Lead Game Designer, Card Design

Koin Games, IncSeattle, WA

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Job Description

Lead Game Designer, Card Design

Koin Games is seeking an experienced Lead Card Designer to own and manage the entire card design process for our new-school collectible card game. This is a hands-on leadership role: you’ll be designing cards, and will also be responsible for ensuring the card team’s work is clear, balanced, and shipped at the highest quality and on time.

You will partner with the Head of Design to shape our card design roadmap, manage day-to-day execution, and collaborate across disciplines to ensure smooth integration of card content into the game. You’ll oversee card ideation, playtesting, balancing, and polish, while keeping the team aligned with our design vision and standards.

If you have top-tier competitive card game experience, proven leadership skills, and the ability to guide a small, talented team toward operational excellence, we want to hear from you.

Duties & Responsibilities

Own and manage the card design pipeline from end to end, including playtesting, balancing, and polish.
Collaborate with the CPO to build & maintain the card design roadmap aligned with project goals.
Coordinate with other departments (art, engineering, production, QA) to ensure smooth execution and delivery of card content.
Lead and mentor the card design team, including a senior card designer, to ensure clarity of direction, quality of execution, and timely delivery.
Ideate, design, and iterate cards, archetypes, and mechanics that offer fun, balanced, and synergistic play.
Use data, player feedback, and meta analysis to identify balance issues & opportunities for improvement.
Facilitate and oversee structured playtests, ensuring actionable feedback is documented and acted upon.
Maintain high standards for clarity, usability, and thematic cohesion in card designs.

Required skills and experience

5+ years of professional game design experience, including at least 2 years in a lead or senior role overseeing content design or balance.
Proven success in competitive card games at a high tier (Legend in Hearthstone, Master in Legends of Runeterra, Mythic in MTG Arena, Infinite in Marvel Snap).
Demonstrated ability to manage a content pipeline, from design through cross-discipline delivery.
Strong leadership, organizational, and communication skills — able to clearly convey priorities and feedback to multiple stakeholders.
Deep understanding of how competitive card game metas evolve with the introduction of new cards, mechanics, and synergies.
Experience implementing content using scripting or game engines.
Ability to balance hands-on design work with team leadership and cross-team coordination.
Mentorship experience in a small-team environment.

Bonus Skills:

Experience running structured playtesting processes.
Familiarity with statistics, analytics, and balance tuning tools.
Understanding of player psychology and retention drivers.
Ability to create compelling thematic card concepts and flavor.

The ideal candidate will

Thrive in creative and organizational spaces, both designing great cards and managing the process.
Proactively communicate progress, risks, and needs to the team and other departments.
Set and maintain a high bar for design quality and clarity.
Bring a collaborative, no-ego approach to leadership, while holding the team accountable to shared goals.
Love competitive card games and stays current with trends, meta shifts, and player expectations.

Interview Overview:
Below you'll find an outline of the interview plan for this role. Please note that while this is what we expect the process to look like; we may ask you for supplemental information or require an additional step before making a final decision.
● 30 min interview with our Talent Acquisition Lead
● 60 min interview with the Hiring Manager and Team
● Design test
● Final interview with the Executive Team
● Reference calls & a background check

The Legal Bits:
● In Compliance with local US law, we are disclosing compensation for this role. The range listed is just one component of Koin’s total compensation package, which may also include bonuses and LTI or other program specific awards. The disclosed range estimate has not been adjusted for geographic differentials.
● We offer competitive pay based on market standards plus a significant bonus structure. The base salary for this role is between $80,000 to $125,000, depending on skills and experience. Individual compensation decisions are based on a number of factors, including experience level, skillset, and balancing internal equity relative to peers at the company. We expect the majority of the candidates who are offered roles at our company to fall throughout the range based on these factors.
● This role is full time, exempt and will be fully remote
● The ability to work on Pacific time is required
● Global, non-US candidates will be considered only on a contract basis

Working at Koin Games, Inc.

Our entire team is working remotely.

We offer competitive salaries, a flexible paid time off policy, and 10 paid company holidays. We also offer a generous slate of benefit options, including medical, dental, vision, life, 401k, and HSA. Employees are eligible for these benefit options on the first day of the month after being hired!

Career descriptions are not designed to cover or contain a comprehensive listing of activities, duties, or responsibilities that are required of the employee.

We’re proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer.

We are committed to providing equal employment opportunities for all employees and applicants. We are also committed to providing employees with a work environment free of illegal discrimination and harassment.

All employment decisions are based on business needs, career requirements, and individual qualifications. No applicant or employee will be discriminated against because of their age; ancestry; citizenship; color; marital or parental status; registered domestic partner status; national origin; pregnancy, childbirth, breastfeeding, or related medical condition; race (including hair textures and styles); height; weight; religion; religious dress practice; religious grooming practice; sex; sexual orientation; genetic information; genetic characteristics; gender identity; gender expression; transgender status; military and veterans’ status; HIV/AIDS status; physical or mental disability or medical condition unrelated to the person’s ability to perform the career; or any other consideration made unlawful by federal, state or local laws, or the perception that anyone has any of those characteristics or is associated with a person who has or is perceived as having any of those characteristics. See more details on your right to work here.

Note to Recruiters and Placement Agencies: We do not accept unsolicited agency resumes. Unsolicited resumes received will be considered our property and will be processed accordingly.

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