FTL

I have no idea what I did! Was using my pad, so mayhaps I did hit it a few times.
I get so confused in this game when I send a boarding party out. I assume if i hit them with my own weapons they get damaged?
Also, are those fire causing weapons any use? I always just sell them.

dibs wrote:

I have no idea what I did! Was using my pad, so mayhaps I did hit it a few times.
I get so confused in this game when I send a boarding party out. I assume if i hit them with my own weapons they get damaged?
Also, are those fire causing weapons any use? I always just sell them.

1) Yes, your crew are just as injured by friendly fire as the enemy are.
2) Any weapon can be useful in the right circumstances and strategy - hit also depends on the ship and crew being used as well though.

e.g. Though this isn't usually the route I go for: missiles and bombs combined with beams (which includes the fire weapons) are a good combination as the missiles bypass shields and can be used to take them and the weapons offline whilst the beams can be used to inflict huge damage on all rooms and personnel.

There's a lot of variation allowed in this game. It's really very beautiful!

dibs wrote:

Also, are those fire causing weapons any use? I always just sell them.

As Duoae said, every weapon in the game can be useful, but I'll answer this question more specifically. The fire weapons - which consist of the fire beam and fire bomb - cause fires on the enemy ship. Fires not only damage enemy personnel, but if they burn long enough, they damage the systems too. I believe the fire beam cannot pass through shields, so you'll have to take down the enemy's shields, but it can target up to 4 or maybe even 5 rooms if the targetting line is placed just right. The fire bomb only targets one room, but it ignores shields.

IMO, the most ideal use of a fire weapon is the fire bomb plus an all-rockmen boarding crew, as rockmen are immune to fire.

MeatMan wrote:

IMO, the most ideal use of a fire weapon is the fire bomb plus an all-rockmen boarding crew, as rockmen are immune to fire.

Yeah, that's a killer combo.

Fire weapons can still be useful with any boarding party, since an enemy fighting a fire is one less enemy fighting your dudes, or vice-versa. If you're not using boarding parties, they're much less good, since usually the enemy will be able to extinguish fires before they have a chance to do much damage.

Note that the fire bomb also does 2 points (20 HP) of direct damage to crew, friend and foe alike.

The Fire Bomb is why Rock B is so awesome. Set fire to room of your choice -> 'port in Rockman boarding squad -> enemies can't fight the fire because they're too busy fighting the Rockmen -> room's system goes down, enemies die like flies from combined fire and Rockman damage -> profit!

It's one of the better ways to take out crews of ships that have a med bay. (My other fav being to 'port in a Mantis + Crystal boarding party and use Lockdown... now if I could only get that !@#$ Crystal ship!)

The firebomb is also one of my favorite weapons against the end boss. Its great for taking out the weapons rooms and their crew since they can't heal or hitting the medbay with it while you focus your primary guns on the shields.

Got to Rock Homeworlds with a Crystal crew member again. Couldn't find the stupid event to unlock Crystal ship again. !@#$.

Yeah, the Fire Beam is my favorite weapon in the game! Followed closely by the Anti-Bio beam.

I'm a boarding party freak.

Got Rock B. learning to love fire:)

FINALLY BEAT IT ON EASY. I started a game while waiting to board my plane in NYC, played a bit in the air, and finished while waiting for my ride in Detroit. Got very, very lucky: maxed out shields, engines/evasion, and weapons. Full crew compliment - twice I had to turn down additional crew members.

I really, really had to keep myself from cheering at the airport. Now to unlock Kestrel B

Maybe it's just me, but I tried this game and I just don't get it. I'm sure I must be missing something...

Coolbeans wrote:

Maybe it's just me, but I tried this game and I just don't get it. I'm sure I must be missing something...

It's practicing, and failing, risk mitigation in SPAAAAAAAAAAACE.

Also it's awesome with all the management, the random elements, blowing things up, lighting entire ships on fire and watching the crew burn. Trying to kill off boarding parties by venting most of your ship into space, having the door control get blasted and frantically attempting repairs after or during the battle...

I keep noticing neat little things. Like the fact that if an incoming laser blast randomly intersects an outgoing missile, the missile explodes and they cancel each other out.

hbi2k wrote:

I keep noticing neat little things. Like the fact that if an incoming laser blast randomly intersects an outgoing missile, the missile explodes and they cancel each other out.

And vice versa... also, if you have a defense drone around your ship a laser blast will do the same - destroying the drone and nullifying the incoming shot.

Going for the achievements, layout unlocks and ship unlocks is playing havoc with my defeating the flagship.

Double fire bombs the other night. Awesome until a ship went ftl with my rocks on board:(

The game taught me an important lesson in greed yesterday. After a poorly chosen jump on the final stage, I decided to quit and reload... only to find that FTL deletes the save when you continue the game, not when you resave or die. The jump wasn't even that bad, and I had max shields and engines, a 5-shot laser, plenty of ammo for my breach bombs, and a pre-igniter. Ah, what might have been...

Picked this up on the recent sale. Put a few hours in and I think I'm done. It was fun, but it's just getting repetitive. I like the idea of roguelikes and this is my favourite so far, but in practice the appeal never lasts.

Somehow in playing on this laptop instead of my desktop, I've consistently been getting to Sector 8. I can defeat the first boss, but I always suffer a significant amount of damage, and the repair station is either too far away or the Rebel Baseship has jumped to the repair station I was planning to use.

Any advice for handling damage from the first boss? I usually have full shields and 40-45% evasion but I guess it's not enough.

T-Prime wrote:

Any advice for handling damage from the first boss? I usually have full shields and 40-45% evasion but I guess it's not enough.

Boarding parties to take out the missile launcher first, then the other weapons. They will have a 2-to-1 advantage and the rest of the crew can't get to them.

Also those crew stay dead in phase 2/3, making it easier to take the weapons down again.

Advanced strategy is to leave one crew alive in the inside left gun emplacement, and try to kill all the rest of the crew. Killing all crew has AI take over the ship and does repairs. Better to leave the one crew alive and you can disable systems as you see fit in wave 2 and 3.

MrDeVil909 wrote:

Picked this up on the recent sale. Put a few hours in and I think I'm done. It was fun, but it's just getting repetitive. I like the idea of roguelikes and this is my favourite so far, but in practice the appeal never lasts.

This is how they work for me too. It's fun learning the system, getting good enough to "beat" it once. Then I normally play o nce more through and call it quits.

MitchellW wrote:
MrDeVil909 wrote:

Picked this up on the recent sale. Put a few hours in and I think I'm done. It was fun, but it's just getting repetitive. I like the idea of roguelikes and this is my favourite so far, but in practice the appeal never lasts.

This is how they work for me too. It's fun learning the system, getting good enough to "beat" it once. Then I normally play o nce more through and call it quits.

What gets me out of those doldrums are looking at the cheevos to unlock new ships, and going for those.

My last run got me to Sector 4 with the Fed ship and only using the artillery beam. Then I picked up 2 mantis crew members, and a teleporter, and lost them a sector later to jumping ships. And then I lost my back-up boarding party two systems later...

But I got the cheevo and unlocked Fed-B

Hey a patch! Haven't heard a peep out of the dev team for a really long time now but it seems like they are back at work. Check it out:

Hello everyone!

Thank you to all of you that still continue to send in bug reports. I've been working on this patch for months as the final bugs trickle in and get reported. It's amazing what we're still finding 6 months after release! Along with the bug fixes, we've also put in a few very minor gameplay changes. The teleportation one is probably one of the most requested problems in the game.

The patch is now available for all FTL vendors! You'll need to go to the HumbleStore link (or GOG site) to re-download the game if you're not using Steam where it auto-updates.

Change Log v. 1.03.3

Tuning:

-You can now retrieve crew from a room when teleporting even if they are shooting at a door or walking, limit of 4 per teleport
-If you're carrying the Crystal alien from the stasis pod, the Rock Homeworld map will start with the appropriate quest marker to for the beacon that leads to the Crystal sector
-The Crystal Lockdown bomb is now available as a drop (from enemies or in Stores) in Rock sectors
-Shield Skill will level up when the shields absorb a hit, not when they recharge. This prevents turning the shields on/off to level up.

Major Bugs:

-Fixed: Bug that would sometimes cause an enemy ship not to get hit by asteroids in an asteroid field
-Fixed: Bug gave double rewards after victory when player teleporter was broken and crew 'used the shuttle'
-Jumping will now immediately provide invulnerability to solar flares, incoming boarding drones, and beams
-Can no longer open the ship upgrades screen in hostile situations using the hot key
-If the boss is destroyed, at that point game over will be blocked and your victory is assured even if your ship is exploding.
-Blast Door health will properly regenerate on safe (no current boarders) jumps
-Boarding Drones will no longer be hit by projectiles after they've successfully landed
-Boarding Drones will no longer be destroyed upon Boss Ship Super Shield regeneration
-Waiting in a nebula will no longer remove the sensor dampening effect
-Fixed: Sometimes enemy boarders wouldn't pursue any targets and just stand around.

Minor Bugs:

-Drones should no longer fly "into" the shields and fire past them.
-Dying crewmembers will stay dead if you Save & Quit + Continue. They will also remain unselectable and unmovable as soon as dying animation starts.
-Will no longer open the store / allow repair in the rare situation that you have 0 hull and should be dead
-Credits + Victory screen won't close if you accidentally tap a key - only escape will close it
-Missiles/lasers/asteroids/etc. will no longer collide with bombs since they are technically 'interior' objects
-The event where your crewmember goes crazy will have the correct race/name after going crazy
-You won't be able to waste your money choosing pointless repair choices at the repair station event
-Beam Weapons can now correctly cause breaches, but that will not come standard to current weapons to preserve balance so it's just for modders.
-Interior console glow fixed to display correct colors for crew levels
-Combat/Defense drones will properly trigger blue event options
-Drone / missile counts can no longer go negative
-Modding to have more than 4 shield bars will no longer make asteroids ridiculously terrifying
-Crew will no longer continue repairing a breach if the room is on fire, the fire will take the correct priority (as the animation shows)
-More grammar/typo fixes and minor animation/image polish

If you're carrying the Crystal alien from the stasis pod, the Rock Homeworld map will start with the appropriate quest marker to for the beacon that leads to the Crystal sector

Now we just have to cross our fingers that there's even a rock homeworld map.

Quintin_Stone wrote:
If you're carrying the Crystal alien from the stasis pod, the Rock Homeworld map will start with the appropriate quest marker to for the beacon that leads to the Crystal sector

Now we just have to cross our fingers that there's even a rock homeworld map.

QFMFT

Has this image not been posted here? Or did I just miss it?

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/ylW2S.jpg)

Saw in the deals thread since this game is on sale again.

Stele wrote:

Has this image not been posted here? Or did I just miss it?

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/ylW2S.jpg)

Saw in the deals thread since this game is on sale again.

That is just so true to how FTL feels!

FTFY

IMAGE(http://img16.imageshack.us/img16/7389/ylw2s.jpg)

I just worked up the nerve to start playing on Normal instead of Easy, I hope I don't fail my crew!

I stuck with Easy until I had unlocked some ships.

Okay that was really painful. Got to the end on Normal with my Kestrel. Stellar ship, Stellar crew, armed to the teeth. Misclicked on the WAIT button and couldn't reach the boss in time...

Even though I didn't win that's my only score so far over 5000. Normal is definitely "the" way the game is meant to be played. But only after you have figured out what everything does and unlocked some ships on easy. Tried the Zoltan cruiser for the first time today and it's amazing how different it plays from the other ships.