Printing your own CCG Cards Howto, Where, & Prices

[DavidBeoulve]

These are the links I have found once I learned the right words to Google: "Playing Card Sheets perforated" sans quotes.

Printing Your Own Cards:

Design-A-Card "UPrintEm"
120 cards =~ $10
600 cards =~ $50
"$10 Each pack contains 20 sheets of 6 cards per sheet!  This means that you can print 2 decks of cards!!"

Playing Card Sheets - Perforated
20 sheets (120 cards) =~$6.8 + shipping
75 sheets (450 cards) =~$24 + shipping
"$0.34
25+  $0.32
100+  $0.28
1000+  $0.22
plus $3.85 shipping for up to 75 sheets"

PlainCards.com
120 Cards, 15 master Sheets, 2 matching card boxes =~ $13.85
360 Cards, 45 master Sheets, 6 matching card boxes =~ $36.50
432 Blank Cards with Blank Backs (54 Sheets 432 Cards) =~ $31.00
"These cards are also micro-perforated  with 8 cards on a master sheet.  They are blank on both sides.  If you want a standard deck of cards on one side, you can download the file "Standard Deck", open with the QuickCards program and print.  The Playing Card Clear Plastic Coating should be applied after printing with inkjet printers.  MAKE DECKS OF CARDS THAT LOOK AND FEEL LIKE REAL PLAYING CARDS."

Rapid POD
Lists "Playing Cards" as something they do, but no prices.

Blank Face Poker Deck & Blank Both Sides Poker Deck
$7 per deck, with or without a back
How to print thread
Design-A-Card with PDF, Word & Publisher templates. Seems related to the Design-A-Card link above.

LESSON #38: PROTOTYPING CARD GAMES
(see the Blank Cards section) Good tips and advice from prototyping on other cards with labels (which I've done) to making real cards.
Also shows you how to make boxes. Be sure to check out their whole "Custom Game Design" articles ranging from CCG to RPG. Looked like good stuff.
Links to "Playing Card Sheets - Perforated" listed above and...

TM Playing Cards
Has a nifty online "create your own deck, front & back" option, complete with uploading graphics, until I realized there is no way to have more than one type of face card... but then it's only to get a QUOTE not actually create the cards, so don't panic.
Fill out Online Form for a Quote

East Playing Cards
No prices listed, but handles custom cards.
It's not immediately apparent if you can get custom cards made without the standard card borders indicating Ace of Spades, for example, but they do have round cards and Tarot Card sized card-stock.

Dick Blick Art Supply
Everyone needs more Dick in their life. I punched the guy who told me that. (actually I started talking about my wife, I don't mind the art crowd as I try to be an artist)
Blank Playing Cards  Small    List $2.59 · Save 23% $1.99
Blank Playing Cards  Large    List $3.79 · Save 21% $2.99
Sadly, you can only DRAW on these, not really print on them... unless you have a photo-printer that might take something this size.
"Small cards have red backing. 2½" × 3½" (64 mm × 89 mm).
Large cards have blue backing. 3½" × 5" (89 mm × 127 mm)."

The Crafty PC Blank Playing Cards
Blank Playing Cards
9 sheets to a pack/72 cards = $9.00
Clearly, others have better prices.

Some GUIDELINES for PRODUCING SMALL EDITIONS of HAND-MADE PLAYING CARDS
Great reading, though some of these articles include people who haven't touched computers to do their artwork and have to do everything from scanning to hand engraving to get their cards made, my hat's off to them. Just pick and choose what you want to read about.

Useful notes on making and publishing your own Tarot deck
An incredible read with excellent links for those who are serious about their CCG printing.
Scroll down to "My Method of making Handmade Decks"

Playing Cards Publishers and Manufacturers
"A note about the classifications below. I have three designations for entries in this list: Printer, Publisher, and Vendor. "Printer" means I think this company owns card production apparatus. "Publisher" means I think they have a product line and brand name identity. "Vendor" means I think they had a deck (or a few decks) produced for them and are selling them to the public. Please don't send printing or publishing requests to vendors; don't expect printers to be able to sell to you direct (unless you want to buy 20,000 units); and, of course, don't expect publishers to jump at the chance to publish your work."

USI Laminators
The Roll Laminators cost the big bucks, but the Pouch ones are a couple hundred. Google's Froogle will net you more information.

Tips from a Card-Printing Road Warrior:
"I found the way you don't put 9 cards on a 81/2x11inch you put 8 on a 60 pounds Georgia Pacific card stock and you laminate it with 3mil it gives a nice thin rough smooth cards that is playable for life , a bit thicker than the real ones but not much,"

Make your CCG an Online Computer Game
If you want to make your game playable as a Computer Card-Trading Game using the GatlingEngine, head to the Developer WIKI on that.
Alternatively you can purchase C#/VB.NET and go to town on your own, or check out SourceForge.net.


Links that Digress...
Modern Art review - a card game that involves amassing wealth through acquiring and auctioning art.

GamersGoneBad.com - my artwork & online web comic about videogames and my hot little elven lass (in real life she's a Latina).

[Veritas Games]

Plain cards, it should be noted, have a width above that of Bridge cards, but are narrower than Poker Cards.

The Crafty PC cards are actually "Plain Cards" being resold.  So, they are more expensive than they are at Plain Cards.

[joepub]

Since we're on the topic:

If I want to create a game with 70 different cards (roughly)

How would I go about ordering/printing/packaging/etc these cards if I wanted:

-5 "decks" of 70
-20 "decks" of 70
-100 "decks" of 70
-more than that



Can you just outline (with a sample retailer), in layman's terms, the easiest way to go about those processes?

[Veritas Games]

Same backs, or 70 unique backs?  Production quality or prototype quality?  True playing card stock or just 12 or 14 point C2S standard stock?

As a general rule it is bloody expensive to go to a professional printer and get one copy of anything done on an offset press.  Same goes for 50 copies.  For slightly more than the cost for a 100 copies you can get 500 copies generally, and for slightly more than that you can get 1000 copies.  Initial price is in the films (used to setup the offset plates) and on the setup of the print run itself.  After that, you are basically just paying for paper and ink.

RapidPOD supposedly offers POD playing cards but they have reportedly dreadful customer service historically, are inattentive, don't return calls, and according to some, they sometimes don't even fulfill your orders.  I'm not certain that they use true playing card stock.

[joepub]

Okay, lets say 500 decks of regular size (52/54)....

Either custom backed, or one of those standard blue/red backs.
What's the cost going to be?

Let's assume a standard poker-card quality.

[Veritas Games]

There is only one domestic game card manufacturer that I know of that will even produce 500 decks.  That's Delano.  You'll have to ask them for a custom quote.  However, when I last priced 100 card decks with Delano the costs were:

$3,700 for the decks in cellowrap (no deck boxes)
$6,500 for the decks in tuckboxes with rules
$8,700 for the decks in tuckboxes, with rules, packed in a printed Point-of-Purchase display

I'm not sure how much you'd pay for a 50 card deck.  Presumably substantially less.  I'd say about 2/3 of that price (I think some of the fixed costs may make it more than half).  But that's a guess.  You'd have to ask them.

To get somebody who does cards willing in 500 deck quantities other than Delano you'll probably have to go overseas if you don't want to pay an arm and a leg.  500 decks is a TON of trouble for a non-playing card printer because they don't have the tools.  For a playing card printer, they want to work in higher volumes in general (in the thousands of decks).

As for deck size -- your deck size should be some exact multiple (including 1/2) of the press sheet size of your printer to minimize costs (otherwise they have to charge you for printed on sheets even though they may cut off half of it and discard it).

[Veritas Games]

BTW -- if your deck is exactly standard size I misspoke, but couldn't edit it.  Few people other than hobby game card manufacturers can deal with non-standard deck sizes, but there are a number of American manufacturers who can get you decks of standard size.

http://www.customizedplayingcards.com/wst_page8.html

As you can see, these guys do decks down to 2 decks, but at a cost of $12.00+ per deck, which is insane if you want to get to market with the decks.

Also, other than hobby card manufacturers, most people will probably not be equipped to do really cool tuck boxes and packed point of purchase displays (and, in my experience, that's where the extra cost really piles on, as seen from the Delano figures).

[joepub]

There is only one domestic game card manufacturer that I know of that will even produce 500 decks.  That's Delano.  You'll have to ask them for a custom quote.  However, when I last priced 100 card decks with Delano the costs were:

$3,700 for the decks in cellowrap (no deck boxes)
$6,500 for the decks in tuckboxes with rules
$8,700 for the decks in tuckboxes, with rules, packed in a printed Point-of-Purchase display

Should that read "when I last priced 1000 card decks"?

It seems to me that $37 for a deck doesn't really make much sense.


So, is that with custom backs? And what's the quality on those?

[Julian]

There is only one domestic game card manufacturer that I know of that will even produce 500 decks.  That's Delano.  You'll have to ask them for a custom quote.  However, when I last priced 100 card decks with Delano the costs were:

$3,700 for the decks in cellowrap (no deck boxes)
$6,500 for the decks in tuckboxes with rules
$8,700 for the decks in tuckboxes, with rules, packed in a printed Point-of-Purchase display

Should that read "when I last priced 1000 card decks"?

It seems to me that $37 for a deck doesn't really make much sense.

If it's a quote for 500 decks, of 100 cards each, it's only about $7.40 a deck. (He didn't actually specify how many decks the quote was for.)

Printing incurs large initial costs before even one card is printed. A run of 100 decks might well cost way too much for it to make sense.

[Veritas Games]

Should that read "when I last priced 1000 card decks"?

It seems to me that $37 for a deck doesn't really make much sense.


So, is that with custom backs? And what's the quality on those?

Five hundred decks with 100 cards per deck.  That's over $17.00 per deck ($8700 / 500 decks = $17+) once they are in tuck boxes, with rules, and in point of purchase displays.  Yes, that's insane.  Which is the reason why I'm trying to tell you that domestic production in units of less than multiple thousands is not cost effective for mass market distribution.  For less than twice as much you can get like 6 times as many decks.

This was a quote for 4 colors front and back with a single back design and unique faces on each of the 100 cards on 300 gsm playing card stock (if memory serves).

[joepub]

Yeah, but that's only $7.40 for cellophaned.

What I am considering them for doesn't require a rulebook insert, because its part of a RPG "box set": Rulebook, cards, Character sheets, necessary dice.

(that is, if I decide to go ahead with the idea).

What is the cellophane packaging? Is it like the packaging for Magic, YuGiOh and those sorts of cards - the booster packs?

[Veritas Games]

Yeah, but that's only $7.40 for cellophaned.

As an FYI, unless you are selling direct, $7.40 per deck is insane.  You'd have to have a retail price of around $20.00 to make even the smallest profit.

What I am considering them for doesn't require a rulebook insert, because its part of a RPG "box set": Rulebook, cards, Character sheets, necessary dice.

See the above.  This is even worse.  It'll drive up the retail price of your boxed set by like $20.00 unless you sell ONLY direct, in which case, without advertising, chances are you won't sell all 500 units.

What is the cellophane packaging?

I haven't bought from Delano, but I assume that it is cellowrap.  Cellowrap is what the outside of decks of most CCGs.

Keep in mind that if you don't get a point of purchase display then many retailers will hate dealing with your decks, as they'll have to put your decks out loose on the table.

[daMoose_Neo]

CCG production is insane.
Your best bet is to totally bypass CCG style production and go with more of a flash card production. Drive costs significantly downward while still fullfilling the same goal.
90% of the appearance of CCGs right now is to appeal to the collector crowd. Collectors collect because they're an investment. 500 copies of a small press RPG with cards won't likely rank very high on the InQuest or Scrye "Must Have" list. Because of that, you're free of a few constraints.

Sides, thats $7.50 for the cards, just wrapped. About, what, $2.00 for a good book (155 copies of my last RPG cost me about $2.30 per copy. Higher quantitiy, varying production values will affect the final cost per). Consider about $.50 per box to house this package, plus package printing, if you get creative with the local Kinkos or such, could run you $.25 per facing and could possibly use one sheet to print the sides if you really wanted. Dice can run you about a nickel per, so that'll depend on what you want.
SO, you're looking at about $10.00, give or take, cost. Retail sales through distribution means that $10 has to AT LEAST be 35% of the final price. Without making profit, and not counting any shipping costs to and from, your game will need to run about $28.00 per copy. Direct, that means $18.00 profit. Distro? Nothing. Also have to deal then with people looking at that for $28.00 or the D&D starter set for $25.00.

[joepub]

Your best bet is to totally bypass CCG style production and go with more of a flash card production.

Okay - can you run me through what this is?
Or should we open a new thread, as it is now not about "CCG" style cards?

I'm looking to create an RPG with card-based mechanics...
The cards would all come within the RPG box, and then players would build decks from the cards contained within.
The total amount of different cards could easily range to... 200-250 unique cards.

I want the cards to have an image, some data... and not look hideous to the naked eye. : P


What are my options for producing the cards?
(Note: I'm not declaring that I am taking on this project, just looking into it.)

[Veritas Games]

I'm looking to create an RPG with card-based mechanics...

Irrelevant.  Other than randomization (which is usually relegated primarily to CCG boosters), printing CCGs and non-CCGs is really quite similar.

What are my options for producing the cards?

Do the cards need to be full color, or will black and white do?  If so, you can probably get them done here in the U.S. fairly cheaply (a one color process should be somewhat cheaper).

Otherwise, go to a printer overseas and pray they'll print a run of just 500 decks.  If you don't need a ton of space on the face of the cards you can save some money by using bridge-sized cards instead of poker-sized cards.

I'm still confused as to how you expect players to build a deck of 200+ cards (per your last post) if you are only putting 50+ in a boxed set (per a previous post of yours saying that you were going to print them as a standard deck).  Do you expect people to buy a whole extra boxed set for 50 more cards?  Are you now expecting to put 4 full decks of cards in each box?

Dude, you are looking at a REALLY expensive game.  I strongly recommend for an indy game that you just make the cards into a PDF and make the PDF of the cards available freely with an option to buy pre-printed cards (which you do somewhere print on demand).

Nate has found a somewhat economical way to make custom boosters in smallish quantities, but I remain unconvinced that the cost Nate probably incurs (haven't seen his balance sheet) make sense for producing entire decks of cards.  And almost any method for producing a deck of cards to include in a game is insanely expensive unless you do the printing overseas and do it in multiples of a couple of thousand decks.

Printing actual playing cards is simply not for the weak of heart.

I too want to hear more of what Nate is talking about with flash card production, but I presume that he means to make cards on standard coated stock (not true playing card stock), make it a little thinner than normal, and potentially with square corners.  At that point, you can find an inexpensive domestic printer to do the job.  Printers almost always have paper slitters (or you can get the sheets cut by a good finishing service).  It's actually the round corners of the cards that typically requires a special die cutting process or access to a corner rounder of the right radius.

Square corner cards do not shuffle as well as round corner cards (unless they are put in card sleeves), and particularly with thinner stocks, squared corners are prone to bending and getting creases in them or tears.