This isn't about a future product but the inevitable update to the Complete Item Cards (CIC). Here's your chance to tell us what you'd like to see, what you didn't like and want to see changed, and whether you found any errors for us to fix.
While it's true of all of our cards, it's more so for the CIC - updates will be free for all customers, and we will be adding stuff sooner or later. And with the CIC, the possibilities are nearly endless.
Future additions to the CIC might include:
* Form fields on the Magic Armor/Weapon Cards. (I seriously thought about adding these right away but didn't, for two reasons: first, I won't need them, and while that might sound awfully selfish, that's how I designed all the TOGC cards ; second, this would take a lot of time, and I'm honestly not sure if it would be worth delaying the release another two or three weeks over).
* Favorite Magic Armor/Weapon Cards - got a combination of special abilities you like and which you'd want to see on a card? Or just want more combinations with fewer fields to write into?
* Magic Armor/Weapons with nothing but empty fields for special abilities.
* "Real" scroll cards.
* Large versions of weapons/armor.
* A PDF with multiple versions of the most common magic items, like Rings of Protection. (But which items, and how many of each?)
* A PDF with multiple versions of the most common magic items, like Rings of Protection. (But which items, and how many of each?)
Yeah, that's the rub - every game is different. You're in an unenviable position!
Quantity boxes only really work if one player has all the items of that type - otherwise you still need multiple cards.
The idea solution would be if the Adobe software actually late you put together your own custom card sheet by selecting the ones you want. But as far as I know, the technology isn't there yet. So the only way it could be done is "popular item" sheets - if an item counts as a popular item, it gets a sheet of its own with 9 copies on it. You can then print out one copy, two, three or whatever knowing that you're only printing out what you need.
What qualifies as a popular item? Goodness knows! Here's what my players have a lot of at 8th level:
- Dozens of potions of healing (mainly cure light, but quite a few cure serious, etc).
- At least everyone has a ring of protection, either +1 or +2.
- There are several cloaks of resistance flying around.
- Wands of Cure Light are regarded as a necessity by my party, and they outfit each character with one every tme they go near a shop.
Also, mundane equipment - there's a lot of that around, including non-magical weapons and armour. For example, in a single session which has, say 3 combats, they may gather together half a dozen longswords, a dozen or so armours of various types, etc. The numbers mount up pretty quickly.
Like I say, it's hard to call. Every game is different.
Hi there. I think this is great but I am finding I can not put any of my own text in any of the blank spots. I have used the Reader and the Professional versions of Adobe but to no success. I asked our work IT fella and he was also stymied. Am I doing something incorrect? Is there a problem with mine?
As to what I would like added is more space to add our own text and less of the text provided by OGL. I really like being able to hand my party a bunch of cards when they pillage teh foes body finding not just a tent but a Bear skin tent coloured brown and tan, with willow wood supports. I like to make my magic items to be made of stuff appropriate in theme like gauntlets of dexterity wrapped in Ermine fur and leather. Just little stuff like that. It allows me to individualize the standard items. I have many items unique to my game as well that I have made cards for, this just adds to my ease of production by having all the standard ones handy. It is why I so enjoy the spell cards. I keep all the ones we use often in a simple page binder by my area during game. These item cards will provide the same benefit for my players and myself.
* Form fields on the Magic Armor/Weapon Cards. (I seriously thought about adding these right away but didn't, for two reasons: first, I won't need them, and while that might sound awfully selfish, that's how I designed all the TOGC cards ; second, this would take a lot of time, and I'm honestly not sure if it would be worth delaying the release another two or three weeks over).
__________________
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dave Mage 06-06-05 - Regarding the hiring of Mearls by WOTC
I think we may have just witnessed the birth of the 4th edition development process...
Slife - Almost all MMORPGs make sense if you assume the god of time has gone horribly, horribly mad.
Quote:
Originally Posted by catsclaw
We'll know how closely 4e mimics WoW by the first table you play at at a con. If one player hands the DM a sheet of paper that says "I find the nearest mining node, and mine it. Then I repeat." and leaves the table, and another player starts yelling at all the other players to buy his gold, then yeah--it's a WoW clone.
Short of that, you're not really getting the MMO experience.
Hi there. I think this is great but I am finding I can not put any of my own text in any of the blank spots. I have used the Reader and the Professional versions of Adobe but to no success. I asked our work IT fella and he was also stymied. Am I doing something incorrect? Is there a problem with mine?
What Wystan said. So no, there's nothing wrong with your copy.
I'll count that as one vote for form fields, right?
Ah, who am I fooling - they'll be coming. But you might convince me to start working on it right away...
Quote:
Originally Posted by photon1966
As to what I would like added is more space to add our own text and less of the text provided by OGL. I really like being able to hand my party a bunch of cards when they pillage teh foes body finding not just a tent but a Bear skin tent coloured brown and tan, with willow wood supports. I like to make my magic items to be made of stuff appropriate in theme like gauntlets of dexterity wrapped in Ermine fur and leather. Just little stuff like that. It allows me to individualize the standard items. I have many items unique to my game as well that I have made cards for, this just adds to my ease of production by having all the standard ones handy. It is why I so enjoy the spell cards. I keep all the ones we use often in a simple page binder by my area during game. These item cards will provide the same benefit for my players and myself.
First, there's a blank version of the cards available for free - if you're designing your items from the ground up, that'd be the thing you need. An updated version, incorporating all the changes I did in the final version of the CIC, is on its way.
Second, are you asking for "Magic Armor/Weapons with nothing but empty fields for special abilities"? Sure, that could be done too. In fact it's one of the things I'll probably do anyway.
I found the Blank Cards you methioned and they will be a great addition to your cards. Now I can have both! Joy Joy. The form fields would be great to have but the product is pluses all the way. I have a printer that thankfulll double sides really well and a Laminator here at work, though I bring in my own laminating sheets but it makes things so much better. Plus I picked up some kewl colour paper last week and print your cards in colour will be a great addition.
I found the Blank Cards you methioned and they will be a great addition to your cards. Now I can have both! Joy Joy. The form fields would be great to have but the product is pluses all the way. I have a printer that thankfulll double sides really well and a Laminator here at work, though I bring in my own laminating sheets but it makes things so much better. Plus I picked up some kewl colour paper last week and print your cards in colour will be a great addition.
Thanks for the quick and helpful reply.
We aim to please
But I wonder why the duplex printer works for you (because many people reported printing issues when using a duplex printer - the back doesn't align properly to the back)... may I ask what kind of printer it is?
Would you please add Handy Haversack to the Wonderous Items? It seems to be missing.
(nevermind. Found that this has already been addressed in another thread)
How about a box for these like the Complete Spell Cards?
And please add me as another vote for form fields.
Thanks!
Last edited by Ahni; 14th February 2007 at 04:16 PM..
Love the cards, great alternative to some pricier options.
Here are my suggested additions:
1) Sheets of most common items (maybe one page of 9 of each): Potion Cure Light Wounds, Potion Cure Moderate Wounds, Ring of Protection +1, Amulet of Natural Armor +1. I prefer to use 1 card per item instead of marking quantities on cards because my players are HORRIBLE at marking off equipment when they use it. This is the primary reason I am using the cards, and it is better if they hand me a card when they drink a potion rather than trusting them to mark off a quantity. For this reason I would actually like a full sheet of each potion, but that's probably asking too much.
2) Cards for unidentified items, specifically potions and scrolls. I like to give an unidentified card to my players with a numeric code on it that is logged in my notes. Then when they identify unidentified potion number 15, I take back "unidentified potion 15" and hand them "Potion of XXXX" card. Right now I am going to use blank cards and write on them, but printed ones would be nicer.
That's it for now, I will probably come up with more as I use them more...
The idea solution would be if the Adobe software actually late you put together your own custom card sheet by selecting the ones you want. But as far as I know, the technology isn't there yet. So the only way it could be done is "popular item" sheets - if an item counts as a popular item, it gets a sheet of its own with 9 copies on it. You can then print out one copy, two, three or whatever knowing that you're only printing out what you need.
If you have Adobe Professional, you can actually do this if the data is included in Text Fields or other fields. (This may work with versions of Adobe more advanced than Reader but less so than Professional, I don't actually know. I only have Adobe Pro 6.) There are actually two ways to do this that I've found. The first way is about copying fields, the second about copying images. Frankly, the second is probably the least complicated if you're not comfortable with fields in Adobe..
First Option:
I am going to use the blank item cards weapon page as an example. I know this will work with blank cards you have filled in from the free blank cards download. I do NOT know if this works with the actual full Complete Item Cards. The demo for that product does not have fields, just the text printed on the page.
1) Open up the page with the type of card you want.
2) Extract that page into another Adobe file. (Document->Page->Extract in 6.0)
3) Choose the Select Object Tool from the Advanced Editing menu.
4) Draw a box around the entire page so that you select every field. They'll turn blue.
5) Hit the delete key. All the fields go away. (This is the data filled in ONLY. You'll still have things like "Attack" and "Critical".
6) Open up the Adobe document with the item page you want to copy. If it's not the same as your original source (i.e. a weapon) then the boxes won't line up.
7) Using the same Select Object Tool you have already, draw a box around the card you want to copy. This will make all of its fields go blue.
8) Choose copy. (Ctrl-C or menu)
9) Go back to the blank page.
10) Choose paste. (Ctrl-V or menu)
11) Click on a field such as Weapon Name and drag the newly copied data over to line up with the background. I generally set up a grid beforehand and snap to it. (See the Adobe help on that.)
12) Repeat steps 10-11 to fill in all the spots. You can also copy something different over.
13) Save the file.
Another option on this one is that instead of step 12 is:
12) With the fields all still highlighted, right-click on one and choose "Create Multiple Copies".
13) Choose that you want 3 across and 3 down. You can adjust spacing as well, but things won't quite line up.
14) Move the various cards into their proper permission by selecting each set of items with a drawn box.
15) Save the file.
The advantage of the Multiple Copies one is that Adobe gives each field a unique name so you can now change any of the fields and it won't change all of the cards. If you use repeated Paste options, when you change one card, all of the other cards change too.
I've found that choosing "Reduce File Size" from the File menu really helps cut down on the size of files manipulated this way. Sometimes very drastically. (I don't know why they bloat.)
Second Option:
Using the same card as a sample. This WILL work with the item demo that I downloaded, so it should work with any cards. It's just not as versatile in the cards you produce. However, this option does allow you to mix and match types of cards. You could make a sheet with a weapon, an armor, a shield, and six more pieces of equipment on it. You could also add spells, monsters, and any other TOGC cards that are the same size.
This works much better if you set up a grid and snap to it for every step.
1) Open up a blank Adobe document. You can create one by printing to Adobe a blank page from Word or something similar. (You can also paste OVER existing cards with this, so that is also an option, plus you get cut lines then.)
2) Open up the page you want to copy a card from.
3) Zoom in on the card you want. The closer you get, the higher resolution of the final card.
4) Choose the Snapshot Tool from the Basic Menu.
5) Draw a box around the card you want to copy. This puts it into the buffer.
6) Go to the blank page.
7) Select the Paste Clipboard Image from the Advanced Commenting -> Attach Menu.
8) Draw a box exactly where the card should sit. The tool automatically pastes the image of the card in for you.
9) Save the file.
Basically, what you've just done is paste in an image of the card you want over whatever was already there. The nice thing is that you can change just one card on a page or make a whole sheet or whatever you want to do.
I don't remember, but I think you have to print "Document and Comments" to get the picture to show on the print.
I do have a quick question on the Complete series. In the final product you buy, are there Text Fields that can be manipulated? If I buy Complete Items or Complete Monsters, do I get text fields I can edit to customize my cards (like in the blank ones) or do I just get images of the cards (like in the demos on RPGNow)?
I do have a quick question on the Complete series. In the final product you buy, are there Text Fields that can be manipulated? If I buy Complete Items or Complete Monsters, do I get text fields I can edit to customize my cards (like in the blank ones) or do I just get images of the cards (like in the demos on RPGNow)?
Off topic, but what the hey...
No text fields in the final product, sorry. But they aren't exactly images either - if you've got a version of Acrobat you'll be able to modify each card.
Hi, just wondering if the Complete Item Cards Update was going to be available soon? I hope to grab them before everything starts to change to fit 4th Edition...I don't care what WoTC changed to stream-line the game, I'm sticking with the hundreds of dollars in 3.5 books I already have, not to mention the Complete Cards sets I own for the 3.5 SRD.
As an avid collector of all the "Complete Cards" series, I have been eagerly awaiting any news as to the updates for the "Complete Item Cards" set.
However, after several attempts to reach anyone via EnWorld and/or the e-mail address provided on the TOGC website, I am still waiting for someone, anyone, to respond. Are you still in business? If so, PLEASE respond to my query, I would really appreciate it.