Making your own power cards

Magus Coeruleus · Jul 13, 2008

Grandpa said:
Not sure what kind of icon junkies we have here, but I wanted to share the icons I made since deciding to tackle magic item and magic item power cards. I made them out of shapes in PowerPoint, dragging curve handles around and such to get everything nice-looking, but I'm not sure if there is an easy way to get those shapes out into other programs people use.

I wanted to keep the orange template from the PHB for the card borders but wanted to visually communicate the daily/encounter/at-will, and now healing surge/consumable power types in addition to the normal power icons. And I figured when thumbing through magic item cards, it would be nice to visually note how many of a given equipment type you had instead of reading it.

The icons have been added to my template files, which you can access here.

Click on the JPG popups for a nicer view of the images.

Very nice! The potion icon makes me think more of alchemy or chemistry (bubbling beaker) than end-product magic potion, which I would expect not to have wide base and to have a cork or other stopper, but I like it a lot nonetheless.

XCorvis · Jul 13, 2008

That's a great start. Thanks Guybrush!

Grandpa · Jul 13, 2008

Magus Coeruleus said:
Very nice! The potion icon makes me think more of alchemy or chemistry (bubbling beaker) than end-product magic potion, which I would expect not to have wide base and to have a cork or other stopper, but I like it a lot nonetheless.

Yeah, I started with a vial but the concept never worked out. I haven't gotten to the section on potions yet so I may try something else.

It was tricky to come up with a magic item layout I liked. For template simplicity, I decided to separate the sets for magic items that have powers and magic items that don't (3 icons in the master slide for those powers, 1 for those w/o). The level / bonus / cost tables in the PHB didn't fit well and seemed of minimal use when people mostly care about the bonus of their magic items, so I created cards without that information, assuming it will be filled in wherever someone wants (upper-right in the card, or in one of the info boxes), and only called out info box requests for other specific abilities based on item level or character attributes.

Ultimately, I knew my players would want to personalize their items with names and the specific armor / weapon type, and I thought this was the best balance of information presented on generic cards for everyone, and making the transition from those cards to personalized cards for those that wanted to tweak them in PowerPoint. I might try a couple more things, but those are the considerations.

I'm about halfway through the set. I'll add them to the complete card set soon. Here's a preview of a generic magic item and a personalized version:

Alphastream · Jul 13, 2008

Mercutio01 said:
After about a week of wrangling and design, Black Plauge and I have come up with what we feel is a serviceable design for using MSE to make character cards.

Great work! I've been hoping someone would come up with some great monster/PC cards. These look great. I look forward to testing them this coming week at my 4E game.

I'm still looking for a good magic item template. I like the Lord Tirian design from page 2 in this thread, so I may just work with that. I'm just short on time, you know, writing mods and such. <grin>

Keep up the good work at DragonAvenue.

Teos

SamuraiJackJr · Jul 14, 2008

Grandpa said:
Yeah, I started with a vial but the concept never worked out. I haven't gotten to the section on potions yet so I may try something else.

It was tricky to come up with a magic item layout I liked. For template simplicity, I decided to separate the sets for magic items that have powers and magic items that don't (3 icons in the master slide for those powers, 1 for those w/o). The level / bonus / cost tables in the PHB didn't fit well and seemed of minimal use when people mostly care about the bonus of their magic items, so I created cards without that information, assuming it will be filled in wherever someone wants (upper-right in the card, or in one of the info boxes), and only called out info box requests for other specific abilities based on item level or character attributes.

Ultimately, I knew my players would want to personalize their items with names and the specific armor / weapon type, and I thought this was the best balance of information presented on generic cards for everyone, and making the transition from those cards to personalized cards for those that wanted to tweak them in PowerPoint. I might try a couple more things, but those are the considerations.

I'm about halfway through the set. I'll add them to the complete card set soon. Here's a preview of a generic magic item and a personalized version:

Great work on this! FYI for all interested, it is very easy to make this into a B&W copy to print out on color cardstock (which is what I am looking for) by simply changing the master slide. I change all of the header's to white, all of the text to black, and all of the circles to light gray. This has been a huge help - thanks for your work and look forward to seeing the items!

shinobi_guyver · Jul 14, 2008

Grandpa said:
Yeah, I started with a vial but the concept never worked out. I haven't gotten to the section on potions yet so I may try something else.

It was tricky to come up with a magic item layout I liked. For template simplicity, I decided to separate the sets for magic items that have powers and magic items that don't (3 icons in the master slide for those powers, 1 for those w/o). The level / bonus / cost tables in the PHB didn't fit well and seemed of minimal use when people mostly care about the bonus of their magic items, so I created cards without that information, assuming it will be filled in wherever someone wants (upper-right in the card, or in one of the info boxes), and only called out info box requests for other specific abilities based on item level or character attributes.

Ultimately, I knew my players would want to personalize their items with names and the specific armor / weapon type, and I thought this was the best balance of information presented on generic cards for everyone, and making the transition from those cards to personalized cards for those that wanted to tweak them in PowerPoint. I might try a couple more things, but those are the considerations.

I'm about halfway through the set. I'll add them to the complete card set soon. Here's a preview of a generic magic item and a personalized version:

Wow... these look excellent. I look forward to seeing the item cards when you finish them.

eloquentaction · Jul 14, 2008

Update to cards...

Not sure anyone still cares, but I've updated the sidebars on my cards with a third type that I think is much better looking.

-- Hirahito

Take a look:

Mercutio01 · Jul 14, 2008

I like that Hirahito.

eloquentaction · Jul 14, 2008

Mercutio01 said:
I like that Hirahito.

Thanks, Mercutio. Coming from a power-card pro like yourself, that means a lot.

BTW - If I get a few moments, I'll see if I can PhotoSlop something for your Item card background. You were talking about having problems with it on the Dragon thread.

Grandpa · Jul 14, 2008

eloquentaction said:
Not sure anyone still cares, but I've updated the sidebars on my cards with a third type that I think is much better looking.

My goals may not be the same, but your cards are super beautiful. And I think the changes you made are a definite improvement, but wish the thin opening / closing lines you use on the right were used as a design template for the areas between each info box (instead of the thick pattern). Hopefully the feedback is welcome. Nice work!

Making your own power cards

Magus Coeruleus

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XCorvis

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Grandpa

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Alphastream

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SamuraiJackJr

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shinobi_guyver

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eloquentaction

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Mercutio01

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eloquentaction

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Grandpa

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