LABORATORY
GREY
The Arkham Chronicles
A custom scenario for Arkham Horror: The Card Game
last updated: 2024/01/21
I've long been a fan of this card game; I created the first publicly available templates for custom scenario design. Many years later, a robust community of fan content has sprung up, and I wanted to develop a scenario of my own. The card game has relatively few scenarios set in Arkham itself, so I decided to fix that.
The premise is fairly simple: a series of X-Files-style mysteries focused on the town of Arkham, reusing a core set of cards to create variety in a common setting. I have some loose ideas about continuing this in a small campaign format. Furthermore, where the official game often uses abstracted versions of Arkham, I wanted to highlight more specific neighborhood fixtures.
I had a few key creative constraints:
- Lean heavily on official lore for Fantasy Flight's property.
- Explore the limitations and uses of AI tools in a creative process.
- Minimize total card count to keep a theoretical physical production cost low.
- Experiment with Miro as a game design tool.
Conclusions
While I have further ambitions for this scenario, I do have a complete, tested version that can be played now in Tabletop Simulator. Regarding AI, I found that Midjourney was capable of producing card art, although attempts at UI elements were less successful.
I have mixed feelings about using AI for commercial projects, but as a prototyping tool, it helped. ChatGPT served more like a brainstorming partner; it lacked the continuity and precision needed for detailed technical game design.
As someone who enjoys flowcharts, I found Miro to be a powerful visual prototyping space. It was easy to upload images, illustrate workflows, leave notes, and examine card sets in high resolution. We used it extensively at Luna for planning, and it's proven just as beneficial in my personal work.
