Grandfather

As the oldest known alien race to survive to the present day, the Grandfathers command a certain degree of authority simply by continuing to exist. They were present during the discovery of the warp and the original inception of the Cosmic Encounter, and they haven’t yet adjusted to the modern rules. They will be the first to tell you how much better things were in the good old days.

Red Alert!

Resource

Wild Flare

When an aspect is zapped, you may discharge this flare to “unzap” that aspect. Burnout.

Any: Any

Super Flare

During any arrival, you may discharge this flare to declare the encounter to be “old-fashioned”. No modern pods may be discharged until next invasion.

Any: Arrival

Modifications

The original alien is named Throwback. Changed to give it a noun with a little more tangibility.
Originally the power of “anachronism”. Changed to the power of “tradition” to fit the Grandfather theme.
The original power has an additional clause that can gain a boon for correcting the terminology of other aliens if they use the “modern” terms for things like pods, ships, and bases. My version of Cosmic restricts conversation to voice and text channels, and I don’t have a reasonable way to enforce such a power programmatically. I could enforce it in the text channel, but it would be remarkably easy to avoid falling victim to it, basically making it a non-power.
Original Throwback considers Flares and Kickers to be classic pods since they were from the Eon Era. It also names the specific values of classic Attack pods vs. modern ones. Classic ones are 01, 04-10. 12-18, 20, 30, or 40. Most of my attack pods are based on the CEO pods, so I don’t think it’s necessary to make the distinction.
Original Throwback doesn’t get infinite free resupplies or negotiating differences, since FFG Cosmic already uses those rules by default.
Original Super Throwback negates reinforcement pods and turns morph pods into auto-losses. I decided to expand the super flare to simply ban all modern pods.
Grandfather’s legacy vaporizes all modern pods from the forge, in addition to vaporizing any pods that go there. While it doesn’t remove pods in alien caches, it puts a time limit on how much longer they will be around. Any flares or distress pods still in the forge at the time will be wiped out. Alien powers like Musketeer and Reactor who rely on newer pods to utilize their power can be greatly hindered by this legacy, as it effectively robs them of their power once all the pods are gone. Aliens need to be extra careful to hold onto their super flares if they have them, as they will be vaporized once lost. Back in Grandfather’s day, they didn’t have legacies.

Tips

Grandfather can make special use of modern pods, either gifting them to allies as needed, scrapping them for more useful pods, or haggling for something more valuable. Since the dark forge is mostly filled with modern pods, Grandfather benefits more from from backer boons than resupplies.
Grandfather is actually immune to poison damage, since P pods are modern pods it can discard. Grandfather is capable of gifting P pods to other aliens at-will, which can be advantageous on its own.
Grandfather has no obligation to dispose of modern pods if they are useful. If it scraps a modern pod and drafts another modern pod, it can immediately use its power again to scrap the new one and draw another. It can keep doing this until it has exclusively attack pods, N pods, and artifacts. However, then Grandfather will miss out on the benefits of flares, distress pods, and other special objects.

Development Notes

The original Throwback is designed as a major continuity nod to the original Cosmic Encounter from the Eon Era. With my redesign of the alien concept, I wanted to do something similar for Cosmic Encounter Online, the version of the game that inspired my version of Cosmic Encounter. I designed this web page to be closer to the style of how alien bios were viewed on that site, which used a lot of blacks and whites instead of the more colorful layout I generally use. I used exclusively Arial and Times New Roman for the fonts, two fonts which were around back in 2008.
I like the idea of having a “throwback” alien that captures the spirit of the past. It gave me a chance to consider the changes I made to my version of Cosmic compared to CEO and revert some of those changes for the purpose of designing a power. The two primary ideas I came up with were negotiating the classic way and getting infinite free resupplies.
“Anachronism” refers to the improper combination of two aspects of history, such as a story set during the Renaissance where people are driving around in cars. In the context of Throwback, it is the combination of old and new Cosmic together into one alien, with Throwback calling out instances of new Cosmic as anachronistic. It is a great fit for the original power, but I needed to change it since I removed that clause from Grandfather.
Normally, the power from the elderly comes from wisdom and experience. However, with Grandfather, the power is simply based around the idea of being really old. The power extending from the prestige of having lived a long time that someone in real life might have if they lived to be 110 years old. Firsthand sources from the past are one of the best resources for keeping tradition alive, provided they remember it properly and don’t misinterpret it. Otherwise, it results in a historical game of telephone.
A “throwback” is a reversion to something in the past. It’s more of an abstract concept, which is why I came up with Grandfather to personify it a bit. Grandfathers are commonly known for talking about how things were back in their day. I could have also used the term “Boomer”, but I think that term will become dated more easily. It would also be confused with someone that causes explosions or makes loud noises.
Another term for accepting something old into the current system due to its legacy status is to “grandfather” it in. This is why I think the current alien name is a better fit than Grandmother.
Despite being a red alert alien, Throwback is most comparable to green-alert Greenhorn. Both powers get an unusual “grab bag” of different clauses that come together to make an unusual meta power. The core difference is that they each simply get a different collection of clauses.
A power based on correcting the vocabulary of other aliens works great for the physical card game, so long as other aliens play fair and speak normally. In my Cosmic, I try to make sure everything can be enforced automatically, so that no one has to rely on the honor system and no one can troll or break the game.
Modern pods in my Cosmic include everything that wasn’t in the CEO version of Cosmic. That would include morph pods, poison pods, distress pods, flares, kickers, intimidate pods, and many more. CEO only had attack pods, N pods, and artifact pods. I changed the Super Flare to only allow the use of these three pods, to simplify the effect. I think the purest form of this power should perfectly recreate CEO encounters.
Since P pods are modern pods, I wanted to make Grandfather’s ability to simply gift P pods to other aliens doesn’t outright replace my P-pod aliens Poison, Serpent, and Quack. Serpent and Poison use P pods more offensively, giving them a niche that Grandfather cannot access. Quack actually manifests P pods to gift to other aliens whenever they would lose 2+ ships, letting it use the power much more often than Grandfather, especially when there are only 3 P pods in the forge.
Grandfather is a great alien for roleplay, allowing for different playstyles. The user can play as a Cosmic puritan who refuses to use anything that didn’t exist in the classic era. Or they could play as an opportunist who complains about the modern day while simultaneously reaping the benefits from it.
An interesting idea to consider regarding this power would be modern powers, as well as modern pods. However, Grandfather itself being a modern power throws a bit of a wrench in that idea. Also, CEO only had 35 aliens, meaning most powers would be subject to Grandfather’s wrath.
Throwback is considered a red alert alien due to the complexity of the power and required understanding of the rules. The original Cosmic Encounter Online didn’t have alert levels to denote such difficulty, but I wanted this page to at least make it clear that’s still the case to avoid confusion.
I find it amusing that Grandfather, due to being based around a power of nostalgia, did not exist in previous iterations of Cosmic. It didn’t exist during the times it wants to go back to experiencing.