Fan Designed Cosmic Expansion Set Discussion

Jefferson Krogh: Nah, think bigger for the Super! Super Joker causes an instant Cosmic Quake! Muahahaha!

Jefferson Krogh: (Poor Phil, I hope he doesn't end up hating us all after we've completely ripped apart his cool idea and reassembled it into a cyborg.)

Matthew Scrivner: @Jeff an instant Cosmic Quake might be too big? What if Super Joker just allows the player to name a an encounter card value between 1 and 40?

Bill Eberle: I've updated our archive to include everything from yesterday. http://www.ideabout.com/fan_design/in_progress/discussions/20111121_fb_fd.html I had also told Mark Hawkinson that we would look at his version of the JOKER rules and see if we could revise my “synthesis” attempt to simplify it . . . keeping all of the valuable ideas from our discussions in mind. Also, I'd like to study Phil Fleischmann's comments carefully, before adding to the discussion today.

Jack Reda: I like Super Joker being able to use cards that were removed from the game. And when he uses those cards, maybe they go straight to the bottom of the cosmic deck. (1 thumb up)

Mark Hawkinson: That works nicely.

Bill Eberle: Mark was correct about the wording for the expansion set's new game rule, COSMIC STASIS. Here's my proposal for how that would work:

New Expansion Set Game Rule - COSMIC STASIS (Jefferson Krogh)

If a COSMIC QUAKE occurs (Cosmic Conflict Expansion) and there are not enough cards for all players to draw a new hand of 8 cards each, a COSMIC DIMINISHMENT is declared and all players draw 5 cards. If there are not enough cards for each player to get 5 cards, COSMIC STASIS is declared and the game ends in a universal draw.

Peter Olotka: Lets keep the Joker in but closer to Phil Fleischmann's original by having a set of WILD CARDS that are added into play when JOKER is in the game. (We can design that next.) Bill Eberle is posting a version of the current alien in progress below. (1 thumb up)

Bill Eberle: Loki Plays cards from Discard Pile

You have the power to play tricks and use cards from the Discard Pile during an Encounter.

Bill Eberle: You may play any non-Encounter card, excluding Flares, in a challenge instead an Encounter card. You play your non-Encounter card face up as a “trick” and then select any Encounter you choose from the Discard Pile and play it face down next to your non-Encounter card. This Encounter card will be treated normally, e.g. can be “seen” by Oracles, swapped by Sorcerers, etc. If you are Zapped, take the non-Encounter card back into your hand and play an Encounter Card from your hand. After the encounter is concluded, the Encounter card you chose to play is removed from the game. Your non-Encounter “trick” card is discarded at the end of the encounter.

Bill Martinson: This rewrite is harder to read and understand than the original, and all the Vulch/Filch stuff seems more fiddly now. There is a precedent in the FFG edition that cards “used as” other card types do not count for both types at the same time. I would say that when it hits the discard pile, it becomes whatever it originally was.

Bill Martinson: If you emphatically call out that Vulch can take it if it happens to be an artifact, then you have to start down the slippery slope of clarifying stuff like Reserve. And, when some new alien appears down the road that can recover played artifacts or kickers or whatever, that will raise questions about what happens when Joker uses those as wild cards.

Much better to define all that in the abstract, or just let it default to whatever rules govern when Reserve's attack card ceases to be a reinforcement and starts to become an attack again. PLEASE don't create an interpretational difference between these two aliens.

Peter Olotka: Agreed

Bill Eberle: I agree; whatever the “trick” card is, it becomes “itself” again as soon as it hits the Discard pile.

Bill Martinson: I realize I'm lagging behind on Bill's updates, but here is the version of Phil's original that I crafted to make it fit into the FFG paradigm:

You have the power to Be Wild. As a main player, you may select and play an artifact card in place of your encounter card. When cards are revealed, if yours is an artifact, [*use*] this power to reveal it first and treat it as a wild card. If this power is zapped, return the wild card to your hand and play a normal encounter card instead. After cards are revealed, name any encounter card in the game. Your wild card becomes that card and the encounter is concluded accordingly. If your wild card is revealed by another player (due to a game effect such as Sorcerer or Magician), you still name its replacement.

Bill Martinson: I also recommend against allowing any non-encounter card. As Phil suggests, it is probably too strong, and it also gets a bit messy if the player is using one kicker as a kicker and the other kicker as a wild card. He could play the x2 and the x0 and then lie about which one was actually his kicker after seeing which configuration is more advantageous. Given the fact that a wild card is virtually a hands-down, automatic encounter winner (and the fact that ever[y] Negotiate will be a Crooked Deal), I think artifact is plenty strong enough. I would choose that power.