What if you did two flags with a design in the middle, or two crossed fags?

Here is a (crappy) image of *kind of* what I am talking about. (Forgive the image, I only have access to MSPaint at work...  )

Edit: Those are supposed to be eagles on a coin in the middle, for those of you that can only see scribble of blobs of crap.

EAGLES.

Double plus edit: Pretend there are stars on the flag. Cause apparently stars are true to cannon for America-stuff.

Justin, this is a pretty cool idea, it has the rotational symmetry right. I'll have a think.

I was going to say I disagreed with Jackson and that I wouldn't want to invest in a project that was an unknown in any regards, then I thought about how much my Kickstarter did and then how much his did and I thought "You know what, shut up." and I did. 

Phill

I think I might hold that back for the box? Dunno.

I dunno, I do like the flags (also it was a suggestion from James and I like the solid blockness of them). Both of the flags are instantly recognisable as the flags of our two nations, but both have changed since the Revolutionary war, and I like that, that sense of nation and the zeigeist that the flags capture. I toyed with the idea of using military ensigns, or the Naval Jack instead of the Union flag, but again, I like the idea that the Revolutionary war was about more than just two military forces, it was about that sense of nation.

Don, you're like the kind of client I hate - forget reaching for an iconic graphic solution, why not spend 20 hours researching and illustrating historical military units? Thanks. 
To be honest, I am continually aware of flippin' Jackson R with this kind of thing: http://www.kingswildproject.com/images/kwbackhero2.jpg he has got historical Americana on lockdown.  I don't want to use curlicues or the kind of woodtype ornaments I usually like, simply because I don't want this to look like a 'me-too' deck. (Since my Fedora 52 went down so badly! ;-P ) I was thinking of looking at architectural reference, Lukeout's chair suggestion is good, but it would have to be done in a non-JR way.

I'll have more of a ponder tomorrow I reckon, thanks for everyone's input.

Current thinking on the card back - James suggested possibly incorporating the two flags of the nations (both of which have changed since). I quite like the block print effect, but I might dig back in and think about some other ways to represent it.

Phill

Right on the money Don, that's actually what James suggested. I was toying with adding colour behind the lines, but I like the effect of it looking like the engraved printing was done in ink of the appropriate colour. The decks are going to be fairly minimal I think, I was tempted to go crazy lavish but I like the idea of making it look like a real piece of ephemera from that era - I'm going to go nuts with the aged printing on the box I think.

Box next.

Phill

Hi guys, earlier in the year when we launched the Great Whites deck we ran a competition to have a custom deck designed for you - James Watson won and after a lot of discussion he decided on a deck based on the American Revolutionary War. Attached is a screenie of the development for the face cards. I'm going full custom all original on this deck, and I've spent a long time figuring out the face details and including characters from the era - it should be pretty cool, I've got a good feeling about it.

I'm planning to make the deck feel kind of like almost an antique deck from the time, so it will be aged but not overworked - I'm really quite excited about bringing it to life. I'll keep posting as I draw all the threads together and get everything in place.

I hope you guys like it.

Before being too harsh on Ashley for the cost of shipping, the price break down might be of interest - bear in mind that to ship a single deck to the US using Royal Mail, even shipping it as Airmail printed papers to get a reduced rate could cost as much as £7.20, which when you add on the cost of secure packaging could make up about $12 / $13 dollars of that $25 cost. I don't know the deal Ashley has done with Ivory, but 100 decks doesn't win you a very low price per deck - if you assume that he is splitting the money with the designer, then once you remove the actual print cost and the packaging and shipping cost, he could easily be making $2 a deck or less.

So just a heads up that whilst you may consider it 'overpriced' I doubt that it is greed that has forced the price there - for limited runs like this it is more likely that that price is the only way to avoid losing money on the project.

Phill

I bought two dozen decks for 99c each at Slots a Fun in Vegas, brought them back home and thrashed the hell out of them performing close up at gigs and events. They were casino stock bees with the corners clipped: I have a little craft corner clipper here so I just clipped the other corners so they didn't look too weird, and they handled great and did their job nicely, plus I quite liked the story (which involved me getting stopped by customs because stacked together the decks looked like drugs on the X-ray, at which point the customs guy starts pulling all kinds of magic crap, bent forks and the like out of my bag.)

Slots a Fun was so nasty it's awesome, and if you wanted a footlong hot dog (that's probably 60% sawdust by weight) for 59c I'm not sure what other option you've got. Looks like it's been rolled into Circus Circus now as something other than a totally skanky mini casino, so I guess that that's done with now. :-(

I find it remarkable that they would use the word 'dreary' in their marketing - remember it means "depressingly dull and bleak or repetitive". Great, just what you want customers to think.

 
I know that some collectors go nuts for USPCC but if you don't want to gamble your house on a deck launch and you don't want to move 2500 units then they aren't the most practical. There are other printers who do good work although they don't have the same big name. 100 is a manageable launch - if your cards look good, you have a non-terrible video and you are careful with your target you should hit it without too much stress.

Phill

Besides being a gaft deck what else would my cards need to appeal to the magician.

In my opinion / experience with magic, the cards need to be instantly and clearly recognisable. When I spend five minutes generating dramatic momentum leading up to a single moment of amazement where I reveal the card and say "Is that the card you are thinking of?" the response I don't want is "Er, I don't know, wait a second, er..." Just my opinion though of course.

Phill