GBP (£)
EUR (€)
Shadow Hunters
You could earn
3575 Victory Points
with this purchase
Related Products
Description
Shadow Hunters is a survival board game set in a devil-filled forest in which three groups of characters—the Shadows, creatures of the night; the Hunters, humans who try to destroy supernatural creatures; and the Neutrals, civilians caught in the middle of this ancient battle—struggle against each other to survive.
You belong to one of these groups and must conceal your identity from others since you don't know whom you can trust—at least not initially. Over time, though, someone might decipher who you are through your actions or through Hermit cards, or you might even reveal yourself to use your special ability.
The key to victory is to identify your allies and enemies early because once your identity is revealed, your enemies will attack with impunity using their special abilities like Demolish, Teleport, and Suck Blood or their equipment cards such as the Rusty Broad Ax or Fortune Brooch. This ancient battle comes to a head and only one group will stand victorious—or a civilian, in the right circumstances, might claim victory.
The 2011 edition of Shadow Hunters from Z-Man Games includes the Shadow Hunters Expansion, a set of ten new characters previously sold separately.
In the demon world an epic battle rages between the shadows and hunters. There are civilians caught up in the middle who have their own goals. In Shadow Hunters you and your friends will take on these roles in a desperate fight to the death. However, you will have to determine who is on your side and who is the enemy!
Shadow Hunters is a secret role game with a distinct manga/anime feel to it. This is a great high player count game, published by Z-Man Games, which sadly seems to have slipped under a lot of people’s radar.
It includes:
- One Game Board.
- Two Sets of 10 Character Cards.
- Six Area Cards.
- 16 Hermit Cards (green).
- 16 White Cards.
- 16 Black Cards.
- 8 Player Boards.
- 16 Wooden Pieces (Two in each player colour).
- One, Six-Sided Dice.
- One, Four-Sided Dice.
- Rule Book.
Playing Shadow Hunters
Role cards are distributed in secret to all players and placed face down on their player board. However many players there are, there will always be an equal number of shadows and hunters, the number of civilians will vary. For example in a seven-player game there will be two shadows, two hunters and three civilians, in a six-player game there is two of each faction.
Each player places one of their wooden pieces at zero on the damage track and one in the middle of the board and the game begins. Each character card contains a fair bit of information. The name of your character is at the top, their affiliation is middle left, hit points middle right and their win condition and special ability is at the bottom. You may reveal your identity at the start of a turn in order to use a characters special ability.
Each player’s turn consists of three actions:
- Move your character (mandatory).
- Action on the area card (optional).
- Attack other players (optional).
To move your character you roll both dice, add the total and move to the allocated area. If you roll a seven you may move to any area you choose, you must, however, move whenever you roll the dice so roll again if you roll the number you are already on.
You may then take the action on the area card. There are six different area cards, each with a different action. The black, white and green spaces (Cemetery, Church and Hermit’s Cave) allow you to draw a card of the same colour (more about cards in a bit). The Underworld Gate allows you to choose a card pile to draw from, The Erstwhile Altar allows you to steal a piece of equipment from another player and finally, The Weird Woods allow you to either deal two points of damage to someone or heal one point of damage.
White and black cards are either single use or equipment that stays face up in front of you. White cards may be cards that heal damage or help prevent it, whereas black cards generally deal extra damage. Green cards help you identify which side other players are on. Read the card and pass it, face down to another player of your choice who should follow the instructions on it. For example, this card, you would pass to someone, if they took a point of damage they are a hunter, if not they are either a shadow or a civilian.
![]("https://themadkatter.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/storytime/media/file/133/full_shadowhunters_greencard.jpg")
At the end of your turn, you may attack any player in the same area as you. You simply roll the two dice and deal an amount of damage equal to the difference between the two dice. If the two dice roll the same number your attack is unsuccessful.
Your character dies when they take damage equal or more their health value, when that happens reveal your card, you are out of the game. If any of the win conditions on your card are fulfilled, immediately reveal your card as the winner, it is, however, possible for multiple characters to win the game at the same time.
Final Thoughts
This is a great and pretty simple game, though the role deduction makes it great fun with the right group. The art on it is lovely and the game board and cards have a lovely finish. One major problem with this game is the player pieces, the colours on the boards and tokens just don’t match (the pink board has purple tokens) and some of the colours are tough to tell apart (the black and dark blue for example).
That said, Shadow Hunters is a great gem of a game and plays up to eight players, which alone makes it worth having. The accusations and promises that occur during a game make it a great social game too.
This might just be my overarching gaming highlight from the UKGE 2024, and I was stunned to find out afterwards that Shadow Hunters have been around since 2005. I was introduced to the game on a first time meeting with some fellow Insta Gamers and it really was a treat. With 7 of us sitting around the table, I think it helped that all but one of us had never played the game before as it very much kept the intrigue and mystery about the game. It was very entertaining and a fun party-like game.
The Game.
Weirdly, I don’t want to go into too much depth on the rules on this one because I don’t want to spoil too much. It somewhat feels like a classic battle of good vs evil but it isn’t that straight forward. There are three groups of characters (all unique characters) within the game. These are the Shadows, the Hunters and the Neutrals. These are all dealt randomly at the start to each player, and nobody (should) knows what character other players have unless the players want others to know who they are. Everyone has unique objectives to complete.
Classically, it is the job of the Hunters to take the Shadows down as the Shadows being night creatures, and vice versa. Those Shadows want to kill off the Hunters. The Neutrals just get caught up.
The board is very simple. It is made up of a health tracker that indicates every character’s health (all have a different health limit). The remaining part of the board is made up of 3 combat zones and 6 spaces (2 spaces within each combat zone). Players on their turn roll the dice and place their counter on the corresponding number. It is then their choice if they choose to act on what they can do in that zone, as well as determine if they want to strike any other characters in this combat zone.
The action could involve collecting gear, or clues as to the other players around you (which is all done secretly), or combinations of this.
Surviving is critical somewhat, but not essential. Not when you are part of a wider team and so you could still win, even if killed off. This would be because your objective was met. Obviously, that does become harder if your character is not actively involved but could happen.
The Creation
I clocked early on that it was a Zmangames product and figured I was in for a treat. They now produce Carcassonne and Pandemic, games I love so I was confident this would go well. I was happy to be proven correct. How I am only discovering Shadow Hunters for the first time is the true mystery.
It is the unique cards that you have the opportunity to gather at the different spaces that really make this one as well as unique characters with differing abilities, not just in what they can do, but also their objective that they are trying to achieve, all a mystery until it happens and the game is done.
Typically this sort of game frustrates me, but I loved it. I normally need to understand the victory condition and therefore be able to figure out what is going on. As well as trying to figure out my own objective, I am also trying to work out what my fellow players are up to to win. Who is my ally and who is my enemy? Do I strike this player or do I not, certainly not knowing at the start if they are a friend or a foe? There is paying attention to every interaction between players to determine what is best for your game. It was a true puzzle/problem solving situation that was highly entertaining.
Then, part way through I picked up a true spanner in the works card which was a weapon that did not give me a choice on whether I attacked or not. I had to attack anyone in the same combat space as me. I had no choice here. It was ok as I was a hunter and this sort of helped me. However from the point of view of making allies, everyone just wanted my character dead whilst holding this piece of kit. I couldn’t blame them.
Game Faults
There are not many in this game, perhaps the only critique is when a player is killed off there is little for them to do in the game from there as they will have to wait for the game to end before they can get involved again. That can be a frustration in any game if all players cannot see it through to the end.
The Experience.
I was in a really good place when playing this one at UKGE 2024. This review is based purely on one play, quite often that is all that is needed. I had gone to the Expo to connect with other gamers and playing this game, Shadow Hunters, very much allowed for that. It was so cool to play a game with people I had met online. Shadow Hunters naturally brings out social interaction. Whether it is in questioning your fellow players or just in funny occurrences/frustrations in someone attacking you. You don’t want your character to die.
I came away from this game thoroughly satisfied with a hugely fun and entertaining gaming experience. The result was irrelevant for me. This is a wonderful social game, even if it’s a little dark in concept. It is a game I would love in my collection for playing with family and friends. Simple mechanics with great depth, what more could you want.
Zatu Score
You might like
- Plays up to a massive eight players!
- Constant player interaction.
Might not like
- Colours and text are hard to read/discern.
- Best with Five or more players.