The Playtable can now start with more than a deck of cards. Select the collections your session needs and ShuffleKit resolves their real layouts, artwork, faces, and physical sizes before placing them on the table.
Start by creating and designing the collections in Components & Collections. A component with no matching layout is skipped, so check its gallery preview before you start a session.
Choose what goes on the table
Open Playtable, select the project, then find Playtest contents.
- Leave Use all cards on for a quick card-only test. It deliberately includes the project card library, not every non-card collection.
- Turn it off to choose individual collections. Select at least one card deck as well as the board, mat, tokens, meeples, or dice you need.
- A board or token collection is placed on the table; it is never shuffled into the draw pile or dealt into a hand.
The Playtable still needs a card deck to deal. Choosing only boards, mats, or tokens produces a clear prompt to add cards rather than starting an empty game.
What each component does
| Type | Table behavior |
|---|---|
| Boards and mats | Start as locked, anchored surfaces beneath the card piles. They retain their real physical scale, so a large board reads as larger than a card. |
| Tokens and meeples | Start as movable pieces. Select, drag, duplicate, rotate, lock, or remove them like other table objects. Collection quantity controls how many copies spawn. |
| Dice | Start as designed, rollable dice. Right-click a die and choose Roll, or use Roll from the multi-selection bar. Its own D4, D6, or D8 face count controls the result. |
| Score pads, screens, boxes, and booklets | Print-only components. They are named beneath the picker as printed rather than played, so their absence from the table is intentional. |
A reliable first setup
- Select your main card deck, then the Main Board or player mats.
- Add token and meeple collections only at the counts you want to test. You can duplicate a piece during the session, but setting the collection quantity first makes the opening state repeatable.
- Add a custom die collection if the rules use one; design every face before the session so a roll never lands on an unfinished design.
- Start the session. Boards and mats tile into the surface area, loose pieces stay in their own play area, and card piles avoid the anchored surfaces.
- Lock any surface that should not move. Use a named snapshot after the session, then turn feedback into data changes back in the workspace.
Multiplayer and recovery
Invite the other player from setup before starting. The host's selected card deck and component collections become the session's table plan, so both players see the same board, pieces, and die faces. Reopening a saved session restores its table objects and resolves their artwork again from the project; it does not turn components into cards.
Card notes are still card feedback. Use the session to test component placement, readability, count, and scale, then make those design changes in the relevant collection. For the post-session loop, see Notes & Version History.
