Quality Issue or Design Specification?

[Bryant_Tsu]

I opened one contraband deck today after receiving it in the mail today. Just recently I noticed the borders on all the cards are misaligned. For example, if I grab the ace of hearts (a one way card) and flip it lengthwise the top and right borders measure 3 millimeters, however the bottom and left border only measure 2 millimeters. Is this a manufacturing defect or a intended design feature? Does anyone else have this misalignment?

 

[j.bayme]

Especially with super thin borders, any irregularity in border thickness becomes slightly more noticeable.

Unless elements of the design are majorly off-center (very rare), any abnormality like your photo should very subtle.

 

[WitchDocIsIn]

From what I've heard there's only one company that pays the USPCC enough to guarantee that every card is exactly the same, border-wise. For everyone else there's bound to be some variation in the borders, some more noticeable than others. It's really not a big deal.

 

[j.bayme]

From what I've heard there's only one company that pays the USPCC enough to guarantee that every card is exactly the same, border-wise. For everyone else there's bound to be some variation in the borders, some more noticeable than others. It's really not a big deal.

Hey Christopher, this is actually not correct. If there was a company that did that, it'd be theory11, but there isn't, and it's not (verified with USPC directly this morning). USPC has very specialized machinery that enables a very precise cut on 99.9% of decks, but there's no way to guarantee a perfect cut every time.

On normal border decks, the difference in width is very difficult to perceive. With our super-thin borders, that same variation can be slightly more apparent. In any event, USPC has done a great job getting borders precise, such that mis-cut decks are rarer than ever, and any alignment imperfections (like the picture above) are often extremely subtle.