Essen Spiel 2024 Novelties - ShelfBusterGames

About Magical Friends and How to Summon Them, from BoardGameGeek:

In Magical Friends and How to Summon Them, you'll be one of 5 powerful wizards who will try to win the Midsummer contest by bringing the most friends to the tavern after 8 rounds. Since your colleagues, the other wizards, are your biggest competitors, you'll have to cheat your way through the competition by using magical powers to sneak in some extra friends, which the others will do. In each round, you'll choose one of the available summon cards and summon a magical creature that will pretend to be your friend. When you choose a summon card, you can place the corresponding creature standee on the board. It also tells you how many and how far your creatures can move this turn. Each of the 50 unique creatures has its own ability and interacts differently with the other creatures. Very quickly, the board will be filled with creatures and it will be difficult to guide your friends through the different paths to the tavern. These paths are double-sided and can be combined in many different ways. But be aware, more dangerous than the paths are the creatures of your opponents. Don't worry, if one of your friends gets slain or poisoned in all the chaos, nothing will happen to you. For every friend you lose, you'll get pity power to speed up one of your other buddies. So stay in the lead or win the game from behind, both are possible. -description from the designer