Jack Reda
United States
Herndon
Virginia
Guess the games in my uberbadge!
My favorite game is Cosmic Encounter.
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Now that Cosmic Incursion is on store shelves, I am writing my best unbiased review of the expansion and its aliens (which you can now look up in detail on The Warp: http://redamedia.com/warp/anypower.php3)
The Aliens
Bully [*] (Eon) - This alien hasn't changed, and it's still scary to go up against. While Bully probably didn't top any fan's list of aliens they wanted in this expansion, it's still one that few will complain about having. It's even more cutthroat than Shadow, and you have to think twice about attacking him with a lot of ships.
Chronos [*] (Eon) - One of the first aliens I ever played, it's nice to finally have Chronos in the game. It isn't hard to play Chronos- sure there can be a little second-guessing from his opponent- but Chronos has the advantage anyway, and like Oracle, it can be good for knowing when to dump a bad card.
Cryo [*] (New) - I've heard the naysayers complain that there isn't any strategy in Cosmic Encounter (madness!). I find Cryo is great for planning on the end game. You find out who you are up against, and save the best cards for dealing with them later. The bonus of drawing a card each time really makes it fun to play.
Deuce [*] (Eon) - There's some great wording on this alien to help cut down on confusion when dealing with aliens that mess with your revealed encounter card. Deuce is a good expansion alien- pure combat power!
Disease [*] (Eon) - It's nice to see the stronger and scarier version of Disease here. Three ships is all you need to spread to the next planet. I love this power because it behaves so differently from your standard alien.
Ethic [*] (Eon) - Just as we started to discuss how Ethic didn't need to be a lucre alien, FFG unleashed the non-lucre version. Ethic, like Bully, is not the most exciting classic alien waiting for republication, but it's a good fit, especially with this set.
Fungus [*] (Eon) - Fungus was born to be in the FFG ship-stacking version of CE. It's one we all expected to see pretty soon (along with Filth... er... oops?). Fungus is great because it not only gets stronger, but does so by punishing his opponents. That's my kind of alien.
Fury [*] (New) - Fury is another great combat power. There's some down-payment in ship loss that must be made, but that gets paid back at a great interest rate. +3 for each token is huge. Sure, you gotta commit them before you know how many you need, but a lot of encounters are won by small margins, so even 2 tokens closes a big gap.
Genius [*] (New) - The new alternate win alien has already stirred up discussion. I'd been playing a version of this since the base set came out, and Genius us way better. It's not easy to win with, but it causes a lot of great in-game tension.
Ghoul [*] (New) - This is an alien that originally appeared in Space Gamer, with few modifications. It's simple and straight-forward, and with the Reward deck, even more potent.
Guerrilla [*] (New) - While most players are not necessarily fond of aliens that give you something for losing an encounter, the benefit that Guerrillas has is in forcing players to consider attacking with fewer ships. As mentioned above, the win can often be by a small total, and Guerrilla will make you hit yourself for only attacking with 1 ship when you could have won if you'd committed 3 or 4.
Leviathan [*] (New) - Since the release of the FFG edition of CE, the individual planets have been perfect for being used in ways that weren't possible in other editions. Leviathan is a powerhouse. Attacking with a +20 is insane! You just have to make sure you keep other players off of your planets (which you can do by playing high attack cards as defense- your smaller cards look a lot bigger on offense when accompanied by a worldship).
Locust [*] (New) - Another alien that plays with the single planets in the game. Locust has to attack alone a lot (and with the Reward deck to entice defensive allies, it's even harder). But Locust knows that if he does win, that planet is getting eaten at the start of the next encounter. It's tricky to win the game with Locust, but very satisfying to play.
Magician [*] (New) - Bruno's alien has probably nudged Laser to the back of the line for now. It's clever and fun. Aliens that make your opponent pull his hair with an agonizing decision is a great alien to play with, and again, I love being able to gain something while shafting my opponent.
Mercenary [*] (New) - Another alien that is beefed up by the Reward deck.
Merchant [*] (New) - Why didn't anyone think of playing cards as ships before? Heh heh. It's a great alien for boosting your encounter totals while risking only crappy cards.
Plant [*] (Eon) - This is a great alien, to be sure. The theme of Cosmic Incursion seems to be "get something while screwing someone else". Plant does that in spades. Not only do you get to use someone else's alien, but now they can't use it at all. Superior to Insect? I think so.
Seeker [*] (Eon) - A classic alien that differs from most others in its mechanics. When played well, Seeker lets you manage your hand very effectively.
Sniveler [*] (Eon) - The number one requested alien by all accounts, although also the one most likely to annoy everyone when "roleplayed". Sniveler keeps you in the game, and is great for newer players to experiment with.
Symbiote [*] (Mayfair) - The lone Mayfair alien in the set makes use of those nifty new orange ships. It also gives everyone incentive to buy the next expansion so you can have Symbiote in a 6 player game. This version is much burlier than the original. It can't be zapped, and all 40 ships count toward the win. That's pretty nifty.
The Reward Deck
As the creator of the Reward Deck, my endorsement only means so much. But I can say that it definitely has provided the intended effect in our games. I wanted a way to give players more incentive to ally with the defense. I found in out games, it was pile-on city for the offense for at least half of the game. Not until one player was going for a solo win did everyone ally with the defense. And so I also wanted to have a way to mess with the end game formula as well. Going for the solo win? Well, you know you're giving most of the other players access to potentially great rewards if you lose. If you do lose, the next player has an even better chance of getting the solo win.
The other reason I created the Reward deck was to be able to add in new cards to the game without messing with the standard deck distribution. Anyone that has played with the Mayfair deck knows that it can get out of hand. I have used and created a boat load of custom new cards, and the Reward deck was a great way to introduce them into the game.
What about the backs of the cards? Well, they are different, and there have been a few concerns- but so far it has been a non issue. They weren't originally different, but it has made for some fun new circumstances. I like psyching people out when I have chosen a Reward encounter card to play. They look panicked, though only half of the encounter cards are particularly powerful.
The New Cards
Rifts: These cards are a lot of fun, especially in light of the different card back art that the Reward deck has. You can target those cards for compensation, but maybe you'll be getting a Rift instead. Plus, the Rift is just good for getting your ships out of the warp, which is nice, since you passed up rescuing them to get cards from the Reward deck.
Kickers: Booyah. I love Kickers, and I think the Reward deck is a great place for them. They would have been one card too many to explain to a new player when going through all the cards in CE. And they make going to the Reward deck a treat when you've drawn one.
Reinforcements: The +6. Nuff said.
Artifacts: Hand Zap, Space Junk, and Finder. These are great artifacts to finally have in the game, and perfect for the Reward deck. I'm not sure what the final verdict will be with regard to Vulch, and using Space Junk with the two discard piles, but for now we're allowing access. It seems more in the spirit of CE.
Crooked Deal. I've had "special encounter" cards, including some like the Morph and this special Negotiate, so I know how much fun they are. I find it very cosmicy to add in little twists to existing entities like this modified negotiate card. It's much sweeter than a regular negotiate- you almost want to throw your next encounter.
Negative Attack Cards: The Reward deck should have a little risk. Most players don't want the negative cards, and maybe you should be drawing cards from the regular deck or rescuing ships for your rewards. Spiff loves them, and so does Loser and of course Anti-Matter (and Reserve!).
6th Player
Orange is in the house. We now have a full set of primary and secondary colors, but more importantly, you can have 6 players. I love Cosmic Encounter with a large group... more allies, more aliens, more encountering. I look forward to being able to add in a 7th (and 8th) player down the line, or at least use Symbiote with a large group (and I hope to see another alien that makes use of extra ships). The safety orange color mixes very well with the existing components.
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Final Verdict
This is an AWESOME expansion for Cosmic Encounter. I've waited many years for a great edition to CE, and even more years for a new expansion. This one was worth the wait, though I am already greatly anticipating another one. I think hands down, Fantasy Flight was the company to produce CE, and their love of expansions was part of the reason. I hope we'll see many more expansions for CE of this quality.
bring it on!
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Barney Bustoffson
United States
Massachusetts
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I got my copy today and I'm looking forward to playing it this weekend. I think we'll be drawing only powers from Incursion for the first game, then mixing it up.
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Jeff Kunkel
United States
Smithtown
New York
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This would be much more useful if you actually briefly explained what the alien powers actually do, along with rifts, kickers, space junk, etc. As someone whose first exposure to CE was the AH version, your commentary on the value these things add to the game meant nothing to me.
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Patrick
United States
Hanover
MD
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Just go to the Warp's Amazing Power Thingy change origin to "CI" and hit submit. That will give you a rundown of all the new powers and their flares.
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Jordan Browne
United States
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I'm curious why Ghoul is a red alert alien. It doesn't seem to merit it.
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"What about the backs of the cards? Well, they are different, and there have been a few concerns- but so far it has been a non issue. They weren't originally different, but it has made for some fun new circumstances."
Was this a design decision made before printing (and will be the same going forward) or just something unexpected that happened? Not that I'm bothered, just curious. If it was unexpected then will it be corrected in a future re-print?
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Barney Bustoffson
United States
Massachusetts
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It was by design. I doubt it will be changed.
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Matthew Cary
United States
Minneapolis
Minnesota
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DirtyDubs wrote: Was this a design decision made before printing (and will be the same going forward) or just something unexpected that happened? Not that I'm bothered, just curious. If it was unexpected then will it be corrected in a future re-print?
This is how Kevin wanted it to be.
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Jefferson Krogh
United States
San Leandro
California
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DirtyDubs wrote: Was this a design decision made before printing (and will be the same going forward) or just something unexpected that happened? Not that I'm bothered, just curious. If it was unexpected then will it be corrected in a future re-print?
Interesting question about card backs for future expansions. I really wonder if the main deck will ever get any new cards in future FFG expansions. It seems that it's tuned pretty tightly. The Rewards deck seems like the logical place to add new stuff, but even there you have a risk of unbalance. I can't imagine adding a third deck of encounter cards, either.
So is that it? Do you think we're done adding encounter cards and artifacts aside from Flares for new aliens?
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Andy Leber
Canada
Orillia
ON
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Kobold Curry Chef wrote: DirtyDubs wrote: Was this a design decision made before printing (and will be the same going forward) or just something unexpected that happened? Not that I'm bothered, just curious. If it was unexpected then will it be corrected in a future re-print? Interesting question about card backs for future expansions. I really wonder if the main deck will ever get any new cards in future FFG expansions. It seems that it's tuned pretty tightly. The Rewards deck seems like the logical place to add new stuff, but even there you have a risk of unbalance. I can't imagine adding a third deck of encounter cards, either. So is that it? Do you think we're done adding encounter cards and artifacts aside from Flares for new aliens?
I personally don't think the deck needs any new attack cards, but I think there's always room for a few artifacts, and maybe reinforcements.... the problem being i guess, that then the ratio to attack cards/non-attack cards could be wrong. I agree the reward deck is probably where the most new content should go, regardless of the card type... that way you can keep the ratio of encounter/non-encounter cards in the main deck the same.
The alternative would be to add card types in equal amounts to the main deck, but that can change the game too... like for the alien/flare that benefits from a re-shuffle... (the name is eluding me at the moment).
Good questions though.
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Barney Bustoffson
United States
Massachusetts
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I expect that if they go to 8 players, you'll see a few more cards in the deck (maybe even at 7 players). These will be marked like the CI cards, so you can remove them if you don't want that many players or don't want to mess around with the distribution. However, I bet most people will just add the cards in no matter how many players they'll have (I know we will). And the new cards will attempt to retain the same ratio of things. It's just by then you'll need more cards to avoid Quakes all the time. I wouldn't mind a half dozen more cards right now anyway. No need to get all Mayfair deck crazy. A relatively small number would suffice.
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Todd France
United States
IF ONLY I had a plan...
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Bustoffson wrote: No need to get all Mayfair deck crazy. A relatively small number would suffice. :goo:
I don't know, there was a certain charm to a deck you had to divide in half just to shuffle...
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I hope to see the encounter deck growing. IMHO it needs a few cards between 15-20 (when you’re not using the rewards deck), another cosmic zap, a few “new” artifacts (Warp Break, Time Gash, Victory Boon), a few more reinforcements and more negotiate cards to keep the ratio. This will also be important to prevent the likelihood of Cosmic Quakes.
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Francis K. Lalumiere
Canada
Brossard
Quebec
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What about moons and lucre?
[ducks]
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Jefferson Krogh
United States
San Leandro
California
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pseudotheist wrote: Bustoffson wrote: No need to get all Mayfair deck crazy. A relatively small number would suffice. I don't know, there was a certain charm to a deck you had to divide in half just to shuffle...
There was! On the other hand, I recall a few games with that edition where I'd draw 2 encounter cards out of 7, with the rest being Artifacts and a Flare or two. So there is that danger with a much larger deck.
Okay, let me work this out. 82 cards in a normal deck, +2 Flares for every player after 5. So for 8 players, 88 cards, of which 16 are Flares. Just adding 6 more Flares drastically affects the deck distribution already! Yikes.
If we add 12 more cards to make an even 100 (I think that'd enough for an 8-player game, assuming you have the Rewards deck), then you'd probably want to add 8 Attacks (00/04/06/08/10/12/14/20?), 2 Negotiates, and 2 Artifacts. That would keep the ratios roughly the same as they are now:
Attack 39/82 (47.6%) 47/100 (47%)
Reinf. 6/82 (7.3%) 6/100 (6%)
Negot. 15/82 (18.3%) 17/100 (17%)
Morph 1/82 (1.2%) 1/100 (1%)
Flares 10/82 (12.2%) 16/100 (16%)
Artif. 11/82 (13.4%) 13/100 (13%)
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Stefan Lopuszanski
United States
North Wales
Pennsylvania
So hear me roar! RAWR!
Her Serenity, The Lady of Pain.
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Good stuff. I was reading all the powers on The Warp and I noticed quite a few typos. You might want to go over it again and fix the more obvious ones ('teh' instead of 'the' and 'as' instead of 'ask').
As always, keep up the good work!
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Just a Bill
United States
Norfolk
Virginia
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The Warp wrote: Disease [*] (Eon) - It's nice to see the stronger and scarier version of Disease here. Three ships is all you need to spread to the next planet.
I'm not positive I'm interpreting you correctly, Jack, but I don't see that they made the power easier to spread. It's hard to tell for sure, because the new wording unfortunately is awkward and ambiguous, but it sounds like you are interpreting it to mean "minimum three ships spread across planets in that system", whereas I think it still means "three ships on any one planet" like it did in Eon. Here are the texts:
Eon wrote: ... if you already have a base of at least 3 tokens in that system you may take one or more of those tokens and move them to any other planet in that system.
Fantasy Flight wrote: ... If you have one or more colonies in the infected player's home system consisting of at least three ships, choose one of those colonies and take one or more of your ships from it, moving them to any other planet in that system.
I'm guessing you are reading it as if it said "together consisting of at least three ships in total", which is a reasonable interpretation and kind of suggested by the fact that they start out with "one or more colonies". I, on the other hand, am assuming that they didn't actually mean to change the power and didn't realize they were introducing ambiguity. I'm reading it as if it said "one or more colonies in the infected player's home system consisting of at least three ships each" (and I'm scratching my head wondering why they even bothered with the confusing "one or more" approach).
(The reason I lean in that direction is because, if they had meant for it to be aggregate, it would have been so much simpler to write "if you have three or more ships on colonies in the infected player's home system".)
It makes me sad and frustrated when they rewrite a longstanding classic power that was working just fine and make it ambiguous. Yet another alien that I have to mock up, rewrite, print out, and oversleeve so that months later when somebody picks it and I can't remember the ruling, we don't have to go check the FAQ that hasn't been updated yet and then search the FFG and BGG forums for 10 minutes to figure out how they wanted us to play the !@#$% thing. Anybody else feel this way?
I guess somebody at FFG will have to tell us how this power is supposed to work in their edition.
Sorry to be so negative ... I realize some of these things seem petty, but this must be about the 10th or 15th Incursion issue I've stumbled over in the last couple of days and right now I'm just sick of it. They didn't even make sure each alien text ended its last sentence with terminal punctuation, or run spell-check on the histories, and some of the powers have flat-out obvious leaks in the gameplay (ask yourself what happens to Merchant's hired ships when they are captured). That's just sloppy, and This Game Deserves Better.
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Jefferson Krogh
United States
San Leandro
California
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Bill,
With the Mayfair Disease, you needed four ships on that colony to spread. That's what Jack means by "stronger and scarier." FFG changed it back to the original Eon, and that's all. The FFG text is crystal clear.
Overall, no, I don't feel the way you do about all this, because I honestly think you're completely over-analyzing every word on every card at this point. Maybe it's time to step back and do something else for a little bit so you don't drive yourself crazy this way? I say this because I enjoy your posts here and hope that you don't burn out.
-Jefferson
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Jefferson Krogh
United States
San Leandro
California
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As to Merchant, once again it's pretty clear: "Any hired ship that goes to the warp or is removed from the game is discarded. Otherwise, hired ships become normal cards again and return to your hand at the end of the encounter."
Since capturing is neither going to the warp or removed from the game, it goes under "otherwise." CE on the whole does require the players to do a little interpretation, since every power combo can't be perfectly figured out in advance, but this isn't one of those cases, my friend.
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Just a Bill
United States
Norfolk
Virginia
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Kobold Curry Chef wrote: With the Mayfair Disease, you needed four ships on that colony to spread. That's what Jack means by "stronger and scarier."
Ah, well that's rather embarrassing, isn't it? I guess I was right when I said I wasn't sure I was interpreting Jack correctly. Obviously I needed to do more research.
I still think the wording is awkward, though, and I don't find it "crystal clear". Why didn't they just say "If you have a colony of at least three ships in the infected player's home system..."? That's basically what Eon said, and it was pretty crystal clear for the last three decades or so.
Kobold Curry Chef wrote: Maybe it's time to step back and do something else for a little bit so you don't drive yourself crazy this way? I say this because I enjoy your posts here and hope that you don't burn out.
Yeah, maybe. I am having a difficult time trying to find a healthy outlet for my frustrations with this set (which got worse today when I noticed that my alien sheets have actually gotten more curly since yesterday -- what is going on here?). Anyway, thanks for the "intervention" and putting it in a nice way.
Kobold Curry Chef wrote: As to Merchant, once again it's pretty clear: "Any hired ship that goes to the warp or is removed from the game is discarded. Otherwise, hired ships become normal cards again and return to your hand at the end of the encounter."
Since capturing is neither going to the warp or removed from the game, it goes under "otherwise." CE on the whole does require the players to do a little interpretation, since every power combo can't be perfectly figured out in advance, but this isn't one of those cases, my friend.
Now here I have to respectfully disagree with you. That word "otherwise" doesn't make the act of capturing go away; it's not an "instead" or an "ignore everything else". Merchant doesn't say the ships can't be captured, and Fungus (for example) doesn't say it can't captured hired ships. Now, we can argue about how "obvious" the design intent was, but here's what I believe technically happens in this case:
1. Resolution phase, Merchant loses.
2. Fungus captures hired ships, stacking the cards in Fungoid stack(s).
3. End of the encounter arrives; Merchant's "otherwise" clause kicks in, turning hired ships back into cards and returning them to hand.
4. Players argue about whether Fungus' capturing stands or Merchant's returning to hand undoes the capturing, then discuss whether to apply the Timing Rule, then simply agree (hopefully) that it's patently ridiculous to have hired ships in a Fungoid stack and decide to return them to hand.
Now, of course that's from a "technical" standpoint. Nobody's really going to try to stack the cards in a Fungoid stack. But it is debatable (this is Cosmic Encounter after all -- the king of Weird Interactions), and it's clunky; it's still a gap in the function as written. We have to wink and interpret the word "otherwise" with a little cheat to get around the gap.
And it seems so unnecessary, when they could have avoided any possibility of argument or confusion or loophole by simply writing Merchant to say "Any hired ship that goes to the warp, is captured, or is removed from the game is discarded". (This is Chapter 5 of Cosmic Encounter Design 101: The Three Things That Can Keep Ships From Returning.) Super Symbiote knows this; Masochist (and his Wild) know this; why didn't Merchant get the memo? This is so basic and common-sense that I can only interpret it as an oversight. (Or did they strongly feel that it was important for hired ships to be discarded by Void but not by Fungus? And if so, why not spell it out clearly?)
That's the kind of thing that is getting under my skin. I believe there will be a FAQ entry about this sooner or later, and I just can't understand why the gap was left open. What purpose was served? One or two things like this are no big deal. But after 10 or 15, you start to get a little obsessive (or, obviously, in my case a little more obsessive than baseline).
Anyway, I will try to take your advice. I really want to like this expansion; there's a metric crapload of awesome gameplay ideas in here. I guess I just gotta get past the vexing manufacturing glitches and all the aesthetic disappointments like the nerfing of Ethic's history by somebody trying to fix a "problem" that didn't exist. Gaaaaaa!
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Barney Bustoffson
United States
Massachusetts
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Jefferson is probably right about Jack harking back to the Mayfair version. I don't really have a problem with "If you have one or more colonies in the infected players' home system consisting of at least three ships, choose one of those colonies and take one or more of your ships from it, moving them to any other planet in that system." What I think that takes care of is the question of "What if Disease has two colonies with 3 ships on it? Does he do a double spread?" The Eon version was ambiguous here, and we did have a lot of debate about that.
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Just a Bill
United States
Norfolk
Virginia
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Fair enough, Barney ... I never had that question, but now that you bring it up I can see that it could be an issue. I guess I must just be all miscalibrated from my misunderstanding of Jack's post.
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Barney Bustoffson
United States
Massachusetts
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I don't think the Ethic history was wrecked. That's a mighty big stretch. A typo isn't the end of the cosmos. Bill, if you're playing CE with people that once they see a typo on the alien sheet, they toss it aside and leave the game in disgust- you gotta get a new gaming group.
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Just a Bill
United States
Norfolk
Virginia
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Yeah, wrecked was a stretch, which is why I changed it to "nerfed" this morning. But your straw-man description of my hypothetical play group is also a ridiculous stretch (did I say anything remotely like what you described? Come on.).
The Eon guys did a remarkable job of crafting wry, witty, literary histories. Am I not allowed to enjoy that? Am I not allowed to be disappointed when the poetry and the humor get ruined? (This isn't the first time they've done it.) Just because you don't care about that stuff doesn't mean nobody else does.
It's not a typo. Nobody accidentally types additional letters in front of an obscure word that turns it into a common word. I'm sure they thought they were "fixing" it because they did not know that "moral suasion" is an actual term that has specific, applicable meaning to Ethic's theme. Part of the original charm of Cosmic Encounter was the use of unfamiliar terms like edict and suasion. They contributed to the otherworldy feel. It's disappointing to see those things go away, like watching mom & pop hardware stores be crowded out by Home Depot.
Again, not a big issue one at a time. Just one tiny blip in a disappointing trend.
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Barney Bustoffson
United States
Massachusetts
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Mayfair also rewrote the Ethic history, so it seems that FFG wasn't alone in wanting to change it. But again, I really don't see it as "ruined" Talk about stretch. I can see "It isn't as good as the original". Yes, that is very true. But ruined sounds just too hypersensitive- no disrespect. I respect all of your contributions here, Bill- and I do feel bad that this has been such a let down. I don't think the expansion is a wash, or a piece of crap, or more bad than good. I think it's very good. Could it have been better? Yep. So too could they base set.
As for typos, I was actually talking about "the race of Ethics now seek to convert Outsiders...". I'm no grammar scholar, but I feel like seek should be seeks, since it's the race that seeks.
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