Polishing Card Design - Criticisim required

[3XXXDDD]

Debated posting this in the Graphics Forum but well, here it is in CCG forum anyway.

Alright. I have just sent my artist the last concepts for my game's illustration, so I should really get to work on fixing up my graphic design but before I go searching for them, I need some ideas.

For reference here are the

Rules:
http://pastebin.com/fWhMK4MM

And

Icons:
http://i.imgur.com/ngiwiq6.jpg

And

Skill Card Template (so far)
http://i.imgur.com/uhSSVH8.jpg

Here are my questions and concerns so far.

Section A:
The Blue Part of the card is the "Cooled" section. However in order to make it easier for the colorblind players or otherwise, I choose to have a shape around all the Cooling Numbers. It isn't present in the card but the shape around the Cooled Number would actually be a different shape. I have a few questions concerning this:

1) Font of the Cooling Numbers. I don't like the current font all that much, I think it could be improved somehow.

2) Should all of the Numbers have a Shape or should that be reserved specifically for the Cooling Number to mark it special (or the other way around where it is the only not in a shape). If so what shape, (don't reply to this point until you read a point about effect boxes below)

3) Similarly, I was considering removing the Cooled Number to make it obvious there isn't any waiting time anymore but this might become a problem in the rules with writing on how to place that card without something as simple as "Place the card in the cooling zone so that 1 is in the top-right corner"

Section B:

There are a lot of symbols in use here. You can see the Minotaur Race symbol above 1 and the Speed Symbol (again, which might be replaced by numbers rather than RPS) in the opposite corner. They are currently not in a very good position.

1) I'm wondering if you have any better ideas than my main ideas which are:

Either lining them up near the ability boxes on the left but they seem to have that side crowded as already is.

The other idea is an extension of Section A 3) where I'd remove the Cooled Number and replace it with the Race Symbol and maybe Speed Symbol (if I kept it to RPS because otherwise the Number would just look weird and might confuse others as to what the Cool Order is).

(For the record, ignore the Copyright and Illus lines. They're just badly aligned and I'll fix that)

2) My next question is about the effect boxes. I haven't rewritten the rules for this but I'd like to make the boxes themselves mean different things depending on shape. In this case, the boxes would choose the target. Circle would mean Self, Square would mean Opponent, Triangle would mean Ally (maybe if I ever introduced abilities specific to Tag Battles) and Diamond would be everybody. (I think it could work as long the skill itself also had 1v1 Application) or Ally would default to Self in 1V1

These are just examples. My main question is what shapes do you think communicate the following words best: Self, Opponent, Ally, Everybody (and maybe Ally Group for "Cure All" like skills or Enemy Group for Hitting all Opponents).

3) Do you think all of these icons are suitable or do you think they're could be better variations? And where should the numerical values lie, centered on the symbol itself like they are now OR aligned to the bottom-right corner of them like many other games.

4) I was considering color-coding the abilities to determine if they are positive or negative effects (Like 2 Green Heart Circle to say "Your Avatar gains 2 life" or 2 Red Heart Square" to say "Take 2 Life from your opponent". Even if I were to do this, I'm not sure it should extend into damaging effects which might be better staying black altogether.

I think that's all of the relevant questions I have now. If you can help me with this or think of anything else that I should consider which isn't listed here, I would very much appreciate it.

[HighChronicler]

I know you said you want to keep it language independent, but for Self, Ally, Enemy, Group, etc. I might be best if you used the words.

I really like your ideas and they seem to work together pretty well.

You could remove the 1 in the Corner and simply make the Race Icon larger.  I think that would look nice

To add some variety Maybe another race or two: Dryad, or Satyr (Faun) or Something.

Color Coding always looks nice, I think you should add that (just don't make each card a rainbow)

Your Font is Fine, I don't really have an opinion on that.  Effect Boxes seem fine; again, no real opinion.

[3XXXDDD]

Not adding any more races at the moment. Budget can't afford it.

Also, don't know why imgur is doing what it is doing, but this should be what the card looks like.

[Trevor]

I think you should tweak the size and contrast of some of your fonts for when it is printed at actual size. If you can't read text easily when you shrink it down to 200 pixels wide, it usually implies your font choices need to be tweaked.

Not sure about the choice of a boxing glove for an icon. Seems to clash with your flavor.