Oligarch

Alert

Essence

Control

Resource

Type

Power of Privilege

Gains Privileges Through Dominion

Setup: You always have the first campaign.

At any time, if another alien has more bases than you have privileges, use this power to reveal a privilege from your nexus. That privilege is placed next to your nexus and remains active for as long as your power is active. If you are zapped when using this power, the targeted privilege is permanently vaporized.

Each time you receive provisions, gain one additional lucre.

Legacy: In order to win the match, an alien’s authority and dominion must add up to at least 10 (8 in 4-alien match).

Led by a small group of well-bred elites, the Oligarchs believe that those who rise to the top deserve to rule over everyone else. As the apex alien species, they plan to seize what is rightfully theirs.

Any: Any

Mandatory

Wild Flare

At the start of your campaign, if you do not have more pods in your cache than all other players, you may discharge this flare to draft pods from any forge until you do.

Invader: Orientation

Super Flare

When another alien would receive provisions, you may discharge this flare to receive one lucre that alien would receive.

Any: Any

Privileges

Absolute Authority – You have one more authority. All other aliens have one less authority.
Compensation Control – When you would collect compensation, collect two more compensation. All other aliens collect two less compensation (min 1).
Encounter Envy – During combat, increase your fleet’s might by 3. All other leaders decrease their fleet’s might by 2.
Reward Reaper – When you would receive rewards, receive two more rewards. All other aliens receive two less compensation (min 1).
Warp Watch – When you would lose ship(s), lose two fewer ships (min 1). All other aliens lose one more ship when losing ships.

Modifications

Original Oligarch has the power of “greed”. The original power name seems like a compromise due to “privilege” already being taken by Aristocrat. Since the essence already uses privileges, I changed my Aristocrat’s power name to free up the space.
Changed the name of some of the privileges to give them all alliteration. Rewards Siphon changed to Reward Reaper. Warp Claim changed to Warp Watch. Absolute Authority is a unique privilege I made to replace Victory Possession based on my influence system, as I wanted the 5 privileges to be closer in terms of utility. Original Victory Possession allows Oligarch to win with one less dominion and requires everyone else to win with one more. When I played with this alien, it seemed a little too obvious that this was the one to zap, so I decided to make it a little more difficult of a choice.
Original Oligarch receives one extra pod from provisions. My version receives one lucre instead since FFG Cosmic has no lucre.
Original Oligarch can choose any of its privileges when using its power. Mine follows the standard essence rule of having three in its nexus and choosing one. Since it only has 5, and can choose 3-4 in a match, it will eventually be able to pick any privilege it wants.
Original Super Oligarch can probe the target’s resupply and snatch one pod of its choice. I thought this power was crossing a little too far into Janitor and Quartermaster’s territories, and I wanted to continue the theme of Oligarch dealing with lucre. I figure it doesn’t need the extra information bonus.
I added the (min 1) limitation to Warp Watch, Compensation Control, and Reward Reaper, to make the three of them less oppressive when active.
Oligarch’s legacy alters the universal win condition for the match, as a reference to its original Victory Possession privilege. Instead of needing 5 dominion, aliens need a combined dominion and authority total of 10. This legacy means that only aliens who retain all of their home bases will be able to win with 5 foreign bases. Aliens that lose all but one base will need 9 foreign bases to win. This legacy can make shared victories more difficult, as few aliens have the exact same number of home and foreign bases. It also makes home bases just as valuable as foreign ones, meaning that every encounter as a leader is incredibly important, unless the invader targets a planet without a base. This legacy favors aliens that are skilled at winning encounters, as well as aliens like Warrior and Tick-Tock that like stalling out the match. This legacy can also be difficult to enable by eliminating Oligarch, due to its Absolute Authority privilege. Original Cosmic has no legacies.

Tips

Oligarch is a major zap magnet due to how potent its privileges can be. Chances are that one of Oligarch’s privileges will be zapped during a match. Since zaps are in short supply, be sure to choose wisely
Due to how Oligarch’s power works, if it gets zapped during upkeep, it will be able to choose a different privilege during the following invasion, almost immediately. The primary means of zapping Oligarch is to cancel a specific privilege, since it will be lost forever.
Since Oligarch’s power affects all other aliens and always grows in power, it can easily take the role of a “boss” alien along the lines of Virus and Ace. It is advisable to use teamwork against it, since it can start to dominate a match if uncontested.
Oligarch effectively starts without a power, aside from the bonus lucre it receives and the first campaign. Its power ramps up quickly though, even if it is losing.
Though all of the privileges can be devastating, Absolute Authority is arguably the most dangerous. While active, Oligarch would need to lose four bases to lose its power, and every other alien would need to lose only two. It also gives Oligarch a major advantage in negotiations, meaning it makes other aliens unlikely to negotiate with it. What makes it especially dangerous is that it effectively protects all of Oligarch’s other privileges from deactivation.
Oligarch can be a very dangerous alien when there are other zap magnets in-play like Mite or Loser. Oligarch will only use its power 3-5 times in a match, so those zaps are sure to be very impactful. Aliens will need to coordinate to see where the zaps are and make sure they are properly utilized. If Oligarch gets them, everyone else can be in for a rough time.
Oligarch can attempt to bait out a Cosmic Zap by revealing a privilege it wants the second-most. If no one zaps it, it could indicate that no one has a zap. If someone does zap it, Oligarch can then likely choose the privilege it wants most, assuming someone else doesn’t have the second zap handy.

Development Notes

Oligarch is the poster child of the Eon Dimension. It is on the cover of the Cosmic Eons box art and acts as one of the introductory aliens to the essence mechanic. Oligarch has one of the smallest sets of essence, having only five when others have as many as fifteen. The small number allows Oligarch greater control over choosing the ones it wants.
The mechanic of basing Oligarch’s privileges on the highest dominion in the match is interesting and helps distinguish it from Pentaform. Oligarch’s privileges are quite strong. Each one provides both an advantage for Oligarch and a disadvantage for everyone else. Oligarch can give itself an effective 5-power combat bonus to pass the Human Test, amazing ship protection that lets it send effectively as many ships as it wants while destroying more enemy ships, gaining authority to make it difficult to deactivate and making other aliens more likely to lose their powers, gaining extra compensation while hindering enemy compensation, and gaining extra rewards while curtailing enemy rewards.
Oligarch is another “royalty” alien. Oligarch, along with Dictator, Emperor, Tyrant, King, Usurper, etc. have almost the same theme. The only real distinction is from the different vibes given by each of the names. An “emperor” has more of a neutral connotation and has a veneer of greatness behind it, while a “tyrant” has a negative connotation and refers to someone who rules with oppressive force. Each of these aliens does an effective job of controlling a different aspect of the match, to make it feel like all of them could be ruling at the same time. No matter how many privileges Oligarch gets, it is still bound by Dictator’s destiny, who is still bound to pay tribute to Tyrant.
An “oligarch” refers to a ruling member of an oligarchy. Commonly known as “minority rule”, it refers to a system of government where a small collective of individuals rule over a large collective. The system is similar to a monarchy or dictatorship, only the power is divided between multiple individuals. In the case of Oligarch, I imagine it is the species itself that refers to the small collective, since the number of Oligarchs is guaranteed to be smaller than the whole of the Cosmos. I can also imagine that an oligarchy of Oligarchs rules over the Oligarchs, in the same way that a single Dictator rules over the Dictators.
Oligarch’s original Victory Possession is widely considered the most notorious of the privileges since it allows Oligarch to more easily win and makes it harder for other aliens to win. Even if it’s not the strongest privilege, other aliens may want to zap it just for adding extra time to the match. I opted to swap out the effect with my own idea, adding a privilege that protects all the other privileges while making it easier for other aliens to lose their powers. Absolute Authority may still be the most notorious of the privileges in practice, but I think it has a more fitting name for it. Also, if other aliens choose to zap Absolute Authority, it will still end up protecting the other privileges, since other aliens won’t have the zaps to stop the others.
In a standard match, Oligarch can only activate four of its privileges. Since one of them is likely to be zapped, it will usually end up activating all of them. There would be no purpose in zapping Oligarch if its privilege pool reset, so I specified that Oligarch’s privileges getting zapped is permanent like Cosmos’s rules. The timing of the zapping means that aliens will know which one they are zapping, so as not to need to rely on blind luck.
All of Oligarch’s privileges are potent, though their potency will vary depending on the other aliens in the match. Warp Watch might seem more impactful than Compensation Control, but Hacker and Zombie would beg to differ. The bonus of 5 might in combat might not matter at all if the other aliens are all combat-oriented. Warrior and Warpish can easily trounce such a small bonus that barely passes the Human Test, while Pacifist won’t be sweating either way.
Reward Reaper and Compensation Control are similar in effect, just affecting rewards and compensation respectively. An alien may not care about compensation at all, while they might care a lot about rewards, or vice versa. Warp Watch is more universally damaging to all aliens, though aliens who can gain ships easily or mitigate losses may not care as much.
Oligarch and Miser both share the trait of starting with one bonus lucre. Since Miser has two separate caches, it can receive a lucre when resupplying each of them. Oligarch simply gets two lucre from its own resupplies, which can increase the speed of gaining vouchers.
I imagine Oligarch’s privileges originate from its authority. As long as it has that authority, it can exert its rule over other aliens, imposing laws and regulations that restrict what others can do while benefiting itself. A supernatural power that makes others believe you rule over them and can impose such laws would be quite fitting to make such a power work.
Since powers in my Cosmic activate and deactivate at the end of upkeep, Oligarch could activate its Absolute Authority to preserve its power after losing its third base, assuming the alien(s) with the most dominion just gained the base.
Aside from FFG’s Human, Oligarch is one of the few aliens whose power somewhat revolves around the Cosmic Zap artifact. Since it uses its power only a few times and has such a major impact on the match, each zap matters quite a bit. Other aliens will likely only be able to stop at most two privileges, meaning they still have three to deal with. Even those three privileges can be a huge advantage for Oligarch, especially if it is able to get the three it wants.