Hull Repair Drones Aren't So Useless in Battle After-All

[videogameguy54]

I remember the first time I had beaten FTL. It was on Easy, because I was still starting out, and wanted to try and unlock some new ships. I had little confidence about getting to the final boss, and had little knowledge about how to unlock said ships. But seeing a few let-plays of FTL before, I knew the basics I set out on my journey.

Many failed attempts later, I had unlocked the Red-Tail (Kestrel layout B). After getting used to it after a few tries I thought that it would be a good pick with it's start-out four salvo shot. Speed forward 8 sectors and I'm nearing the boss. I can't remember my load-out exactly, but I'm pretty sure I had four crew, along with some ion weapon, a Mk I burst laser, a heavy laser Mk I, and what I think was a basic laser, along with 3 drones (could only use two at a time though): a Anti-ship Mk I, Defense Mk II, and a Hull Repair. Now that I think about it, I also had three shields.

Getting to the first phase, I went though the basic battle you would expect, with the defense and anti-ship out, and raging when he cloaked, and healed up after he ran away (I expected that from the lets-plays, but I've never seen past the second stage.)

Onto stage the second. Still using the same drones, Defense was helping against boarding drones, but a few got past, causing trouble, and I think I lost a crew member.

Final stage. After seeing how the last battle played out, I had equipped the Defense and Hull Repair drones. Glad I did. After being beaten down to a third of my health from the power attack, taking constant pause breaks to calm down, I had to make the decision. By powering down the basic laser, I spammed the Repair drone. Keeping just barely above zero health, I kept on fighting. After getting down to 1 to 2 health, I was beginning to loose hope. But then I heard an explosion. Thinking it was my ship, I look down from my screen with sorrow. But then, instead of hearing silence, I heard three descending notes though my headphones. And upon looking back up at my screen, I saw not the words "Game Over", but "Victory".

I would like to say I then fell out my chair, or just smiled and went to the menu. Instead I just childishly stood up shouting "YES! I WON! YEAH!" Then I realized I had only about 3 ships and still had to complete it on "Normal".

Also, upon more thinking back, I remembered I might have had a level one or two cloak. Still, this was my first time beating him. So you have to give me some credit, just as I have to give those Repair drones. They saved my ass.

[UltraMantis]

Desperate wins are sometimes the best win. The boss is also such a bastard you really want to break him into little pieces.

As for the Hull drones, their main use is outside of combat and they can heal up to 5 HP, which is nice to have. In combat they tend to be a distraction and are probably not worth the power needed to run them, but there are exceptions.

They are of greatest help on shieldless ships.

[5thHorseman]

In my most recent run on YouTube, I had the exact situation where a Hull Drone came in handy. IE, it was all I had for drones. In a no-cloak battle against the final boss, I wold have much preferred a defense drone but I was quite happy with how well the Hull drone functioned.

Luckily, as it was the final battle after a game of not using drones, I had plenty of parts to spare

http://youtu.be/O_x4GCGZopw and I get the drone at 5:35