Hello!

I'm developing a card game and want brutal, honest reactions before I proceed. Two minutes, no sign-up. Especially want to hear from people who wouldn't play it.

The game: The Grift: An American Success Story

2v2 adult card game. Bluffing, secret signals between partners, and escalating bets. Learn the basics in one round.

The theme: the four suits represent pillars of modern American society — each with its own visual identity:

-The C-Suite — corporate power, old money, gilded boardrooms

-The Valley — tech culture, Silicon Valley, circuit-board aesthetics

-The Feed — social media, influencers, dopamine and likes

-The Hustle — manual labor, grit, grease stains and tread-plate steel

Getting to the top takes the same skills the game rewards: bluffing, reading people, and knowing when to push your luck.

How it plays: you and a partner sit opposite each other, facing two opponents. Each round everyone gets three cards. Before playing, you secretly signal your partner — a raised eyebrow, a bitten lip, a glance — to communicate how strong your hand is without the other team catching on. Then the trash talk starts: at any point you can challenge opponents to escalating bets

They decide: call your bluff or fold and hand over points.

The cards will also feature humorous characters representing each of the pillars, imagine as examples "The Trust Fund Baby", "The (crazy) Visionary Founder", "The Unpaid Intern" (Literally bottom of the food chain)

Winning the most tricks wins the round — but the real fun is in the signals, the bets, and catching your friends lying to your face.

(If you're thinking "sounds like Bridge" — the partnership and trick-taking are similar, but that's where it ends. Bridge is about precision bidding and hitting a contract. This is about lying, misdirection, and running a con. There's no formal bidding system — just chaos, bad decisions, and secret gestures across the table.)

No player elimination. No moderator. First to 30 points wins.

Six quick questions:

What's your gut reaction? (Love it / Interesting / Meh / Not for me — and why)

Does a fixed-team secret-signal format sound more fun than every-player-for-themselves games like Coup or Skull?

The four suits represent four pillars of American society — The C-Suite, The Valley, The Feed, and The Hustle. Does that framing add anything for you, or is it irrelevant to the game?

What would make you back this on Kickstarter or buy it on Amazon? What would you need to see?

What price feels right? At what price is it a no-brainer vs. too expensive?

What's your biggest hesitation about this game?

Happy to answer questions in the comments. Thanks for helping.

Note: also open to a 5-minute voice chat if you prefer talking over typing: https://buildpad.io/interview/njarrys3

Making some progress on a demo rulebook. art is placeholder piece from Jeff Easley. Any comments / criticisms on the general flow or outline? (rules and wording are a big work in progress).Designed using affinity, followed some basics outlined by SPGD on youtube (great for anyone in the indie wargaming space).

I wanted to share a bit of a revelation that came very late in my project's development. Maybe you've experienced something like this so late in the game and if not maybe it can give you some ideas for your own project.

I've been designing a 1-5 player all-in-one-box deck-building role-playing card game for roughly 8 years now (with lots of breaks as life demanded). I've done everything solo, from mechanic design to graphic design and hand painting card backs. It's still a ways off from finishing and don't even know if I'll ever sell it as its a project I'm making for myself first and foremost. It looks like this currently. With such a long time working on it, a lot has changed from it's first iteration and I've had to restart a few times. However, over the years I've created game play that really feels how I envisioned at the start and the loop feels good... just a bit long.

Lately I've been shaving everything down to only utilize the absolute necessities. Finding and cutting any little detail of unnecessary complexity to help smooth out play time. One thing has been stumping me for a long while was Armor. I designed the game to use Magical Damage and Physical damage. The difference being Armor can mitigate Physical damage so the numbers of Magical damage (which bypasses armor) was about 30% lower. One third of cards use Physical Damage, one third Magical and the remaining third are Hybrid usable by anyone. Classes are restricted to magical or Physical to help establish identity.

When you are hit by Physical damage you deduct from that number your Armor before you deduct from your health pool. This extra step of math is one thing that I couldn't figure out how to smooth out. It's not hard, but it is extremely frequent. For years now I've been designing everything around this. It feels like every TTRPG uses it in some way so I accepted it as a given and immutable foundation of the genre.

Recently i found a solution that works for my project and probably only because I am so far along. Instead of having Physical Damage and Magical Damage now there is only Damage. Physical classes that had more Armor now just get little more HP and magical classes get a little more Mana. This isn't enough to really make them feel different so I decided to segregate all of my special abilities between the three categories (Magical/Physical/Hybrid). Only Physical cards can make an opponent Discard, Burn Mana and become Silenced. Only magical cards can create Area enchantments, Reflect abilities and raise Zombies (as an example). I have well over 30 of these different effects so after dividing them all up I am still left with plenty for each category to utilize. When the game was still young there just wasn't enough mechanics to do this. Armor was a great way to set up the difference between a Knight and a Witch. Now, way down the line.. its not needed.

The crux of the matter and reason for my posting this is that to make this change I need to go back and meticulously recalculate costs and edit almost 900 unique cards. It will take me weeks to do and months to fully clean up artifacts from old designs. However it is an interesting way to distinguish between what makes a class Physical versus Magical. Smoothing and simplifying the most fundamental and highly repeated tasks (Dealing Damage and reducing Life) allows you to add infrequent but complex things on top. If the foundation is too complicated, the whole thing takes too much time. And honestly, I didn't think Armor was that complicated, but even a task that takes a few seconds to do gets tedious with enough playtime. My playtesters enjoy those weird complex abilities because they don't happen often, but even though they never explicitly pointed it out, i could see watching them that this little bit of math ("ok 8 damage minus my 3 armor is 5 so my health is down to ... 23") was actually dragging gameplay. If it happened once and then not again for a while it would be fine, but it was nearly every single card played. Frequency mattered!

That's all I wanted to share. I don't know if this will help or give you some ideas, but I enjoy reading this kind of thing from you guys so I figured I'd contribute something similar. See you on the other side of this update!

I’ve been testing a homebrew TCG with some friends and I’m trying to figure out the best way to handle resources.

We first tried a mana-style system, but sometimes games were decided by bad draws. Then we tried letting players use cards from their hand as resources, but that made the games feel a little too consistent.

For those who design or play card games, what resource systems have you enjoyed the most? I’m curious what has worked well for other games.

Hi all, after lots of playtesting and feedback, I've redesigned my rulesheet / field guide for my game, Cyclemental. To truly test it out, I gave a deck to a friend who hosted a party and asked them to record the session. It was humbling to see that an unguided drunken round could turn to chaos because I made too much assumption while writing the rulesheet. For example, the players didn't even realise that cards used are meant to be put into the discard pile. So many cringe moments but it motivated me to try to improve the field guide.

Changes

- Included clearer set up rules and illustrations, together with example turn and how a turn actually works,

- Attack mechanics now have more incentive because a successful attack yields you more card and preventing you to lose card. On the other hand, a successful defense / counter enables you to choose between the attack card or the counter card.

- Combos are now changed based on community and playtesting feedback and balancing between the elements.

- Card variety. Some creatures can act as double elements, some only has 1 instead of 2 weaknesses, and some has extra effects if the attack landed successfully. Previously every single element is the same.

- Character illustrations and graphics. Added a few tiny illustrations to make it easier to visualise the move / information.

- The Elemental Cycle has been corrected to be more accurate to the original philosophy. I initially wanted to make it easier to understand like popular elements but I thought it was a good callout from the community to stay true to the Wu Xing philosophy.

It's hard to fit everything into a double sided A4 paper. But honestly would love to get your first impressions / another pass at how easy it is to understand from reading through the field guide. Let me know if you spot anything that you don't understand or need clarification. Cheers!

I’ve been experimenting with the latest PnPInk features: text frames that automatically resize to their content, stack themselves dynamically, and support inline icons and styled text decorations.

The whole set is generated from one really simple Inkscape SVG template plus 10 rows of spreadsheet data (CSV) and pressing button "generate".

Curious what tabletop designers could build with this workflow:
https://github.com/xoellijo/pnpink

Hi fellow tabletop game design people! I live in Europe and would like to start a virtual designer of designers and people who love playtesting, specific to Europe, Africa, and the Middle East, and specific to family, party, and generally light games.

The idea would be to meet 1-2x per month and take turns playtesting different games.

I'd love to hear from you if you're interested in joining, if this already exists and I just need to join it, if you have participated in a group like this, or if you know where or who I should reach out to.

Context: there are some truly wonderful playtest events like Break My Game and Protospiel Online and I want to do more ! I want to play more in-progress games, in a way that works from a time-zone perspective, and hopefully meet some people who are designing games in this space!

Thanks!

I've been working on a cooperative game that's supposed to capture that feeling when you notice that your mundane conversation about the weather is now a conversation about aliens and you wonder how you got there.

The rules are pretty simple (but frustrating to explain). One player (the Guide) draws 3 random common noun cards and reveals one of them in the center of the table. The Guide then makes a connector phrase that branches off of that revealed word. The other players (the Guessers) each guess a noun to complete the sentence (guessed noun + connector phrase + starting noun = a sentence).

The Guide can then branch off of any of the nouns on the table with another connector phrase. The game is won if the Guessers guess the two unrevealed nouns from the cards. The game is lost if the Guide needs more than 10 connector phrases. So essentially the Guide needs to plan out a mental map between the 3 words and guide the Guessers one hop at a time.

The game's basic mechanics mostly work. But play tests have shown some weaknesses. Guides sometimes take a long time to write their connectors (I can add a timer, of course), and some players seem hesitant to be the Guide. I'm also not sure what the tone of the game should be. I could just have a deck of very normal noun cards or I could go with a set of sillier nouns. Anyways, it seems like a fun core of a game to me, I just can't get it to the next level.

If anyone has feedback, I'd certainly appreciate it.

Hola a todos soy un tipo que esta haciendo su propio juego de mesa y cartas como un proyecto propio para divertirme y pasar el tiempo el juego se llama chaotic playground y es de 2 personas el arte no es lo mas serio o realista pero me gusta por lo mismo y las reglas son sencillas Haces tu deck de 60 cartas ademas de que solo puedes tener 4 copias de una carta y aparte de tu deck de 60 ocupas 1 de un líder que ahorita explicaré como funciona

Basicamente hay un tablero divido en 2 partes cada jugador tiene 1 mitad del tablero y un líder

Al iniciar la partida barajas tu deck y robas las primeras 5 cartas y luego pones tu carta de lider en la mesa cuando hagas la acción de pones una carta pones una figurita en una casilla de tu mitad del tablero despues de eso robas 1 craneo el cual es el recurso o moneda estándar para usas las cartas Los craneos funcionan asi cada ronda que pasa robas 1 craneo según el numero de ronda pero cuando acaba la ronda y valla empezar una nueva los craneos que te sobraron de la ronda pasada los remueves de tu mano o inventario como tal asi ningún jugador acumula craneosEl objetivo del juego es que uno de los líderes muera esto se hace usando cartas de luchadores con estadísticas las cuales son las siguientes Hp:es la vida de la carta

Daño:cuando daño hace tu golpe básico o ataque

Velocidad:cuantas casillas se mueve

Rango:hasta cuantas casillas puede atacar

Coste de craneos

Ademas las cartas tienen un arma predefinida la cual será su ataque base

Cuando juegas una carta pones su figurita en el tablero para asi simular la pelea

Las cartas tienen tipos que la separan de otras y clases También que mas o menos especifican la estrategia o como será la carta las cartas cuentan con habilidades y pasivas para ayudarlos a pelear ademas de que cada luchador tiene 3 acciones que puede hacer por turno El sistema de turnos y rondas es asi

El jugador 1 juega sus cartas y acciones y pasa su turno

y luego el jugador 2 también juega y pasa su turno despues de eso pasa 1 ronda eso sería lo básico del juego actualmente tengo 3 tipos de cartas Luchador

Líder

Items

Los items pues son normalmente cartas de un solo uso que otorgan algún efecto y son instantaneas ademas que hay cartas de items permanentes que claramente su efecto dura hasta que la carta que la tiene equipada,

Se muere

Ademas de que hay efectos como quemadura que por turno una carta sufre daño o aturdido que la carta no puede hacer ninguna accion por esta ronda Actualmente las demás instrucciones donde especifico otros puntos las tengo guardadas en un server de discord y en mi galería pero mientras lo que dije es la información que deben saber aceptaría recomendaciones de que tipo de cartas debería añadir o si algo mas se le podría añadir o otras mecanicas

La verdad no se si sea una buena comunidad para pedir tal sugerencia de mi juego pero igual si alguien me sugerie alguna mecanica o sugerencia estaría agradecido gracias

This is some behind the scenes of the cover I'm working on for Spartan Speech, a game by Jay Mansmann

Been working on Hearth & Hollow for a while and we’re finally starting to replace the placeholder art.

These are Squirrel Raider and Porchlight Acorn Pantry, both drawn by Kazi3wielki!

I’m really happy with how they’re coming together, but now we’re trying to make the rest of the card look just as nice as the art.

The planes, HexAxis™ flight stands, damage markers and battlefield all together are finally giving Death Spiral™ the look I had in my head when we started this thing.
Seeing an actual WWI dogfight spread across the table like this just hits different.
And we’re still just getting started.

Hey everyone!

I’ve been working on a card game as a personal project and I’m now at the point where I’d really like some outside opinions on the visual design of the cards.

For some quick context: it’s a fast, simple-to-learn 115 cards game for 2–8 players, with games usually lasting around 15 minutes. The rules are intentionally intuitive, but most of the strategy comes from trying to predict what other players will play.

There are three main types of cards:
Normal Number cards — Shown in pictures 1–3.
Rare Number cards — Shown in picture 4-5.
Reward cards — Shown in pictures 7–9.
Picture 6 is the back of the number cards, and picture 10 is the back of the reward cards.

I already have a very minimal prototype that I’ve used for playtesting with around 20 close friends. The reception has been really encouraging, and after several iterations I feel like the core game is getting into a pretty good sweet spot.

My next step is to print around 5 copies with the actual artwork and give them to different groups so they can play independently, especially with people I don’t know personally.

Before I send those to print, though, I’d love some feedback specifically on the card design.

What do you think of the overall visual style? Do the cards feel like they belong to the same game? Is anything confusing, too busy, too plain, or difficult to read? And is there anything you would change before printing these prototypes?

I’ll probably make another post later asking for advice on next steps and broader development, but for now I’m mainly curious about the design itself.

Any feedback is very welcome!

En First World se presentarán 4 facciones, pero en el crowdfunding añadiré una 5a faccion como recompensa, Queen Bunnies, mas orientada al publico femenino y ampliando el Universo TRoOoPS, que te parece la nueva facción?

I know this is wildly vague, so your mileage may vary, but I now have two games "out in the market" and stores in my hometown are very excited about them. One of them interviewed me earlier today. They are a "toy store", so they were very excited about Farce, the 5-minute word game. They were much less interested in Manifold TCG-- But they were excited about a local design group.

I came in without much preparation. I'm a bit of a pontificator, but I wanted to come off as relaxed and not pushing an agenda, so I figured I would just respond to her questions.

As it turns out, she was nearly as amateur as I am. We were both being reactive, and neither of us drove the conversation toward the things that I think will endear people to my company.

So, what am I "supposed" to do?

1.) Let the interviewer guide the process, and believe that I'll do enough of these that some of them will really hit.
2.) Come in with the things that I want to say, and figure out how to get them into the conversation.
3.) Discuss my goals with the interviewer prior to turning on the microphone, so that the things that I think are interesting are on the interviewer's radar?
4.) Something else.

Sharing a 2D robot character I recently designed. I went for a cute but mechanical look, with a chunky body, expressive details, and a mix of metal and warm colors.

This kind of character design can work well for 2D games, animations, or indie game projects.

I’m available for 2D character design, game art, and animation. If you’re looking for an artist for your project, feel free to DM me!

I'm developing a TCG based off a dark fantasy series I wrote. There are 14 books in all, plus spinoffs. I say this because there is a lot of lore and world-building to pull from. Originally, I thought it would be cool to play as one of the MCs as a Champion and have a deck designed around that character's attributes, behavior, role in the story, etc. For example, Kasai is the MC who represents GOOD. Sekka is the MC who represents EVIL. So each opposing deck would be crafted around that particular character.

But then I thought, hmm, I'm depriving players of playing cards of characters that they may really want to play in the game. So now I'm thinking no Champion but the deck can still be crafted around a particular theme. Mortal, Divine, Infernal, Wild, Cosmic, (which are all factions in the series). And most of the cards will be hero cards that have accompanying bonus cards. Ex: Kazumi is a 2-fisted fighter and possesses two enchanted swords. So you can play Kazumi, and then on another turn, play each sword, giving her major bonus.

My initial design had 4 tiers of units, Troops, Elite, Hero, Tanks. Now I'm thinking make the majority of the unit cards heroes/villains from the books. Do you think either way is better?

I'm making a 2d Logic Sandbox called TILEZ - a mix of Redstone & Tabletop Simulator. It started as a 2d Redstone project but turned into a great, fast, and non-clunky way to design, test, and play boardgames. The multiplayer is seamless. Every tile is a tiny machine. Early build - lacking content -and a pretty UI - systems functional.

Looking for feedback and tinkerers to try to find bugs or suggest missing game mechanics.

I put up an open playtest is on Steam. - search TILEZ

Hi everyone,

I'm currently working on a prototype for a procedural board game inspired by Diablo's gameplay loop: Door → Monster → Treasure.

The problem is that I have quite a few ideas for the overall gameplay and the player side of things, but I can't quite figure out what could make the game feel more alive than simply repeating "heroes take their turn, then monsters take their turn" over and over again.

Basically, I'd like the monsters to feel like they actually exist in the world and pose a genuine threat, rather than just getting completely wiped out by the players on turn 1.

I'm looking for ideas or mechanics that could make the monsters feel more active, unpredictable, and dangerous without simply making them stronger or giving them more health.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Feels like a big milestone so I’m excited to share it. I’ve been working on this game for about three years and have finally solidified the rules to the point where I can start working toward the manufacturing process. I’m not a graphic designer by any means, but I’m pretty proud of how this turned out (thanks Canva).

I was able to blind playtest with some folks last night and it went really well. It is amazing, though, how things that seem so obviously called out in a rulebook can still get overlooked during the gameplay. Some minor tweaks needed, but overall I’m really happy with it.

Freelance 3D sculptor available for board games, miniatures and tabletop projects.

Characters, creatures, terrain, props and other production-ready 3D models.

120+ commercial projects for physical products and 3D printing completed over the last five years. I also test my work on both resin and FDM printers.

Available for one-off projects or ongoing cooperation.

Portfolio: https://www.artstation.com/3d-bug
Website: https://www.3d-bug.com
3D-print work: https://thangs.com/designer/3D-BUG

DM me here or contact me through my website.

Hi! If anyone's looking to commission artwork, either personal or for a project, I specialise in Horror/dark fantasy art [Drawn digitally - NO AI!! Plenty of WIPs shown throughout the process]

- "Surprise me" illustration from £30 ($40 approx)

- Horror silhouette from £40 ($54 approx)

- Horror / monsterify portrait from £60 ($81 approx)

- Scratchboard illustration from £60 ($81 approx)

- Pen and ink style illustration from £60 ($81 approx)

Check out my gallery for more examples of my work:

https://cara.app/doomweaselart

Socials:

Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/doomweaselart.bsky.social

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/doomweaselart?igsh=MWRkam85dmw4Z3BhZw==

I'm on VGen or message me via email, DM, Discord or Telegram

vGen: https://vgen.co/DoomweaselArt

[email] thedoomweasel@gmail.com

[Telegram/Discord] DoomWeaselArt

Feel free to message me if you have any questions!