Hello,

I am a new member here, but I have been playing Arkham Horror for years. I need some help with the printing of high quality versions of promo Great Old Ones, Investigators, and Scenarios from the Arkham Horror League. Really, anyone with this knowledge would be great, but I specified Tibs as he seems to be THE guy who has done the most work in this regard from my searches and reading forum posts.

I am trying to print the promos to match the size of the actual cards of the same type. So the Calvin Wright Ally card should be printed as 1.625" x 2.5", the Investagator and Great Old One Cards should be printed as 5" x 7", and the Heralds, Guardians, and Arkham Horror League Scenarios should be printed as 6.75" x 4". However, in each case, the scans of these cards (many times uploaded by FFG themselves) are much smaller than these dimensions. When I scale the images up to meet these dimensions, the clarity of both the text and the pictures deminish noticably. It seems the Promo Yig has the best clarity off all of the cards, the clarity on this card is visibly better than on the other great old ones.

Are there any extremely high resolutions images of these cards that will not require upscaling? That are either the correct size by default or larger and can be downscaled? I found this previous thread where Tibs links to high res scans of the promo cards and talks about DPI for high res. But these images still required scaling for me, which ruined the image quality. I realize that perhaps there are no higher quality images for most of these promos as they were only released digitally by FFG, so what FFG released is the best we have. But at least for the Great Old Ones released at Arkham Nights, it should be possible to make an extremely high res scan of those cards.

Are there any better resolution images of these promo cards than what is on BGG (and the FFG Arkham Horror Support page for the League Scenarios) or am I stuck with slightly blurry images if I want the size to be correct?

I realize I could use Strange Eons to print these cards, but I also want to use the same art for each card that is on the official card, and I am not sure how to get the same exact art in the same place using Strange Eons. Is there some way to do that?

Finally, my plan is to print on 110 lb cardstock. Will that be sufficient, or is there a better option. I tried on 65 lb, and that was just too flimsy.

Sorry for the long post and the pleas for help, but figured if anybody could help me, it would be the great people here.

Thanks!

*Veil of shadows slowly draws open*

Well, I mean, a lot of the promo stuff I uploaded was reconstructed in Strange Eons. The art placement isn't a 100% perfect match but once that stuff's on the table, you're never going to notice.

In at least one case (Yig I think) I had to photoshop in a little bleed space to get the pic to fit.

Honestly I don't know the best way to solve your resolution problem. I don't have most of these promos to re-scan.

I don't know anything about paper weight value but if 65 was flimsy, give 110 a try (if you're able). Personally I no longer have access to heavier paper weights so I just print fronts and backs on lighter weights and then paste them together with spray adhesive.

Thanks Tibs. I didn't realize the promos you had uploaded were done in Strange Eons. How did you get the art for them? Are the art for the Arkham Nights Great Old Ones the same art used on the physical cards, or were those just art you chose for the cards?

Do you have the EON files still? I think that might solve the resolution issue because it appears that SE is able to print in rather high resolution, but after the images is converted out of EON, it loses some clarity.

You can google the art, that's what I did. Then put it in Strange Eons.

Or, you can use this, this, this and this. They're the best quality promo AOs I found on the internet. Daoloth is already modded to fit in SE.

Tibs,

That's a great suggestion ~ I used glossy 5" x 7" photo paper, printed the front and the back of the Investigator cards, and glued them together. They were much more durable...and gorgeous.

Cheers,

Joe

Thanks Tox for the link with high quality art Downloaded and archived

Thanks Tox, I will reconstruct the sheets in SE with those images! The clarity for the finished product should be much higher.

Also, good suggestion on printing on photo paper rather than cardstock. I'll give that a shot.

I wish that the League images were higher quality as well. Thankfully, the Spanish League images are all SE files so they look great, but the English League are all low quality. Similarly, the PA characters seem to be low res as well.

Yes. Spanish Leagues had the opposite problem: good images but an overall terribly poor design.

Yes. Spanish Leagues had the opposite problem: good images but an overall terribly poor design.

Thankfully, since they are all EON files, they are easily edited.

Very true. In case you need, on the Edge forum, filed under the French League (same scenarios as the spanish one) you'll find some posts I did trying to re-address the problems of those Scenarios (both for the second and the third League; sadly - or fortunately, depending on the point of views - I never attended the first one, so I cannot comment).

In case you're interested in League stuff, have you considered joining the Advanced Players League (link in my signature)?

Very true. In case you need, on the Edge forum, filed under the French League (same scenarios as the spanish one) you'll find some posts I did trying to re-address the problems of those Scenarios (both for the second and the third League; sadly - or fortunately, depending on the point of views - I never attended the first one, so I cannot comment).

In case you're interested in League stuff, have you considered joining the Advanced Players League (link in my signature)?

When you say "problems" are you referring to game play/mechanics/balance? I have read that the Spanish and French leagues are the same (same scenarios), is that right?

I have not heard of the Advanced Players League. I'll take a look. I played A LOT of Arkham a few years ago. Now, I am pushing to get my group of friends back into it. I would love to do it every weekend if I can manage it.

As a fellow person who is interested in League stuff, what is your thought on incorporating elements of the League into everyday Arkham play? By that I mean allys, investigators, boards, and cards specifically introduced for League play being integrated into the entire Arkham (Base game plus all expansions) experience?

That's a long one :laughter:

Can't remember the issues exactly. Not only rules, but obnoxious situations: monsters resurrecting and giving free clues, tests impossible to pass because they required exploring Lost Carcosa but there was no Dunwich in play, cards forcing you to be devoured every time you got delayed and so on. Basically, a game is good when it's challenging, not when it's stupidly insane or has loopholes everybody can exploit. Plus there were other problems...Second Legue (aye, French and Spanish are the same, French simply ditched expansion boards just to make the game really stupid too easy) allowed you to carry over ALL items from one Scenario to another (guess what happens...); third one allowed you to store items on locations, but if a gate opened there before you could pick your equipment up, it was forever done. They thought this to be a clever move, but actually it's totally stupid (again): dropping objects on high-freq locations imply you can get rid of all the crap and have decks done by Elder Signs and KiY and only marvellous items so that you can break the game from the setup. I won the second League by a landslide, and one of the adm implied I was cheating (only to end up apologizing because he never considered I could have played at a high strategical level. Wondering if I look dumb or it's just because I'm a woman; dunno, and don't want to know). And I won the third one, and was banned from the forum (the adm refused to publish the results, pushing them from month to month to the point he said he'd not have published the final ranking, only to ask me to do the math and send him the results. BAH). Worst. Arkham. Experience. Ever.

Congrats for finishing the grad school Sure returning to Arkham will be sweet Let me know if you have questions about the Advanced League.

As for you final question... I do not integrate League stuff in my everyday Arkham. The only non-official material I use are Heralds or Ancient Ones (most of the times, Heralds). There is a lot of good stuff created through the years by Avi, Amikezor, Veet, Rovdjuret and myself *modest* that really makes the game challenging.

Thanks for the well wishes. Sorry to hear about your experience with the official leagues. I think people in power get rubbed the wrong way when they see that they have made poor decisions about rules and that players were crafty enough to take advantage of them.

I would be interested to know more about the league. Are you still running it? I see the post on BGG is from the beginning of this year. Are other people contributing to it or do you have a story line in mind and are writing it yourself?

I have found that (as I suspected), I am able make reproductions of the Arkham Nights cards in much better quality than the other versions I found thanks to the art links from Tox. My guess is that the newest SE version probably allows me to export the images at a higher quality than older versions, which is why Tibs' versions did not scale well for me. I would imagine that at the time of their creation Tibs would have made them look as good as he possibly could. I am going to try to do the same for the Arkham League English images and PA characters where I am able to find the same pieces of art, but I don't know how much success I will have.

When I am done with these pieces (and my intent is to make them identical to the actual original physical versions) do you think BGG would host them? I know there are already versions of these same cards hosted on BGG, but I think that better rez images that are properly sized and ready to print should be hosted somewhere, in-case someone with my same interest for higher rez versions comes along. If I have already done the work, there is no need for other people to have to redo it.

Thanks for the well wishes. Sorry to hear about your experience with the official leagues. I think people in power get rubbed the wrong way when they see that they have made poor decisions about rules and that players were crafty enough to take advantage of them.

Agreed. But nevermind. It's a pity because everyone could have had a better experience if they'd have spent some more time (maybe asking for help from someone knowing the game better - and I'm not pointing at myself, there were a lot of great players involved / writing on their forums who could have helped) trying to figure out the implication of the rules. Anyway, it doesn't really matter.

I'm not the author of the Advanced League (but thanks for the curiosity ) Avi created it, back in 2010. You can read about it in his blog (and yes, there is a story behind it, linking the Scenarios, and everything is on his blog). There is no time limit to complete the challenge, and, as long as I'll have breath in my body and a sound mind to answer questions (in case Avi couldn't), I'll keep on running it (Avi's designed it, but he's rarely on the Geek, so I'm running it on the Geek for him - yes, I do love this League, and I do love the guy, he's a great friend and an awesome genius). We had to put the Scenarios there as well, simply for visibility (lots more people on the Geek, plus here the threads tend to sink).

2 people are actually playing the League (Dj and Eagermind) and they are doing brilliantly.

Finally, the League is not "completed": even though the 24 Scenarios are out, I still have to finish preparing the eons for the "Elder God mode" (replay everything at a higher difficulty level). Plus, there will be 4 extra scenarios to be played after Scenario 24. They are not linked to the main events, though, but they should provide some interesting twists of rules. I'm designing these ones, but lately I've been quite short of time. Probably in January I would be able to finish some of them.

As for printing and stuff... not really an expert here but in case you don't mind sending via e-mail the eons for the new AOs, I'll be more than happy to get them :whistle:

Yes, sorry, I Googled the art. Or if I knew it was in the "Art of H.P. Lovecraft Mythos" art book, I scanned it from there.

Sorry I didn't get back to you. I don't frequent these forums much anymore and only get notifications for new threads.

If you email me: [email protected] I'll send you eon files (if I still have them). Make sure to say what you'd like though, to make it easier for me to search.

Julia,

Sure thing. I just messaged you on the BGG boards. Let me know what email address you would like me to send them to. I could also use a hand in critiqing the final products, as I would like to try to get these to be perfect.

Tibs,

Thanks, I am sending off the email now. I don't mean to presume I can do a better job than you, I am just confused as to why the upload on BGG is blurry when I print it out.

Eldergias, I got the message Gonna answer you in a couple of hours (yesterday I was off-line most of the time and I have a Hell of messages to recover...). As for now, thanks for the kindest letter