Some help with wording.

This is a good question, one that could probably be better answered by a pro graphic designer that does layout work for card games.

As the person designing the core of the game you might try just focusing on the mechanics and flow of the game, before worrying too much about how the information will be presented in the final game.

Don't get me wrong, you should try to make the early prototypes clear and easy to understand, but if that means not worrying about making the text short/brief, so be it. You might try, just writing out the full description of what the card effect is, how it changes or influences play, and how you want it to work in the game. You can always reduce the information down to icons and brief text later. It is more important early on that everyone playing the game understand what each card does with out needing to look back at the rules all the time.

Most if not all of the big card based games on the market are made by large teams of designers, artists, and graphic designers. I am not saying that one person can't do such a card game alone, but the task would be very difficult.

As to your question:

The main problem I see are the phrases:

"One player"

and

"4 More"

You might try making the wording targeted. Who is the one player and how do we pick what player gets to be that one player. Is it the person playing the card? Is it the player of your choice and the one that played the card gets to pick?

Note: If the target of an action card is the player who played it the target can be implied with just: "Heal 8" or with a heart icon with the number inside the icon.

This also works in reverse for damage to an opponent. The target of an attack is implied by the use by one player against another player. "Deal 8 damage" or a combat icon with the number inside the icon.

If this is an action card the player is using like a healing potion and then they have the option to Discard 2 cards from their hand to gain a bonus that brings the total health gain to 12. You might consider and "or".

When played: Gain 8 (hearts) or discard 2 cards & gain 12 (hearts).

The main thing is to develop a list of terms, phases, and icons that will be use the same way across all cards:

Will, Must, May, Can, Pay, Use, Activate, Expend, Tap, Each Player, All Players, Active Player, The Player of your Choice.

Having a good clear set of Icons for the commonly modified statistics can give players an easier time of playing once they have learned all the icons. However, too many icons can make the game harder to learn and understand until players finish learning them.

I recommend making a list of all the things that could be made into icons on the cards and then rank that list by most used and then most important. The less and icon would be used, the less the icon is truly needed for that item on the list. Make the first few at the top of the list into icons and see how it plays and see how easy it is for people to understand what the icons mean.

This type of icon and text wording, becomes more important during blind play testing and the final version of the game. For your first draft it just needs to be clear and descriptive. The cards just need to function based on the mechanics they modify in the game.

Take a look at the following game & a short article that I think did a good job with card text & explaining these issues.

Mage Knight

Overcoding Article

This is all just my opinion but I hope it helps in some way,

@BHFuturist

I agree with BHFuturist on maybe using some icons for your cards.

Suggestions:
Have an icon represent "any player" (like a pawn)
and have an icon represent "optional power" (like a big plus sign)
or have an icon represent "discard card" and then put a value to indicate the amount needed
or have an icon represent "heal".

There's many ways to do this, which will cut down on your wording. You will need to decide what to make as an icon, however your text as it appears seems ok. You will need to test that with audiences to be sure.

I know that card real estate is limited, so putting clear and concise instructions is vital. A lot of card companies (coughBushiRoadcough) tend to just lower the font size to accommodate the text, which ends up being way too small for the player to read...then again, those asian languages tend to communicate more in fewer characters.

I am quite sure most if not all players will understand that card setup, so great progress! :)

I am not sure the word instead is needed...

My only large critique is to move the cost to the upper left corner and the deck type (player icon) to the upper right. This is a "right-handed bias" but still very standard to have Cost on that side for fanning the cards out in your hand, as an easy reference.

Check out this great little article by one of our other forum members Unknown Depths: HERE

Keep it up, one man shows are a tough gig!

@BHFuturist

Well, maybe I should not have said it is standard but that it is becoming more common and I think will be a standard in the future...

@BHFuturist

LOL, don't feel bad... I had to grab some cards and make sure, and even after I made sure, I checked that article.

And from the other players perspectives you would not have been wrong... and that gives me a whole new mechanic idea... crap got to go write that down in my notebook...

@BHFuturist