欧博abgStellaris Shadows of the Shroud Guide
The Shadows of the Shroud DLC introduces a new psionic-focused layer to Stellaris, letting your empire interact with the mysterious Shroud. Accessing it requires careful choices, research, and patience, but the rewards include powerful psionic abilities, domain powers, and the ability to pledge to Shroud entities for unique strategic bonuses.
The easiest way to reach the Shroud currently is to start as a gestalt civilization, such as a Hivemind or a Machine Intelligence, and take the Shroud-Forged Origin.
This immediately puts you in contact with a being of the Shroud, and you’ll be prompted to make choices that determine how you interact with it. Focus on selections that increase progress; some may cause minor debuffs, but they are generally manageable.
Progress toward accessing the Shroud is gradual. Random events will occasionally appear, letting you either speed up or slow down your advancement.
As long as you avoid actions that block your psionic potential, you should be fine. Prioritizing traditions and technology is recommended, as these are key to advancing psionics later in the game.
Once the initial situation concludes, you unlock access to the Psionics Tradition tree, but you cannot complete it until you finish a second situation. At this point, you should also have Psionic Theory in your technology queue, which is required to unlock the full tradition.
After this, the Shroud menu becomes available. To delve further, you need to complete the Psionic Ascension situation, which progresses over time at variable speeds depending on your game. Upon completion, you receive a transmission from the Shroud, granting full access.
Inside the Shroud, you can explore four distinct domains, each offering unique powers through accords and covenant abilities. To unlock these powers, you must increase attunement to a given domain.
Think of it like a D&D alignment chart: your empire’s alignment can shift over time, and you can rotate focus between domains depending on the actions you take. Sending envoys to a domain can also increase attunement, allowing for more flexibility.
Once all domains are fully explored, your empire gains near-maximal aura effects from psionics, and you can pledge allegiance to a specific Shroud entity, unlocking additional benefits and strategic options for your civilization.
The Shadows of the Shroud DLC introduces a psionic-focused layer to Stellaris, allowing empires to interact with the mysterious Shroud and unlock powerful abilities. The most straightforward method is through the Shroud-Forged Origin, but the expansion also works with the existing Ascension system, letting any psionic-capable empire eventually breach the Shroud.
There are also alternative origins that provide very different gameplay experiences. Mindwardens are anti-psionic, preventing you from ever breaching the Shroud. They play very differently from standard psionic empires and are challenging, but offer a unique and rewarding playstyle.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, the Endbringers Origin casts your empire as a galaxy-devouring endgame boss, forcing you to ascend and dominate the galaxy instead of interacting with the Shroud in a typical way.
Certain civics can accelerate psionic progress or provide powerful bonuses tied to specific playstyles. Chosen grants your empire an immediate connection to a Shroud patron, along with other starting buffs, making it easier to begin your psionic journey.
Entropy Drinkers, exclusive to Endbringer empires, funnel resources to your elites, granting massive bonuses and the ability to spawn extremely powerful leaders. Experimental Sentencing lets you conduct experiments that improve technology while also providing unique interactions with slaves.
Secret Societies unlock the new Proxy War mechanic and offer additional bonuses to subterfuge, espionage, and covert operations, giving your empire more tools for manipulating events both internally and externally.
Tankbound lets you get bonuses with your machine civilizations as you essentially have to automate almost everything, giving you some debuffs, but also some boosts, helping you break the veil faster.
Check our Stellaris: Shadows of the Shroud Review