FTL - a streak attempt

[thrawn]

Engi C



A most reliable and possibly even the best ship in FTL, Engi C should be easy cruising.


Sector 1

Beacon 1



Start with the distress and then see.

Since I don't like to depower the hacking drone to get it past the enemy defence drones, I'm not sure whether to sell or to keep the defence scrambler augment.


Beacon 2



With a clone bay it's safe to gamble.


Beacon 3



Exploring asteroids.


Beacon 4



Forgot to take a starting screenshot. They had basic laser+BL1. Decided to hack shields because if I hack weapons I'll get to fire two times before the BL1 but all 4 shots will need to hit to take it out. If I hack shields then only the first volley needs to hit. Also decided to add the beam drone as it could make it much easier for the second round to hit.

The first volley was successful and took their weapons out. I tried to crew kill them but it didn't work.

We got up to 21 scrap after the fight and I upgraded to shields-3.


Beacon 5



Nice to have an engi.


Beacon 6



Very nice event and even a free weapon.


Beacon 7



The problem is that the missile will come offline second. Also they are running and have a repair drone. I'm going to hack shields and then fire the laser in shields too, to give the beam drone maximum chance to cause damage.



The beam drone kept hitting the empty room but they are going down anyway. They just fired the missile for the second time but it's a leto so we'll take just one more damage before they die.



30 scrap at the end of the fight so we can upgrade to shields-4, but there is also a store. Since we have hacking, a shield buffer and two engis we are very safe, so I'll wait with the upgrade and visit the 3 beacons before the store.


Beacon 8



Hacked drones preemptively.



The first time it worked but we missed and the second time we took two damage .


Beacon 10



Clone bay saves the day.


Beacon 11



Heavy laser 1 - definitely buy.



They also have DD1, so I sell the augment and buy it too.


Beacon 12



Hack the drone to block it from firing rapidly a second time or if it looks like it will break the shield for the mini beam.



And the hack pays off.



This was the federation base quest and we get a nice reward.


Beacon 13



Hacking shields should allow any of our shots to take out the BL2 before it fires and I'll also use the drone so the human goes to repair something else and the mantis is on weapons.



I'll go up as the green sectors have more stores and we should be fine with zoltan shields.

Sector 2

Beacon 1 (14)



Explore and search for the store/s.


Beacon 2 (15)



No way to be perfectly safe so I'll go all out with hacking shields and using the drone.



Drone hits weapons and we are good.


Beacon 4 (17)



Safe fight so first train weapons by firing the ion in the empty room, and then ionise oxygen though I had to use hacking to help.


Beacon 6 (19)



Used this mantis to train evasion and then oxygen killed them.


Beacon 9 (22)



Tricky due to low power but the scrap will make up for any damage.



The missile was off so I first used them to train shields.



And then oxygen kill gave us a weapon.


Beacon 10 (23)



Completely safe but they tried to run and I couldn't crew kill them.



Nevertheless we get a weapon from the regular kill.


Beacon 11 (24)



No weapons but they have a drone recovery arm and I get it.



I also sell the hermes and buy the backup battery.



We have a choice of 2 distress beacons vs 3 nebula ones. I'll go for the distresses and also equip the anti-bio beam in case of spiders. There is no need to sell it immediately.


Beacon 14 (27)



Some scrap and federation base quest from the distresses. I decided to keep the bio-beam for a bit and this is an easy kill with it.



High scrap and a mantis.


Beacon 16 (29)



Zoltans but we should be alright.

[T-hawk]

For sector 1 both beacons 9 and 12, if you had taken the shields-4 upgrade before that, both fights are zero threat, plus you don't have to spend a hacking drone, and you could even get evasion and weapons training. I would've taken the shields right away - if you have workable weapons in sector 1 (plus even hacking here), stores don't matter, that shield upgrade is more important and will carry you to later stores. In general I think you're over-prioritizing stores. As long as you're above half hull and have workable weapons, you don't need to push for stores.

[thrawn]

It's true that I prioritise stores very highly. Most of the time my game revolves around saving scrap for purchases and exploring the sectors in a way that allows me to find and visit all the stores.

As an extension to this I've been trying to squeeze in a store visit or two even in sector one, but am starting to think that for most ships it's better to just get shields-4 asap and visit an early store only if you have things to sell. So for this I agree but what would you do from sector 2 onward if not prioritise stores the highest, and wouldn't you greatly increase the risk of not finding weapons and systems for several sectors in a row with any other strategy?

[thrawn]

Engi C


Sectors 3-4

Beacon 1 (30)



First distress, then the store.


Beacon 2 (31)



Will detour through the second distress since it doesn't risk losing a store.


Beacon 3 (32)



The mantis should be easier esp. since he doesn't get an engi.



Weapons down with the first volley and I switch to the bio beam to finish them off.


Beacon 5 (34)



Hull laser 2 is slow but packs a punch so I sell the ion stunner and the bio beam and get it. I also upgrade to weapons-4 and am just a little short from weapons-5 to be able to use all 3 together.


Beacon 7 (36)



The small bomb hits shields but with 5 shots we disable their weapons.



Second store and I realised that I didn't refuel...


Beacon 8 (37)



Hack weapons to delay them and the 5 shots are enough.


Beacon 9 (38)



Everyone's favourite police inspection.



The hull laser makes it easy.


Beacon 10 (39)



The flak is a given but which weapon do I replace? Hull laser 2 does 1 more damage than the heavy but is slower and this will also slow down the other weapons. So we get flak1 + dual laser + heavy laser which is 6 shots for 7 damage every 10 seconds, and is already online at weapons-4. But I'm not going to sell the hull laser 2 yet in case we find a halberd.


Beacon 14 (43)



Next up engis and I managed to get some fuel from the fights so we could be ok.


Sector 4

Beacon 1 (44)



Immediate store so go there to refuel and then the quest which is the zoltan.


Beacon 2 (45)



Do I want a teleporter or mind control for the last system? With mantis/lanius/clone bay/hacking/defence drone and 3 engis to run the ship the teleporter works. The flagship will be more dangerous without cloaking but we'll have more than enough cash to upgrade shields and engines. But the problem is that it will be slow to board ships and I'd rather save RL time so I pass on it.


Beacon 4 (47)



An envoy from the quest.


Beacon 7 (50)



A good amount of fuel and cloaking. There is also the option to get mind control + hull beam but cloaking should be the safer way to drive this to victory.


Beacon 11 (54)



The game is effectively won so I get a second beam drone to speed up the flagship.


Beacon 12 (55)



Rocks for the extra store and to have the option to choose later.

Sectors 5-6

Beacon 1 (56)





Beacon 2 (57)



Getting the rock for the blue options since we have mantis and engi and don't need anything specific.



Found the stores. We have all systems but could switch to stronger weapons or get a reloader.


Beacon 4 (59)



A preigniter but we don't have enough cash.


Beacon 8 (63)



LRS and fuel.



And there are no more stores in the sector so I spent the remaining scrap on upgrades.


Exit dive



Easy dive but I got distracted and the crew lost xp from suffocating



Next up the civilian for the higher scrap.


Sector 6

Beacon 1 (70)



Going to skip the bottom two fights for the store - though there was nothing in it.


Beacon 4 (73)



No need for more crew - got 57 scrap instead.


Beacon 5 (74)



I bought the hull repair drone and with it and the drone recovery arm we are practically invincible - 2 free repairs per jump and with 20+ drone parts we can repair as much as we want in a tough fight.


Beacon 6 (75)



Full crew with 2 zoltans.


Beacon 8 (77)



Nothing interesting in the store. In some cases I'd replace the DD1 with a DD2 but here I'll stick with it.


Exit dive



Abandoned for sector 7.

I haven't been reporting fights because they've been trivial and we have even hoarded 457 scrap...

[sunrise089]

Thrawn, I won’t speak for T-Hawk, but my sense is he heavily prioritizes a max-scrap path and sort of assumed the weapons and systems will work out. I play much more like you hitting stores often and looking for something close to my ideal layout. T-Hawk also said he’d not even hit a store to heal uncles his health is pretty low. That’s too scary for me; i almost always heal if I’m in the yellow part of the bar or lower.

T-Hawk, I find that if I don’t die I am usually getting level three shields and level five engines by the flagship even as a mediocre player. With your presumably greater scrap are you trying to get those systems upgraded more? Or just upgraded earlier?

[Jabah]

Your thread inspired me to play again FTL and hit an unexpected losing streak with fédération C. Especially depressing as I lost twice to flagship mainly because drone means no hacking and no clocking (first was losing in the 3rd phase the attrition war despite having a scrap record run but no way to heal, second was my fault for being greedy arriving with o turn left and get weapons hacked, realising too late I could use artillery and having hull drone in the hold instead of active...).
Is drone the correct last system (but without I can't manage missile in the previous sectors).

[thrawn]

Fed C is certainly one of the most vulnerable ships but if you reached the flagship you covered the most difficult part. What weapons did you have at the end?

For the last system I'd get hacking because it is the most useful in general and helps boarding greatly. I'll be coming to Fed C soon and can go in more detail on how to deal with enemy missiles if that will help.

@Sunrise: I also like to keep the hull at full or close to full - it's very easy for something to go wrong and then get an event or two with unavoidable damage like the mantis fugitive.

[thrawn]

Sector 7

Beacon 1 (83)





Beacon 2 (84)



A reloader is very nice.



A third beam drone will butcher the flagship and since we aren't oxygen killing the lanius we can use it against them too.


Beacon 4 (86)



This is a cool fight - lanius bomber with teleporter, cloaking and mind control at a pulsar



We are winning but shields got ionised while the cloak is on cooldown and their laser is close to firing so I'll hack their weapons.



And they are dead with no damage for us. Beam drones FTW.


Beacon 6 (88)



With the beam drones there is no escape.


Beacon 7 (89)



Lanius blue option but nothing good.



Guaranteed fights or the store? We have awesome weapons and a full compartment of beam drones so we are good and can just focus on getting scrap.


Beacon 9 (91)



Even a zoltan with a glaive is no threat despite us having only 2 shields.



We cross the 600 scrap threshold.


Beacon 10 (92)



Another worthy enemy and this one is giving us a harder time. Just suicided the zoltans to get rid of the boarders.



Still, no probs esp. with the ASB to help. We only got 3 damage from the missile because I forgot to cloak the first time.


Beacon 14 (96)



Sector 8. 771 scrap hoarded.

Sector 8

Beacon 6 (102)



The small bomb hit shields, I cloaked and the engis managed to repair it in time for the halberd.


Beacon  (103)



1k+ scrap shows how incredibly strong this setup is. Now let's spend it before the flagship.



Quite an upgrade


Stage 1



Shields hack but they aren't going to live long enough to enjoy it.



Stage 1 over.


Stage 2



Carnage - dead as they are firing the laser for the first time which means in 15 seconds.


Stage 3



Dead before the first power surge and we didn't take any damage in any of the stages.



Even the boarders didn't cause problems though one of the zoltans did die and is being resurrected.

Ship and stats

The ship prior to stage 3



Upgrades



Items



Stats



Scrap and items.

Systems:

• Hacking - starting
  
• Drone control - starting
  
• Cloaking - sector 4
  

[T-hawk]

I'm only talking about the first two sectors to deprioritize stores. You have great cost-efficient upgrades to make right on the ship for shields-4 and engines-4 and the power to use them, and you won't have scrap for any big weapons or cloaking or whatever. Those upgrades themselves reduce the need to keep your hull high as those are defensive measures to avoid damage. After shields-4 and engines-4 and into sector 3 where enemy ships often have two shields so I need better weapons and when I can afford cloaking, then yes I'm visiting every store.

[El Grillo]

Yep, that's my rule of thumb as well on most ships with a reasonable offense, a quick shields-4 and engines-4, ideally with a chance to train piloting/engines, gets ahead of the curve on survivability, and you don't see too many ships with 2 shield bubbles prior to sector 3.

That said, these reports have definitely opened my eyes to looking for opportunities to get early crew kills that I wouldn't have tried for, and having more scrap spent on weapons early opens up access to those opportunities.