Most board games contain a variety of pieces. Some board game pieces have obvious names and well-known designs, such as a pair of D6 dice, while others may look unfamiliar and have names that you’re nor familiar with.
If you’re creating a board game, knowing what these pieces are and how they’re produced can give you a much stronger understanding of the board game manufacturing process, letting you create your own game with a more concrete plan.
Even if you’re not interested in creating a board game, understanding the many pieces found in a typical game can enhance your gaming experience and help you avoid confusion.
Board game pieces are occasionally also referred to as components, or simply by the name of each piece. For this guide, we’ve used “pieces” and “components” interchangeably.
Below, we’ve listed the numerous pieces we produce that you can use in board games, as well as the function each piece serves, how it’s made, and what you should know before considering this piece as part of your game.
Playing Cards for Board Games are probably the main part of every board game and card game. Cards are the parts that are held the most touched the most and hence are most prone to damage. In addition, cards come in a variety of sizes and options and have their unique tuckbox. In this page we will cover everything about playing cards, and cards for board games.
Generally speaking, there are 7 standard playing card sizes that are commonly used in most board games
Following this, there are two approaches when deciding which card size to use in your game or the number of cards to have in your game. First, through game testing, you get an idea of the best number of cards to have in your game and follow it blindly.
The second way is to work from the manufacturing backward to know how many cards fit in a sheet of paper, this way, you maximize the number of cards while controlling the manufacturing costs.
If the standard card sizes are not suitable for your needs you can also have your own size of playing cards. However, you do want to take into account the available sheet sizes, to ensure that you are maximizing the use of materials.
There are three size sheets we can use:
Please note that with custom-size cards, the cutting, collating, and corner rounding are done manually, so the quality will not be as high as the standard cards. (It is possible to make your own cutting mold for the automatic machines, but that is if you need to make over 100K decks of cards.
There are three types of paper that can be used for any playing cards: white core, blue core, and black core. Some factories offer a gray core paper, but we at Hero Time stay away from it due to its poor quality.
The best most stuffable cards use high-quality German black core paper, however, this is mostly reserved for magicians and poker houses. If you would like slightly better durability and elasticity you can choose Chinese black-core paper or blue-core paper. However, there are three drawbacks to consider
For most game creators we recommend using a high-quality white core paper, either 300gsm (0.32mm thick) or 350gsm (0.35mm thick). If you are searching for the lowest price you can also find cheaper white core paper.
Watch our video to learn more about paper qualities.
You can use any boxes for playing cards. If your game is an independent card game with only cards in it, using the tuck box (the same box used in poker cards) is most recommended, as it keeps the prices as low as possible. If you have over 100 cards in your game, you might want to consider a small two-piece box. If you woould like your card game to be more prestigious, the best box for that will be the flip box, which has a magnetic latch and a one-piece box.
You can learn more about boxes in our box page.
To achieve this, we first check the total thickness of the cards in the game. A 300gsm paper is around 0.32mm thick, and 350gsm paper is around 0.35mm. Once we know your total number of cards, we can figure out the size of the box needed. For example, if you have 130 cards in your game and want the premium 350gsm cards, you have a total of 130×0.35mm = 45mm thickness. In that case, we would prefer to split your cards into two decks and place them side by side.
You can also check our component guide for standard box sizes:
– Hersh (Founder of HeroTime)
– Hersh (Founder of Hero Time)
– Hersh (Founder of HeroTime)
– Hersh (Founder of HeroTime)
– Hersh (Founder of HeroTime)
– Hersh (Founder of HeroTime)
– Hersh (Founder of HeroTime)
– Hersh (Founder of HeroTime)
Board Game Creators are the pillars of the board game industry. As a board game manufacturer, it is our duty to make sure you have everything you need throughout your journey.
