2012 DW Convention ~ Cripple Mr. Onion Card School

[Jan Van Quirm]

SUIT THEMES
As you can see I've edited this so we don't have a string of related threads on various aspects and can do an integral poll on how to theme the decks from the many excellent suggestions we've had coming in.

Due to space considerations in the poll, please read the following explanations of the options first BEFORE you use your 1 vote!

• A: Regional
  Geographical/continental areas) ~ Circle Sea; Ramtops; Agatean Empire; XXXX
  OR Political axes ~ A-M (economic); Klatch (Tribal); Lancre/Uberwald/Borogravia (Horror); Ephebe/Djelibeybi/Tsort/Omnia (philosophical)
  
  B: Suit associated
  Examples only
  Hearts ~ k = Carrot; q = Adorabelle Dearheart?; j = Casanunda; a = Rosie Palm
  Spades ~ k = Patrician; q = Susan; j = Jonathan Teatime; a = Death
  Diamonds ~ k = Moist; q = Lily Weatherwax; j = CMOT; a = Mr. Shine
  Clubs ~ k = Cohen; q = The Low King ; j = Chrysoprase; a = Detritus
  
  C: Series Groups
  Death (Mort, Reaperman etc) = Spades; Witches (Wyrd Sisters, Wintersmith etc) = Hearts; The Watch (Guards! Guards! Nightwatch etc) = Clubs; Wizards (Colour of Magic, Unseen Academicals etc) = Diamonds
  
  D: Ranks
  Kings ~ Patrician; Low King; Cenobiarch (Omnia - Brutha/Vorbis); Pteppic/Ptraci
  Queens ~ of the Elves; Magrat/Witches; Lady Margolotta; The Duchess of Borogravia
  Jacks/Knights ~ Moist; Carrot; Wm de Worde; CMOT
  Aces ~ Death; Granny W; Ponder Stibbons; Patrician
  
  E: Inclusive/Random
  All face cards ~ 54 characters!
  Random would be a catalog of unassigned characters that for you to make your own personalised suits applied to a 'universal' template
  
  F: Something else
  PLEASE say what something else if you don't like any of the other suggestions.

Where I've put in specific characters it's a combination of those already put forward or my own examples - these aren't intended to be definitive and we can discuss specifics for the suit face cards after we've got the theme sorted.

BIG EDIT 12th March 2012 - have deleted the rest as we're further on now. Here's the template for front cards and the 'generic' back design which can also be used for you to make your own if you like!

Bog standard face card template - use this as the background for your design as it says and then either block out the grey line and text or delete that background layer when you've got the basic drawing down

This is my original work and I freely allow people to use it as the back design in conjunction with the layout templates

 

[raisindot]

I LOVE this idea!!!!!!!!


Put me down to be the official U.S. distributor of the finished product if it ever comes to that.

Do you need to pay licensing fees to do this? Bugger, don't let that get in the way of innovation.

I wish I could do the artwork, but I'm a "words and ideas" man, not an illustrator. You'd really need someone of the Kidby level to do it justice.

For the backs, I couldn't see anything other than a image of the Discworld flying through space on the back of the elephants on back of the Great Aut'ain(sp.)

I'd think Moist and Rincewind would make the best jokers, since they're both knaves.

The kings'll be controversial choices, but wouldn't you want Granny, Nanny, Magrat and perhaps Susan to be the Queens? And since Jacks are Knights, i.e., the movers and shakers and protectors, perhaps Carrot, Wm. De Worde, Ridcully and Lu-Tze?

Death would definitely be an Ace. Maybe the others are gods or personifications (like the Hogfather)?

The rest of the cards could just have images of other characters.

I'd also recommend sticking to the traditional hearts/spades/clubs/diamonds for suits, if only because people may want to use them for real games, and the last thing you want to worry about in a game of bridge is whether cabbages outrank crossbows.



J-I-B

 

[poohcarrot]

Spades - Watchmen
a Vimes
k Carrot
q Angua
j Nobby

Hearts - Witches
a Granny
k Nanny Ogg
q Magrat
j Tiffany

Clubs - Wizards
a Ridcully
k Ponder
q Hix
j Rincewind

Others - Diamonds
a Death
k Patrician
q Susan
j Moist

 

[Who's Wee Dug]

I think Ace of Spades should be Death. and somewhere the Feegles enmass on one card would be good.

 

[DaveC]

Clubs - Wizards
a Ridcully
k Ponder
q Hex
j Rincewind

personally I would swap Ridcully and Ponder - Ridcully is King, even if he isn't clever - and Ponder is an Ace in most situations.

 

[michelanCello]

I think this is a great idea, and I support the "watch-wizards-witches-death" theme idea, and it should deffinitely be the traditionas suits - in the first place, that is
This is just such an amazing idea!

 

[Jan Van Quirm]

No credit for me on this idea - it's Jane's Mr. Shine card that got us fizzing!

Thanks for the feedback on the suits guys - got some good ideas coming in there, so perhaps we'll get a mini vote-off for that going next but I think there's only the ONE CANDIDATE for the Ace of Spades

Let's see how it goes with producing this - really I'm only thinking of making these templates for us to download for home use from the forum or for people to get printed locally, but we could maybe go to Transworld and see if they'd be interested in using it for promos perhaps, or (as their usual answer is generally no dosh to spare) we could look into marketing it perhaps. At that point however it wouldn't really be 'ours' anymore and there'd be licences and other mucky stuff to get around if we did this commercially, even if it's donated original artwork (as in original to us - we couldn't use anything of Paul's and Kemar's) - 'sharing's ' permissible under the fair use clause of the copyright acts, even if we used the official artists, but as soon as you're selling it or money's exchanging hands, then the publishers and Terry's sales team'll be muscling in for a cut

 

[Jane]

I agree with Jan; we should just make these for home entertainment, because it saves a lot of complications. If DW is copyrighted, doesn't that make profiting from fanart illegal?

Anywho, it seems like this idea has taken off, even though I originally meant for it to be a "Hey! Wouldn't it be cool if..." moment. If we end up getting serious about it, I'll be happy to do some art when Dec 10 starts, because that's when my Christmas holiday begins.

 

[Who's Wee Dug]

It would need to be cleared by Terry even if it was only for members use on the forum, at the Mo it is only a discussion.

 

[michelanCello]

It would need to be cleared by Terry even if it was only for members use on the forum, at the Mo it is only a discussion.

I agree... you can always ask for permission, even if it's not necessary.

 

[Jan Van Quirm]

Anywho, it seems like this idea has taken off, even though I originally meant for it to be a "Hey! Wouldn't it be cool if..." moment. If we end up getting serious about it, I'll be happy to do some art when Dec 10 starts, because that's when my Christmas holiday begins.

That sounds fine Jane - it might be you'll have some of the characters in your 'back catalogue' as it were and if Cheery looks in during the holiday maybe she'll help out and BP and some more of the arty types so perhaps the workload could be shared around?

If there's no money changing hands and it's kept as a fan project then technically we don't need permission but it's always polite to ask anyway (I use Paul Kidby artwork on DreamWorlds and he was fine about it provided we don't flog it, as it's free advertising as it were. So - line of least resistance I'll run it by Lyndsey at Transworld (the PR lady) and the only thing I think they'll worry about is us publishing an online print template actually on site for download as anyone could use it.

That's easy enough to get around by not posting the final templates, but have them available via PM (I can host them on one of my sites with a dedicated and unpublished link), which I think will satisfy copyright considerations and the rest of the artwork can be shared as usual on the forums

 

[raisindot]

If there's no money changing hands and it's kept as a fan project then technically we don't need permission but it's always polite to ask anyway (I use Paul Kidby artwork on DreamWorlds and he was fine about it provided we don't flog it, as it's free advertising as it were. So - line of least resistance I'll run it by Lyndsey at Transworld (the PR lady) and the only thing I think they'll worry about is us publishing an online print template actually on site for download as anyone could use it.

That's easy enough to get around by not posting the final templates, but have them available via PM (I can host them on one of my sites with a dedicated and unpublished link), which I think will satisfy copyright considerations and the rest of the artwork can be shared as usual on the forums

You obviously know more about the British copyright rules than I do, but in the U.S. any use of copyrighted materials and ideas for any purpose would be considered a violation of U.S. copyright law if it were made available for use by the public (i.e., anyone besides yourself) for any purpose without written permission from the copyrightholder and proper royalty/licensing agreements. (I know this from experience, as I was once able to successfully shut down a scumbag who used some of my copyrighted content without authorization or proper royalty payments).

Even with the final templates only available via PM, what happens if someone sends them on to someone else who creates decks of cards and starts selling them? Both the seller and the creator of the templates will be on the legal hook for unauthorized commercial use of copyrighted material. At least, that would happen in the U.S. Not sure about the UK.

J-I-B

 

[Jan Van Quirm]

It's tricky, but the 'fair use' clause is something that's regularly used over 'share' activities on forums and blog sites and the clincher is always whether there's money being made and, sometimes where there's a bandwidth issue - which is why hotlinking's a real no-no by and large.

What you do 'within the community' under the fair use umbrella isn't necessarily legal, but a blind eye is turned if it's done without intent to harm or profit from material taken without permission or notification to the original source. So that's where there have been cases with things like the Encyclopedia of Harry Potterwhich had to be cough up for licences/royalties to JKR because they were patently sourced largely from her books and the films and could not claim 'fair use' if they published without properly acknowledging and getting licences from her and her publishers/producers.

This is not like that because Jane and any other artist who contributes will be using their own works and inspiration and therefore not taking anything 'owned' from the various movies, or the books even, so long as we're not making money out of it.

Your point about someone else potentially using it without our permission is a worry, but what you do there is something like THIS - see bottom right where I've asserted my own copyright and disclaimer, which effectively means I can turn around and say to the Tolkien Estate - that is my own original work (yes inspired by The Hobbit but not copied from anyone or anything outside of my imagination) that was produced for a non-profit-making site and I marked the image so anyone taking it would know it was not to be used for commercial purposes. Whether this would stand up in a court of law is another matter, but it would only get there if someone somewhere was making more than the odd bit of cash with it on the sly...

But checking this in with Lyndsey first will be the sensible thing once we're ready to apply the art to the templates and hopefully won't be seen as anything other than a 'sharing' of artwork for our own amusement. Up to that point we're only doing what we always do in the Discworld Art thread, just with more purpose than usual

What might be a stumbling block is people getting this done by a print shop perhaps - there's a possibility that the template files could be used by unauthorised persons - so not a member of this forum and not as a one off print. Again, if people want to print the templates off at home for personal use, then there's no money changing hands at all - so anyone who wants them must promise faithfully they're not going to pay anyone else to print them and aren't going to slap it on Ebay or on somewhere like Zazzle or CafePress for commission etc...

We're just having communal fun here for now and if Transworld are OK with us playing with this without any distribution beyond the forum and with nothing to download in the public arena (or alternatively not on the web at all and I email the template files to people who want them so it's off the internet altogether). If Transworld should be interested in this being published commerically then that's different again and I suppose if that was the case then we just handover the lot and let them do it - after negotiating some kind of deal for use of our combined ingenuity (well Jane's anyway ) as makers

 

[deldaisy]

Jan said:

fair use umbrella isn't necessarily legal, but a blind eye is turned

I was just scimming all the copyright stuff and this opped out at me and I thought.... OHhhhhhhh yes! Its all fun and games til someone loses an eye!

Raisindot: The idea of the classic Great A'Tuin on the backs of the cards is perfect.

Someone or everyone: Call me oldfashioned but I would think Kings have to be male types. I mean WE know about the witches, but it would have to be a deck a non-discworld person would be able to play with too immediately without a full explanation about the characters and WHY a king is a woman.

And yes... the traditional clubs, spades, diamonds and hearts.
clubs (trolls... get it? ), spades (dwarves... cause they DIG ). There are SO many discworld characters I think that the individual cards 2 to 10 could have characters too. (10 would have to be a hourde of Freegles).

At the moment lets just put the copyright issue aside and have fun with the cards themselves (names to cards).... because without that we have nothing. I know some of you could spot a pubic hair in a Big Mac at 200 paces but lets not get toooooooooo pedantic about rules. Just throw it out there.

 

[poohcarrot]

Call me oldfashioned but I would think Kings have to be male types.
I know some of you could spot a pubic hair in a Big Mac at 200 paces but lets not get toooooooooo pedantic about rules. Just throw it out there.

Who's being pedantic about the rules now?

 

[Jan Van Quirm]

When is a King not a King? When she's a Queen Regnant.

Too many to mention but there were at least 2 of note in Ancient Egypt - hardly a civilisation known for it's obsession with equal rights. Namely Hapshepsut who was one of the greatest Pharoahs ever, and of course Cleopatra (although you could argue that she was a Governor under licence from Rome she still called most of the shots and had no co-ruler). Then there's Elizabeth I who was a superlative monarch and politician, also Matilda, daughter of Henry I who literally fought for the crown with her cousin Stephen and only stopped when he agreed to pass the crown to her son Henry II and not his own son as his successor, acknowledging on the sly that her line was the rightfully and better entitled... Other Queen Regnants are well enough known on the British and European thrones, but some lack the clout of Liz and Matty as they had hubbies or a strong masculine council inserting their oars at every opportunity...

So bring on the girlie Kings where they fit

Back in later with some options gleaned from posting so far - as for having 54 character cards... Let's see what our artists have to say about that shall we? It's certainly possible to do that many, but choosing the faces and aces is already getting complex

 

[poohcarrot]

Witches don't curtsy, they bow.

 

[Sjoerd3000]

Jadwiga of Poland

Her official title was 'king' rather than 'queen', reflecting that she was a sovereign in her own right and not merely a royal consort

 

[deldaisy]

Jan while being examined by a fool gynocologist before his students once (the silly man had the NERVE to say something alone the lines of "If women could only get rid of their ovaries and PMT they could rule the world" or something equally proposterous) I launched into a tirade of indignation and listed a long list of "most powerful women of the world historical AND modern" followed by some final lines of "Call administration! I am not having fool like you touching my innards!" and advice to his interns to always "consider the source" when taking advice or notes from a "senior". He gave me a withering look and said "See what I mean!" and walked off. Good thing I couldn't reach the water jug!

No I only meant on a "traditional" basis for cards if using them with "other" people.

But I stand corrected. Its just that there ARE so many strong women in DW huh.

 

[raisindot]

Back in later with some options gleaned from posting so far - as for having 54 character cards... Let's see what our artists have to say about that shall we? It's certainly possible to do that many, but choosing the faces and aces is already getting complex

Hey, if the Bushie warmongers could scrounge up the images of the 54 most wanted Iraqis to put on playing cards, identifying 54 different DW characters should be a snap.

For example, use Juliet, Sally, Angua and (for equalrightsism) Cheery for the rank right under the jacks.



J-I-B