Subset Games Forum

This is probably my 15th game or so on easy, give or take. I've gotten to the end half of the time, but the boss battle always squashed me like a fly. I feel like the difficulty on easy isn't that bad, usually when I lose it's because of stupid mistakes or making some bad buying decisions early on. But the boss is a tough nut. This run I feel like I've made a lot of right choices and have gotten a fair bit of luck with quests here and there. Here's a large pic of my current Torus ship and crew (about a meg size, sorry).

http://i3.minus.com/ibvUV5w2r8xtmI.jpg

The last guy on engines is a newb, I've played through most of the game with 2 members. One died early on in a gamble, and it's only in the 7th sector I've actually gotten one by chance. In a previous game I once had 5 guys handed to me, haha. The second Enki is bought, which I tend to not do usually... their repair is nice, but their learning ability is really awesome. Humans just pale in comparison.

Is this enough to beat the flagship? And if so, what strategy should I use. I still have a bit of scrap to spend.
Been thinking of an extra crew member, though an augmentation like an ion shield would be nice?
I've not relied on missiles at all, rather pummeling the shields and using the ion to keep them down.
I've noticed using the stealth early on gives me some shot at getting enemy shields down quickly while staying out of trouble. Then just keeping the shields off by using the lazers and/or ion while the drones take down various rooms. When I'm boarded I use a combination of flushing o2 and using the health regen nanobots on my crew members to keep them alive while fighting, retreating into med when things get nasty. I've also invested in the repair drone for getting stuff fixed while the crew is busy.

Can I make it?

Don't bother with the ion augmentation, too narrow and unreliable. If you can get them, 2 (or 4) Zoltans in the shield room are the way to go.

Ion Blast 2 can theoretically defeat any number of shield bubbles... but with the typical miss rate against the boss, it'll take time. An additional Ion Blast or 1-2 Reloaders would make this much, much better.

Hull Laser Mk2 is a very useful weapon. Mostly because of its flexibility - it enables victories by crew kill by letting the air out of medbay and oxygen, unlike the dedicated anti-crew weapons it actually packs a punch. Playing to choke the entire crew isn't the best approach against the boss, but the constant breaches will slow down repairs (shield system mostly).

Not too happy with the drone setup. Laser and ion don't mix too well for taking down shields, the drones are awkward and not too power-efficient in this setup... but you're a little light on offense without them. A defense Mk1 would be nice to have.

Teleporter helps quite a bit against the boss - the weapon systems are isolated with a single human crewmember each.

*

You should be able to defeat the boss, but your ship isn't very powerful by endgame standards. Priorities:

Second Ion weapon
Reloader
Piloting 2 (to avoid losing it in a single hit)
Any other weapon (assuming you can pay for the power)
Teleporter
Defense Mk1
Shield Recharge Augmentation

*

Things that don't help much against the boss:
Shield above 6
Cloak above 1

I would want another laser weapon myself; drones don't always hit want you want. Ion Blast Mk II is great, but the boss has a cloak, so more shots will help to get through its shields. Also a Defense Drone Mk I. Teleporter and more crew for boarding/repelling boarders.

Iranon wrote:Things that don't help much against the boss:
Shield above 6
Cloak above 1

I don't quite agree - well, I guess I'd say other things help more. While there are other priorities, L7 Shield is useful as a damage buffer; in the third boss round a L3 Cloak can avoid the first missile burst and surge burst. And if you have Stealth Weapons, you like to have a longer Cloak. But a basic Cloak is relatively the most useful, and I have won with just L1 before I got better at the game and can collect more scrap.

You can win, but it require some luck, a lot of pause, and a bit of skill.

Actually, have you played it yet? You should make a backup of your save right before you get to the first boss phase and post it somewhere. That might make a good challenge

Actually, we should do that in general. Whenever you're worried about if you can beat the boss copy your save file and make a challenge out of it. Person who beats the boss with the least damage wins. Something. I don't know.

Hehe, I know some people are really big on permadeath, but to me it looks a bit like a self chastising cult sometime Still I don't wanna scum, though. Anyway, here's the save upon entering the last stand.

(I hope the 'continue' file contains what it's name implies)

So the awnser is... yes. Yay

Spiney wrote:So the awnser is... yes. Yay

Sweet! I haven't had a chance to play your save but it's nice to know you got through it!