Card Game Illustration + Graphic Design for a Satirical Party Card Game (Animal Cast)

I'm developing a satirical party card game planned for a Kickstarter launch in late 2027, published by my company, CatNap, LLC. I'm gathering rates from illustrators and graphic designers for the full visual production, which needs to be complete by the end of the year. The game is unannounced, so please keep the details confidential. One thing up front, since "political" can give people pause: the game is APOLITICAL. It's political in setting only. There is no partisanship, no side taken, no real politicians, no live policy debates. The satire targets corruption itself, in a fictional government, and it lands on everyone in power equally. At the table it's a party game about bluffing your friends. The tone: this is satire in the Animal Farm tradition. The entire cast is animals, and animals are inherently endearing, which is the point. The vibe to nail is ENDEARING YET CORRUPT, and the split matters: the characters themselves stay endearing (endearing, not cute), while the corruption lives in the art around them: small hints in the settings, props, and background details that you only notice when you look twice. Charming at a glance, crooked on the second look. Think of a used car salesman: charismatic, fun, enjoyable company, and absolutely trying to screw you. This is character work, but not in the roleplaying sense. The cast is animal ARCHETYPES: each species embodies a political disposition and a cultural role in how politics works. One example: the pig is the business class. What needs continuity is the archetype: every pig, on every card a pig appears on, should read as the same kind of creature. Only one character in the game is a named individual with a consistent on-model design; other names appear in card text but are not tied to specific character illustrations. The scope below is split so you can quote only the parts you do; illustration and graphic design may go to different people. ILLUSTRATION. The base game is 190 cards, but the work is NOT 190 paintings. It splits into three kinds: 1. Key illustrations (full-card art): 4 standard-suit cards, one per suit; the 64 standard cards in the deck reuse these four with only the number changing. Plus 1 wildcard face and 4 card backs. 2. Spot illustrations: 32 unique small in-card pictures, one on each of the 17 action cards and 15 event cards. Each is unique, and the recurring archetypes appear across them. 3. Template faces with variants: 30 secret-objective cards share one face design with three variants (a small distinguishing detail marks easy/medium/hard; otherwise only text changes). The penalty cards (17) and reward cards (15) work the same way: shared face designs, slight detail differences, mostly text changes. Expansions: - Expansion A: 22 cards, ~21 unique faces, plus packaging art (a "classified dossier" envelope exterior). - Expansion B: 20-25 cards, ~20 unique faces, plus a small tuck box. - Expansion C: one box of ~32 cards: 17 built on the penalty-card template (text plus a slight design variation; minimal new illustration) and ~15 action-type cards needing ~10 spot illustrations. One tuck box for the whole thing. - Premium edition: NO new illustration. Same 190 cards with slight production variations (foil accents over existing back art); at most some production-file prep. GRAPHIC DESIGN: - Card frame/template system (one per deck type), suit iconography, typography - Rulebook: a single-sheet fold-out, 16 panels, ~365 x 275 mm open. Note: its cover panel doubles as the premium edition's box art (visible through a window lid), so the cover carries extra weight. - Rules inserts for the expansions (small booklets) - Boxes: the base game box (magnetic flip-top, ~141 x 103 x 55 mm) plus the expansion packaging above. The premium edition's box is NOT in scope; it's wooden and handled separately. On AI, read this before quoting: how you work is your business, and AI is fine in your process. Reference collages, mood boards, ideation, whatever gets you to the drawing. The finished art is a different matter: no generated imagery in the final work, no AI painting, coloring, or cleanup in the final files, and nothing that reads as AI-generated. If I wanted art that looks generated, I could make it myself. The finals must be human-drawn and look it; this will be contractual, and I review layered source files. Other requirements: - Process work is part of the deliverable. Keep your sketches, drafts, and iterations (a sketchbook, physical or digital); I want WIP delivered alongside finals, with rights to use it in marketing and campaign updates. Price that in. - Full rights assignment on finals and process work (work made for hire). Please quote on that basis, not licensing. - Print-ready finals: 63 x 88 mm plus bleed, CMYK, layered source files included. In your proposal, please include: 1. Your rate structure: per illustration (with complexity tiers if you use them), day rate, or a project estimate for the phases you'd take 2. Portfolio links: anything related to this kind of project, especially character art; animal characters are a big plus 3. Revision rounds included per piece, and the rate for additional rounds 4. Availability and realistic throughput in pieces per month, given the end-of-year completion target 5. Whether you'd take a small paid test assignment (2-3 cards) first. I expect to start there with anyone. Happy to share the fuller brief and references under a short mutual NDA if this interests you.