Transporter

[Maya]

-Don't use it in an asteroid field or near a sun (solar flares) the 'random' damage can destroy a ship when you don't expect it

You can teleport some crewmembers as long as you dont destroy their shield system (what you won't do anyway if you build your ship around the Teleporter^^) and also sun flares doesn't do as much damage against a non damaged ship, so you normally got enough time to escape before it bursts (and anyway, fire isn't as fast as a well trained Mantis-Squad^^)

I've only played a few games, and never gotten a transporter so far.

I'm curious about them though...so far it seems like out of everything on my ship, the crew are my most valuable and most vulnerable resource. Systems and hull can be repaired. Fuel and missiles are commodities. Weapons/augments/etc, seemingly cannot be destroyed in battle, only sold. But your crew are very vulnerable and potentially *very* hard to replace, especially if they have lots of experience.

Sending them to an enemy ship seems like a big risk...are there suitably cool rewards if you do manage to eliminate the enemy crew and take control of a second vessel? Do you get tons more scrap than if you just blew it up, or do you get your choice of taking whatever systems or weapons that ship has?

Its not that much more, but if you can manage to kill every crew, then you got a significant amount of bonus Scrap wich can help you to survive the boss more easy.
And if you know how to do it, then its not a risk you don't want to receive. Just Antipersonal Drones and a hole Mantis-Crew could be hard to defeat sometimes, but with a level 3 Teleporter and some tactics to prevent to much punishement you can even fight a majority like the crew of the boss or a 4 man Mantis-Crew with just 2 of your own.
And if you get 2 Mantis, then they can even kill one enemy in his Lv1 MedBay

[CrazyMLC]

I had been skeptical about the teleporter, and I just used it a little bit to try and fight an enemy. I teleported a slug and a mantis over, with the enemy ship at one point of hull, almost every system taken out. Everything was on fire and I was just finishing off the crew.
I wasn't in an asteroid field or sun area, but the ship seemed to self destruct right after I killed one of the last two crew members - making me lose my only mantis and slug. How can this happen? I didn't fire my weapons at all, so I'm completely baffled.
I may not be using the teleporter if the ship can just randomly explode with your crew on board.

[NWade]

Crazy -

You said many rooms of the ship were on fire? If fire causes a system/room to become totally destroyed, it can do additional points of damage to the hull. So the fire probably destroyed some remaining subsystem and that finished off the ship and caused it to break apart.

--Noel

[CrazyMLC]

Well crud - You learn something new every day. Thanks.

[Ronnyfire]

Teleporter works flawlessly for me. Toss a mantis crew onto the enemy ship early game, add in a rock or another mantis if i have one by the 3rd-4th sector and i am golden, even used boarders to beat the boss my first time last night =]

To teleport back it is generally best to pause the game and use the recall button and click the room that has your crew you want to retrieve in it, then unpause the game and let it do its work!
---WARNING! In the time it takes to teleport your crew back the enemy gets another hit in on your crew!!! Be sure to ---teleport them back to your ship early!

Defeating enemy ships via boarders always nets you some nice extra resources (more fuel, often more missiles, a lot more scrap, and rarely equipment for your ship! (weapon, drone schematics)(Never got an augment, but maybe?)

If you want your boarding to go well, it is generally best to distract the crew on the enemy ship with a blown up weapons system or something (blown up medbay if they have one), and ALWAYS keep their medbay damaged so they wont cycle out of combat with you to heal.

Obvious, but always be aware of the various aliens abilities. Mantis do double damage, Rocks have 50% more HP and are fire immune, Engi do half damage, and (i cant recall the races name) have 30% less HP.

As for gear that helps boarding!

-Tier 2 scanners you can use knowing where the enemy crew is to your advantage and warp in on that lone Engi on the the other side of the ship and murder him before anyone helps.
-Ion weapons can disrupt medbay operation without damaging the ship or your boarding party
-Fire generating weapons with a rock crew? yes please.
-A well upgraded medbay to heal your boarding party as quick as possible is always nice.
-Any weapon that damages systems but not hull is a great help (use them to snipe crew that are not with your boarders or to take out the enemy medbay or the weapons system.
-Boarding drones and system repair drones are both useful, boarding drones for obvious reasons, and system repair drones because when boarding your ship can sometimes be low on crew with some raging fires or destroyed out systems. (dont want to have your boarders in a pinch and have your teleporter damaged, easiest way to lose some well trained crew!)

Be sure to pull your boarders out if the enemy ship in in danger of exploding soon (low hull with asteroids, solar flares or fires)

Hope that answers anyone questions on the matter(or encourages people to try it out! ), only been playin a couple days now but its what i have gathered so far.