What augmentations are best?

[bakedlama]

Well, I'm going to say that getting the Shield Charge Booster was the correct decision since I just beat the game on Normal for the first time. Score: 4250. That was a great run, I unlocked the Kestrel's Type B layout as well as the Zoltan Cruiser. Lots of fun.

Knowing a few things makes the game much easier: That boarding gives you so much more scrap, and that you can pick off the boss's crew save one weapon guy in the first round, and pick off its other weapons with boarders.

Back on topic... Stealth Weapons is great if you have a really fast weapon like Ion Blast II and max out stealth. Pre-igniter is obviously awesome if you have powerful weapons, as you can disable whatever you want on the enemy ship immediately. But in that last game I just had the weapons and shield regen speed boosts and that was just fine. I ended up with a nicely balanced ship with plenty of firepower (two Laser Burst Mk II's, a Hull Beam and an Ion Bomb).

[Hissatsu]

I rate them as follows:

Scrap Recovery Arm. It is worth 25 $ (you buy it for 50 and sell for 25 so you really pay 25 for it), which means that after you gather 250 $ you start making profit! This is worth getting whenever you find it, while of course you should aim to gear yourself with 3 combat ones, so dump this when you can exchange it for something that helps you fight

Weapon Pre-Igniter. It is as good as long it takes for your weapons to charge. If you have weapons like Burst III, Glaive, etc that take 17 to 20 seconds to fire, you'll get a lot out of it, best augment to have. If you just have any mix of weapons that have good fire rate (Burst II, Dual Lasers,...) you will get your benefit out of it too. If you have Ion II canons, it is pointless, because then you rely on gradually disabling shields with constant array of shots, and then firing your big gun - here, pre igniter will give you almost nothing.

Automatic Reloader. It makes you fire faster and i feel like it stacks additivey, so its % from your dude, % from this and all its copies... gives you insane rate of fire. The more your get of this, the better.

Drone Recovery Arm. This makes a huge difference if you got good drones - basically this + defense drone makes your life SO MUCH easier its insane. And if you also have a anti-ship drone you'll appreciate it very much. However, by the end of the game, consider dumping it since you already have enough drones to make it through the final boss.

Anything else: Garbage. Well, I wouldnt mind free Zoltan Shield / Engi heal dispersal / Titanium plating and long range scanners preset on several ships. But i'd sell them, if that means getting something better, and i'd definetly sell one of those to keep a free augment slot in case i find an augment.

Sensors - dont really help that much, usually i can handle myself in any situation, and knowledge where the ships are doesnt give you THAT much of an income to warrant a paycheck and augment slot

Shields recahrge rate - you really very rarely have situations when this augment would do something for you, since generally you have shots come in bulk, and they either penetrate your shields or not, and by the time next shot arrives you already regen to full. It will help if you get anti-ship II thrown at you, but then again, its rare. Not worth a slot.

Repair Arm - waste of scrap, huge waste of scrap! I hate when i "find" this and no shop is nearby.

Slower FTL for them - you never really have problems disabling enemy engines or helm

Faster FTL for you - you never really have a use for it except in rare occasions in solar flare star systems, which doesnt varrant a paycheck and augment slot waste

15% resist chance - i dont take my chances, and even when i'm forced to, extra 15% chance doesnt help that much. Better sell it since it sells for good scrap.

Stealth weapons - usually you use stealth to either dodge a volley, or last until you can fire on the enemy. This means, that in case 1, you can fire right before going stealth (or start a burst) and go in stealth and have no problems, and in case 2, you can charge all weapons, and fire them as you exit stealth. This sounds like a cool thing but in fact is useless, except very specific situations where you have same or longer charge time of your lasers as his beam, and so you need to fire from stealth so that his weapon system gets hit before he gets a chance to fire his beam, and even in this case you may still have enough time with a disrupted cloak, since firing does not cancel it right away but only shortens remaining time.

Zoltan shield - its cool at the beginning, very helpful, but its pointless in the end. In the end you get bombarded with so many stuff (missiles that deal 3 damage, ion that does 2 to 4 damage to shield) that it barely helps you.

Medbay dispersal - more of a QOL stuff. Engi ship has great layout so you really can always fight them off in the medbay, or near the medbay, so no problems with healing.

Mantis speed booster - why would i need it if i have mantis? Plus, benefit or walking around your ship faster are really miniscule. Especially with already fast mantis.

Slug breach repair - breaches can be bad, but they are bad in the short term - when you are hit in a system AND breach appears, you have to repair breach first, then the system. Slow self heal doesnt solve this problem! And in long term, breach is just one extra stuff to fix on your ship - so it is not a problem, and thus no point keeping this augment.

[OmegaJasam]

I think the pre-igniter is being underestimated here.

Almost everyone gets cloak by the end of the game. Pre-Igniter + cloak allows you to get 3 safe volleys off before taking /any/ damage.

Thats usually enough for breaking through zoltan sheilds, or taking out a critical system well before you bored the ship.

If you have enough ion weaponry that the ignigter takes you from taking damage to disablig them before they fire, then it's worth it even with the faster weapons.

Long Range sensors if I recall right make a number of events safe. Not sure if they're a likely return or not, but I wouldn't underestimate them. Dodging the electric storms alone may be worth it.

[Mr. Mister]

I'd say that, ignoring the scrap recovery arm (which is always your best choice early-game), then the best combos are pre-igniter + 2x auto-reloader, and drone retrieval + shield boost charger + stealth weapons.

[Hissatsu]

2 OmegaJasam
You are forgetting that igniter does cost extra ~70 over Automated Reloader, and so in case of using Ion II, you may really find a way to spend those 70 scrap elsewhere. Sure it helps, but the amount of help is really small (in my case i had 2x Ion II and a Pike Beam, and so, all it did was give me ~2.5 second headstart).
However if you got a Burst III and a Glaive, then yeah, you get a ~15 second headstart which is huge.

[Starbug]

The best augmentation is the one that implants sunglasses into your face , but I digress

I always try and go for Scrap recovery arm, drone recovery arm, and the auto-reloader, if I've got a standard kinda build going on (and some actual drones), and if I can find them.
I imagine I would get stealth weapons if I could ever afford the stealth module itself with any reliability :p.

As for the choice you had with 15% shield regen and 20% ion resistance, they have tempted me sometimes, but I've always tended to save the scrap and spend it on something more pressing (like another shield bar!)

[DasRav]

The Pre-Igniter is the best aug because it makes it possible to always disable the enemy damage before it hits you. Just point all your damage at their weapons and see half their guns go offline right at the beginning.

Scrap recovery is good if you get it early.

Other augs are situational. The shield one I do not like because it does not help against bombs and missiles and the ion one is really not needed because the AI will often target the ions at stupid or empty rooms.

[Kaerius]

Scrap recovery and drone recovery arms are both early/mid game, but I try to replace them for the endgame.

I always try to have stealth weapons for endgame(especially if I'm running ion blaster 1 or 2, which I usually am).

Zoltan shield and engi med dispersal are probably the best special augments(and I usually will "buy" the med dispersal if I get that encounter). Both are good enough to keep for the entire run(and so is rock plating, barely).

If you get a pre-igniter it's worth keeping for the entire run as well. It's going to save you a lot of hurt, RL time(because of shorter encounters) and is still good for the boss. I wouldn't call it a must-buy though(and on the runs I've had it, I got it as a random augment from an encounter), but if you're rich and see it in an endgame shop, by all means pick it up.

Other than those. I'd rather combo my stealth weapons with 2x auto-reloader than anything else(yeah they stack), 3x auto-reloader would probably be pretty sick too.

[ComboBreaker]

For me,best beginning augmentation is Long Range scanner.You are able to see where you have to jump to fight enemy ships,or solve distresses.Really helps to plan your route.

Also this augmentation has saved me a few times,when my hull was damaged badly and I had to get to the shop as fast as possible - wait,the shortest route has an enemy ship?We'll use different way,and kill it on the way back
: )

[ApSciMorgs]

Dude, Damaged Stasis Pod is like, the single best augment in the entire game. Lol jk...

In all seriousness, my favourite 3 would have to be the Weapon Pre-Igniter, the Weapon Auto-Reloader, and Long-Range Sensors. With that combo, you can have better awareness of the environment you'll be jumping into before combat, instant firing on the enemy the moment you drop out of FTL, and quicker firing rates.
Barring any one of those, I'd go for the Scrap Recovery Arm. More scrap is always good, right? Barring two of those... I've always wanted to try out the Zoltan Shield.
Not that I have anything against the other augments, of course. It's just that they aren't that great. Rock Armour is great, but the chance is too low for my liking, I've found.