Very low quality boxes on the "deluxe" expansions.

By yloquen, in Arkham Horror: The Card Game

Compared to LotR LCG, the boxes are horrible. Very thin cardbord and as a result my box for Dunwich Horror is already torn.

FFG has been famed with the high quality of their products, but there is nothing luxurious about these new boxes of "deluxe" expansions ...

This isn't new or specific to Arkham Horror. Bear in mind that the price of deluxe (and the price of core sets and packs, for that matter) has not increased for a very long time, despite inflation. I'd rather FFG cut costs in the packaging than elsewhere (especially given their boxes were never any good to store cards after unpacking).

They're obviously meant to be thrown away after opening, not for storage... so I guess I've never seen an issue with them.

and also meant to let you buy a better storage ... WHO WANT TO BUY OUR " RETURN TO ... " PRODUCT ?? THERE A BOX WHO IS NOT SO HORRIBLE THAN THE ORIGINAL ONE , AND FOR NOT LET YOU CHOICE THERE'S NEW PLAYER AND ENCOUNTER CARDS INSIDE !! GO RABBIT , TAKE THE CAROT !! ............................. Ok , I'm ironical , but dont mistake , I will buy these products for real ^^

It's not like the need for additional storage or the thought of a product having bad storage as purchased are new to card or board games. I like that the core is relatively inexpensive to get into. I'd never played an LCG, but love Lovecraft and the mythos. I was looking at board games and compared the cost of Arkham Horror to picking up Lords of Waterdeep or something, and I was daunted by all those expansions and mythos packs, but decided to give it a try because it was cheaper. I liked it, printed some proxy cards to try the expansions, loved it, and now I own two cores, the two deluxe expansions, two novellas, and nearly all the mythos packs...

To me this is like the complaint that the core set should just come with doubles of all the cards— it'd cost more. For every $5 extra it costs, X fewer people will buy it. I like the deluxe expansions, and I like that they cost less than the core. I feel like they're striking a very fine balance, and they've pretty much nailed it. I do wish that instead of Return to NotZ they'd released a deluxe core with doubles of cards and deluxe storage, and then done NotZ Redux as a standalone expansion. I'd gladly have bought that and gifted my cores to a friend to get them into the game, but I get why they don't do it.

I don't mind dropping $200 over time on a game I love, but I want as much stuff as I can for that money, and I want the option of small but meaningful "bites." The current core/deluxe/standalone/mythos paradigm does that for me, and I'll take the sacrifices that go with it. Deck boxes are cheap.

Reduced packaging is a good thing. Why do you need more durable garbage?

6 minutes ago, HolySorcerer said:

Reduced packaging is a good thing. Why do you need more durable garbage?

Exactly.

Throw the box away and build a storage solution in your multiple core sets ;)

I remember the stout, linen-finish boxes for the deluxe expansions to the CoC LCG. They always made me a little queasy because they were beautiful but perfectly useless once you opened them up and integrated the cards into your collection. I'm glad of the lighter packaging for AH:TCG.

Edited to add: Oops, accidental thread necromancy from the "Next Unread Topic" link!

Edited by Carthoris

The "Return To" boxes so far have been great so I have migrated all my scenario cards to those boxes. We'll see how they stack up after a couple years of heavy use :)

Edited by phillos
1 hour ago, Carthoris said:

I remember the stout, linen-finish boxes for the deluxe expansions to the CoC LCG. They always made me a little queasy because they were beautiful but perfectly useless once you opened them up and integrated the cards into your collection. I'm glad of the lighter packaging for AH:TCG.

Edited to add: Oops, accidental thread necromancy from the "Next Unread Topic" link!

I have this same reaction with other games.

I just got an order in the mail where I was catching up a bit on expansions for other games I keep up on, which included a couple small-box expansions each for Smash Up and Marvel Legendary (which give you roughly the same amount of cards and stuff). The boxes for the Legendary expansions are super flimsy one-piece folded cardboard and the Smash Up ones are super well-made linen-finished boxes with separate lids... and all I could think was "Ugh... I wonder how much extra I'm paying for these beautiful boxes that are going straight into the trash?!"

Edited by KBlumhardt
2 hours ago, Carthoris said:

Edited to add: Oops, accidental thread necromancy from the "Next Unread Topic" link!

I never understood the concept of "thread necromancy". Why shouldn't we be allowed to discuss this topic anymore if it hasn't been discussed about for x amount of time? So weird.

OT: I actually dont mind the boxes being a bit flimsy since i dont want my cards to be stored in 10 different places. I like to cut out the artwork and glue them onto my storage solutions. Makes for a nice touch

5 minutes ago, Raahk said:

s. I like to cut out the artwork and glue them onto my storage solutions. Makes for a nice touch

Cool idea! I use the cardboard boxes you get on Amazon which are almost the identical size of the Return to boxes and store all my cards there. Each campaign has its own box, but I haven’t thought about using the artwork that way. Nice!

19 minutes ago, Mimi61 said:

I use the cardboard boxes you get on Amazon which are almost the identical size of the Return to boxes and store all my cards there.

I don't get those boxes on Amazon, but I'd like to! Can you supply a link or a product code?

Edited by Carthoris
1 hour ago, Carthoris said:

I don't get those boxes on Amazon, but I'd like to! Can you supply a link or a product code

All my cards are sleeved and I have two core sets and everything else AHC has released. One of these boxes fits a full expansion and their 6 Mythos packs perfectly with the dividers for scenarios and their encounter cards. The 6 Mythos pack instructions fit in the empty space left. When a Return to releases, I have a box ready for the next expansion. I currently have all of the stand alones and my investigators in one box, but The Hotel isn’t going to fit, so I am figuring that out. All of my player cards fit in two boxes. I have them divided into classes with 0 level in one box and 1-5 in another. It is getting tight though, if we don’t have multiple decks built! So may have to figure that out soon. I took a picture, but wouldn’t let me upload it.
Just as FYI. If you have Return to NoZ, the empty space left will fit a whole campaign with its encounter cards, sans Mythos pack instructions. That is where our Forgotton Age is currently residing, awaiting its Return to box.

641DC5DB-206D-4F38-B046-2D8407A29D47.jpeg

Edited by Mimi61

They should have come in Return To boxes but they didn't. They are meant to be thrown away. Had the been good quality boxes like the core it would have been a waste since those are unsuitable for storage anyway.

Don't get those boxes off Amazon if you can help it. I got an 800 count box for about $2 from a local comic/card shop. You can find them a lot cheaper elsewhere.