Subset Games Forum

Has anyone else tried to do this yet?

I managed to finish once so far with the Kestrel. Towards the end I had two elite human boarding boarding teams that had no problem punching to death everything I came across. My run with the Stealth A was going sort of ok, but it got derailed when I finally got an opportunity to make it to the secret sector (fleet of my own, yay!).

But I think next I'll try to go for an all mantis ship and just dismiss that engi at the start. I might die to the very first fire but if I can get a full 8 mantises, dang that's going to look awesome!

I've gotten 7/8 Zoltans, but never found that last one sadly. Then I would've had a good reason to use the autopilot.

You wont hear me complain about Mantis, but 8 is 4 too many. What will they do? 4 Mantis is the jackpot. That's two teams or one if you have a big teleporter and they can clobber any crew you meet. Any more and you are actually weakening yourself.

Mantis dont repair well. Or at all. They break things, that's their gimmick. On your ship you NEED very badly an Engi. Any other crewmember but the Mantis really. Your 4 can beat back a boarding assault and then go on a rampage on the enemy ship.

Ideally:

Helm ----- Rock or Engi
Engine --- Zoltan. Another Zoltan or two to keep him company.
Weapons - Engi
Shield ---- Any but Mantis

- Rocks still have plenty of health after a cockpit hit.
- Rocks are immune to fires that can keep the helm disabled for too long.
- Rocks can more easily fight off intruders.
- Rocks are slow but rarely have to leave the helm and go heal. (do it when safe)
- Engi repair things at the speed of light. UltraImportant for Helm and Weapons.
- Engi scoot around the ship quickly so can hop to the medbay and heal relatively quickly.
- Zoltan give you free energy so have them socialise in the engine room.
- Don't waste Mantis on Shields. They cant repair them if needed and any other can do the job just as well.
- Do have Mantis huddle near the teleport and draw straws to decide who goes in first.
- Humans and Slug have no weakness and can do any job realy well.

I happen to be a fan of rockmen, boarding and The Shivan. Just once I had the honor of having a full crew of them (you just have to find 4 more of them) and I will never forget the terrified faces of the enemy boarders getting mauled to death by my mechanics.

UltraMantis wrote:Engine --- Zoltan. Another Zoltan or two to keep him company.
Shield ---- Any but Mantis

Zoltan energy is unaffected by Ion, so any multiple of 2 should always be in the shield room. This renders your other systems immune to Ion entirely, since you'll always have that 1(or 2) shield(s) up.
This is amazingly useful against ships with only Ion and Beam, in some cases you're actually invulnerable (Allowing you to max your pilot/engine skill in one fight).

UltraMantis wrote:You wont hear me complain about Mantis, but 8 is 4 too many. What will they do? 4 Mantis is the jackpot. That's two teams or one if you have a big teleporter and they can clobber any crew you meet. Any more and you are actually weakening yourself.

Mantis dont repair well. Or at all. They break things, that's their gimmick. On your ship you NEED very badly an Engi. Any other crewmember but the Mantis really. Your 4 can beat back a boarding assault and then go on a rampage on the enemy ship.

Ideally:

Helm ----- Rock or Engi
Engine --- Zoltan. Another Zoltan or two to keep him company.
Weapons - Engi
Shield ---- Any but Mantis

- Rocks still have plenty of health after a cockpit hit.
- Rocks are immune to fires that can keep the helm disabled for too long.
- Rocks can more easily fight off intruders.
- Rocks are slow but rarely have to leave the helm and go heal. (do it when safe)
- Engi repair things at the speed of light. UltraImportant for Helm and Weapons.
- Engi scoot around the ship quickly so can hop to the medbay and heal relatively quickly.
- Zoltan give you free energy so have them socialise in the engine room.
- Don't waste Mantis on Shields. They cant repair them if needed and any other can do the job just as well.
- Do have Mantis huddle near the teleport and draw straws to decide who goes in first.
- Humans and Slug have no weakness and can do any job realy well.

Well, of course there's an ideal way, but where's the fun in that?

Tsch, screw efficiency. I hate the fact that more games - even roguelikes - seem to be encouraging that. If I want to make my repair team entirely Mantis, and my combat team Zoltan or Engi I should have that right and it should/will look awesome. More seriously, I would rarely use an all-one-species run for multiple reasons. One, since every ship (shy) has the same Federation plot, it seems weird to have a somewhat Planetist/Speciest crew. The other is that since only humans have gender dimorphism (specifically two icons), it helps me to have a diverse crew to remember who I've assigned to what.

Although at sometime, I may mod in a 'Spathi Eluder' captained entirely by Slugs...

hborrgg wrote:Well, of course there's an ideal way, but where's the fun in that?

in pointing it out on forums, i guess.

Oh, and i love you Old Uncle. Modders need to get to work on this immediatley. At least give a Backwards Utilised Tracking Torpedo -type missile to those AI drones that run away

Don't worry, Mantis m'friend! After tomorrows work ends, I know entirely on what events I'm putting together - though someone'll have to rush me up a ship schematic. I'll probably just use the default Slug ship design, at first. Maybe I'll add some other familiar faces as well, hrmn. I always liked the Supox...