Codex Entry #1: Arkham Horror LCG

Since we're going to talk a lot about the Arkham Horror LCG game, especially in the next few weeks, I thought I would briefly explain what the game is about. Arkham is a cooperative living card game for 1 to 4 players. Let's examine this definition a little more closely. 

• Cooperative: Players vs the Game, players work together to solve a mystery, fight enemies and try to avoid death. Keyword: try. 
• Living Card Game: A subgenre of card games where the publisher, in this case Fantasy Flight Games (FFG), creates new products regularly, player and campaign cards, that are added to the game universe. Unlike a Trading Card Game (TCG), like Magic The Gathering, the content of each card pack is fully known. There isn't any rare or better card, you always know what you pay for. 

It is perfectly suitable to share your box of cards with your friends. There's no need for everyone to have their own copy, although having your own cards allows for some duplicate between each player's deck. That's right, each player gets their own deck. More on that shortly. 

Why the name Arkham, you might ask? Arkham is a fictional town in Massachusetts created by the early 20th Century American author H.P. Lovecraft. He repeatedly used this town in his mix of science, fantasy and horror writing universe known as Cthulhu Mythos. This world has inspired many creations in literature, cinema, music, television and games, from Stephen King's novel to, well, this game. I invite you to click on a few links at the bottom of this article to know more about Lovecraft and his work. 

By now, you might have guessed the game is about solving horror mysteries. In the pure Lovecraftian tradition, many of these mysteries revolve around cultists worshipping weird and evil entities. To accomplish this goal, each player incarnates an investigator, a mere mortal crazy enough to try to lift the veil on these mysteries. These investigators have a few statistics for resolving tasks and instruction on how to build their deck of cards. In a game of Arkham LCG, players take turns trying to find clues, fight enemies or resolve any other problem the game throws at them. Rather than using dice to determine the outcome of an action, the investigators draw from a token bag, each token has a numerical value or represents a symbol with scenario-specific effects. The nature of the bag content is how you can adjust the difficulty of the game. That's the game in a nutshell. I don't think it would be particularly useful to go into more details, I will invite you to watch a few gameplay videos if you're curious to know more. 

One last thing. I mentioned the game is for 1–4 players. While it is true the game can be played solo, most of the time you'll hear solo players say they play two-handed, i.e. one person with two investigators. The game is hard enough as is, having a single investigator able to do everything is like playing on extra hard with a hand tie behind your back. 

Please don't hesitate to post any question about the game in the comments. Until then, I'll see you on my next adventure. 

Links: 

• HP Lovecraft: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._P._Lovecraft
• Cthulhu Mythos in pop culture: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_works_influenced_by_the_Cthulhu_Mythos
• Justin from PlayingBoardGames takes his friend Eric, who is relatively new to the game, through an Arkham campaign: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXmf8-Jo8F-tvpdwKrGFALz1OD58DViaZ. In the first video, they go over the deck building aspect using a website called Arkhamdb.
• ArkhamDB, a public repository of decks shared by enthusiasts https://arkhamdb.com/