Mouth
Alert
Resource
Destroy
Type
Power to Gobble
Gobbles Discharged Pods
After any payoff, use this power to “gobble” every uncharged pod in other exhausts. Shroud gobbled pods in your nexus. Then, if there are ten or more pods in your nexus, “belch” one of those pods out and add it to your cache. Vaporize the remaining pods in your nexus.
Legacy: When a driver is discharged, vaporize it instead of sending it to the exhaust.
Contrary to popular belief, the wide-mawed Mouths are not nearly as gluttonous as they appear. They use their sizable facial openings in order to gather resources, strategically storing them for the right opportunity.
Any: Payoff
Mandatory
Wild Flare
As a leader, whenever an artifact or flare pod is discharged by another alien, you may discharge this flare to charge it and add it to your cache.
Leader: Any
Super Flare
As a leader, after contact, you may discharge this flare to replace either driver with an encounter pod from your nexus. Scrap the replaced driver.
Leader: Contact
Modifications
- Original Mouth is leader-only and only gobbles enemy pods. My version expands the power to gobble more often and more passively but require more pods to belch one out. Increased from five pods to ten due to the increased use rate of the power.
- The original Super Mouth can also replace either driver with a vaporized pod. My version of Cosmic attempts to make vaporization more absolute for thematic purposes.
- Mouth’s legacy vaporizes drivers after they are used, permanently removing them from the game. Since my version of Cosmic allows encounters to continue without pods, there is no need to specify what to do if the forge is somehow completely exhausted. This legacy makes rare high-value pods even more valuable since they are always single-use. It carries on the threat of Mouth itself, which also excels at wiping out the forge over time. It might be better to deactivate Mouth if the goal is to stop its pod vaporization threat. Original Cosmic has no legacies.
Tips
- The more aliens oppose Mouth, the faster it will get its free pod. Avoid inviting too many allies when challenging mouth, and try to restrain the power of the pods you use, lest they be used on you later on.
- Mouth will get a minimum of two pods every encounter unless acting as a leader, but any artifacts or support pods played will allow it to gain a pod of choice more often. Consider the number of pods Mouth currently has to avoid letting it cross the threshold an encounter earlier.
- Mouth can only retrieve one pod at a time from its power, making it important to prioritize the highest-value target. Unless the other aliens are spamming pods, it will only get a new pod every 3-5 encounters, so it will be prudent to choose wisely.
Development Notes
- Mouth stands out as the odd fourth corner of the Clone-Envy-Fido trio, an alien capable of repurposing pods after they are used in combat. While Clone, Envy, and Fido exclusively focus on encounter pods, Mouth alone is capable of gaining other pods such as support pods and artifacts. Of the four, Fido stands to gain the most resources from its power, capable of activating its power every encounter. Envy can activate it every encounter as well, so long as it participates, giving it the second-most amount of resources. However, in Cosmic, resources are not always a benefit, and Envy and Fido are weaker when it comes to targeting specific resources they want. Fido may not get to keep the pod it grabs, and Envy is limited to what the opposing fleet plays when it is involved. The other aliens are both leader-only, but they are more skilled at getting the specific pods they want. Clone can keep reusing its own encounter pods, allowing it to keep a strong cache strong. Mouth can get one specific pod that any other alien has used, but it has to wait until it hits the magic number 10 to add it to its cache.
- My change to make Mouth target every pod played by every other player was meant to expand on the common house fix of letting Mouth gobble every card played. I wanted to make Mouth more competitive as an alien without making it strictly better than Envy, so I gave Mouth’s passive gobbling effect more pronounced. Now every alien has to be careful about what it plays every encounter since it knows Mouth will get it. However, Mouth now has a tougher choice to make, since it can only choose one of 10+ cards to add to its cache. It feels more noteworthy as a red alert alien, especially since this also means it will vaporize cards from the forge at a much faster rate. Unless Mouth plays/belches the pod or the power is zapped, every pod in the forge is suddenly single-use, creating the threat of the forge running out of aur.
- I liken my version of Mouth to the Time Eater from Slay the Spire, putting pressure on other aliens to avoid playing too many pods at once. Since communication is limited, they will need to each individually understand not to play too many pods at once. It can be especially tricky with support pods, since
- Unless Mouth is the leader, it will gobble 2 pods minimum per encounter. This means that Mouth will get to belch out a card approximately every 3-5 encounters. Meanwhile, Envy could potentially be gaining a new encounter pod every encounter, though it is limited to gaining encounter pods. Mouth also doesn’t have to participate to gain pods, making it less reliant on sponsors. It is also partially at a disadvantage as a leader, since it won’t be able to gobble its own encounter pod. For both of these aliens, the pods they are retrieving are reused, giving them both the disadvantage of predictability.
- I do find it somewhat strange that Mouth’s wild flare is so similar to Vulture’s base power, but I can appreciate that it targets both artifacts and flares instead of just artifacts and requires the user to be a leader to make it more situational. Vulture’s flares both specialize in snatching flares, so this flare would invoke the timing rule if played at the same time as one of those to target the same flare.