6 or more. You'd just have to have people making deals over the table to team up on someone to take them out.
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Wouldn't it be possible to send a PDF of the deck's cards to alpha testers? Have them print it out and cut up the cards manually. Paper cards are really flimsy, but you can slide them into card sleeves with regular cards in them to make them as durable as standard playing cards. It's a bit of work, but a lot less work than asking people to make the cards themselves, and less risky than mailing it out.
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Calgary26004 Posts
On February 07 2013 12:24 Salivanth wrote:
Wouldn't it be possible to send a PDF of the deck's cards to alpha testers? Have them print it out and cut up the cards manually. Paper cards are really flimsy, but you can slide them into card sleeves with regular cards in them to make them as durable as standard playing cards. It's a bit of work, but a lot less work than asking people to make the cards themselves, and less risky than mailing it out.
Yes, it's possible, I just imagined people wouldn't want to do that. It's a lot of work to cut 300 cards out (I know - I've done it haha) especially if you don't have access to one of those paper cutters.
Definitely an option and a good one. I'll think about it, because it would be great to get some Alpha feedback BEFORE I actually print the cards.
That's actually a very good idea Salivanth - thanks
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It's really worth it.
Design your cards to that size.
Sleeved paper feels weak.
edit: need some cards?
I could mail you some commons.
Sleeve them for the weight.
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+ Show Spoiler +On February 07 2013 08:37 Coagulation wrote:Something like this?
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I think you should try to revamp the rules to make the game ideal for not just 2-4 players. Drinking card games often have big groups of people 5+ (up to a dozen or so). It isn't a big deal if you leave it primarily meant for 2-4 players but I feel like when people play drinking games there are usually more than 4 involved. Always remember your target audience when creating something!
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On February 07 2013 12:29 Chill wrote:Show nested quote +On February 07 2013 12:24 Salivanth wrote:
Wouldn't it be possible to send a PDF of the deck's cards to alpha testers? Have them print it out and cut up the cards manually. Paper cards are really flimsy, but you can slide them into card sleeves with regular cards in them to make them as durable as standard playing cards. It's a bit of work, but a lot less work than asking people to make the cards themselves, and less risky than mailing it out.
Yes, it's possible, I just imagined people wouldn't want to do that. It's a lot of work to cut 300 cards out (I know - I've done it haha) especially if you don't have access to one of those paper cutters. Definitely an option and a good one. I'll think about it, because it would be great to get some Alpha feedback BEFORE I actually print the cards. That's actually a very good idea Salivanth - thanks
No problem. Anything combining drinking and Magic-analogues has my full approval I can't help test though, sadly: currently lack the necessary physical gaming group to do so.
Unfortunately, with that many cards, getting the card sleeves together may be a chore for some, so that's probably a bigger barrier than the labor required to cut them out. With 300 cards, my idea may actually not be that great after all. If you do decide to go for it, a Magic forum might be a good place to go to to get additional feedback from the niche of players who actually own enough sleeves to make it happen.
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for alpha testing why not just write a command line java program? the main work would be typing in 300 cards worth of stuff, but it makes it pretty easy for people to alpha-test when they only need to run a small java applet. it might be less "fun" without the physical cards but in terms of just testing the mechanics it should be okay.
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Calgary26004 Posts
On February 07 2013 17:13 rauk wrote:
for alpha testing why not just write a command line java program? the main work would be typing in 300 cards worth of stuff, but it makes it pretty easy for people to alpha-test when they only need to run a small java applet. it might be less "fun" without the physical cards but in terms of just testing the mechanics it should be okay.
The mechanics are fine. The pacing, drinking, confusion over rules, etc. are the things that need to be tested
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I very much agree with hiring multiple artists. I don't think it should be too much of a drain on your time, and it's going to improve the look of the game significantly. Even though this is just a fun project, you want it to look good. A bunch of uniformly-drawn artwork simply doesn't resonate as much as multiple styles. On top of that, hiring multiple artists will incentivize your artists to work harder, since they're competing for commissions. If you hire one artist at a flat rate for the whole project, he may be inclined to just bang it out as quickly as possible.
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Zurich15366 Posts
On February 07 2013 10:51 Chill wrote:
My goal was always to get TL members to help alpha test this game, [...]
Over here! Over here!
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Why don't you kickstart it?
Sounds cool.
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On February 07 2013 22:22 Steveling wrote:
Why don't you kickstart it?
Sounds cool.
That step comes later.
The game needs polishing first.
Then, mass production!
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EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/Kwc25wU.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/9Y0YU9K.jpg)
