How to Play Black Sonata: Strange Shadows

Objective of the Game

Black Sonata: Strange Shadows includes several expansions for the base game. One of these, Cat and Mouse, is an asymmetric two-player game where one player is the Dark Lady and the other is the Historian. The Historian wins if they can successfully find the Dark Lady three times to gain three tokens. The Dark Lady wins if they can avoid being found for long enough to declare a visit to every location on the map.

Preparation (Setup)

Historian Setup

1. Lay out the board and place your two pawns on any two locations with the same color.
2. Place the 7 deduction and 4 tracker tokens from the base game nearby to use as required.

Dark Lady Setup

1. Arrange the two map cards behind the screen (e.g., box lid) and place your pawn (from the base game) on a location of your choice. The Historian should not be able to see this, but you should be able to see the main board and the Historian’s pawns.
2. Shuffle the location cards and remove one, unseen by the Historian, from the game. Place the remaining ten cards on top of the Dark Lady victory card and behind the screen.
3. Find the 20 stealth cards with letters G to Z in the bottom left corner. Shuffle these together and place them on the table, face down (landmark icons showing) as a draw deck, with space for a discard pile nearby.
4. Place one fog card (2 to favor the Dark Lady player, none to favor the Historian) on top of the draw pile. Then draw the top five stealth cards and spread them on the table as an open hand, visible to both players.

The Darkest Ladies Setup

If using The Darkest Ladies expansion:

1. Shuffle the Darkest Lady cards and tuck one face down under the edge of the board without looking at it. Return the rest of the Darkest Lady cards to the box.
2. Shuffle the clue cards and place them in a draw pile nearby.
3. Place any two clue cards as a bonus underneath the location cards, as you would normally do with the clue that matches the Dark Lady’s suit.

Indirections Setup

If using the Indirections expansion:

Shuffle the indirections cards and select any number of them to substitute into the stealth deck. After deciding which of the eight pre-defined sequences to use, assemble the stealth deck as normal, but inserting the selected indirections cards in sequence instead of normal stealth cards. The finished stealth deck will contain a mixture of normal stealth cards and indirections cards. Cut the deck as usual.

Blazonry Setup

If using the Blazonry expansion:

1. Shuffle the blazon cards and place them face down in a pile.
2. Take the top blazon card and without looking at it, place it face down (shield side down) on top of the Dark Lady card. You must correctly deduce the four symbols of this blazon before you are allowed to access the Dark Lady card.

The Ferryman Setup

If using The Ferryman expansion:

1. Return the riverside location cards (Blackfriars, Liberty of the Clink and London Bridge) to the box. Since these cards are not used in the game, you cannot search for the Dark Lady at those locations.
2. Shuffle the remaining location cards before placing them in a pile on top of the clue card that matches the Dark Lady’s suit. If using the Darkest Ladies, place the pile on top of the two bonus clue cards.
3. Place the ferry token at any one of the riverside locations.

Fluxo do Jogo

The players take turns, with the Dark Lady going first.

On the Dark Lady’s Turn

The Dark Lady’s turn has two steps.

1. Optionally move your hidden pawn to an adjacent location on the map cards. You do not have to move every turn, but to confuse the Historian you should always pretend to.
2. You must perform one of the following actions:
   1. Play the top card from the location deck to the discard pile, if it shows your pawn’s current location.
   2. Play one card from your open hand to the discard pile, if it matches your pawn’s current location. Note that fog cards match any location. Draw a card from the draw pile to replenish your hand.
   3. Only if you are unable to perform either of the actions above, you may instead discard all stealth cards (but not location cards!) from your hand and replace them from the draw pile.

When the draw deck is depleted, renew it by shuffling the discard pile. In this way, location cards may eventually enter your hand, but these can be played as normal if they match your secret location.

On the Historian’s Turn

You may use the tracker tokens to mark the Dark Lady’s possible locations, as in the solo game.

On your turn, the Historian must either:

1. Move one of your pawns to an adjoining location, or
2. Search for the Dark Lady.

To search, place an unused deduction token on a location with one of your pawns. The Dark Lady player must then say if their pawn is in that location.

• If it is, place that deduction token on the board in one of the three deduction spots.
• Otherwise, discard that deduction token from the game.

Regardless of the outcome, the Dark Lady player may flee by optionally moving her secret pawn up to the number of times matching the number of deduction tokens on the board. It is then the Dark Lady’s turn.

Tarry Cards

At the start of the Dark Lady’s turn, if you want her to stay where she is for one turn, simply add a Tarry card to the top of the stealth deck, then continue as normal (moving the top card to the bottom).

When a Tarry card appears on top of the stealth deck during a subsequent pass through the deck, you must immediately flip it over and carry out the instruction on the back, then discard the Tarry card from the game.

Ações e Como Jogar

Testing Clues (The Darkest Ladies)

Each time you earn a clue you may choose which side of that clue card to use before testing it.

• One side shows four symbols. When you test it, the hole will show how many of these symbols are present on the Darkest Lady card.
• The other side shows three symbols. Here, the hole will show how many are present on the Darkest Lady PLUS how many of those are in the correct position. For example, 2 indicates either that one symbol is present on the Dark Lady card in the correct position OR that two of the Dark Lady’s symbols are shown but they are both in the wrong positions.

To test a clue, place it with the side you wish to use face up. Lay the Darkest Lady face down on top of the clue and flip them both over together to reveal the number of matches through the hole. Then flip the cards back over, tuck the Darkest Lady back under the board, and use a numbered token to record the number of matches on the clue card.

Indirections Cards

Indirections cards should be treated exactly the same as the normal stealth cards. But instead of showing a local landmark of the Dark Lady’s current location, the indirection cards give two different types of clue.

• Compass symbols show the north-south and east-west directions travelled by the Dark Lady from her previous location. For example, a card might indicate she travelled south (towards the lower edge of the board) and west (to the left) to reach her current location from the previous.
• The other type of indirections card shows the possible color of the Dark Lady’s current location. For example, she is in a red or purple location (Shoreditch, St Paul’s, Eastcheap or Southwark).

Deducing the Blazon (Blazonry)

When you search for the Dark Lady, instead of inserting a fog card into the stealth deck, insert the top card from the blazon deck, question side up.

Whenever you encounter a blazon card on a subsequent pass through the search deck, insert a normal fog card underneath it, remove it, and use it as a clue to deduce the Dark Lady’s blazon.

When you collect a blazonry clue, flip it face up and notice the arrow pointing to one edge. Align this card next to the blazon card, with the clue arrow pointing to the blazon card. The arrow will indicate the number of symbols in common between the clue and the hidden blazon.

Once you have sufficient clues, you should be able to deduce the symbols on the blazon and form it from the tokens (with one token left over). You may then flip over the blazon card and check your answer.

Using the Ferry (The Ferryman)

You must collect each location card in order, one at a time, starting first with the one on the top of the pile, then the next one revealed, and so on. To collect a card you must visit the associated map location with your pawn. You may not use a location card to search for the Dark Lady until you have collected it in this way. As normal, you cannot take the bonus clue card (or cards if you are playing with the Darkest Ladies) at the bottom of the pile until you have collected all the location cards on top of it.

The Dark Lady moves as normal, but the player’s movement is now affected by the river. You may still cross the river via London Bridge, but you cannot cross the river between Blackfriars and Liberty of the Clink without the help of the ferry.

You can use the ferry whenever your player pawn is in the same location as the ferry token. On your turn, you may move your pawn and the ferry token to any other riverside location. This counts as one “move” action. When you subsequently move your pawn away, the ferry will remain there.

If you are at a different riverside location from the ferry, you may use one “move” action to instead summon the ferry to your location. You may then use the ferry during a subsequent turn.

Fim de Jogo e Pontuação

The game ends when either:

• the Historian collects three deduction tokens from successful searches (Historian wins)
• the Historian loses five deduction tokens (Dark Lady wins)
• the Dark Lady depletes their location deck down to the victory card (Dark Lady wins)
• on their turn, the Dark Lady is unable to play any card to the discard pile (Historian wins)

Scoring (The Darkest Ladies)

If you win, add 5 points to your score.

Scoring (Indirections)

At the end of the game, add ½ point to your score for each indirections card that you added to the stealth deck during setup.

Scoring (Blazonry)

If your guess matches the blazon, you may access the Dark Lady card to complete the game. If your guess is incorrect, then the Dark Lady is protected and you lose the game.

If you win, add 10 points to your score.

Scoring (The Ferryman)

If you win, add 10 points to your score.

Dicas para Vencer

• Dark Lady: Try to deplete the location deck as quickly as possible to win the game, bearing in mind that each time you play a location card it will reveal exactly where you are.
• Dark Lady: Watch the cards in your hand and the top card of the draw pile to plan your future moves and avoid being trapped.