Build your galactic empire in Cosmic Encounter 42nd Anniversary Edition!

In the far reaches of space, the aliens of the cosmos vie for control of the universe. Alliances are constantly forged and broken in the pursuit of power as starships journey from planet to planet, ready to build colonies and battle foreign powers, ensuring the survival of their people as they spread throughout the stars.

Now is the perfect time to return to Cosmic Encounter or to experience the classic game of intergalactic colonization for the first time. Cosmic Encounter 42nd Anniversary Edition will become the new standardized version of the game when it hits shelves in the third quarter of 2018, and it remains compatible with all existing Cosmic Encounter expansions. To see the exciting changes that await, read on!

Search the Stars
At the dawn of a forgotten age, the Precursors sought intelligent life in the cosmos, only to discover that they were alone. Feeling the weight of their solitude, they sent the seeds of life to thousands of planets in the hope that sentience would follow. But before they could see the fulfillment of their legacy, they disappeared.

Now, the species that sprung from the Precursors' efforts populate thousands of solar systems, with only the remnants of their creators’ technology to guide them. Without the guiding hand of the elder race, these aliens fall to squabbling amongst themselves and battle for supremacy over the stars. In Cosmic Encounter 42nd Anniversary Edition, as in previous editions of the game, you're invited to become the leader of your own unique alien species, seeking to expand the reach of your civilization across the cosmos. You will launch the spaceships of your fleet through the Hyperspace Gate to reach planets beyond your home system where, with your own cunning and a bit of luck, you just might establish a colony. If you can successfully establish five of your colonies on foreign planets, you will earn victory and your species’ supremacy will be assured!

Extraterrestrial Expansion
As you attempt to colonize beyond the reaches of your home system, you will quickly find that every planet is controlled by someone. In Cosmic Encounter, the planets you target for your colonies are determined by Destiny cards, meaning you may be sent to the home system of a loyal friend or a dire foe, and alliances can shift in an instant. If you wish to establish a colony, you must win over the ruling species, either by negotiating a peace or engaging in conflict. If you succeed, you move closer to victory, but if you fail, you risk not only falling into obscurity, but also falling into the black abyss of space!

Cosmic Encounter is a competitive social game, where diplomacy is every bit as important as numerical strategy. Once you launch your spaceships, you can ask the other players at the table for support in your campaign... but of course, they each have their own goals, and their investment may cause you more harm than good. After the attackers and defenders are declared for conflict or a peace has been negotiated, you and the ruler of your target planet each select an encounter card and play it facedown.

No encounter takes place solely between two players, of course. At this time, every player can weigh in, using their Alien Powers, Artifacts, Reinforcements, or Flares to tip the odds in one side’s favor, allowing alliances to be forged and broken between anyone who wants to be part of the action. If your fleet wins the encounter, you may establish your colony, but if you lose, your ships may be sent into the Warp, trapped until you find a chance to rescue them! The back-and-forth action, surprising moves, and treacherous backstabs of Cosmic Encounter take center stage as every species struggles for supremacy, and we'll take a much closer look at these encounters in future previews!

Customize Your Conquest
Cosmic Encounter 42nd Anniversary Edition welcomes new players to the game of infinite possibilities with a freshly revised rulebook and a beautifully illustrated Quick-start Guide that captures the nostalgia of the original game and makes it easy for anyone to learn. The Quick-start Guide’s comic book style throws readers back to the 1970s, providing vital insight into the core rules of the game while embracing the fun of a cosmic conquest filled with wacky aliens and outrageous abilities. What's more, with the beautiful translucent ship pieces (as shown above), spreading your colonies across the galaxy has never been more stylish!

A newly discovered species joins the classic line-up of aliens. You can, of course, play as old favorites such as Mite or Remora, or you can try your hand at leading the ruthless Demon to victory. Previously only released at Cosmic Con, this species was exiled from their original galaxy for unprincipled opportunism. Now they seek cosmic vengeance, using their power to possess other players’ hands to bolster their own strength and sap others’ will to win.

In addition to this monstrous newcomer, Cosmic Encounter 42nd Anniversary Edition offers you new ways to customize your games with the introduction of Cosmic Combo cards. These carefully assembled cards offer a list of alien species with a brief description of their powers to create themed matchups and explore different types of games. You may find yourself among some Big Time Clubbers or Cellar Dwellers, that can be integrated into three, four, or five-player games. Every card spins a new challenge, and with these new options for customization, no two games are ever the same.

Conquer the Cosmos
The infinite possibilities of the cosmos lay before you. Forge your alliances, plan your betrayals, and expand your civilization’s reach to the farthest star.

3–5 Players
60–120 Min
Age: 12+

Unlikely alliances are forming throughout the galaxy, and fantastic new aliens have arrived to be part of them. Can these unexpected partnerships last? It’s a party in the Cosmos, and everyone’s invited!

Cosmic Alliance, the third expansion for Cosmic Encounter, brings 20 new (and classic) alien races to the game. Players will now stand petrified by the hideous Gorgon, be baffled by the puzzle of the Schizoid, and feel obsolete before the bionics of the Cyborg. Cosmic Alliance also makes the Cosmos even bigger, adding another player and offering rules for large eight-player games (if you own all three expansions). Finally, Cosmic Alliance introduces a new variant – team rules, which allow steadfast allies to dominate the Cosmos together.

• The third expansion for Cosmic Encounter, the classic game of interstellar politics
• Introduces 20 new and classic aliens to Cosmic Encounter
• Adds components for an additional player
• Includes official rules for large games (up to eight players, if you own all three expansions)
• Features all-new team rules, never-before-seen in Cosmic Encounter

The forces in the Cosmos have grown. New aliens have appeared, and with their arrival, the tensions between all races have never been higher. Who will reign in this crowded Cosmos? Only time will tell.

The fifth expansion for Cosmic Encounter… an expansion that goes further than ever before to acknowledge the game’s debt to its enthusiastic and imaginative community of fans!

In this fan-designed expansion, thirty new aliens blast their way onto your tabletop. Chock full of fan-favorite aliens, wacky new powers and flares, and a brand-new reward deck, Cosmic Dominion will have you and your friends competing to determine once and for all who rules the galaxy. Four new variants allow you to modify the classic Cosmic Encounter experience, and new ship markers allow players to create their very own variants.

Designed for the fans and by the fans – in conjunction with Peter Olotka, one the game’s original designers – Cosmic Dominion is a must-have for anyone hoping to explore all that the game’s cosmos has to offer!

Thirty New Aliens
Cosmic Dominion features thirty new aliens, the most an expansion has ever offered. With all the fan favorites and zany new powers among them, you’re sure to find an alien among the bunch to play as you endeavor to take over the galaxy.

From the Doppelgänger and its haunting presence to the Alchemist with its transmutative abilities, the thirty new aliens in Cosmic Dominion represent the fan community’s collective contributions and offer an assortment of unique approaches to claiming dominion over the galaxy.

You can use the Privilege of the Aristocrat to leverage your way to victory, or embrace the Pickpocket’s sneaky methods to Lift cards from your opponents. Raid fellow players when you play as the Pirate, or Discover the galaxy as the Explorer.

For more about the origins of Cosmic Dominion and the fan community’s involvement in the creation of the expansion’s thirty new alien races, we present you with a few words from Peter Olotka.

Peter Olotka on the Development of Cosmic Dominion
Cosmic Encounter has always been about breaking the rules, so it stands to reason that the game should break the rules about designing expansion sets. In this case, the rule that only the designers and publishers would create new expansion sets was broken by the Cosmic Encounter fans!

The design process took a couple of years and was organized online. Roughly eighty fans are cited in the Cosmic Dominion rules for playtesting and development, about twenty of whom are cited for Alien Design. The credits for Expansion Design and Development also go to fans: Jefferson Krogh, Bill Martinson, and Jack Reda.

In addition to new aliens, the fans decided the set should include fan updates of some of the original Eon Products aliens that were left out of the FFG version.

The design process evolved as it went along. Initially Bill Eberle, another original Cosmic Encounter designer, and I participated by adding our own ideas to the mix and critiquing the work of the fans. That process did not work. We were getting in the way and defeating the purpose of the fan set, so we bowed out and pulled our ideas out of the mix. I converted my role into a liaison between the fans and FFG.

Jeff, Bill, and Jack then buckled down and did an astonishing amount of work to wrangle a Space Ark of aliens down to thirty. They also created a considerable amount of other new content as well.

Within this new, ever-expanding universe, there will now be 165 Aliens. That makes 29,772,765 different four-player alien combinations. So unless you are the Zombie with the power of impartiality, while you are not going to play them all, you’ll never have to play the same game twice.

I want to publicly thank all of the thousands Cosmic Encounter players who in one way or another participate in this one-of-a-kind endeavor.

On behalf of the fans of Cosmic Encounter, I would also like to thank FFG CEO Christian T. Petersen, VP of Research & Design Corey Konieczka, Producer Jason Walden, and all the other good folks at Fantasy Flight Games for trusting this project to the Cosmic Encounter players!

Thoughts from the Fan Designers of Cosmic Dominion
Longtime fans of Cosmic Encounter, Jefferson Krogh, Bill Martinson, and Jack Reda took their love of the game to an unprecedented level with their work on Cosmic Dominion. Like Peter Olotka, each of them was inspired to offer some words about the process of working on this unique fan-created expansion.

Jefferson Krogh:
“I love Cosmic Encounter because I never know where it will take me, and it evokes a sense of wonder and humor that's rare in real life. Now it's taken me to where I had the chance to work with other people to help design Cosmic Encounter, and it's like the end of 2001: A Space Odyssey. I'm not sure how I got here, or what really happened, but I know that it's been intensely cool and mind-blowing.”

Bill Martinson:
“You'd think after all these decades of adoring fans stretching, twisting, flip-flopping, and transmogrifying the game system (which somehow remains as resilient as ever) we would've seen it all. But it's a big cosmos, and we were amazed by players' ingenuity again and again. Having so much great material to choose from made it a privilege and a pleasure to help guide it all into yet another eclectically fun, serious, whimsical, and fun expansion set for the best board game on the planet!”

Jack Reda:
“There are so many things to enjoy about Cosmic Encounter, and each fan brings a perspective about what he or she likes best. It was fun and rewarding to be exposed to so many varying effects, and to help shepherd everything to the end product.”

Variants in the Cosmos
In addition to its thirty new Aliens, Cosmic Dominion introduces special ship markers that allow players to enjoy a range of variant play options as they compete for control of the galaxy.

The Flagship Variant grants players the ability to add a plus three to encounters in which their flagships are involved, while the Salvage Vessel variant rewards players for involving their Salvage Vessel in encounters, allowing them to receive two rewards or draw two tech cards (if in use) and choose one to keep.

Moreover, the new special ship markers are also designed to allow players to create their own variants, and you will be encouraged to browse the different variants, as well as contribute your own, in a special ship marker variants thread that we will add later to our community forums.

Brand New Rewards
Cosmic Dominion also includes a brand new reward deck as part of one of the expansion’s new variants. This new reward deck includes several brand new types of cards, as well as more of the new cards types introduced in previous expansions.

You’ll find new Intimidate cards that may turn the tide of encounters before they begin, and Retreat cards which allow players to completely avoid conflict. Meanwhile, Rift and Kicker cards, similar to those found in the Cosmic Incursion expansion, offer a wider variety of game effects to shake up the galaxy.

• A Cosmic Encounter expansion designed by fans for fans
• Includes thirty new aliens - the most an expansion has ever offered
• Offers four new variants and the option to create and share your own with the Cosmic Encounter fan community

The galaxy of Cosmic Encounter, like most galaxies, is constantly changing. Just when you think you’ve explored every corner of it and met most of its aliens, you turn around to find that a new star system has just materialized, full of new species with astonishing, wildly unique customs. You’ve learned that when interacting with a strange alien for the first time, its best not to reveal all of your hand at once. If you want to establish colonies in these recently-formed parts of the galaxy, you’ll have to be conceal your true intentions, negotiate with cunning, and be careful not to put your foot into cross-cultural quicksand—or into your mouth.

Cosmic Eons, an upcoming expansion for Cosmic Encounter, introduces new aliens with abilities unlike any you’ve dealt with so far, but it doesn’t stop there. This expansion features the Hidden Alliances variant, which enables you and your opponents to reveal simultaneously whose side you’re on. With this simple mechanical twist, Cosmic Eons promises not just to open up a new part of the galaxy, but to change how you play the game.

Keep Your Plans Close
In Cosmic Encounter, you have to make friends if you want to establish as many colonies as possible. That doesn’t mean you should trust all your friends, or even stick with them for the whole game. The Hidden Alliances variant makes it possible to engage in all sorts of discussions about whose side to take in the encounter, then only reveal your true intentions at the possible last moment.

When using this variant (which works best with at least four players), you have an alliance dial that shows exactly how many ships you will commit to which side—if you want to get involved in the encounter at all. Once you and your opponents are finished discussing alliances and have determined what they want to do, you place their dials facedown until everyone has made a decision. Then, all at once, you reveal your plans. This simple adjustment creates lots of opportunities for persuasion, deceit, and betrayal, as well as adding another element of suspense to the game.

Keep Your Friends and Enemies Closer
Of course, not all the aliens in the galaxy are your friends. Some may be your enemies, and most will likely switch back and forth between the two. In Cosmic Eons you’ll discover a new genus of aliens that can keep closer tabs on (and has greater power over) both friends and enemies than any aliens before. These are the six aliens able to dole out Essence cards.

Essence cards work slightly differently for each alien, but generally as an alien who has them you can, once per turn, give one out to another alien of your choice. The Essence card then affects the behavior of the alien that you gave it to, perhaps by preventing them from doing something, perhaps by encouraging them toward an action, perhaps by penalizing or rewarding something they’ve done. The Sheriff, for example, can hand out Tickets which force other players to pay fines for certain infractions, such as Loitering, Vagrancy, or Littering. Similarly, the Nanny can give a Consequence to an alien she thinks is likely to behave badly. The Assistant earns rewards for helping out other players by, say, tidying up their Messy Colonies when they ask her to.

Aliens with Essence cards are just a few of those who appear in Cosmic Eons. If you’d rather not hand out Tickets and just want everyone to get along, you can play the Bleeding Heart, who compels players to negotiate rather than fight. The Coward also doesn’t like fighting. He runs away from encounters and earns a reward for each ship the opposing player threatened the Coward with. Or you might be the Moocher, who doesn’t actually have any planets, so he is forced to camp out on couches across the galaxy.

Infinite Possibilities
Cosmic Encounter has always been a game of infinite possibilities. Cosmic Eons allows you to explore more of that infinitude than ever before and interact with the aliens you meet in two entirely new ways. You never know who or what you're going to encounter, and whether they'll deserve a Ticket or just some friendly Help along the way.

• An expansion for the classic game Cosmic Encounter
• Designed by original Cosmic Encounter creators Bill Eberle, Peter Olotka, and Greg Olotka
• Thirty new playable aliens join the game
• New Hidden Alliances variant adds suspense and opportunities for bluffing
• Essence Cards enable some aliens to hamper or enhance others’ abilities

A new Cosmic Age is dawning and with it arrives a new cast of extraterrestrial beings struggling for complete galactic domination. How will these fresh faces affect the delicate cosmic balance of power? Only time will tell.

Cosmic Incursion brings 20 additional races to the core set and marks the return of 10 classic Cosmic Encounter aliens. Players will face the sticky terror of the Fungus, scratch their heads at the perplexing Magician and shudder in fear as the Locust consumes their planets in one gulp.

We’ve expanded the universe and added components for a 6th player to the game. In addition, Cosmic Incursion introduces a new variant to spice up gameplay – the reward deck, which offers exciting new cards such as kickers and rifts to those aliens who ally with the defense.

Cosmic Incursion requires the Cosmic Encounter board game to play.

Across the vast expanse of the cosmos, strange quakes and startling explosions make the galaxy an even more dangerous place to wage war. New alien races are making themselves known in the interstellar clash for control. Set up space stations to boost your skills, then prepare for galactic disturbances and more epic encounters than ever before.

This new addition sets the galaxy trembling as twenty-five new alien races come zipping through the cosmos. Guard yourself against the sticky-fingered Swindler, and stand in awe of the massive appetite of the Mouth.

Cosmic Storm also adds space stations, which when attached to one of your home planets, gives you additional powers to use in your encounters!

Batten Down the Hatches
Prepare for the upcoming galactic turmoil by setting up a space station on one of your home planets. This variant allows each player to draw one of ten space station cards and then attach the corresponding space station to one of their home worlds. Each of the ten stations has a unique ability that can be harnessed as long as a player has at least one ship on the planet the station is attached to.

Space station abilities like the Big Space Laser or the Alien Outpost shake up interstellar encounters, and provide even more options for players to maximize their options on their quest for galactic supremacy!

Space stations are also compatible with all previous expansion variants, so no rules have to be changed to include them.

Meet the Bulwarks
The toughness of the Bulwarks is legendary. They think nothing of facing overwhelming odds or throwing themselves into the thick of battle, knowing they have the ability to endure nearly any hardship. The Bulwarks can also be as thick-headed as they are thick-skinned.

The Bulwarks are just one of twenty-five new alien races bursting into the galaxy and entering the chase to become ruler of the cosmos. Incredibly tough and strong, the Bulwarks are widely known for their Resilience, a power which allows them to withstand even the most brutal battles.

With the help of this power, any time a Bulwark would lose ships to the warp, they can reduce the number of ships lost to one, making them incredibly difficult to defeat.

Brace yourself for the upcoming Cosmic Storm! Equip your home world with a space station, choose your alien race, and prepare for the strange and exciting altercations that can only occur in Cosmic Encounter!

A Fitting Battlefield
To stage your adventures in a truly cinematic fashion, Fantasy Flight Games has created the Cosmic Encounter Duel Gamemat!

This 26” by 36” mat features vibrant original art from Cosmic Encounter Duel atop a high-quality, slip-resistant rubber base. As you become immersed in your cosmic clashes, you can beautifully display your cards while protecting them from stains and spills, whether you're playing in a tournament or just around the kitchen table.

Whichever species you choose to lead in their fight to join the Cosmic Citizenship Council, this playmat will help keep your cards and components protected, ensuring that the focus stays where it belongs—on your games!