Calling Cosmic Encounter a board game is completely inadequate. It starts with a boardgame, wraps a card game around it, then adds science fiction and combat elements to make a game of unending combination and strategy.
This diary is intended to explain something about the game itself to those who are not familiar with it. Fans of any board games, card games, strategy games, space games, or intellectual games should be interested. It is endless fascinating, thrillingly complex, and always surprising. It is in a way the ultimate gamers' game.
Below the fold I give a brief explanation of what Cosmic Encounter actually is, how it is played, and why people who find rules fascinating find CE captivating. Join me if you'd like to get Cosmic.
The basic mechanics are simple enough, but still unique. Each player (from three to five is optimum, but party games of up to a dozen are possible) is designated an alien race and tries to land colonies on the other player's planets. This is accomplished by "challenges" in symbolic combat. The offensive player removes 'ships' (tokens) from colonies he already has and employs them for 'battle' against the defensive player's ships already on the planet. Using strict time/sequence "phases" (because things get really complicated as you'll see) both the offensive and defensive players can ask non-participating players to help on their side and provide ships for the battle.
Each of the "main players" in the challenge then select one card from their hand as a "challenge" card. The custom deck of cards includes challenge cards with numbers (which will be added to the quantity of ships on their side) and 'compromise/negotiate' cards. Both players having selected a card from their hand (without knowing their opponent's selection) the cards are revealed and the totals are added up. The higher total wins the challenge. Offensive victors (main player and allies) land on the planet. Offensive losers lose their ships to "the warp", from which they usually only return slowly. Defensive winning players merely stay alive (do not lose their ships to the warp and maintain the colony on their planet), but defensive winning allies gain "rewards" of ships from the warp or cards from the deck. (All ships on the losing side go to the warp.)
Negotiate cards signal a willingness to give up. Any player who plays a Negotiate challenge card against an Attack (number) challenge card automatically loses. For being willing to compromise, however, they receive "consolation" from the winning player's hand, one card for each ship lost. If both players are willing to Negotiate, then they can trade (or give away) cards or allow their opponent to land a colony on a planet they already inhabit.
A player who wins their first (offensive) challenge can take a second, but win or lose after that the next player around the table takes their turn. Who will be attacked in the challenge is selected for them, they don't get to pick who to challenge, but they do get to pick which of that defender's home planets to try to land on.
Such are the rules of the game, simplified and in brief. Edict cards in the deck (special purpose cards that can be played at various specified times and have all sorts of effects) keep things lively, and the random elements of both the dealing of the cards (players start with a seven card hand and only get a new one when they run out) and the selection of defensive players (called "destiny" in CE terminology) add some randomness, and the frequent need for allies to help adds uncertainty to any strategy.
To be honest what I've described, alone, would be a pretty good game. At least for kids. It doesn't have quite the excitement or variety it would need to hold the attention of adults. But although it was invented and first developed in the 1970s, it has been published by more than half a dozen game manufacturers, and exists in a state of perpetual development that is unparalleled.
Because the fun part of Cosmic Encounter is not the rules, but breaking the rules. The basic rules are much more complete (and concise) than I've described, but what's important is the mechanism of alien powers. That is the "Cosmic Encounter" described by the name. Each player plays as an alien race with its own unique power. Each alien power enables the player to change the rules in some specific way.
"Machine" is an alien race that has the power to ignore the rule about two challenges per turn; as long as it has cards it can keep taking challenges. "Dictator" is an alien that controls destiny; it determines who will be attacked in each challenge (unless it is the offensive player). "Will" is something like the opposite; it gets to pick who it will attack - not even Dictator can control Will's destiny. There are powers that change how the numbers work (low total wins, for example) or what a Negotiate card does or just about any other part of the game mechanics. One alien (Zombie) never goes to the warp. Another (Warpish) adds the ships in the warp to their side of every challenge.
Which alien a player has is determined in various ways at the beginning of the game. The combinations of powers (with each player having a different alien) and edicts, destiny, and challenge cards make the game endlessly complex. No two games are ever alike, but there is a layer of strategy that goes far beyond just alien powers and their interactions. Advanced players often play (in real life, the online version of this feature hasn't been developed yet, though it is planned) with two powers for each player. This makes every game a little bit of strategy, a fair amount of tactics, and an unmistakable degree of chaos.
The current edition of the (RL) game is published by Fantasy Flight Games. I won't be making a habit of linking to them, since this isn't supposed to be commercial spamming. There is a link in the diary proposing/introducing this group:
Group Proposal: Daily Kos Cosmic Encounter Group
The current edition has fifty different alien powers (there are hundreds that have been created) and more are available in expansion sets. Two expansion sets (Cosmic Incursion and Cosmic Conflict) are currently available.
If anyone is interested in learning more about Cosmic Encounter, or curious about playing the game, I would like to organize an online session at Cosmic Encounter Online to introduce the game, explain the rules, and walk you through playing it (it's free, no registration is required, and you can play for free indefinitely.) Ideally this would happen on Sunday afternoon or evening, but I will try to schedule at other times if there is interest. Post a comment if you have question about the
game or would like to join a walkthrough session.
I will not be available to respond to comments this morning. Please leave any question or suggestions you have or to schedule a walkthrough sessions, please leave a message and I will respond this afternoon.
Thanks for your time. Hope it helps.