Elden Ring Playing Cards

Inspired by traditional playing cards, I thought it would be nice having a full deck of cards with art and characters inspired by the video game Elden Ring.

I started with laying out the face cards and creating a concept for each pip. The ace of spades the “death card” sparked my initial idea. Who other than Destined Death himself would fit this card better? So the ace of spades became Maliketh. Following this decision I thought of related characters to create the king, queen and jack of spades: Radagon, Marika and Rennala. Marika being the half-sister of Maliketh, Radagon being Marikas husband (as well as being Marika herself) and Rennala as Radagons wife.

**“Spades”** face cards (early sketches)

The characters of the spades create a good opportunity to establish the other characters for each card. For the hearts I decided to use the offspring of Marika and Radagon: Miquella (king), Malenia (queen), Messmer (jack) and Melina (ace). The king of hearts fits Miquella well as he is the one that wins the hearts of his alleys with compassion and kindness. Messmer having one eye also fits the jack of hearts, because he is often called the one-eyed-jack (due to his side-profile design on the original card).

**"Hearts"** face cards (early sketches)

The offspring of Radagon and Rennala create the face cards of diamonds. Rykard (king), Ranni (queen), Radahn (jack) and for the ace card I used one of the closest alleys of the respective characters; for Rykard it is Lady Tanith, for Ranni it is Blaidd and for Radahn it is Commander Gaius. Rykard is the king because he is the lord of Volcano Manor and had a big following (focusing on his former glory, rather than his current state). I chose Commander Gaius as Radahns ally, because Gaius studied gravitational magic with Radahn and became friends with him (like an elder brother).

**"Diamonds"** face cards (early sketches)

For the last pip, the clubs, I wanted to incorporate Mohg as he is one of my favorite characters in the game. So the clubs became the Mohgwyn Dynasty. The king therefore is Mohg, the jack is Varré, the ace is Sir Ansbach and the queen gave me a little trouble. Related characters to the Mohgwyn Dynasty are the Invaders, Albinaurics and Sanguine Nobles. Having almost no female members, finding a queen is tricky. I settled on two options: 1. Eleonora and 2. a Sanguine Noble (since it is not unlikely that there are a few female nobles, or at least it can be possible). Choosing the Sanguine Noble isnt perfectly lore-friendly, but is aesthetically fitting to the set. I also thought about the “Formless Mother” for the queen. Being the source of Mohgs blood magic she has close relations to him, but having no visual references and being “formless”, this character was sadly inapt.

The pictures are all sketches and concepts that will be reworked to form a coherent and consistent style. I also plan to incorporate some small design details on the number cards (such as adding some other interesting and lore adequate characters).

I appreciate all the feedback and other ideas that you might have! Feel free to contact me anytime.

Unfrequent updates are posted here on my blog as soon as I get time to design more.

PS: There are symbols and motifs on all the face cards (not on all the sketches yet, but in the final version there will be, I’m thankful for any tips and ideas of fitting symbols), that relate to the characters specific lore as patterns and design elements. I hope you have fun spotting them! :)