Schatten der Macht ("Shadows of Power") is a strategic Euro Boardgame in the Dark Eye universe.

Lead a clandestine Organisation into the battle for control of Aventuria. Gain influence in numerous locations on the continent (the game map), send out groups of heroic adventurers and command ships on the high seas.

Those who cleverly develop their influence on churches, magical societies and great lords will find themselves in a good position to assist their adventurers in the fight against competitors (and monsters) as well as convince the greatest heroes of the age to lend them their swords and wisdom. And last but not least, each secret organisation pursues its own agenda of intrigue in the Shadows of Power.

The main gameplay is focussed around gaining a deck of cards, each of them representing regions on the map or powerful characters and then playing those cards to use the resources they provide - to recruit and move adventures, influence organisations and command ships. A major aspect of the game revolves around combining actions to make them more powerful and resolve them without spending too many turns - since every player has the power to dictate the remaining duration of a round!

At the end of each round, conflicts regarding the control of regions are resolved - an elegant majority system is used to determine the victor, but since conflicts are not resolved during the individual player's turns, everyone can react and have a small skirmish become a decisive battle for victory.

In addition, the game features an innovative scoring mechanism that keeps the game free of bookkeeping hassles (all scoring is performed at the end) and also allows weaker players to catch up due to relative scoring systems.

The game features many illustrations on the cards - dozens of characters of Dark Eye lore, organisations and regions.

It is playable with 2-4 players as the basic game and there is a 5-6 player expansion available at launch.

—description from the publisher

Games