OD&D Designing Spell Cards

[Jack Daniel]

Alongside my house rules and character sheet, a while back I did up a heap of spell cards for my BECMI/RC campaign — or to get pedantic about it, "FX cards," since I include psionics too.

I need to keep them printer friendly for obvious reasons, but they're also kind of, I don't know, plain? Unavoidably lackluster in appearance? Has anyone else designed their own spell cards for a home campaign? What do you do to make them visually appealing, useful and functional, or whatever else you prioritize?

I'm not looking to solve any specific problem here. I just want to shoot the breeze and swap ideas. Suggestions and anecdotes are welcome.

 

[aco175]

I like function over form. The name, class, and level should be large enough and easy enough to read to sort them fast. The text can be shorthand to keep the font large enough and more direct to the point (I have the book if I need to look it up, right).

There could be a color-coded border for class or even level. I would not want a color background since the printer cost would go up and eyes are getting too old to want to read black text on red background. Using the border for level of the spell might work since I already know the class and would tend to only have those cards in front of me.