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[Deraldin]

Man that third stage boss with the new content is killer. Again I call bullshit on "Easy Mode". Even with all the crap that I managed to get I still almost lost. Probably wouldn't have been so bad if I hadn't accidentally blown up my mantis on the second stage.

Stealth ship with full shields, 6 engines, 3 teleporter/cloak/autopilot, 2 medbay
Weapon Pre-Igniter, Zoltan Shield Bypass, Reconstructive Teleport
Dual Lasers, Heavy Laser II, Pike Beam

Human Pilot (max skill)
Human Weapons (max skill)
Human Engines (max skill)
Human Extra (no skills)
Mantis Boarder (max combat)
Mantis Boarder (max combat)
Engi HERO (max all skills)
Engi Extra (level 1 engine)

 

[Woorloog]

Again I call bullshit on "Easy Mode".

It is more like Evil Mode. You are like "whoah, i'm doing good, the game's too easy" and then "What the shit, every bad thing happened at once!"

 

[Phandy]

Got to the last boss. It stealthed instantly, dropped a hacking drone on my weapons, turned it like clockwork 1 second before any of my weapons could get charged. Nothing I could but watch everyone die slowly.

THANKS FTL

 

[ScOULaris]

Advanced Edition brought me back to FTL, and now I'm hooked all over again. This really is one of the best games to come out in years, IMO. It's just so well crafted, compelling, and challenging in all the right ways. Every single playthrough is an adventure with masterfully balanced risk/reward combined with general strategizing. By the time my play session inevitably comes to an end, I always have a story to tell about what happened to my fallen ship and its brave crew.

 

[Weltall Zero]

Advanced Edition brought me back to FTL, and now I'm hooked all over again. This really is one of the best games to come out in years, IMO. It's just so well crafted, compelling, and challenging in all the right ways. Every single playthrough is an adventure with masterfully balanced risk/reward combined with general strategizing. By the time my play session inevitably comes to an end, I always have a story to tell about what happened to my fallen ship and its brave crew.

Amen to that!

 

[Mindlog]

I always have a story to tell about what happened to my fallen ship and its brave crew.

I got tired of trying to beat the game with, Slug B.

So I break out my trusty Crystal B and start the game on hard. At the end of Sector 1 a Chain Vulcan drops! The run is going far easier than any of my Engie B/Slug B runs. Until a random Zoltan appeared. I purposely went out of my way to avoid those guys. There it was with its stupid shield and armed to the teeth. Took me down from green health before my jump engines were even half-way charged. Never seen anything like it. Not even the boss can damage me that fast. I once played against the boss where seemingly every bolt that landed on my ship started a fire and I transported everyone off my ship to the boss while the flames died down. That still wasn't as hard.

Definitely back in again. Still very impressed with the design of the changes.

 

[Ghost]

I finally managed to finish the game on easy thanks to the AE stuff, seemed quite a bit easier but I didn't mind because I still nearly died on the last stage of the boss.


Such a great set of improvements, and for free!!!

Only thing I'm disappointed about is that I can't see an option to use the touch controls on PC.

 

[Kenaras]

I'm finding that if I want to beat the boss, ignoring most of the new systems is the way to go. The Cloning Bay is good, particularly when dealing with mind controls. If you need extra power, the Backup Battery isn't bad. However, both the Mind Control and Hacking systems offer less in that fight than the standard Drone Control, Crew Teleporter, and Cloaking systems.

Two of the new augmentations are amazing in that fight, though. The Zoltan Shield Bypass makes phase three much easier, and depending on your loadout, the Defense Scrambler can be great for phase two.

 

[SwiftDeath]

I'm finding that if I want to beat the boss, ignoring most of the new systems is the way to go. The Cloning Bay is good, particularly when dealing with mind controls. If you need extra power, the Backup Battery isn't bad. However, both the Mind Control and Hacking systems offer less in that fight than the standard Drone Control, Crew Teleporter, and Cloaking systems.

Two of the new augmentations are amazing in that fight, though. The Zoltan Shield Bypass makes phase three much easier, and depending on your loadout, the Defense Scrambler can be great for phase two.

Mind control is a blessing if you use it on the pilot of the enemy ship right before you unlease a full barrage as it likely halves the enemy evasion or more

 

[Weltall Zero]

I'm finding that if I want to beat the boss, ignoring most of the new systems is the way to go. The Cloning Bay is good, particularly when dealing with mind controls. If you need extra power, the Backup Battery isn't bad. However, both the Mind Control and Hacking systems offer less in that fight than the standard Drone Control, Crew Teleporter, and Cloaking systems.

Two of the new augmentations are amazing in that fight, though. The Zoltan Shield Bypass makes phase three much easier, and depending on your loadout, the Defense Scrambler can be great for phase two.

Huh, weird; I found both the hacking and mind control systems straightaway amazing. Overpowered, even. The amount of stuff you can do with each is simply mindblowing. Hell, I completed my third Lanius run on normal without neither stealth nor drone systems.

 

[Grimm Fandango]

Level 3 mind controlling a Rockman is amazing. He can tear through at least 2 people. Put him in a room on fire and laugh maniacally.

edit: also can a mod merge this and the Advanced Edition thread and keep it in gaming for a bit?

 

[PandaPedinte]

Died in an Asteroid Field, in the first sector with the Noether because I was greed. smh

 

[Kenaras]

Mind control is a blessing if you use it on the pilot of the enemy ship right before you unlease a full barrage as it likely halves the enemy evasion or more

How does that help against the boss?

Edit: At least, compared to things like quickly and permanently disabling its weapons, evading its super attacks, or stopping boarding drones and mitigating missiles. Even the new Hacking system allows you to repeatedly reduce evasion to zero, if that's what you want. Mind Control just lets you reduce evasion one time, then the pilot is dead.

Unless the AI is active you should still be able to mind control the pilot and severely affect the evasion rating of the boss ship

Yeah, it's just not very helpful compared to other options.

 

[SwiftDeath]

How does that help against the boss?

Unless the AI is active you should still be able to mind control the pilot and severely affect the evasion rating of the boss ship

 

[backlot]

Unless the AI is active you should still be able to mind control the pilot and severely affect the evasion rating of the boss ship

The boss also uses mind control on your crew which you can undo with your own mind control.

 

[SwiftDeath]

The boss also uses mind control on your crew which you can undo with your own mind control.

Yeah I just used that tactic moments ago when fighting the boss. He kept mind controlling my guys and I just said Nope!

Something interesting happened in my last playthrough. I ran across an Engi ship in a distress beacon and the random action was to kill my engi crewman.

After I defeated the ship and killed all its crew I was rewarded with a new engi crewman based on my old ones DNA except this one was new and improved...

 

[Ilúvatar]

Yeah I just used that tactic moments ago when fighting the boss. He kept mind controlling my guys and I just said Nope!

Something interesting happened in my last playthrough. I ran across an Engi ship in a distress beacon and the random action was to kill my engi crewman.

After I defeated the ship and killed all its crew I was rewarded with a new engi crewman based on my old ones DNA except this one was new and improved...

This happened to me a couple hours ago!

My reaction was something like this:

 

[Deraldin]

This happened to me a couple hours ago!

My reaction was something like this:

I recruited an engi the turn before running into that encounter. One jump and suddenly my engi was gone. I horribly murdered everyone on that engi boat by turning off their oxygen in revenge. Then my engi respawns with super skills.

Oops. >_>

 

[Lotto]

I finally beat this game on easy for the first time. I don't really play roguelikes and I remember quitting real early when it first came out; it was just too frustrating. Fast forward to today where I see a bunch of my friends playing it since they released the Advanced update; I decided to give it another shot. I had no idea how people beat this game since I never even beat the first form of the Rebel Flagship (hell, I didn't even know there was more than one form). I kept at it despite my frustration growing more and more and lo and behold, on my umpteenth attempt I got the luckiest run of my life (using the Engineer ship, The Torus). To make things even sweeter was that I ended up winning with just 1 tick of my hull left!

I'm so happy right now ;_;

 

[Weltall Zero]

How does that help against the boss?

Edit: At least, compared to things like quickly and permanently disabling its weapons, evading its super attacks, or stopping boarding drones and mitigating missiles. Even the new Hacking system allows you to repeatedly reduce evasion to zero, if that's what you want. Mind Control just lets you reduce evasion one time, then the pilot is dead.

Huh? If the pilot is dead, evasion is reduced permanently. Not like one of the other crew won't replace the pilot, going back to square one. Also, while they're killing him, they don't man their own stations, and they have to heal afterwards (which is a good moment to hack the medbay).

I personally use it against the tri-missile gun. Having its gunner not only not repairing it but directly damaging it allows you to destroy it before killing the gunner, which is safer. Obviously, if you don't have the means to permanently kill him, it's less useful, but still worth it.

Further, mind control costs nothing, compared to hacking's drone part cost. Sure, against the boss that might be irrelevant, but there's a game before it. It's also amazing when boarding, or when you're boarded. And that's aside what's already mentioned, like undoing enemy mind control.

As an aside, what system allows you to "quickly and permanently disable its weapons"? I can't think of one.

 

[Kenaras]

Huh? If the pilot is dead, evasion is reduced permanently. Not like one of the other crew won't replace the pilot, going back to square one. Also, while they're killing him, they don't man their own stations, and they have to heal afterwards (which is a good moment to hack the medbay).

I personally use it against the tri-missile gun. Having its gunner not only not repairing it but directly damaging it allows you to destroy it before killing the gunner, which is safer. Obviously, if you don't have the means to permanently kill him, it's less useful, but still worth it.

Further, mind control costs nothing, compared to hacking's drone part cost. Sure, against the boss that might be irrelevant, but there's a game before it. It's also amazing when boarding, or when you're boarded. And that's aside what's already mentioned, like undoing enemy mind control.

As an aside, what system allows you to "quickly and permanently disable its weapons"? I can't think of one.

If the pilot is dead, another crew member replaces him and there's no discernible difference in evasion. It's possible that the enemy crew members have skill levels similar to player crew members, in which case it's a 5% loss in evasion; not very exciting. That ship has so many crew members that it's essentially irrelevant when a few leave their stations.

Mind controlling the gunner for the missile launcher is effective, but it only works for one phase. The gunner will be dead when the boss transitions to the next phase, even if he was alive with the ship jumped. You could keep him alive and do it in phase three, but then you can't use your mind control to counter the enemy's.

There's a reason my post was specifically about the end boss, so bringing up the advantages of Mind Control elsewhere is irrelevant. If my goal is to beat the boss, making the easy part of the game easier only to make the hard part harder is counterproductive.

The Crew Teleporter will quickly and permanently (for that phase) disable weapons. In phase three you either have to drop the Zoltan Shield first or have the Zoltan Shield Bypass augmentation, but that's the only thing that slows you down. (Hacking can disable a weapon even faster, but not permanently.)

All of this is largely irrelevant, though. Arguing whether Mind Control has uses is meaningless; the question is whether it helps more than the other available systems. You can't have all of them. If people want to argue that Mind Control is good in that fight, they should state which systems are worse for that fight. Crew Teleporter? Drone Control? Cloaking? Hacking? At least two need to be worse than Mind Control. I can see cases for some of those if you have specific ship setups, but in general, I find every one of those systems more helpful in the fight.

 

[Mindlog]

If the pilot is dead, another crew member replaces him and there's no discernible difference in evasion. It's possible that the enemy crew members have skill levels similar to player crew members, in which case it's a 5% loss in evasion; not very exciting. That ship has so many crew members that it's essentially irrelevant when a few leave their stations.

Killing the pilot isn't as important as incapacitating him. Use MC to stun the pilot as your projectiles are about to arrive. There's an excellent video on Youtube demonstrating evasion stunning + flak, but it has huge spoilers so I won't link it. Don't go looking for it until after you've beaten hard!

I like using MC + TP to trivialize killing the crew. Mind Control an enemy and let him fight on their ship. Right before it runs out teleport back and kill him while he's wounded. It's a great alternative to the Med-Bay slugfest.

Typically I would take MC over Drone Control and Hacking. (I want to say something else here, but I won't.) MC can get the job done at level one, with one unit of power and no accessories required. The others take a larger investment in scrap and power. On top of that MC lets me sell Drones when it's an option. This is always subject to change any given run because my favorite part of FTL is adapting to drops. Hacking can be a great counter to potential weaknesses against automated ships and Combat II is a great supplement to strategies dependent on overwhelming firepower.

 

[Deraldin]

Hacking worked out pretty well for me on the boss with my Mantis Cruiser A. The lockdown ability of the hacking drone allowed me to prevent enemies from fleeing to the medbay when they were injured.

Other than that I had probably my worst run ever for losing crew members. I lost at least 4 if not 5 mantis because of not paying close enough attention to their health while boarding. And yet, I still managed to replace all but 1 of them from random events. If I had been able to keep them all alive I could have had an 8 person mantis crew with the dread mantis pirate what's-his-name.

 

[Kenaras]

Killing the pilot isn't as important as incapacitating him. Use MC to stun the pilot as your projectiles are about to arrive. There's an excellent video on Youtube demonstrating evasion stunning + flak, but it has huge spoilers so I won't link it. Don't go looking for it until after you've beaten hard!

I know you can incapacitate the pilot as projectiles are about to arrive; I discussed that just a few posts up. In fact it's what started the entire conversation. I know incapacitating him - not killing him - is the primary benefit; I already said as much. (Hacking still does that trick better, but this is going in circles.)

There's clearly something I'm not understanding about Mind Control, though. Apparently you're using it repeatedly; I use it once and afterwards it's disabled by an ion effect for the rest of the fight. I'm guessing that wears off if I wait long enough? Are you spending forever in phase one, waiting on Mind Control to come back online so you can assassinate the entire crew (minus the laser gunner) one-by-one?

On a related note, in the rest of the game having your mind control targets survive battles can be incredibly time-consuming. If I want to capture the ship intact, I'm left to deal with that last mind-controlled enemy first. Often the only way to kill him is to teleport him aboard my ship and then vent the entire ship, leaving no oxygen in rooms he can get to. In some cases, I've had to kill one of my own crew members in the process, then revive in the Cloning Bay. I keep thinking there's got to be an easier way, particularly since the Lanius B is built around the Mind Control + boarding party concept.

Other than that I had probably my worst run ever for losing crew members. I lost at least 4 if not 5 mantis because of not paying close enough attention to their health while boarding. And yet, I still managed to replace all but 1 of them from random events. If I had been able to keep them all alive I could have had an 8 person mantis crew with the dread mantis pirate what's-his-name.

My last run with the Mantis B, I got one crew member in Sector 3, and no other opportunities until Sector 7. Well, that's not entirely true; Sector 2 had a store that offered crew members - but it was three Engis. What a frustrating ship when you're stuck with a crew of three. And yet somehow, I entered Sector 8 with an eight-man crew. (Fourth crew member purchased from a slave trader, two more from a store shortly afterwards, and the final two in back-to-back random events immediately after leaving the store.)

 

[McNum]

Heh, the Zoltan Suicide Clone Squad tactic works pretty well.

Get cloning facility, get teleporter, attack with Zoltans. They'll lose, since they're kind of awful in melee, and then do a lot of damage to the enemy as they die. A few seconds later and a brand new Zoltan pops out of the cloning facility. You don't even need to power the teleporter since the Zoltans can do that on their own. Well, you need to power it up for the return trip... but it's mostly going to be outgoing teleports anyway. I want to try this on a four-man telepad sometime. the explosion damage from four Zoltans should be enough to take out anything that's not a Rockman.

This was my first victory in the AE version. The Flagship didn't really stand a chance this time. Boarding party to take out the missiles, a Zoltan Shield to delay the hacking long enough that I could disable it, an Ion Blast, a Halberd Beam, a Flak II and a Breach Bomb II. And a cloak. Really, this fight was over before it began.

 

[Deraldin]

Heh, the Zoltan Suicide Clone Squad tactic works pretty well.

I... I have to try this...

 

[Mindlog]

I know you can incapacitate the pilot as projectiles are about to arrive; I discussed that just a few posts up. In fact it's what started the entire conversation. I know incapacitating him - not killing him - is the primary benefit; I already said as much. (Hacking still does that trick better, but this is going in circles.)

My apologies. I should have been more through reading the post chain up.

Yes, using MC more than once or as a compliment to other abilities is key. Again there is a really great video on Youtube (that I won't link to) that highlights how some abilities are best used at one charge. It's something that I always knew, but rarely put into practice. Things like the mantra: 'Cloak is used to dodge enemy projectiles. Not to charge your weapons unimpeded.' Even then while Cloak is used to dodge by itself MC is meant to be used with other assets. I can see where that difference creeps up in the greater conversation. Clone Bays and Automated Ships require more finesse than a strategy based on other systems would.

My last run with the Mantis B, I got one crew member in Sector 3, and no other opportunities until Sector 7. Well, that's not entirely true; Sector 2 had a store that offered crew members - but it was three Engis. What a frustrating ship when you're stuck with a crew of three. And yet somehow, I entered Sector 8 with an eight-man crew. (Fourth crew member purchased from a slave trader, two more from a store shortly afterwards, and the final two in back-to-back random events immediately after leaving the store.)

Reminds me of trips without seeing an affordable weapon for some ships like the Federation Cruiser C. Some will call me crazy, but at times certain setups on Easy can be harder than Hard.

 

[O.DOGG]

Heh, the Zoltan Suicide Clone Squad tactic works pretty well.

Get cloning facility, get teleporter, attack with Zoltans. They'll lose, since they're kind of awful in melee, and then do a lot of damage to the enemy as they die. A few seconds later and a brand new Zoltan pops out of the cloning facility. You don't even need to power the teleporter since the Zoltans can do that on their own. Well, you need to power it up for the return trip... but it's mostly going to be outgoing teleports anyway. I want to try this on a four-man telepad sometime. the explosion damage from four Zoltans should be enough to take out anything that's not a Rockman.

This was my first victory in the AE version. The Flagship didn't really stand a chance this time. Boarding party to take out the missiles, a Zoltan Shield to delay the hacking long enough that I could disable it, an Ion Blast, a Halberd Beam, a Flak II and a Breach Bomb II. And a cloak. Really, this fight was over before it began.

That's amazing. I will have to try it.

On a related note, I haven't been able to beat the AE yet. Maybe I'm rusty but I used to beat the game every time I started it (on easy anyway). Now I can't. I'll keep trying...

 

[Vlad]

Get cloning facility, get teleporter, attack with Zoltans. They'll lose, since they're kind of awful in melee, and then do a lot of damage to the enemy as they die. A few seconds later and a brand new Zoltan pops out of the cloning facility. You don't even need to power the teleporter since the Zoltans can do that on their own. Well, you need to power it up for the return trip... but it's mostly going to be outgoing teleports anyway. I want to try this on a four-man telepad sometime. the explosion damage from four Zoltans should be enough to take out anything that's not a Rockman.

First, I had no idea that dying Zoltans did explosion damage. I guess since I've never really relied on them for melee combat I never had the chance to see it. My Zoltans usually die by more pedestrian means.

Second, aside from the explosion damage and the need to not dedicate power to the teleporter, you could just as easily use any other race, correct? Substituting out Mantises would be pretty devestating, I imagine. Of course, this all depends on having a upgraded clone bay, correct?

 

[PandaPedinte]

Heh, the Zoltan Suicide Clone Squad tactic works pretty well.

Get cloning facility, get teleporter, attack with Zoltans. They'll lose, since they're kind of awful in melee, and then do a lot of damage to the enemy as they die. A few seconds later and a brand new Zoltan pops out of the cloning facility. You don't even need to power the teleporter since the Zoltans can do that on their own. Well, you need to power it up for the return trip... but it's mostly going to be outgoing teleports anyway. I want to try this on a four-man telepad sometime. the explosion damage from four Zoltans should be enough to take out anything that's not a Rockman.

This was my first victory in the AE version. The Flagship didn't really stand a chance this time. Boarding party to take out the missiles, a Zoltan Shield to delay the hacking long enough that I could disable it, an Ion Blast, a Halberd Beam, a Flak II and a Breach Bomb II. And a cloak. Really, this fight was over before it began.

lol

 

[Haly]

I beat this game for the first time today, using the Engi Cruiser A,

Spoiler

on easy.

 

[Kenaras]

Yes, using MC more than once or as a compliment to other abilities is key. Again there is a really great video on Youtube (that I won't link to) that highlights how some abilities are best used at one charge. It's something that I always knew, but rarely put into practice. Things like the mantra: 'Cloak is used to dodge enemy projectiles. Not to charge your weapons unimpeded.' Even then while Cloak is used to dodge by itself MC is meant to be used with other assets. I can see where that difference creeps up in the greater conversation. Clone Bays and Automated Ships require more finesse than a strategy based on other systems would.

I'll play around with Mind Control some more. On a run where you have have weak weapon options, MC seems like a good backup plan. Hacking might be able to achieve a similar effect: hacking the boss's Shields should lock the doors leading to and from the cockpit. Then you could teleport a two-man crew into the cockpit and assassinate the pilot before he can escape to the Medbay. Leave and when they replace him, go assassinate the new pilot. I'll have to try it and see if the hacked doors hold out long enough; if that doesn't work, maybe try hacking Door Control.

Reminds me of trips without seeing an affordable weapon for some ships like the Federation Cruiser C. Some will call me crazy, but at times certain setups on Easy can be harder than Hard.

I still need to unlock Federation C; that and Stealth C are my last remaining two. I'm guessing there's something special about that layout you're referencing, but I'll avoid spoiling myself by looking it up. I've definitely had those runs where lack of weapon options becomes a big problem, though. It's particularly bad with the layouts whose starting weapons can't deal with more than one level of shields. Everything will seem to be going well, then suddenly random encounters have one more shield bubble and there's no longer any way to kill them.

Edit: Is the Zoltan explosion thing new? I never knew they did that. I'm not sure if any of my Zoltans have died in melee combat, but I've killed plenty of enemy Zoltans that way. Never noticed the explosion before.

 

[SwiftDeath]

I'll play around with Mind Control some more. On a run where you have have weak weapon options, MC seems like a good backup plan. Hacking might be able to achieve a similar effect: hacking the boss's Shields should lock the doors leading to and from the cockpit. Then you could teleport a two-man crew into the cockpit and assassinate the pilot before he can escape to the Medbay. Leave and when they replace him, go assassinate the new pilot. I'll have to try it and see if the hacked doors hold out long enough; if that doesn't work, maybe try hacking Door Control.

The way I have always played FTL and how I view the game is mitigating risk

The entirety of FTL in a nutshell seems to be risk management. Option A might nuke the enemy offensive capabilities but might leave you open to a massive counterattack. Option B might rattle down their offense a little but not leave you as open and so on

I find hacking to be a less optimal bet early on in the game as an additional system than mind control simply due to the drone part and greater power requirement to be truly effective. Mind control costs one power. Hacking costs one drone part an attempt and usually 2 - 3 power if you want to be effective.

As per your earlier point that you were focusing solely on the boss battle I find MC to be less effective in the first and last boss stage but more effective in the second where you face the bosses defense drone

The problem though with simply focusing on the boss is it ignores the first 7 sectors of the game where you are entirely reliant on drone parts to use hacking and in many cases mind control is a cheaper alternative that achieves similar results. Have you never used the Engi Ship and run out of drone parts before? It's a serious concern and a serious risk you run playing the game, especially on normal or hard, and trying to utilize hacking effectively in the majority of your battles

 

[O.DOGG]

Alright, managed to beat it with the Crystal B. On easy, of course.
Those 4-person teleporter ships, man, so much fun. I love my boarding parties!
I guess I got lucky and got a couple of good weapons along the way, that really helped me. Also the mind-control room. Learned my lesson.

 

[Kenaras]

The way I have always played FTL and how I view the game is mitigating risk

The entirety of FTL in a nutshell seems to be risk management. Option A might nuke the enemy offensive capabilities but might leave you open to a massive counterattack. Option B might rattle down their offense a little but not leave you as open and so on

I find hacking to be a less optimal bet early on in the game as an additional system than mind control simply due to the drone part and greater power requirement to be truly effective. Mind control costs one power. Hacking costs one drone part an attempt and usually 2 - 3 power if you want to be effective.

As per your earlier point that you were focusing solely on the boss battle I find MC to be less effective in the first and last boss stage but more effective in the second where you face the bosses defense drone

The problem though with simply focusing on the boss is it ignores the first 7 sectors of the game where you are entirely reliant on drone parts to use hacking and in many cases mind control is a cheaper alternative that achieves similar results. Have you never used the Engi Ship and run out of drone parts before? It's a serious concern and a serious risk you run playing the game, especially on normal or hard, and trying to utilize hacking effectively in the majority of your battles

I'm sure I've run out of drone parts before, but it's been a while. Hacking isn't a system I'd want to buy early on, though. I certainly wouldn't pick it up on a ship that already had Drone Control. If I'm playing a ship that starts with Hacking, I usually only use it against ships I judge to be an unusually high threat. My last two playthroughs where I had it, I also had a Defense Scrambler, which eliminates the problem in phase two. (Once with the Engi C, and once where I picked up the augmentation by chance.)

Mind Control is certainly a strong early system, though I'd still prioritize getting my core defenses up to a comfortable level first. I've just been unimpressed with it when it comes time to face the boss.

 

[Weltall Zero]

There's clearly something I'm not understanding about Mind Control, though. Apparently you're using it repeatedly; I use it once and afterwards it's disabled by an ion effect for the rest of the fight. I'm guessing that wears off if I wait long enough? Are you spending forever in phase one, waiting on Mind Control to come back online so you can assassinate the entire crew (minus the laser gunner) one-by-one?

Mind control's cooldown is 20 seconds (starting right after the effect wears off, 10 seconds after activation). Unless you're destroying the flagship in like 45 seconds (to account for its stealth phase), you should be able to reuse it.

On a related note, in the rest of the game having your mind control targets survive battles can be incredibly time-consuming. If I want to capture the ship intact, I'm left to deal with that last mind-controlled enemy first. Often the only way to kill him is to teleport him aboard my ship and then vent the entire ship, leaving no oxygen in rooms he can get to. In some cases, I've had to kill one of my own crew members in the process, then revive in the Cloning Bay.

Wait, what? Why don't you just 4-team him? The last mind controlled enemy should be next to dead by the time you have to pick him off anyway.

One very cool thing about mind control is how you can adjust how much damage and HP the controlled crew will have. So you can use just one energy if there's two enemies, or up to three if there's more of them, so that the fight is even and all combatants go as low on HP as possible. You can also use a buffed MC on the enemy crew member with the least HP, to even out their life bars. You can often pick them off with regular weaponry afterwards!

First, I had no idea that dying Zoltans did explosion damage.

Neither did I after well over a year! This game is nuts!

Second, aside from the explosion damage and the need to not dedicate power to the teleporter, you could just as easily use any other race, correct? Substituting out Mantises would be pretty devestating, I imagine. Of course, this all depends on having a upgraded clone bay, correct?

Yeah, this tactic is quite obviously good with mantises or rockmen, but the one good thing about this zoltan strategy is that, if it deals a chunk of damage all at once, it might be enough to kill them before they can heal at the medbay. I have to try this!

 

[McNum]

First, I had no idea that dying Zoltans did explosion damage. I guess since I've never really relied on them for melee combat I never had the chance to see it. My Zoltans usually die by more pedestrian means.

Second, aside from the explosion damage and the need to not dedicate power to the teleporter, you could just as easily use any other race, correct? Substituting out Mantises would be pretty devestating, I imagine. Of course, this all depends on having a upgraded clone bay, correct?

Well, yeah, you could use Mantises, but then you'd need to be careful to not get them killed anyway since they lose fighting skill from cloning, Zoltans are fire and forget. Teleport them into the enemy ship, wait for them to die and deal 35 damage to every enemy in the same room as them. Fighting skill is nice, but optional.

It sort of offsets that having a cloning facility means you don't get a medbay. I mean, who cares if your suicide Zoltans are at full health? Being at less just makes them explode faster.

But it's true. This is just one of those thing you do because it 's possible. Beating the game using an all-Zoltan boarding crew. How is that not awesome?

 

[Kenaras]

Mind control's cooldown is 20 seconds (starting right after the effect wears off, 10 seconds after activation). Unless you're destroying the flagship in like 45 seconds (to account for its stealth phase), you should be able to reuse it.



Wait, what? Why don't you just 4-team him? The last mind controlled enemy should be next to dead by the time you have to pick him off anyway.

At this point, I'm thinking there's something corrupted in my FTL installation. My Mind Control does not have a 10 second duration, and does not have a 20 second cooldown. The effect never wears off: when I Mind Control an enemy, he is mine for the rest of the battle or until he dies. I cannot attack him, and I cannot release him. The UI button for activating Mind Control becomes grayed out, and stays that way until I jump. It stays grayed out even if my victim dies.

I just checked out some YouTube videos showing Mind Control, and this is not what happens when everyone else uses the system. When they use it, the UI button shows a duration bar, similar to Cloaking. When that duration runs out, a countdown timer appears, like every other activated system. Then the system is available to use again.

By the way, when it comes to fighting the boss, my version of Mind Control sucks compared to everyone else's. It's actually quite good everywhere else, other than the annoyance that sometimes it's extremely difficult to kill my victim at the end of the fight. Using my ship's weapons to shoot him is the primary way I do it, but if the hull is already weakened and I want to capture the ship intact that isn't an option.

Edit: Just installed FTL on a second computer; Mind Control works properly there. Something is definitely corrupted on my other computer's installation. If you want to understand where I've been coming from on this subject, try re-reading my recent posts with the understanding that my Mind Control lasts forever and can only be used once per battle.

 

[O.DOGG]

Neither did I after well over a year! This game is nuts!

I somehow got the impression that this was added with the AE but I could be wrong. I certainly never noticed it before.

 

[Mindlog]

At this point, I'm thinking there's something corrupted in my FTL installation. My Mind Control does not have a 10 second duration, and does not have a 20 second cooldown.

I've had that bug happen to me a couple of times. Never really pinned down the exact cause.

Federation C hints at the suicide Zoltan strat. They try to mislead you with that big cannon and a Mantis, but do not be deceived!

It's perfect.

 

[Grimm Fandango]

I somehow got the impression that this was added with the AE but I could be wrong. I certainly never noticed it before.

It's new.

 

[McNum]

Federation C hints at the suicide Zoltan strat. They try to mislead you with that big cannon and a Mantis, but do no be deceived!

It's perfect.

It really is. I used the Zoltan Cruiser, but yeah. The Fed C can do the strat out of the box. Also, you'll be pelting your own guys with an auto-firing flak cannon for that extra mile. Why suicide when you can actively try to kill your own guys, too?

 

[Haly]

I hate this game so much.

Got a Zoltan Shield Bypass augmentation thing, perfect for Stage 3 because I love boarding strats and that thing was stumping me. Have 2 mantises + 4 other guys on Federation A, good setup, everything going smoothly...

Then I board a Rock ship with reinforced doors, one of my Mantises died because they weren't able to leave in time but I was able to extricate the other one.

One Mantis lost, no big deal, right?

Well I sent the surviving Mantis to the MedBay and BOOM. Missile on the MedBay.

Instantly ragequit, fuck this bullshit game.

 

[SwiftDeath]

I hate this game so much.

Got a Zoltan Shield Bypass augmentation thing, perfect for Stage 3 because I love boarding strats and that thing was stumping me. Have 2 mantises + 4 other guys on Federation A, good setup, everything going smoothly...

Then I board a Rock ship with reinforced doors, one of my Mantises died because they weren't able to leave in time but I was able to extricate the other one.

One Mantis lost, no big deal, right?

Well I sent the surviving Mantis to the MedBay and BOOM. Missile on the MedBay.

Instantly ragequit, fuck this bullshit game.

Yesterday maybe? I had this beautiful stealth ship up and running in sector 7, full shields, maybe 9 laser shots across various guns, mind control, drone control, good boarding party

Came across a random rebel ship, nothing too special. Oh look he hacked my oxygen supply isn't that nice? Oh a random shot made it through my shields and hit my oxygen system huh

Let me just send in a crew member to fix that. Huh doors are locked by the hack. Well I'm sure I can just break my way through with my whole crew.

Suffice to say my whole crew suffocated to death. And the real kicker of it? I could've jumped away and saved myself I'm pretty sure

Actually what happens to a hacked system if you jump"?

 

[McNum]

You jump out of range of the hacking ship and the hack drone disappears. So, yes, you could have jumped out and saved your crew.

 

[SwiftDeath]

You jump out of range of the hacking ship and the hack drone disappears. So, yes, you could have jumped out and saved your crew.

FTL: 34876, Daniel: 4

 

[Lotto]

I beat this game for the first time today, using the Engi Cruiser A,

Spoiler

on easy.

hi5, I was ecstatic when I beat it

Spoiler

same difficulty, same ship

Some day I'll beat it more than once.

 

[Weltall Zero]

At this point, I'm thinking there's something corrupted in my FTL installation. My Mind Control does not have a 10 second duration, and does not have a 20 second cooldown. The effect never wears off: when I Mind Control an enemy, he is mine for the rest of the battle or until he dies. I cannot attack him, and I cannot release him. The UI button for activating Mind Control becomes grayed out, and stays that way until I jump. It stays grayed out even if my victim dies.

Ouch! Yeah, of course that makes the system next to useless! :S They rolled out all these systems right now, I guess a few bugs are to be expected, a patched later on.

I now understand why you would have difficulties killing your controlled guy, as well, if you can't even attack him directly with your guys. Yeah, all together, that bug makes it suck.

Edit: Just installed FTL on a second computer; Mind Control works properly there. Something is definitely corrupted on my other computer's installation. If you want to understand where I've been coming from on this subject, try re-reading my recent posts with the understanding that my Mind Control lasts forever and can only be used once per battle.

I'd advice to reinstall FTL on your original computer, but perhaps you may want to ask the devs on the official forums if they need someone with the bug to aid in development. If you do reinstall it should preserve your savegame (since it's in a My Documents folder, separate from the game), but all the same you might want to back it up, especially since for some reason FTL still has no Steam cloud saving (assuming you're launching it from Steam).

I've had that bug happen to me a couple of times. Never really pinned down the exact cause.

I never had it happen to me. It's weird how some people get it all the time, some never (like me, so far) and some, like you, sometimes.

Federation C hints at the suicide Zoltan strat. They try to mislead you with that big cannon and a Mantis, but do not be deceived!
It's perfect.

Holy crap, it really is. I mean, it's a Fed cruiser with a teleporter, why would you want an artillery beam and a teleporter, which work so obviously against each other, if not to do this? I have to unlock it ASAP.

I somehow got the impression that this was added with the AE but I could be wrong. I certainly never noticed it before.

Oh, that might explain it. Although Zoltan are not usually in the middle of a fistfight anyway. It makes them more dangerous when they board you, however.

And the real kicker of it? I could've jumped away and saved myself I'm pretty sure

Actually what happens to a hacked system if you jump"?

Reading each sentence my brain was screaming "why won't you jump!?". Remembering to jump might be one of the most crucial survival skills in this game. Dat moment when a missile salvo is headed for your ship and you mash the Jump button when it's almost charged.

And yeah, as mentioned, the hacking drone is destroyed if you jump, same as if you destroy the enemy ship. Interestingly, hacking the enemy's hacking system also has a pretty high chance of destroying the drone, which might be beneficial if they hacked a vital system and the next time a less vital one (so you can skip counterhacking altogether). This is particularly useful when their hacking system is more powerful than yours and therefore you can't counter it 100% of the time.

 

[SwiftDeath]

Reading each sentence my brain was screaming "why won't you jump!?". Remembering to jump might be one of the most crucial survival skills in this game. Dat moment when a missile salvo is headed for your ship and you mash the Jump button when it's almost charged.

And yeah, as mentioned, the hacking drone is destroyed if you jump, same as if you destroy the enemy ship. Interestingly, hacking the enemy's hacking system also has a pretty high chance of destroying the drone, which might be beneficial if they hacked a vital system and the next time a less vital one (so you can skip counterhacking altogether). This is particularly useful when their hacking system is more powerful than yours and therefore you can't counter it 100% of the time.

Yep I've actually probably played like 200 hours of vanilla FTL so I should be fairly well versed in when to jump and am in most normal cases but that ship made me soft. It really couldn't do much damage to me and I was working down the crew without realizing how killer the oxygen thing was. Then when I realized I kind of panicked a bit and tried to fix it but well it went sideways :\

FTL the ever changing learning experience

 

[Haly]

What I hate about hacking is that the first thing the flagship hacks is your hacking room.