The Eclipse Variant

Over on BoardGameGeek, there's a cool new variant from Toomai Glittershine for use in the Reward deck.

Solar Eclipses have always acted as a distraction, causing temporary chaos. When played, they cause a phase to be skipped. They are played in the phase preceding the skipped one; for example a Solar Eclipse that skips Destiny is played at the end of the Regroup phase.

Lunar Eclipses usually cause weird stuff to happen. When played, they cause a phase to be repeated, after which the game resumes where it left off. They are played at the end of the phase to be repeated or any time after that; for example a Lunar Eclipse that repeats Launch can be played at the end of Launch or during Alliance, Planning, Reveal, or Resolution.

Here's a mockup of a card, created by Bill Martinson:

The cards would allow a player to affect a certain phase of the encounter in some way that hopefully gives him or her an advantage. There are a lot of interesting possibilities, and it's a good fit for the Reward deck.

Below are some examples of the cards:

Solar Eclipse (Regroup): Skips the Regroup Phase. The offense does not retrieve a ship from the warp. This effect may not be played if the offense has no available ships.

Solar Eclipse (Destiny): Skips the Destiny Phase. The hyperspace gate remains in the previously-attacked system; the defense is the same player as the previous encounter. This effect may not be played if the offense was defending in the previous encounter or there has been no previous encounter.

Solar Eclipse (Launch): Skips the Launch Phase. The defense points the hyperspace cone. The offense launches a single ship.

Lunar Eclipse (Launch): Repeats the Launch Phase. The offense may re-aim the hyperspace gate and launch an additional 1-4 ships.

Lunar Eclipse (Alliance): Repeats the Alliance Phase. All allied ships are returned to colonies before allies are re-invited.

Lunar Eclipse (Planning/Reveal): Repeats the Planning and Reveal Phases. Encounter cards are selected in addition to the ones already played; a new encounter card only interact with the opponent's new encounter card and vice versa. A negotiate card is ignored if a player's other encounter card is an attack.

Cosmic Incursion Reviews

It's taken some time before some user reviews of CI finally surfaced.

Gerald Katz posted one on the rec.boardgames.ce newsgroup- mostly positive:

"Hooray for the return of Kickers, Negative Attack Cards, and some
Edicts (Artifacts) like Space Junk and Hand Zap.

I like the crooked Negotiates. +1 compensation or -1/+1 ship to the
warp on failed deal..."

Nate Owens posted an even glowier review on boardgamegeek:

"It’s a welcome expansion, and the extra variety is so good, I would recommend this expansion be bought when you pick up the base game."

Of course, I'm pretty biased when it comes to Cosmic Incursion, but I think it's a fantastic addition to CE, and I highly recommend it. The 6th player color let's you have a bigger and more intense game- or you can just use the ships to play with Symbiote in a 5 player game.

The 20 aliens are a great mix of old a new. Sniveler was one of the most requested classic alien, and it's joined by several others I've always been fond of (Chronos, Seeker, and Plant).

Finally, I've been a long advocate of the Reward Deck (naturally). I like the fact that it makes defensive alliances an even more serious consideration for all players. While not everything in the Reward Deck is great, the lure is often too hard to resist. The first game I played with CI, I drew four rewards (all of the negative cards and a negotiate). It was a serious bust. But since I was playing Ghoul, I was tapping into the Reward Deck a lot, so the next time I ended up drawing a pair of artifacts, a kicker, and a high attack card. It's worth the gamble.

If you love Cosmic Encounter, then this expansion is a must. Even if you only like CE, I think the expansion adds quite a bit and will enrich your experience. We're less than a year away from the next expansion, which I'm eagerly awaiting... if it's in the same league as CI, it will be another great addition.

Nova Cards

I recently issued a plea on the CE newsgroup for information about Mayfair's never-released expansion for Cosmic Encounter that tantalized players for a long time, was play tested, and on the verge of release when.... it wasn't. Nova cards.

Responding the most popular complaint about its edition of CE, the one-shot flares, Mayfair cooked up a new card that would behave like the classic Eon flare (play it, but don't discard it). There would be one Nova card for each alien in the game. That was about all the information that was ever released.

Now, it's more than a decade later, and I've always wanted to know what the content of the Nova deck was going to be. I felt there was no reason to keep the data secret anymore... people worked hard on creating it- it deserved to be shared and discussed. I didn't really get the information I wanted, but close. Gerald Katz explained that the Nova cards were essentially going to be a new version of his Pulsar cards (also known as Immunity cards). Gerald has been posting Pulsars for every CE alien (including many homebrews) for years- which to me says that it's even more all right for someone who had access to the "official" rules for Novas to just send that stuff to me, but I digress).

Nova cards, like Flares, have two headings: Con and Pro. The Con heading is an immunity to the effects of the power listed on the card. It partially or completely nullifies that power, ala Cosmic Zap to some degree, but often only to the benefit of the card holder. The Pro heading was only used if you held your own power's Nova, giving your power a boost like a Super Flare (but a different effect than the Flare).

For example, if you held the Anti-Matter Nova, all allies' ships add to the encounter total (his allies as well as yours). Conversely, if Anti-Matter held his own Nova, the effect is his opponent's allies add to the encounter total instead of subtracting.

In an article on the newsgroup, Gerald explained that he almost ditched the idea since they were too close to flares, but when Mayfair's one-shots came out, he decided they were a great way to reintroduce a retained card to the game.

That brings us to the FFG edition, which does have the classic Eon style of retained flares. Would it be too weird to have a second flare-like card in the game? One of the unfortunate things about flares is that you rarely ever get your hands on your own Super. I didn't want to see a game where you had two cards for your alien power and even less chance of seeing one of them. I was on the fence about it, but then I thought about the Reward deck. What if you added a Nova card for each power in the game and shuffled them into the Reward deck? No extra Novas were added- only powers in the game, meaning each one that did come up would be relevant. The Reward deck is smaller than the encounter deck, so you had a better chance of getting a Nova for a power being used into the game. It might still be hard to get your own Nova, but now you have the added tension of having a player acquire your Nova and becoming somewhat immune to your power.

It's no secret that I am a big fan of the Reward deck. I like that makes people think twice as the defense about inviting players to ally (and think carefully about whom to invite). It makes other players think hard about which main player to ally with. And it makes the offense have to worry about whether or not he invites certain players on offense, because if he doesn't invite them, the defense just might. Plus, before the Reward deck, if you did ally with the defense, and drew cards from the deck as your reward, you stood an excellent chance of drawing cards you didn't want. The odds of getting something good are a little better in the Reward deck (no guarantee, which is how it should be).

If you mixed in 3-6 more cards, it doesn't have a huge effect on the Reward deck distribution, but it does make you a little bit more keen on accessing it. And, the Rift cards take on an even bigger role in the game when you know someone has a Nova in his or her hand, and you want to target it for compensation. If the dozen or so games I've played with Cosmic Incursion, I haven't felt much of a need to hold onto my Rift cards as a deterrent. I just play them and get the ships out of the warp. If I had a Nova in my hand, I would be more inclined to keep a Rift if I could afford to.

Culling info from old newsgroup posts by Gerald, and noodling up my own info on the new aliens, I have created my own set of Nova cards and add them to my Reward deck when playing. The first game was about a week ago, and it was very well received. We got three of the six Novas into play. Only one of the flares for the powers in the game was played, and as a Wild, not a Super. There was also a desperate move by one player to take his Nova out of another player's hand through compensation, and it took him two tries to do it. The cost in ships was pretty high (7), but it ultimately led to his sharing a win with only one other player in a six player game.

Spotlight on Rewards

When you ally with the defensive main player, and your side win, each ally receives "rewards" (one for each ship involved in the encounter).

Rewards consist of any combination of cards from the deck or ships from the warp (returned to colonies)- and, with the release of Cosmic Incursion, allies can take rewards from a separate deck called the Reward Deck.

The Reward Deck includes many cards that are not available in the normal encounter deck:

-Kickers (available in some previous editions of CE, but not FFG's until now)
-Crooked Deals (a special kind of negotiate card)
-Negative Attack cards
-Rifts
-New artifacts

There are also some duplicates of cards that are available in the normal encounter deck, like Cosmic Zap.

Some of the new aliens in Cosmic Incursion take advantage of the Reward Deck, like Ghoul and Mercenary.

But one of the most interesting and subtle changes to Cosmic Encounter by the inclusion of the Reward Deck is the dynamics of defensive alliance.

Over many years, the trend I have seen in alliance is that players ally more frequently with the offense, especially early in the game. Everyone starts the game with a full hand of cards, at least some of which are pretty good, and no ships in the warp. There isn't as much need for rewards. Gaining a colony, without must risk or effort as an offensive ally is more attractive.

The Reward Deck has changed that, at least in a small way. Players have more incentive to collect rewards in general. However, defensive main players have also been forced to take rewards into consideration more carefully when they invite. The odds of drawing really useful cards as rewards from the encounter deck is even at best (and in reality, you are probably more likely to get something no better than what you're already holding). There's a better chance of getting good cards from the Reward Deck at any given time.

This also makes the end of the game speed up as well. In the past, when one player tries to go for the win, he or she can pretty much count on having to face all of the other players are full strength. If you don't beat them, they will be collecting some pretty good cards for rewards if they get them from the Reward Deck. This means they have a much better chance of getting that solo win on their turn.

I love this dynamic quite a bit.

The other great thing about the Reward Deck is the ability to add in new cards to the game without greatly affecting the card distribution in the encounter deck. The Rifts, Kickers, etc. that are part of the CI Reward Deck are a great addition, but it would be too much to have shuffled into the normal encounter deck (definitely too much to teach to a brand new player). The Reward Deck can grow at a faster rate than the encounter deck as well- since its distribution is a little bit easier to manage.

Of course, Flares are the great equalizer in the card category. You can't get them in the Reward Deck, so if that's what you're after, you should stick to taking your rewards from the main encounter deck. As for ships, you can always hope for a Rift card, and increase the number of ships you are able to free- or play it safe and just take rewards from the warp.

The biggest "controversy" with the new Reward Deck is the back art. Originally, the cards in the Reward Deck were designed to match the normal encounter deck so you could never tell which cards were which. FFG has chosen to make the art different, letting everyone know how many Reward cards you have and when you're playing one. It's an interesting move, and the presence of the Rift cards mitigates them as targets for compensation (but probably only a little). Rift cards can be used to free ships from the warp like a Warp Break artifact (which doesn't actually exist yet in the FFG edition), or, when they are taken from your hand by another player, they cause the loss of ships to the warp by the playing taking the Rift- a sort of boobytrapped card.

I like the Rifts a lot, but I can still go either way on whether having different back art is the way to go. In my custom CE sets, I still have the Reward Deck cards matching the encounter deck cards. If you've played with the Reward Deck, what's your impression? Have you noticed more or fewer defensive allies? Different card art yea or nay?