The Warp said:

such excitement has been aroused, I dunno now if FF will think about the 3rd for some time (i'm scared, this expansion might be it!). but with the limit of 90 aliens, kinda makes you think why there isn't about 100. also, what about such past cosmic aliens and variants? I believe FF talked about a 2 player variant some time ago in the FAQ or the manual, they might have an ideal on that.

I'd be shocked if Expansion #3 wasn't all about Lucre and Team Cosmic, with components for an 8th player.

I am going to LOVE having 90 aliens in my FFG set, but I will also be quite ready to have 110. 

I think the 8th player color (oh how I'd love a metallic color like silver, or some kind of crazy marble color)and  20 aliens (mostly new!) will be a great way to start, but as for cards... I'm thinking it will be time to minimize the Cosmic Quake by growing the encounter deck by about 12 or so more cards.

I'd also love a few new Techs and Rewards.  I can appreciate the model of making the expansions stand alone, but at the same time I'd like to think Big Picture and have the expansions complementing each other.

Color #8 is probably going to be white, wouldn't you say? 

Assuming for a minute that a 55-card printing sheet is standard for such things, how about this for Expansion #3 (Cosmic Avarice, for Lucre):

20 Flares

12 Cosmic cards

15 Tech cards

8 Rewards cards

Lucre doesn't require any cards, just a bunch of tokens...

Are we having too much fun getting ahead of ourselves?  Nah.

I love Tech, but you're going to see more Rewards cards per game than Tech, so it would seem more logical to have more Rewards cards than Tech in a theoretical Big Picture expansion.

I've gotten really close to a Quake multiple times, and actually got one once, and I unfortunately don't have all that many FFG Cosmic games under my belt.  More cards would certainly be nice, especially with 7 players now.

The Warp said:

That's easily solved in a Lucre based expansion.  Include a new elite deck in the Lucre set which can only be accessed by paying Lucre.  But, this new deck can match the reward deck backs and be combined with the reward deck for those of us using both expansions.  Then we get new reward cards in a stand alone expansion, it's win/win.

I expect grey and white will be the next colours.  I'd be surprised to see pink or brown.

Joe K. said:

There also is a hint in the rules about the possibility of a destiny card directing the offense to attack another players foreign colony.  And the original box includes enough Grudge tokens to support nine players.  Let's just keep our fingers crossed!

A Lucre deck is a really neat idea.  However, it forces you to play with Lucre, and just because a group wants to play with 8+ players doesn't mean they want to play with Lucre.  I think more cards for the current decks are still called for, but I would certainly welcome a Lucre deck, too.

I don't think there should be a special "Lucre deck", but it would seem that just allowing Lucre to buy cards from the normal Reward Deck would accomplish the goal of making Lucre a little sexier.  Whatever it ends up costing to buy a card, perhaps you can just choose which deck to draw it from, should the Reward Deck happen to be in the game.

But to me, the single most important aspect of Lucre to get right is to make absolutely sure that the Lucre powers don't suck. That's the worst thing about Lucre.  The second-worst thing about Lucre is that there might end up being a menu of prices that has to be memorized or looked up (yuck).

I'd be shocked if FFG prints Lucre but doesn't let you buy from the reward deck.  I suspect it will be moderately more costly than buying regular cards. 

What I'm getting at is Lucre gives an excellent opportunity to expand the reward deck.  Just promote the idea of buying these cards so it fits the theme of the Lucre set.  Maybe even don't include the rule wherein you can draw these as defender rewards.  But, if you have Incursion, you can shuffle the reward decks together.  Even if you don't use Lucre in your game, you can still use the so cards.

So I'm not so much thinking of a special Lucre deck, but rather of a second reward deck disguised as a Lucre deck..  

This is a very good idea, and I would not be surprised if it happens in a Lucre-themed expansion.

Two different reward decks with different rules, both called the Reward Deck, that can also be shuffled together? You don't think that would be confusing to explain (and correctly reference on other cards)?

Let's not even think about a second one until they've answered all the gameplay questions about the first. ;-)

I don't see why it would need different rules.  Just call it the Rewards deck.  Add the rule that you can purchase cards from the Rewards deck with Lucre, and mention that it can be mixed with other Rewards decks as you please.

A Lucre deck would fit FFG's expansion model better though if we are to assume there is a pattern from just two expansions.  I could even see them using a Rift-like card that causes Lucre loss when stolen or Lucre gain when played.  Of course, that might seem too derivative to expand the card pool solely through separate decks using the same basic mechanism.

I just want more cards, whatever kind of deck FFG decides to put them in.  I have been looking forward to Hazards since the base set mentioned them, but it seems odd to expand the number of players but not the deck size.

I rather like the idea of another Rewards deck.  I wouldn't have them separated.  If you happen to own both, you'd just combine them.  Having a lucre-themed Rewards deck is very interesting, and I expect I'll start creating some cards for my version to play around with the idea.  It's hard to say whether or not FFG would bother with lucre-aliens (I'm certainly fond of the idea, but I concede that most of the existing ones aren't that great). 

In fact, I'm actually thinking about some Cosmic Stars that are lucre-themed, so you'd have the effects but still have an alien power to play that isn't dependent on lucre.  As it is, we never play a game with lucre aliens unless it's a two (or more) alien per player game, and only one of them is lucre.

Back to the lucre deck rewards cards...   I love the idea.  However, I would still be inclined to prevent players from buying anything from the reward deck.

The way we've been playing lucre of late (and sadly, not that often in the last two years), is players start with very little, and only "earn" more by forgoing the released ship during Regroup.  There's a lot less lucre in circulation, so people are more careful about how they spend it.  And, we're only using it to buy cards and ships.

I think you could have a special type of card in the reward deck that allows you to spend lucre on other things.  "Spend 1 lucre per point to add to your encounter totals".   "Spend x lucre to buy a card from the Reward deck".   "Spend x lucre to buy a flare from the unused flare deck".  And so forth. 

@Just A Bill-

In practice a Lucre based Reward deck would not confuse anybody.  The description would be almost identical to the one in Incursion:

In this variant, players may draw from a special, slightly more powerful deck when purchasing cards with Lucre.  This variant makes use of the reward deck.

And another note later:

If playing with the Cosmic Incursion expansion, shuffle the reward decks together.

Somebody who does not own Incursion couldn't possibly be confused.  Somebody who does can shuffle the reward decks together, and use either or both variant(s) for reward deck access.  I think this is a nice way to expand the reward deck whilst keeping in theme with the set theme and maintaining stand alone status.  But I'm not really a game designer; just a geek who likes games.

@The Warp -

It seems odd that you would only aqcuire Lucre by forgoing ships from the warp, and then spend it to get ships from the warp anyway.  How does that work?

As for not allowing the purchase of reward cards, I think you should be able to buy anything (that might otherwise have come into play).  Unused flares, reward cards, etc.  The trick is careful pricing and control of Lucre circulation.   I have complete faith in the FF team!

@Adam -

Regarding adding more players but not more cards - as  it stands the Cosmic deck is the same size whether you play with three players or with five, and only two cards bigger if you play with six.  Adding new cards to the main deck would increase the deck size even if you don't use the seventh player, and this might not be desired.

I have yet to see a Cosmic Quake.  If they happened too much it would get a little tedious and annoying, but as an occasional occurrence I think it's a good mechanic.  It  helps break overly powerful hands and card combos and adds to the chaos.  Seventh player or not, extra cards or not, there are always going to be more Quakes in games with more players, and there probably should be.

That said, a Lucre set might do well to include extra cards from all decks - Cosmic, Tech, Reward, Hazard (inflation perhaps), Destiny, all having Lucre themed mechanics.  This wouldn't work as stand alone though, so it might not be the best plan.