I have been working on a spell card design for Pathfinder to streamline spell management for my wizard in our current campaign. First, I know: there are a handful of these things out there. I wasn't satisfied with what I saw. I recognize this is equal parts a matter of taste and organizational strategies. What works for me isn't necessarily what works for others.
With that out of the way, here's a PDF with a few pages of samples showing the front and back of a handful of cards. This was my thinking:
1. Color-code the card backgrounds by spell level, not by school. To do this, the cards have to be printed for a particular class. This is both a plus and a minus. I think its more of a plus because spell level is the most significant attribute for a caster.
2. Also include a color-coded symbol for spell school. This is particularly useful for specialized wizards, where you need the specialized school for the extra slot and want to quickly spot the opposition schools.
3. Include blank cards (there are two at the end of the PDF). The point of these should be obvious. :)
4. Don't just replicate the printed spell texts onto a card.
5. As a follow-on to #4, condense the text to get things to fit. Standardize units and abbreviations, remove wordy text and replace it with condensed text or symbols. Resize text that's too big for fields.
6. Recognize the limits of #5. Sometimes, a full spell description doesn't fit.
7. Get the full description for a spell on the card, too. Or at least what will fit.
8. Use a US Business Card size for economy. The 2x3.5" size gives you 10/page using the Avery Business Card sheets. This also allows for cheap lamination using laminating pockets and a $30 heat laminator.
9. Keep it legible. Minimal decoration, no text smaller than 6pt. Primarily use Verdana because it's easy to read.
There are still a few things I need to clean up. Tables in the spell descriptions are hit and miss (anything I do has to be automatable via a script because there are too many spells to do anything by hand afterwards). I am not sold on the "plain" look of the back of the cards. And a few other nits here and there.
I tried an earlier prototype of these in the game and they were a godsend. I know what I think I need, but I'd love to hear from others.
Stuff I'd like to add to this project long term:
- Cards to represent empty spell slots for given levels. This is fairly urgent since keeping a slot or two open is pretty common, and the placeholder means you'd always start the day with the right number of cards in hand.
- Cards to stack with spells that represent multiple spell preparations (e.g., a card with [2 3] on one side and [4 5] on the other which you turn to place the preparation count in the "up" position)
- Cards to stack with spells that represent metamagic
Here is an early prototype of printed cards.
One other design decision was to have the level color boxes bleed off the top edge of the cards for easy viewing in a stack