What do y'all think are four or five alien power that would work well together for teaching first time players? I understand how the color system works, but even among the "green light" aliens some powers are easier to get than others.

I am looking for diversity as well as balance. I enjoy Cosmic's unbalanced play, but I would like for new player to not walk away feeling cheated or that someone got the "ultimate" power. And by new players, I mean people who have never played board games beyond RISK, Monopoly and Scrabble.

Cosmic Online has 6 free aliens that were chosen for these same reasons: Oracle, Macron, Zombie, Warrior, Trader, and Clone.

If you're playing a 5-player game, I would take out Warrior since he requires extra components. If you're playing 4-player, I would take out Macron since his power text was made more complicated in this edition -- though I think he would be a good alien for a follow-up game because newcomers tend to love Big Mac.

Will and Vulch are also very simple green-light aliens, but their abilities might seem underwhelming to new players. Oracle, Zombie, Clone, and Trader is probably the perfect 4-player alien combo for newcomers. Just make sure to explain why Zombie doesn't compensation before the game starts.

Well, these are some good "learners" in my opinion:

Zombie: As simple as it gets, barring the compensation kerfuffle. Things are more fun when you don't have to worry too much about making mistakes.

Observer: Same as above, but just a touch different.

Oracle: While math isn't the most important part of the game, it's certainly a good idea to awaken those dormant number muslces in your brain. Also an alien that doens't have to worry much about mistakes.

Sorcerer: He's certainly powerful, but he helps teach new players about the importance of prediction.

Will: Once people understand Will, they'll probably be able to understand better why destiny is random in the first place (a common complaint with new players).

Clone: Simple and fun, and his strategy is easy to grasp.

Vulch: Having Vulch in the game allows Artifacts to be used more often, letting players learn them faster.

As for aliens that are green yet should not be used with newbies:

Macron: He's not as easy to grasp as you might think, and his massive defense is Virus-esque.

Parasite: New players tend to ask for allies all the time, so he probably won't ever get a chance to do his thing.

Pacifist: It's probably best to fix in people's heads that Ns will usually lose before you flip it on its head.

Loser: Simple in theory, but the N restriction can be confusing, and there needs to be a distinction between "low total wins" and "loser wins" when Anti-Matter shows up later.

Miser: Havhing too many cards may be a bad thing for a new player, since they have to read everything.

Hacker: Same reasons as Miser.

Warrior: He'll probably start getting called unfair once his experience builds up.

While the CEO picks are very safe, I think I like Toomai's suggestions as those powers have some I don't play a lot. And why should the teacher of the game also not have fun as well. Thanks both of you for the suggestions, I love that game and would like to spread the word but don't want to bog the new players down in too much before they get a chance to play a few rounds.

I finally got to play my new FFG set with a couple of first-time players a few months ago. I did a poor job of explaining things ahead of time, and to compound my error one of the newbies got, as her two aliens to pick from, Sorceror and Spiff. She actually won, but that was at least partly because the two of them ganged up on me as the only person who knew what he was doing.

Toomai said:

This term isn't used nearly enough. My new goal: use "kerfuffle" once per day.

I was about to post the same question. I'm hoping to get my family started on CE and needed suggestions on some good starter powers. I'm glad I checked back a week from the front page. Thanks for the answers everyone.

When explaining the game, explain powers LAST and play with the bare minimum. I know it doesn't say much for FFG version cuz the only thing to leave out would be techs/flares (and reinforcements peraps). Most every game I play I'm explaining the rules to a newcomer lol.

Start with explaining what planets/tokens/warp/objectives/destiny are briefly.

Then move on to cards, (skip edicts or w/e they're called in this version) and talk about attack cards versus negotiates.

Next run through a mock-encounter from destiny to outcome phase. Make sure you highlight when each phase ends, and the next begins. Best if you give them a hand of 7 cards as well so they can be a lil more tactile, and also to lead them to ask "what are these edict/artifact cards?" to which you simply reply "exactly what they say on the card". At this point they should have a good enough knowledge of the turn process to know when each is being used.

NOW for the fun part, POWERS! Just throw out examples (simple ones) like the zombie. Then when they read their powers the pieces of the puzzle snap together and they can start to envision when/how to use it already. Takes a couple games usually for newcomers to get into a good flow, but we've always taught people this way and they just seem to become hooked haha.

Hope this helped anyone who reads here =P

I've just bought a copy of the game as well after seeing quite a few excellent reviews. I've been itching to play the game and was wondering as well what aliens were probably best to start with. Reading this has been a great help. I'll be playing the game tonight with some friends who are board game fans yet haven't heard of this game before. Should be great fun