Fan Designed Cosmic Expansion Set Discussion

Bill Martinson: EXECUTIVE ... You have the power to Belay. (Or the power to Veto.) The idea is that the local commander or diplomat makes his decision, and then at the eleventh hour the leadership back home overrides the local decision and changes it to something else.

Bill Martinson: WORRYWART ... You have the power to Second-Guess. (Panic and change your mind at the absolute last moment before cards are revealed, at the cost of wasting a valuable resource to make the last-minute switch.) I think I like this one the best so far.

Peter Olotka: @Matthew Scrivner re discard pile, because when it is in the game that's part of it's power. It stops others from looking at the discard pile.

Gerald Katz: I like this power better than the original version. There's less chance of an auto-win but still a good one. Why allow choosing a non-encounter card? You can get rid of a player's Super Flare, sure, but I don't see it so necessary for the power. I'm not thrilled with the Super Flare. It should just allow the card not be removed from the game so can be reused. Play it during Resolution to allow the possibility the Super Flare is taken as compensation to avoid infinite loop of always taking the 40 and winning. Grifter is a good name. I'm biased against Pod since I have my own Pod power.

Peter Olotka: @Gerald Katz We are giving the Joker a bunch of WILD CARDS in the deck when its in the game :) ... we will do a group design of that as well.

Christopher Aurel Oliveira: Since this guy deals with recycling old card in the discard pile perhaps a name like “Scrounger” or some trash/garbage related thing.

Bill Eberle: We're thinking Grifter is kind of a trashy name. We like it for this power.

James Albright: From a practical perspective, it complicates the game mechanics when you have to have two discard piles: one that's removed from the game and one that's discarded. From a power-level perspective, it's a better version of Filch. The only difference is Grifter can replay his own played cards as well as anyone else's, instead of just the opponent's. From a strategy perspective, I don't really see much skill in the decisions you make with this guy. You just choose the best encounter card in the graveyard, and that's it. What about something like this instead:

Grifter
You have the power to scavenge. As a main player, after encounter cards are played but before they are revealed, you may choose a card in the discard pile. If it's an attack card, add it to your played card if the value is less than your played card, then put the chosen card on bottom of the deck. If it's a negotiate, add zero to your total. If it's not an encounter card, add it to your hand.

This way, it's completely different than Flich. Filch gets what's played against him, while Grifter either boosts his attack power or just draws something from the graveyard. On the power-level side, if he already has good cards (20+) they'll just get better, which is fine since he'd probably win anyway. However, if he has a more mediocre card, then he relies on the existence of a worse card being in the graveyard AND Grifter would want to save his 12's and 14's for the mid-game and use his 08's and 06's earlier on. Also, he could either be really confident and just go for a non-attack card or just throw the encounter all together and grab an artifact from the graveyard.

What do you guys think? Do you think his similarity to Filch with his super (using played encounter cards) is a problem?

Christopher Aurel Oliveira: I agree that this power makes Filch obsolete.

Peter Olotka: Actually not. The Filch continues to get it's opponent's card. Just not the Grifters. If you were playing vs the Filch as any other alien, you would still not play the 40 if could avoid it. It's like saying the VOID makes the Zombie obsolete because VOID eliminates Zombie ships.

Peter Olotka: Design Alert: Announcing the Parallel Processing FanAssisted Cosmic Encounter Cross-Checking Computer ......I am making a Google Docs spread sheet which will allow everyone to pick an alien, artifact or other listed existing content and be the responsible player who checks it against the content in progress. The acronym is PPFACECCC pronounced faceck (Fun, huh?).. So if everyone can invite a couple of more players into this Design Group we will be well covered. I love this because it goes to the heart of solving the difficulty of adding Cosmic Content.. the dreaded cross-check! Details after Thanksgiving!

James Albright: It's not about Filch vs. Grifter. Those sorts of alien conflicts happen all the time (like Healer vs. Masochist). The problem is Grifter being exclusively better than Filch. Filch, normally, can only get his opponent's card and only as a main player. Filch with his super can get any other player's card. Grifter, just as a regular alien, can already get anyone else's played card, which is virtually the same as Filch with his super (both get to re-use played cards). Granted, there are some technical differences (like how Filch keeps his hand full, which is usually bad since drawing a new 8 is often good, or how the card can be negotiated out of Filch's hand, or Filch can get handzapped), but almost all the technical differences hurt Filch. Even the zap-timing is generally bad for Filch. If you zap Filch, he'll never get to use that 23 at all. If you zap Grifter, he won't get to use it this turn, but he can use it next encounter. This is what Chris Oliveira meant when he said it makes Filch obsolete, heck, it even makes Super Filch obsolete. This is why I think it would be much more interesting to add a Calculator-esque element, where if the “hot” card is lower than his played card, it gets added to his total, or something like that. Sidenote: PPFACECCC huh? Awesome!

Mark Hawkinson: Okay, in that case Grifter needs some sort of drawback. Such as needing to use a non-encounter card for his con perhaps?

Peter Olotka: Comparing aliens for the dreaded - “it makes such and such obsolete” -is a slippery slope. If one wants to look at the current FFG 130 aliens compared to one another, any number of obsoletes claims can be made. Many aliens are cousins and their powers can be plotted along a continuum. Aliens are never obsolete because new aliens share characteristics. In general I don't think we need to add artificial drawbacks to an alien before it is tested in game situations. It's rare for an alien that is perceived to be “too powerful” to keep that reputation after a few games. And more often than not the weak underbelly is exposed as a surprise. PS we might want to move the tread up to the Current post.

Jefferson Krogh: Peter Olotka -- *130* aliens? There's only 90 in print right now...um, is there a loose cat that belongs in this bag, perhaps? ;-)

Peter Olotka: No I counted 90 in basic by mistake

Mark Hawkinson: One easy comparison to further explain Peter's point is the difference between Pacifist and Empath. Pacifist is generally perceived to be “better”, but it has limitations that Empath doesn't.

Bill Martinson: This comparison is on a completely different level than the other comparisons between aliens. Grifter is what many players would call a "superset" of Filch. That doesn't occur among the other published aliens.

Look at it this way: If Grifter had come first, Filch (as we know it) would NEVER have been published. This makes it clear that Grifter needs to be revised.