FTL - Faster Than Light

[Molach]

Even remember to beam back my crew before jumping on.

It must be a pleasure serving on your ship!

Oh we are a big happy family.

But there are a couple of very confused mantis elite boarders, somewhere, in a galaxy pretty far away, stranded aboard a gutted and looted husk of a spaceship. "Was it something we 'said'?"

[Brackard]

I can't tell you how many boarders I've lost in my autofire. Autofire is not my friend. And every time I do it, I tell myself I'll never autofire again, only to, well, autofire again, and blow up more elite boarders.

As to this last round, that one scout was a beast. I recently unlocked the Type B mantis ship, and am having the same issue with auto-scouts there as we had here. Not enough firepower to take it out, and no ability to go over there and take care of business. Ended up having to jump out of far too many combats that way unfortunately.

[Gustaran]

Oh we are a big happy family.

But there are a couple of very confused mantis elite boarders, somewhere, in a galaxy pretty far away, stranded aboard a gutted and looted husk of a spaceship. "Was it something we 'said'?"

Well, they shouldn't have made that unfavourable remark about your new tie!

I can't tell you how many boarders I've lost in my autofire. Autofire is not my friend. And every time I do it, I tell myself I'll never autofire again, only to, well, autofire again, and blow up more elite boarders.

I understand. Conversation probably went like this "Hey Brackard, you still owe me 500 credits, right?" *Autofire* "Sorry, honest mistake!"

[Molach]

About sectors:
I vote Pirate sector as the other choice is Mantis again.
And for now voting Myself's save, unless someone else has even more luck with shops....

[Brackard]

I will second your voting there Molach.

[slowcheetah]

I don't want to hold you guys up so I may have to skip this sector. I meant to play saturday but I was ill and I've got rather a busy schedule over the next few days. I'l definitely play the next one though

[Molach]

Okay. Commander Brackard, if you have time you can download the save, jump to pirate sector and save it there. I probably won't have time until tomorrow sometime.

[Brackard]

I'll get it up loaded tonight!

[Brackard]

And here we go:

[Brackard]

Sector 5 - Pirates.

Good sector!

Ok, so where do we stand here? Actually looking pretty good. We have a solid crew with piloting and engine gold, weapons almost gold, and shields working. We have a mantis/rock boarding crew which is solid setup.

Weaponry includes burst 2 and burst 1 for a total of 5 shots not including the missile. All can be powered simultaneously.

Wants/needs at this point. Heading into the second half of the game, I need to start thinking about exactly how I want to tackle the mothership. I've won it a couple of different ways, some easier than others.

For stage 1 of the mothership, I like need to be able to take out the missiles very very early. When playing my own way, I've generally gone defensive drones and decent engine and that's worked out pretty well. Defensive drones also work well for stage 2 when they send boarding drones to the ship. There are only four or five drones that can be sent, and I've played several defensive games where not a single drone made it through the double defensive drone defense.

After missiles and/or drones are taken care of, I can switch power back over to weapons and/or whatever else is needed.

So, with that rambling, my main goal right now is to shoot for drone bay and defensive drones. I can manage with what I have even with though the teams have been selling all my drones!



Star 1 - Distress signal. The stasis pod, or weapon and scrap. Scrap it is this late in the adventure. Pegasus missile. Not a bad haul when I can't pierce shields in some battles. I also have power for both sets of missiles.

Star 2 - INTRUDERS! Three humans decide the best place to start an assault of the ship is the teleporter room. You know, the place where we send our top notch assault teams FROM. The other ends up in the engine room. They are all brought down quickly. Heal up, and move on.

Star 3 - Scout. Download data? Not. Would have probably passed but the scout had no shields. I figured we could withstand one round of assault. Sure enough, missile hits sensors, but the scout is taken down after that. Got some scrap.

Star 4 - Slug assault craft. In an asteroid field. They have stealth. We take a hit or two while powering up weapons. Manage to finally get through their shields and while it takes awhile, take them out without too much damage.

Star 5 - Distress signal Engi needs fuel. Sure thing. I give them 2 fuel. They give me 55 scrap. 27 scrap per fuel. Not a bad turn around.

Star 6 - Small pirate ship. Whatever. Assault team boards, takes out the two humans aboard, and boom done. No damage.

Star 7 - Mine asteroids. Blue option. Great scrap.

Star 8 - SLAVER! Attack! So, we pound on their weapons system. Enough to kill the poor sod who was managing weapons. After some additional softening up, we board and kill the mantis and human who were desperately trying to keep the ship alive. We free a slave - another rockman.

Star 9 - Another slaver. Ditto. We'll soften them up, and then board. After doing some solid softening up, including destruction of med bay, I beam over and take the ship. Have a choice of slaves to free and help. Choose the mantis. Now have two mantis and two rockmen for boarding purposes.

Star 10 - Mercenary. Delay the rebels. Another couple of jumps.

Star 11 - Store. Wow. Ok. Hmmm...what do we do here. I have 505 scrap. I'm a kid in a candy store here:



What can I buy?
Drone system: 80
Stealth: 150
Repairs: 39

Heading into the new sector, I can't assume that I'll receive anything ever again. So this may be the last chance I get anything from store (likely not, but possible I will never again see what I want - might as well keep options open).

Upgrades needed:
Shields + Power: 235
Teleporter upgrades: 90
Med upgrade: 35 (not required)
Stealth / drone upgrades: As needed

Ok, for now, I'm going to hold off on shields, and just buy everything else:
Drone system: purchased
Stealth system: purchased



From here, jump back to exit and save.

And the ship stats:

Scrap: 236
Hull: 30 (0 damage)
Fuel: 19
Missiles: 24
Drone schematics: 12

Number of crew & race: 2 humans, 1 zoltan, 2 mantis, 3 rocks
Crew skills: Pilot gold, engine gold, weapons gold, shield 1/3 gold

Upgrades:
-shields: 6
-engines: 4
-oxygen: 1
-teleporter: 1
-stealth: 1
-weapons: 5
-medbay: 1
-piloting: 1
-sensors: 1
-doors: 2
Reactor: 14 bars
Weapons: Burst Laster II, Burst laser I, Artemis, Pegasus
Drones: Repair
Augmentations: Scrap Recovery