Alien Strategy Series: Clone

First appearance: Eon base set.

Plain-English power: May keep own encounter card.

Loved by: Mutant; Hacker; Magician, Barbarian.

Loathed by: Filch.

Three ways to win as Clone:

1. Spend some time early in the game trying to get cards as rewards. Once you can get your hands on a great encounter card, like the 30 or 40, you'll be extremely hard to stop.
   
2. It's difficult to get a new hand of cards as Clone, so if you think you'd like a new hand, you'll have to not use your power early and often. It may be better to go ahead and keep those undesirable cards, so you can retain them for compensation to other players. No sense making it easier for them to get any of your decent cards, like artifacts or flares.
3. Commit your ships to the encounter when you are the attacker. Everyone assumes Clone has a great card, even before they've seen anything he's played. You can bluff players sometimes, and until you know how good your best card is, having four ships in there may be the difference between a win and a loss.
   

Three ways to win against Clone:

1. If Clone has a particularly good card, you need to get it out of his hand, or he'll mop the floor with you. This is an alien that's worth spending a Cosmic Zap on- otherwise that encounter card will be the gift that keeps giving. With other aliens, like Virus or Anti-Matter or even Loser, a Cosmic Zap becomes more about waiting for the right moment to play. Stopping Clone with a 40 is in everyone's best interests.
   
2. Gang up on Clone, especially when you know what his best card probably is (the one he keeps playing). You can do the math, because you know what spread you have to beat.
   
3. Clone will probably play his best card on defense as well as offense, because why not? Ally with him if you don't think the offense can beat the spread, and get some good cards out of the deal. Similarly, don't invite Clone to ally with the defense, because you can't afford letting him get an even better encounter card.
   

Other notes:

The FFG version of Clone clearly indicates that his or her encounter card is not really subject to compensation. The power text explains, "...after the encounter is resolved (and after any compensation is claimed), you may use this power to return your encounter card to your hand instead of discarding it." Thus, the encounter card is still lying face up on the table and not part of the hand. In past versions of CE, this was certainly an area that was open to debate, and I know my group discussed whether or not Filch could take Clone's card, or if anyone could get that card by negotiating for compensation. This version definitely makes Clone more powerful.

At CE Online? Yes.

Alien Strategy Series: Barbarian

First appearance: Fantasy Flight CE

Plain-English power: Ransacks opponent's hand, keeping what he wants, trashing the rest.

Loved by: Masochist. Love is probably too strong to describe Masochist's feelings about Barbarian, but it's all relative. Most aliens don't have much love for this guy.

Loathed by: Genius, Remora, and anyone that finally drew their own flare card.

Three ways to win as Barbarian:

- Commit big as the offense. You only get to use your power on your turn when attacking, so you should increase the odds as much as you can. Putting four ships in the gate will send a signal to the other players that you are confident you'll win, and it will attract more allies to your side and fewer to the defense's. Plus, the more ships you commit, the more cards you keep from the loser.

- Play the good cards early. Sometimes players are tempted to save their good attack cards for later in the game. When it's your turn, go for it. If you win, you'll get access to your opponent's hand, and if he or she has been saving some good cards, you'll get them.

- Ally with the defense when it's not your turn. You want to slow down other players from getting colonies, but you also want to keep adding good cards to your hand whenever you can. Then, when it's your turn, you have better cards to help you win, and other players have more incentive to ally with you.

Three ways to win against Barbarian:

- Unless you feel very confident that you can win as the defense against Barbarian, you might want to think about playing your negotiate. Barbarian loots your hand, but you get to collect your compensation after- so you may get back some of the good cards you had. Also be sure to consider playing all of your reinforcements onto Barbarian's side. No point in giving him any of those cards.

- Play your best attack card. If you don't, you may end up losing it anyway. Remember, you don't just lose the colony, you lose your hand. And even if you want to lose your hand, you don't want Barbarian to get the good card you didn't play.

- Barbarian is a great target for a plague. Even if he hasn't looted any player yet, a plague will weaken him and make it less likely he'll win on his turn.

Barbarian relies on getting some good cards on his turn. If you ally against him, you can shut him down for several encounter until his turn comes back around. Allying with the defense can also give you access to good cards in you're using the Reward deck. In those games, Barbarian will be even more keen on winning as the offense, so you must convince the other players to gang up on him.

At CE Online? No.

Alien Strategy Series: Remora

First appearance: Fantasy Flight CE

Plain-English power: Gets Cards or Ships when other players do

Loved by: Hacker, Barbarian, and Mutant.

Loathed by: Warpish and Mutant. With Mutant, it's a love-hate thing.

Three ways to win as Remora:

- Make judicious use of a negotiate card. When your hand starts to get big, it becomes a target for compensation. Players are more likely to play a negotiate against you, so you increase the odds of getting into a deal situation.

- Invite a lot of defensive allies. Sure they'll get rewards if you win, but then so will you.

- Ally with the defense, and commit big. You can afford to risk the ships, since you have a good avenue for getting ships out of the warp faster than anyone else.

Three ways to win against Remora:

- Single Remora out when deciding whom not to invite on the defense. If your side wins, Remora will be collecting rewards anyway, so there's no need to double his gains.

- Make judicious use of a negotiate card. If you are on defense against Remora, and he won't be able to win the game on his turn, then this is the best time to surrender and get cards from him. It gets the negotiate out of your hand, and the opportunity to get some decent cards out of Remora's hand.

- Cosmic Quake. If Remora is holding a huge pile of cards, then one of the best moves you can make is to run through the rest of the encounter deck. When the deck is exhausted, all players must discard their hands and start with new ones. It levels the field for you against Remora.

At CE Online? No.