Lemming

Alert

Invasion

Destroy

Type

Power to Follow

Follows Its Peers Wherever They Go

Whenever one or more of your ships would go to the warp, use this power to ravage one of your ships.

After any destiny, if you have twelve or more ships in the warp (ten in an alien match), use this power to jump six of your ships out of the warp onto any planet in the target system you do not occupy.

Legacy: If an alien has nine or more ships in the warp, that alien may revive a ship each warpfall.

Due to their physical bodies allowing them to naturally traverse the vacuum of space, the Lemmings never evolved the base degree of sapience other aliens needed to perform interplanetary travel. With only their leaders actually capable of strategizing, the others just follow their lead no matter where it takes them.

Any: Destiny

Mandatory

Wild Flare

During your warpfall, when you revive a ship, you may jump it to any planet where every alien except you and/or the planet’s owner has a base.

Invader: Regroup

Super Flare

Whenever you use your power, you may discharge this flare to move four ships instead of five.

Any: Destiny

Modifications

Originally the power to “migrate.” Changed to the power to “follow” to better fit the core idea of the theme.
Original power is optional. Changed due to the addition of the first clause.
Original Lemming doesn’t have the clause that destroys more ships. Added to give more flavor to the power.
Original Lemming jumps four ships out of the warp instead of six. and requires nine ships in the warp instead of twelve. I gave the power a slight nerf to prevent Lemming from chaining its power with a single loss. Since it can use the power every destiny, I think it could potentially be unfun to play against.
Lemming’s legacy benefits aliens with a lot of ships in the warp to help them preserve their powers and avoid elimination. It protects ships but not bases, so aliens still need to worry about losing too many ships or losing as defender. Aliens like Amoeba and Kamikaze who value their ships more can benefit from this one. Aliens like Assassin and Cudgel who specialize in destroying ships may struggle a bit more. Original Cosmic has no legacies.

Tips

Lemming is greatly incentivized to commit as many ships as possible as many times as possible. Win or lose, it can continue making progress toward dominion.
Commissioning Lemming can be dangerous since it will often be working toward its win condition no matter the outcome. However, since Lemming always wants to send maximum ships, it can make a pretty reliable sponsor.
Though Lemming enjoys losing ships, it does not care for losing bases. Its power is not persistent, so it needs to protect its home bases. As a result, it would rather throw an encounter as an invader than lose as a defender.
The closer Lemming gets to using its power, the closer it gets to losing its power. Once it uses the power, it gets a major reprieve. If it overshoots the goal of 12, it can even use its power again after losing another set of 4-5 ships. It does need to be careful about overshooting though, since it cannot easily regain its power once it is lost.
Lemming’s biggest weakness is the Warp Key, as it will undo all of Lemming’s progress. Anything Lemming can do to keep these pods out of play will help it utilize its power.

Development Notes

Lemming is comparable to a non alt-win version of original Masochist. It gains bases by having a lot of ships in the warp, giving it two means of gaining dominion. The changes I made to Masochist makes Lemming very different in concept, but it allows me to have an alien that still captures the spirit of original Masochist.
Nine ships in the warp is one less than half of the total , and it is specifically one more than is necessary to gain a base in two losses.
Similar to original Masochist, Lemming’s biggest weakness is the Warp Key. As with Cosmic Zaps, I don’t like powers being balanced around a hard counter, as there’s always a chance the Warp Key might not every come into play. As such, I opted to have the power require 5 ships to be pulled from the warp, so that a single 4-ship loss doesn’t get Lemming another use of its power.
Lemmings are a type of animal most commonly known for being natural followers. They are famously stereotyped for a behavior that will lead them to follow their leader off a cliff if the leader jumps off one. Though inaccurate to real lemmings, the term is commonly used to refer to one who follows a crowd without thinking.
In the context of the Cosmic alien, I opted to tweak the original power to better match the theme. The Cosmic equivalent of a Lemming would jump into the warp if its leader does, and it would be in its nature to do so. The result was that I made the clause mandatory and increased the number of required ships to use its power, in exchange for a clause that makes Lemming lose an extra ship when losing ships. I think this clause makes the power more interesting, since Lemming has to put more consideration into how many ships it commits.
Lemming can be considered the Anti-Roach, an alien that loses an extra ship instead of protecting one. Normally this would be an anti-power, especially as a mandatory effect, but Lemming’s secondary ability to revive six ships when it has twelve or more in the warp can be quite strong, especially since it gains one dominion for it.
The original Lemming needs nine ships to use its power, which is one more than it can get from two losses. Since my Lemming can lose five ships from an encounter at max capacity, I increased the number to 12. As a tradeoff, it revives six ships from the warp instead of four, meaning that losing five more ships will still be insufficient if it had exactly 12. Twelve ships in the warp will diminish Lemming’s defensive power, making it highly vulnerable to losing its power. Though it only needs three ships minimum to maintain its power, it needs at least five ships to get the dominion it needs for victory. 12+5+3=20, so Lemming could theoretically win the match using its power if it gets its ship math exactly right.
Original Lemming’s power notably doesn’t change its numbers in small matches, with only 16 ships. In such a match, Lemming only needs two ships to maintain its power and four ships for dominion. 12 + 4 + 2 = 18, so Lemming could only use its power to get the first two bases. I reduced the number to 10 in 4-alien matches so the power can be used the entire match. Since Lemming has fewer total ships to work with and needs to earn less dominion, the power has an inherently greater risk for a greater reward.
Lemming is the kind of alien that can create an unwinnable scenario for its opponents. Suppose it had 4 dominion and invaded another alien alone with 3 ships, with 8 ships in the warp. Win or lose, Lemming will be able to gain a base by the following destiny, barring any zaps. Due to the way my victory condition is calculated, the current invader would still have a chance to go for a partial victory after Lemming gets its final base with its power, and Lemming could not gain a partial victory with its power if the invader gets their last dominion by destroying the ships they need to use their power.
Kamikaze and Masochist can be compared to Lemming, other aliens who want to destroy their own ships. Masochist has a persistent power and wants to keep its ships in the warp, while Kamikaze has no easy means of reviving its ships. Lemming is the only one of the three with an invasion-based power, making it more like a fixed version of original Masochist.
I am very glad I changed Doctor’s power to work more organically with Masochist. Doctor cannot force-revive another alien’s ships when they are lost, meaning it also doesn’t unfairly prevent Lemming from using its power either. Instead, Masochist and Lemming are free pods for Doctor in exchange for nothing, since Lemming and Masochist will almost always refuse. However, the relationship can still be interesting since Doctor can help mitigate Lemming’s risk or help prevent Masochist from being eliminated.
Due to my change to Lemming’s power, powers like Assassin and Vacuum that destroy small amounts of ships frequently are much more punishing to Lemming, since they will ravage an additional ship whenever they activate. Lemming has to take these powers into account when factoring in how many ships it commits, since losing too many ships will put it in a bad spot.
There are quite a few legacies that revolve around reviving ships. Zombie lets the invader revive all ships, and Benefactor lets aliens revive all ships when requesting a resupply. These eclipse Lemming’s legacy in value, but they are much more infrequent in use. Warphole allows reviving one ship when committing ships from the gate, which is the closest to Lemming’s legacy. There are no legacies that offer a blanket “revive one ship each warpfall” effect, as even Lemming requires aliens to have a lot of ships in the warp to do so. Lemming is specifically a “lose less” power that only benefits aliens who lose a lot of ships. It distinguishes it from similar legacies flavor-wise.
Lemming is designed as the kind of power that evokes its name. Most people consider a “lemming” as an insult, a follower who cannot think for itself. However, the true power of lemmings come from their ability to form a mob mentality and act in unison without thinking. It is comparable to that of Horde or Reserve. However, rather than overwhelming the opponent with raw numbers, they overwhelm their opponent with raw singlemindedness. A single Lemming can do little on its own, but a group of them together can become a massive stampede that few can stop. Even if you zap them, you’ll only be delaying them for a turn.