Shadows of Malice: Seekers of a Hidden Light Review
on Aug 26, 2015
Jim Felliâs Shadows of Malice, which I reviewed just a couple of months ago, is one of the best games of 2015. Itâs a fresh, almost âoutsiderâ design that pretty much throws away the handful of fantasy board game design templates and does a couple of very unique things. With its random creature generation, a paradoxically vague but concrete sense of narrative worldbuilding and mechanics that support a tangible sense of actual cooperation beyond the usual whack-a-amole style of gameplay, Shadows of Malice is a maverick and even experimental design. If thatâs all we ever got from Mr. Felli, weâd already have something of a treasure â even if it is, like fine art, not exactly for all audiences. But there is more, and Mr. Felli has released Seekers of a Hidden Light, an expansion to Shadows of Malice. I would regard Seekers as a must-have expansion for those already converted, but those new to the game may want to come to grips with the base game first.
I sort of raised my eyebrow at an expansion coming along so soon. And my suspicion about it was completely correct- the small box add-on contains material that could have been included in the base game. One of the complaints Iâve heard about the base game is that there isnât much dimension to what players can do â you walk around and either visit Mystics/Cities or fight things. Thereâs no side-questing or anything like that other than the overarching goal to get strong enough to take down the Guardians at the Light Wells and to combat both XulâThul and his Shadows. This expansion completely addresses that lack by focusing on quests that the Avatars may optionally take on at the request of the Mystics.
And it really demonstrates that the new material shouldnât have been in the base game. With Seekersâ quest rules, the game almost becomes something of an âAdvanced Shadows of Maliceâ. It doesnât add much in the way of new processes, although it does expand the world-building quite a bit with all of this business about Lux potion-brewing Alchemes and Lux rune-inscribing Lumeres. This is not a suite of mix-and-match additions, nor does it supplement any of the card decks already in the game. No new masteries for the Avatars, no new treasures, no new Fate cards and no new potions. No new creature traits either.
Some may view that as a disappointment but considering the small number of all of the above that may feature in a given game it steers the expansion clear of being one of those bulk-adding cards that adds pointless variety rather than substantial material. You donât even have to pursue any of the quests if you donât want to, and the decision to do so is one that youâve got to weigh against the current situation on the board, what other players are doing and if there is even time to risk getting involved in one to try to reap the benefit of some very nice rewards.
There are four quest types, and all are issued by visiting a Mystic and spending an action. You get to pick which kind of quest you will pursue- Gathering, Harvesting, Hunting or Seeking. A Each type is progressively more difficult to accomplish because the specifics escalate. When you Gather, you simply have to go to a certain terrain type and make a Luck roll. Failed? Donât worry, it gets easier each time you attempt it. But if you Harvest, you have to go fight a specific type of creature to harvest some part of its body. Hunt, and youâve to fight a specific monster on a specific type of terrain. But if you really want to go for it, you can Seek, which means youâre looking for a specific monster, terrain AND ability color.
I read this in the rules and I thought âno wayâ because of how the random creature generation works. But then I read on and learned that all of the hexagonal, yellow counters with terrain types on them were bait that you could buy from Cities or Mystics. If you take on a quest, youâd better get some bait because these invaluable markers let you bump the creature generation roll around so that you can get what you need. Theyâre also helpful for treasures that affect certain kinds of creatures.
Complete a quest and you can earn a couple of different rewards and not just Soulshards and potions. You also earn Lux, which becomes something of a shared currency within the group. You use these to buy potions or runes from the aforementioned Alchemes and Lumeres. The potions are particularly powerful and offer very different kinds of effects from the standard drafts available throughout Aetheros. The Lux runes are expensive but attach to treasures, augmenting their power. Are the rewards worth it? Itâs up to you decide. There are no timers, doom tracks or any other artificial methods of increasing tension to tell you one way or another. Talk it over with your band, see how the Lightwells are doing, and create your own trajectory.
The open-ended gameplay and compelling lack of ham-handed fantasy game tropes is completely unaltered. As a whole, Seekers fits right into the Shadows system with very little effort and it does not appreciably affect game length- and can even accelerate it somewhat since successful questing can lead to stronger Avatars. But I would still recommend that those new to the game cut their teeth on the system before applying the quest, bait and Lux. That said, I wonât play without them from this point forward.
I canât stress enough how impactful this game has been on the way I view the whole fantasy/RPG-style board game. It isnât really anything like all of those other ones over there (Iâm pointing at your game shelf) and now it isnât even really expanding in the same ways that those all have. Do I want more from Mr. Felli? Of course I do. But I also want any further expansions to be this casually meaningful, well-considered and indispensable. An excellent encore to a masterful performance.