The strongest trees are rooted in the dark places of the earth. Darkness will be your cloak, your shield, your mothers milk. Darkness will make you strong.
The three-eyed crow,A Dance with Dragons
Fantasy Flight Games is proud to announceThe Shadow City, the first Chapter Pack in theDance of Shadowscycle forA Game of Thrones: The Card Game!
Darkness falls across the world ofA Song of Ice and Fire. While Daenerys Targaryen struggles to rule Meereen, conspirators plot her downfall. Jon Snow serves the Nights Watch as their new Lord Commander, but there are dissidents hidden within his ranks. In the darkling alleys of Kings Landing itself, House Lannister, House Tyrell, and the faith of the Seven clash for control of Westeros. There are shadows everywhere.
The Shadow Citymarks the beginning of the fifth cycle of Chapter PackstheDance of Shadowscycle. Here, youll find the story advancing into the pages ofA Dance with Dragonsand the return of a beloved mechanic from the games first edition: shadows. Throughout this expansion and the rest of the cycle, youll find characters, locations, attachments, and events emblazoned with the shadow keyword. Assassins, spies, conspirators, and secrets hide in the twilight, ready to spring into view. Every faction must embrace the darkness and the path of shadowsor fade into obscurity.
You can pre-order your copy of this Chapter Pack at your local retailer or online through our webstore today! Then, read on to learn what you might expect to find withinThe Shadow City.
Your battles for the Iron Throne fall into darkness with the advent of theDance of Shadowscycle and its new keyword, shadow. Before this cycle, most cards in the game were drawn from your deck and remained in one of two spaces: in your hand or in play. The shadow keyword introduces a new place for your most devious, underhanded, and unexpected cards to be played.
For example, we may look at one of the new characters introduced in this expansion:Ser Gerris Drinkwater(The Shadow City, 16). Ser Gerris Drinkwater may seem like a standard character, but his shadow (5) keyword and the dark sigil attached to his gold cost destine him for the games most shadowy areas.
Cards that bear the shadow keyword can be played normally by paying their gold cost, or they can be marshaled or setup facedown in the shadows area by paying two gold! Cards in shadows exist in a unique stateseparate from your hand and play area and hidden from your opponents sight. Though your opponent can see how many cards you have in shadows, he wont know what they are until you reveal them. Once youve played cards into shadows, you can bring them out of shadows asActionsin any phase, at any point during the game. To bring a card out of shadows, you must pay its shadow cost: the number found as part of its shadow keyword.
By paying two gold, you may place Ser Gerris Drinkwater facedown in your shadows area.
In other words, you could marshal or setup Ser Gerris Drinkwater in shadows for two gold. Then, at any point in the game, you could take anActionand pay his shadow costfive goldto bring him out of shadows and into play!
The advantages of holding cards in shadows are readily apparent. Your cards in shadows almost form a second hand of cardsa place to put cards where they cant be lost to intrigue claim or discarded to meet reserve. You can setup shadow cards into shadows, potentially improving your setups. And cards in shadows have many similarities to cards with ambush, letting you spring them into play without warning! Unlike the ambush keyword, however, cards in shadows arent fettered to the challenges phase. You can bring them into play as anActionin any phase.
And if the inherent benefits of shadows werent enough, many shadow cards offer a powerful effect when they come out of shadows! Ser Gerris Drinkwater, to return to our earlier example, lets you choose a card in your plot deck and switch it with a card in your used pilepotentially reusing powerful plots likeValar Morghulis(There Is My Claim, 80) orThe First Snow of Winter(No Middle Ground, 79) without cycling through your entire plot deck. If the plot you need is locked in your used pile, Ser Gerris Drinkwater can get you what you need.
A character like Ser Gerris Drinkwater could be played in a deck without any other shadow cards, simply on the strength of his ability alone. But if youre trying to build a Martell deck based around shadow cards, youll want to enterThe Shadow City(The Shadow City, 17). This location can, of course, enter the shadows itself, but its true potency is only apparent while its in play. First, The Shadow City reduces the cost to marshal your cards into shadows by onemeaning youll only pay a single gold to put a card in shadows. And if that werent enough, you can kneel The Shadow City and discard a card from shadows to draw two cards!
By giving you both an economic advantage and a way to reliably draw cards, The Shadow City can serve as the linchpin for a Martell deck dedicated to the shadows. You may even useThe House with the Red Door(Journey to Oldtown, 39) to ensure you always start the game with The Shadow City in play. After all, four gold is the perfect amount to setup two cards in shadows.
While many shadow cards can be played normally or into shadows, some powerful cards must pass through the shadows, such asBeneath the Bridge of Dream(The Shadow City, 11). Instead of its gold cost, Beneath the Bridge of Dream bears a cost of to signify that it cannot be played normally. Instead, you must pay two gold to place Beneath the Bridge of Dream facedown into shadows, and pay its shadow cost (in this case, zero gold) to bring it out. These cards offer unusual and powerful effects, such as regaining access to your entire plot deck. You just need a little forethought to marshal these cards into shadows so theyll be there when you need them.
