Subset Games Forum

This is the most frusterating game ever... but I can't stop playing. It's like I'm a gambling adict and I keep telling myself, "This time it will be different." And I keep playing on easy which doesn't seem to be that easy.

I have played so many play throughs that I have lost count. I'm probabaly in the hundreds. I have only made it to sector 8 twice and I have never once finished the game. Never.

I don't know what I'm doing wrong. So much of it seems to be random that there are times I'm doing great, lots of crew, lots of weapons, lots of everything and then I get 4 mantis people teleported on and kill the whole crew and I'm out.

The randomness is EXTREMELY frusterating because there is nothing I can learn from it, there is nothing I can do to combat it. It's not like I'm trying to kill a final boss in another game and eventually I go "Ohhh right I can avoid that attack because he telegraphs it with this pattern." or something. Instead it's like "Oh ok I got killed by people teleporting." so the next play through I upgrade the doors to blast doors but then in that play through no one teleports and I get killed because I don't have enough shields. So then next time I try to balence shields and doors and a solar flare burns too many rooms and everyone suffocates, etc.

Sorry I just need to vent. I made an account just so I can vent. No one else I know plays this game so any thing I said would fall upon deaf ears.

FTL is a roguelike-like. What you've been facing is to be expected.
The fun is in trying to deal with what the RNG throws at you!
And you're right, "easy" mode.... isn't really that much easier than normal mode.

With experience you will find there are general rules/patterns to any general playstyle (such as combat ship or boarding ship etc.) that you can follow to improve your chances of winning, but in the end you are at the mercy of the RNG.

For instance, level 2 doors combined with scrupulous use of venting and the medbay should allow you to survive any strong boarding party.

If you need any more help, don't be afraid to ask others here on the forums, it's a very friendly community! Maybe you could also watch playhthroughs on Youtube and observing the strategies the players use.

Anyhow, hope your luck improves soon

I felt your feel, bro. FTL is *so* *hard* until you *know* it.

I hate to pimp my stuff (really, most people say that but I'm cringing right now as I type this) but I've beaten the game with every ship, and with a lot of the ships I've beaten it twice, while recording. I'm not perfect but there are a lot of gems you can learn from watching my videos. Check out my thread here.

Also, here's my standard strategy that essentially gets me a chance at winning every time. I don't win every time, but I win far more than half the time. This strategy does it:

Before the end of sector 1, 2 shields (4 bars)
Before the end of sector 2, 4 engines.
Before the end of sector 3, 3 shields (6 bars)
Before the end of sector 4, 5 engines.

Also, you need to have a way to get through:
Before the end of Sector 2: 2 shields (Most ships can do this)
Before the end of Sector 4: 3 shields (This usually means you need to buy weapons or a teleporter in sector 3)
Before the end of Sector 7: 4 shields (or the Boss is gonna suck)

Note: to get through 2 shields, you need to do 3 laser shots. Or have 2 ions and a laser/beam/whatever. Or have a teleporter. Or a bomb. Doesn't matter what.

THEN I start thinking about upgrading other things, like doors and O2 and medbay and stuff.

Most of the time I don't reach these milestones, and I end up not getting my 4th engine until midway through sector 3 or something. No biggie, as long as you keep trying.

Never, ever, ever, EVER buy missiles. Unless you simply must because you've not found a way to get rid of your missile weapon. They are the single biggest resource drain in the game if you buy a lot. The next big resource drain is repairs. Any time you show up at a store needing a ton of repairs, that's a weapon you can't buy, or drone control or a cloak or long range scanners or who knows what else.

Ions are great in groups, but not so great by themselves. 2 Ions will eventually take down ANY shield so long as your opponent doesn't dodge too many of them. An Ion and an Ion 2 will reliably take down ANY shield eventually. Once those are down, you can use your other weapons to actually damage the ship.

Try to get 2 of these 3 things before you meet the flagship: Teleporter, Cloak, Defense Drones. A cloak and a level 5 engine will make you unhittable while the cloak is on, and you'll be dodging 1/3 to 1/2 of all shots fired when it's off. Add in a defense drone and you're essentially safe from most everything but the occasional lucky shot (and bombs, but those generally aren't a big deal as most can't damage hull). 2 mantises and a teleporter are your friend, make it a priority early so by the time you get to the later sectors your mantises are fully leveled up, and they will be killing machines.

It's tough starting out. I just went back to watch Day9 playing FTL (seeing his play is what made me get the game in the first place). Now that I consider myself to be pretty much an expert I saw how much stuff he was doing wrong. It was almost painful to watch. Though it made me realize how many aspects of the game are just not intuitive. So, here are some general tips that might help. There's way way more to the game. So, you might have all this down and be missing something else.

Tips:
This game is more or less about getting lots of scrap and spending it wisely. So, you should a.) visit as many beacons as possible without the rebel fleet catching you b.) try to minimize scrap lost per battle (including the fuel it takes to jump to the battle, the drones/missiles you use, the hull damage you take, and any loss of crew)
Defense > Offense IMO. If you can setup your ship so you don't get hit by anything then you have all the time in the world to figure out how to beat your opponent (only caveat is when there's a sun nearby or when the enemy is trying to jump away).
Boarding is overpowered. Learn to use boarding to your advantage as much as possible. Often you can beat an opponent who has a medbay even without disabling it if you send in enough boarders. A teleporter and upgrades for it are cheaper than weapons and the upgrades it takes to power them. So even level 3 teleporter is not very expensive. With it you can send crew over in waves. Then you just have to micromanage them to keep the lower health ones out of danger. Usually you can get the crew to focus on some of your boarders and send others to the medbay to destroy it or 2 mantis can overpower the healing rate of level 1 medbay versus a single opponent.

If you focus on those you'll can start really steam rolling opponents. However, nothing beats practice. The more practice you get the more you'll think of all the angles you can exploit to beat a situation.

5thHorseman wrote:I felt your feel, bro. FTL is *so* *hard* until you *know* it.

I hate to pimp my stuff (really, most people say that but I'm cringing right now as I type this) but I've beaten the game with every ship, and with a lot of the ships I've beaten it twice, while recording. I'm not perfect but there are a lot of gems you can learn from watching my videos. Check out my thread here.

Also, here's my standard strategy that essentially gets me a chance at winning every time. I don't win every time, but I win far more than half the time. This strategy does it:

Before the end of sector 1, 2 shields (4 bars)
Before the end of sector 2, 4 engines.
Before the end of sector 3, 3 shields (6 bars)
Before the end of sector 4, 5 engines.

Also, you need to have a way to get through:
Before the end of Sector 2: 2 shields (Most ships can do this)
Before the end of Sector 4: 3 shields (This usually means you need to buy weapons or a teleporter in sector 3)
Before the end of Sector 7: 4 shields (or the Boss is gonna suck)

Note: to get through 2 shields, you need to do 3 laser shots. Or have 2 ions and a laser/beam/whatever. Or have a teleporter. Or a bomb. Doesn't matter what.

THEN I start thinking about upgrading other things, like doors and O2 and medbay and stuff.

Most of the time I don't reach these milestones, and I end up not getting my 4th engine until midway through sector 3 or something. No biggie, as long as you keep trying.

Never, ever, ever, EVER buy missiles. Unless you simply must because you've not found a way to get rid of your missile weapon. They are the single biggest resource drain in the game if you buy a lot. The next big resource drain is repairs. Any time you show up at a store needing a ton of repairs, that's a weapon you can't buy, or drone control or a cloak or long range scanners or who knows what else.

Ions are great in groups, but not so great by themselves. 2 Ions will eventually take down ANY shield so long as your opponent doesn't dodge too many of them. An Ion and an Ion 2 will reliably take down ANY shield eventually. Once those are down, you can use your other weapons to actually damage the ship.

Try to get 2 of these 3 things before you meet the flagship: Teleporter, Cloak, Defense Drones. A cloak and a level 5 engine will make you unhittable while the cloak is on, and you'll be dodging 1/3 to 1/2 of all shots fired when it's off. Add in a defense drone and you're essentially safe from most everything but the occasional lucky shot (and bombs, but those generally aren't a big deal as most can't damage hull). 2 mantises and a teleporter are your friend, make it a priority early so by the time you get to the later sectors your mantises are fully leveled up, and they will be killing machines.

So I watched your videos of the Torus ship. I'm going to say this and hope it doesn't offend, as a suggestion for future videos could you explain why you are doing what you are doing? In the video when the mantis beam aboard your ship you start moving people here and there and without the rational as to why you are doing that it's hard to really learn how to suck less at this game.

Well the good news is watching 5th Horseman's videos and the advice here completely changed the way I play the game. I used to make a run right for the exit but now I zig zag around the sector until I absolutely need to excape.

I got to the end and did a reasonably good job of fighting the final ship, I used the teleporter to one by one dismantle the the 4 weapons. I teleported back and forth healing as necessary. The problem then was I ran out of crew to throw at them because the main compartment was full of dudes to fight me. My lasers were not enough to penetrate their shields and damage any systems so I was basically playing a game of ping pong where no one missed at this point.
Oh well still the best game I've played yet, the score, check out my new scoreboard below.

mrozowjj wrote: So I watched your videos of the Torus ship. I'm going to say this and hope it doesn't offend, as a suggestion for future videos could you explain why you are doing what you are doing? In the video when the mantis beam aboard your ship you start moving people here and there and without the rational as to why you are doing that it's hard to really learn how to suck less at this game.

No offense taken. Which run with the Torus and which episode/sector/whatever? I'm curious what happened.

Very likely what I did was get everybody in the medbay except one or two guys whose sole purpose was to distract the mantises until the air ran out of whatever room they were trashing. Then I ran the guy or guys who were doing the distracting to the medbay. That's a tactic I tend to do

5thHorseman wrote:

mrozowjj wrote: So I watched your videos of the Torus ship. I'm going to say this and hope it doesn't offend, as a suggestion for future videos could you explain why you are doing what you are doing? In the video when the mantis beam aboard your ship you start moving people here and there and without the rational as to why you are doing that it's hard to really learn how to suck less at this game.

No offense taken. Which run with the Torus and which episode/sector/whatever? I'm curious what happened.

Very likely what I did was get everybody in the medbay except one or two guys whose sole purpose was to distract the mantises until the air ran out of whatever room they were trashing. Then I ran the guy or guys who were doing the distracting to the medbay. That's a tactic I tend to do

I'd have to go back and watch them but it was one of these
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL ... UamSa8JfhZ

That was just a specific example that popped into my head, there was 2 or 3 times where I though knowing why you did what you did would be fantastic.

mrozowjj wrote:

5thHorseman wrote:

mrozowjj wrote: So I watched your videos of the Torus ship. I'm going to say this and hope it doesn't offend, as a suggestion for future videos could you explain why you are doing what you are doing? In the video when the mantis beam aboard your ship you start moving people here and there and without the rational as to why you are doing that it's hard to really learn how to suck less at this game.

No offense taken. Which run with the Torus and which episode/sector/whatever? I'm curious what happened.

Very likely what I did was get everybody in the medbay except one or two guys whose sole purpose was to distract the mantises until the air ran out of whatever room they were trashing. Then I ran the guy or guys who were doing the distracting to the medbay. That's a tactic I tend to do

I'd have to go back and watch them but it was one of these
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL ... UamSa8JfhZ

That was just a specific example that popped into my head, there was 2 or 3 times where I though knowing why you did what you did would be fantastic.

I'll watch them with a critical eye on what I was thinking.

One thing, this is my first run with the Torus so really I wasn't as good as I am today. I may have been making poor decisions or even just flailing. But if I see any good strategies that went unexplained I'll chime in

A brief catalog of tactics. I don't use all of them (directional reset, for example, I think is a little cheap):

Ship-to-Ship:
Offense:
Ion Lock: Use autofire on the Ion weapons. Typically, if you've got an Ion Cannon II, you start an engagement by setting it to auto on shields.
Alpha: Save all your shots and fire them together. Useful if you've got a lot of lasers.
MRSI Alpha: time your shots so that they arrive together. This is useful if you're against something with a type-II defense drone. time it right, and the drone will fire at the burst laser round and not the breach missile.
Ripple Alpha: time your shots so that they arrive in a certain sequence to do maximum damage. This is usually Missiles-bombs-ion (to reduce shields or the helm), followed by burst-simple lasers (absorbed by shield) and then heavy lasers-hull lasers.
beam painting: the moment the shields drop to 0 (or 1 with Halberd, 2 with Glaive), pause the game and find the precise pixels that allow the most damage on a ship. Ideally, you want to start on or near the shields, since the moment the shields get damaged, the shield operator will start fixing them, which means that the shield regeneration time goes slower.
Pre-Cloaking: I believe that weapons already assigned a target when you go into cloak will fire without breaking cloak. The next time, however, they will break cloak. An Ion II's second auto-shot will break cloak. This is a useful trick for timing your cloak precisely.
Weapons order: when the weapons room takes damage, the weapons are disabled in order from right to left. This means that you want your optional/one shot/fast charging weapons on the right, and the slow-charging beasts on the left.

Defense:
Power Dancing: I hate it, but I often have to be slightly underpowered. You don't need oxygen all the time; and if the enemy's got no weapons left, you don't need shields or engines. Cloak, Medbay and Teleporters don't need to be powered when they're not in use. So learn to shift the power around as needed. And pay attention! It's embarrassing to suffocate your whole crew!
Cloak farming: if you're up against an enemy that can't hurt you, might as well use any cloak to avoid shots anyway, as your Engineer/Pilot will get credit for misses.
Triage: know what you can lose and what you can't. Generally you can lose oxygen. If you've already powered down oxygen, know how much you have left.

Melee:
Offense:
Heparin Airlock: if the enemy has a Medbay, disable it with weapons fire, then beam your boarding party there.
Broken Shield: damaged shields almost always forces the AI to commit someone to fixing it. Just try not to do too much damage to ship when you have people on board, especially when fires are raging.
Load Balancing: learn how to change positions of your boarders to prevent one from bearing the brunt of the damage.
Laser Tag: if your boarders are at the point of dying, the teleporter is not ready yet, and the ship does not have improved doors, you can run from one end of the ship to the other with the enemy chasing, and not be killed. You look silly, but you live.

Defense:
pre-venting: Flying around with your airlocks open. The theory is that one gets the non-air to the places it needs to be faster.
Stalling tactics: sending a guy in to keep a boarding party busy long enough for the air to become unbreathable. Of course, if you forget about that dude, this could end badly.
Directional Reset: if boarders are trying to leave a room, entering that room will cause them to start to fight you. Leaving it will force a rethink of which direction to leave. So you can guide them the direction you think is tactically ideal.
Citadel: the medbay with one power is the end of the line for most boarding parties.