Cosmic Encounter, eh? It looks like the reserved event spots for it are all taken already, but I might look for it in the games library.
What's it like? What kind of game? How many players? How do you play?
It's player interaction. You play as an alien race and your goal is to establish 5 foreign colonies. On your turn, your target is selected randomly and you want to invade and kick out a race on a planet in a foreign system (each player has a home system of five planets). You can invite other players to help attack, or if you're the one being attacked, you can invite them to defend. They are advantage to being an ally, of course.
When you are attack, you'll play a card with a number on it (Encounter Card) and add the number of ships you have on your side to that card (typically, each player can launch 1-4 ships in an encounter, allies and main players).
Finally, each alien race has a power that bends or breaks the rules of the game in some way. It takes about 90-120 minutes to play (longer in some cases). With all expansions, it can play 3-8 players. A 4-5 player game is well-rounded for newbies. If you can, I recommend playing it at least once to see if you like it.
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"Coinflip is sacred."