David Dawson
United States
Champaign
Illinois
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The FFG product page says that the game has 54 cards, of which we know 20 will be flares, and 3 will be destiny cards for the white player. But did anyone figure out what the other 31 cards are going to be yet? They haven't announced any other new card-based system (like the reward or hazard decks), just the team rules. Sorry if this was already figured out before, but I didn't see anything in the forum about it, and wanted to generate some discussion. I, for one, can't wait to see the new aliens and get this to the table!
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Jefferson Krogh
United States
San Leandro
California
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They haven't said officially, but if you look at the expansion announcement, you'll see a Morph card with a new symbol in the corner. Consensus is that there will be extra Cosmic cards for inclusion in Team Cosmic games, or games with lots of players.
Perhaps the next preview will touch on that more.
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Kweku Abraham
United States
Oakland
California
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yeah what Mr. Kobold Curry Chef said, plus the Schizoid cards (for selecting his win conditions). Likely card back spotted in the first preview, and soft-confirmed by Peter Olotka
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Just a Bill
United States
Norfolk
Virginia
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My prediction (based on no inside information whatsoever):
* Thirty of those cards will be divided between Schizoid and a batch of new optional cards for the cosmic deck.
* The 31st card will be a Classic flare; my guess is Diplomat.
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Just a Bill
United States
Norfolk
Virginia
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Bill Martinson wrote: The 31st card will be a Classic flare; my guess is Diplomat.
After further consideration, I think this prediction is wrong. Let's start the logic train back at the station:
* The number of cards for the new mechanic(s) work out to a nice even 30 if there is a Classic Edition flare in the set: 30 new mechanic + 3 destiny + 20 flares + 1 classic flare = 54.
* The most obvious candidate for Classic treatment is Wild Butler ("secretly take a [ship] from any other player's [colony] and put it into the warp, once per [encounter] without showing this card..."), but I do not expect any Lucre in Cosmic Alliance.
So far so good. But then I took a wrong turn:
* Among the remaining Eon aliens, the non-Lucre power with the "silliest" wild flare is probably Wild Diplomat: "Once per [encounter] you may confront any player who has offended you (in your opinion). You both must deal...".
Perhaps true — but I had foolishly limited my research to aliens that FFG had not published or announced, meaning I left out Schizoid. Looking at it now, I think the flare is a pretty good candidate for the Classic treatment:
Wild Schizoid: You can switch planet [systems] (and thus colors) with any player, between [encounters].
Hmm ... Classic Schizoid ... where have I heard that phrase? Oh yeah:
On facebook, Peter Olotka wrote: Cosmic Alliance has a Classic Schizoid
Interesting. Most of us interpreted that to be all about the base power, but I can now see it's entirely plausible that the comment came from having seen a Classic Schizoid flare in the approval materials. Or perhaps both suppositions are true. But in any case, I now predict that the 54th card is Classic Schizoid Flare.
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Bill Martinson wrote: On facebook, Peter Olotka wrote: Cosmic Alliance has a Classic Schizoid
Interesting. Most of us interpreted that to be all about the base power, but I can now see it's entirely plausible that the comment came from having seen a Classic Schizoid flare in the approval materials. Or perhaps both suppositions are true. But in any case, I now predict that the 54th card is Classic Schizoid Flare.
Most of us interpreted that to be about the base power because the entire discussion up until that point was based entirely on the Schizoid itself and its new version (how the card deck will work, how it will hold up compared to the "old Schizoid", etc), and that very post of Peter's explicitly referenced how the old Schizoid power worked with no overt mention of the Flare:
On facebook, Peter Olotka, full comment text wrote: In our EON Cosmic Schizoid you could make up your own conditions..Cosmic Alliance has a Classic Schizoid
Certainly, it's possible that he was referring to the Classic Wild Schizoid, but the context very strongly points toward the Schizoid power itself.
It's also worth noting that both of the currently-existing Classic Wild Flares, Filch and Empath, do absolutely nothing as long as the other players are alert. Classic Wild Schizoid, on the other hand, looks like by far the strongest Wild Flare in the game in most cases, can't be blocked (outside of standard measures like Card Zap), and leads to a version of the Shark Problem. I love the two Classic Wild Flares that currently are in the game and never use FFG's non-Classic versions, but I doubt I would ever play with the Classic Wild Schizoid.
The Classic Wild Butler seems closest to the style of the two Classic Wild Flares we have so far.
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Just a Bill
United States
Norfolk
Virginia
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salty53 wrote: that very post of Peter's explicitly referenced how the old Schizoid power worked with no overt mention of the Flare: On facebook, Peter Olotka, full comment text wrote: In our EON Cosmic Schizoid you could make up your own conditions..Cosmic Alliance has a Classic Schizoid Certainly, it's possible that he was referring to the Classic Wild Schizoid, but the context very strongly points toward the Schizoid power itself.
Absolutely correct, and I did re-read and consider that entire context before posting.
But I have also learned two things from participating in the fan-designed expansion conversations: (1) Peter and Bill E are both creative, stream-of-consciousness kinds of guys who will not let mundane considerations like established precedent, missing punctuation, or the non-sequitur stand in the way of expressing themselves; and (2) they are not always as fluent in FFG's conventions and terminology as one might assume.
So although everyone else in that conversation was talking about the base power, I consider it entirely plausible that Peter's thoughts at that time were not as limited/focused as everone else's. And again, I'm not saying there isn't a rule about old-school use of the power; I'm just saying don't be surprised if there's a classic flare. It may very well be that both things are true.
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Looks like you were right about the Classic Flare being the Classic Schizoid.
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Jefferson Krogh
United States
San Leandro
California
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24 cards for the Cosmic deck for 7+ player games
6 Schizoid cards
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Just a Bill
United States
Norfolk
Virginia
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salty53 wrote: Looks like you were right about the Classic Flare being the Classic Schizoid.
This is one of those cases where I would have preferred to be wrong.
I'm telling you, the folks making this game (both FFG and Eon) are not plugged in to its mechanics or its terminology nearly as well as the player base is. I guess we should probably stop looking to them for answers and carry on with the crowd-sourcing.
So, we've got a Schizoid with six victory-condition cards and no classic mode. Everybody still excited about that? 
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Bill Martinson wrote: So, we've got a Schizoid with six victory-condition cards and no classic mode. Everybody still excited about that? :what:
I'm currently intrigued, and will have to see what the cards are. They could certainly pull something out that's as clever as Saboteur, though I can't think of how it would happen off the top of my head.
There was a theory floated in the other thread of the cards being colony count, but I'd expect they'd just use tokens if that were the case. That's what they did with the BG win prediction in Rex- but obviously given lead times and whatnot we don't know which one was developed first.
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Just a Bill
United States
Norfolk
Virginia
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GregF wrote: There was a theory floated in the other thread of the cards being colony count
I really hope that's not the case; it's hard for me to imagine a more pointless waste of six card slots, considering that the player would already have a pencil in his hand to write the (much, much longer) other condition.
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Jefferson Krogh
United States
San Leandro
California
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Bill Martinson wrote: salty53 wrote: Looks like you were right about the Classic Flare being the Classic Schizoid.
This is one of those cases where I would have preferred to be wrong. I'm telling you, the folks making this game (both FFG and Eon) are not plugged in to its mechanics or its terminology nearly as well as the player base is. I guess we should probably stop looking to them for answers and carry on with the crowd-sourcing. So, we've got a Schizoid with six victory-condition cards and no classic mode. Everybody still excited about that?
I'm going to reserve judgement until I actually see the entire power. All I know is that our intital assumption based on seeing a new card back may need revision.
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So we have 24 new Large Group Cosmic Cards. That's exactly 1/3 of the original 72 cards of the regular Cosmic Deck. My guess is that we'll see more of the same with the same proportion (1/3).
These are the 24 new cards based on my speculation:
* Five Negotiates (There are 15 in the Cosmic Deck. Five is exactly 1/3).
* One Morph (it was revealed when they announce this expansion).
* 13 Attack cards (which is exactly 1/3 of the 39 on the Cosmic Deck). My guess we'll see: 04, three 06's, three 08's, 10, 12, 14 and maybe three new Attacks, something like: 02, 16, 25.
* Two Reinforcements (the Cosmic Deck has six) +2 and +3.
* Three Artifacts (the Cosmic Deck has 11). This is the hardest part to predict, but I think we'll see another Cosmic Zap, anothe Card Zap and another Mobius Tubes. I don't think we'll see another Plague, Emotion Control, Ionic Gas, Force Field or Quash. We will maybe see one or two from the Reward Deck though. A Finder or Space Junk is not likely, but maybe a Hand Zap.
What do you think?
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I'm guessing your numbers are probably very close, and that makes me wonder about card dilution. In our 7-player game it's apparent that using many card resource powers with a few reshuffles means seeing the same most-powerful cards numerous times in play. So another Morph, high Attack cards, and some Artifacts may actually increase their relative values with 7-8 player games.
But then again, perhaps that means more players will make use of mid-range Attacks and Negotiates. I can't figure the odds or which way it might shift since that depends so much on the powers in use.
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Just a Bill
United States
Norfolk
Virginia
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I certainly hope there are some new cards among those 24, and I don't mean "fillers" like attack -03. This is a perfect place to include some of the original edicts (artifacts) that are still "missing," like Warp Break and Victory Boon. (But I really hope they didn't go down the brainless Mayfair path of producing every possible canceler card: Tech Zap, Hazard Zap, Kicker Zap, Rift Zap, Morph Zap, Fun Zap.)
I also don't want to see escalation. There should never be an attack greater than 40 (really there shouldn't be any more in the 20+ range; they are already starting to lose their mystique), nor any higher Reinforcements either. Let Reserve always be the only guy who can delta the encounter by 7; that's cool.
This is also a great place to duplicate a few reward-back cards with cosmic backs. Kickers are an obvious opportunity.
And it would be good to get maybe one new artifact that we've never seen. If it's well designed.
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Jefferson Krogh
United States
San Leandro
California
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The nostalgic in me would be thrilled to see Warp Break, Victory Boon, and Rebirth reappear, or for any new cards to be part of this 24. My wiser half is telling me not to expect it, though. Kevin and FFG spent tons of time getting the balance of the Cosmic deck just right, and I can't see them messing with it now. I think it'll be repeats of existing Cosmic cards, leaving us to add the old Edicts to our Rewards decks.
Anyway, I suspect the Rifts were meant to take the place of Warp Break. Victory Boon would be a nice one to get, though. I should add that to my Rewards deck sometime soon.
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Just a Bill
United States
Norfolk
Virginia
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I'd probably be most interested in Keeper, Timegash, and Sanity.
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GregF wrote: Bill Martinson wrote: So, we've got a Schizoid with six victory-condition cards and no classic mode. Everybody still excited about that? :what: I'm currently intrigued, and will have to see what the cards are. They could certainly pull something out that's as clever as Saboteur, though I can't think of how it would happen off the top of my head.
Here's a possibility, though it seems a bit off from the flavor of the original. Suppose the cards are things a bit easier than the existing win conditions. (Four foreign colonies, 12 ships in the warp, each other player has lost four ships, 12 cards in hand, the deck has been reshuffled...) Start of the game, Schizoid picks two, and you have to meet both conditions to win. Each encounter, the offense peeks randomly at one of the four unused cards. So everybody sees what conditions Schizoid is bluffing, and gets information slowly by process of elimination; they might know everything as soon as their second turn, or they might not.
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Just a Bill
United States
Norfolk
Virginia
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Well, now I at least know it wasn't Col. Mustard.
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