FTL: Faster Than Light

So I have been playing TONS of FTL lately and I thought it might be cool to have a roleplay based in that game, if anyone is interested. You don’t have to have played the game before to participate either.

If you haven't played, read this.:

I’m not entirely sure what to do with a roleplay like this, but I had a few ideas. We could have the roleplay take place on one ship, and have each person play a single crewmember and possibly one person to decide what happens at each beacon on the way to the federation fleet, or some other destination if we don’t want to be a part of the rebel/federation journey. We could also have each person be a commander of their own ship, and decide their ships role/loyalty (like federation, or rebels, or even solo mercenaries or pirates.). In that case the crew of each of the ships would be more minor roles. Either way, one ship or many, we can have whatever kind of journey we want. Please post if you have any questions or ideas.

We'd need a lot of random generators to determine the kinds and quantities of loot we'd get from encounters.

But if we can figure this all out, I'm in.

I guess I didn't think about that. I can always check the wiki for the range of loot that can be gotten and generate within those numbers. Actually I just checked the general rewards page, and evidently the events have a set list of rewards to yield based on how the event was completed (ship defeated by being destroyed, killed off crew etc.). They specify an amount of scrap like high medium low, but don't give exact amounts, and apparently an event in early game yields generally less scrap than the same event in sector 8. So, I'm not entirely sure how to go about that.

Random generator? MERRY WINTER:

http://donjon.bin.sh/

There's even a sci-fi section.

Well that happens to be blocked at my school but thanks for the link Rokku. I should be able to do it at home anyways. Also welcome back!

Arguing with doctors and the demons of the financial aid office Has consumed most of my time. BUT! I RETURN!

You may have to adjust some of the loot in the generator to be more scifi appropriate and less fantasy based, but its still a pretty good program.

Wait, you get different stuff if you kill the crew instead of destroying the ship?

NEW STRATEGY ACQUIRED.

Also, having played many rounds of this game, I think I can safely say that I hate it. It's on easy, I'm doing everything I can think of and I've never won once.

The closest I've ever come to winning was with the Kestrel and that was just dumb luck. I didn't have a chance in The Final Stand or whatever they call the last area.

The best I ever did, I would have to say was with the square ship that starts you off with ion weapons and drones. I didn't get as far as I did once or twice with the Kestrel, but I never felt like I was limping.

And oh, look, I'm talking about the actual game instead of a roleplay about it. I should probably be posting this elsewhere but it's late and I'm tired and angry because I JUST KEEP LOSING.

Also, I've posted three times in a row now because you're all gone or quiet or just boring (I'm looking at YOU, Layne, who hasn't even posted here!)

Okay. Well you appear to have had the same problems as my other friend who plays it. However, it is supposed to be a hard game. Its mentioned on the website the the devs intended you to win maybe one out of ten times (presumably on normal) Ive once out of about 30 or so tries on easy (kestral type a) and 15-20 or so times out of around 60 tries on easy. Thus far I have unlocked the engi type a (easy to start, hard to win) and b (terrible. Just don't even try it,) the federation cruiser type a (pretty solid overall) and b (slightly less so, unless you get enough blue options with the unique starter crew) the rock cruiser type a (havent played too much because I don't like the dependence on missiles) the zoltan type a (difficult without getting better weapons early on but the shield is useful throughout the game) the mantis type a (barely played it, but it seems fun) and the kestral type b (my personal favorite so far, with really good starting weapons and two aliens from the beginning). And of course the kestral type a, which is in my opinion the most balanced ship in the game. Probably not the best, but its up there. And yeah, if you kill all of the crew of an enemy ship (through asphyxiation, bio beams, or just melee combat) you get more scrap, and the chance for weapons and crew. And if you are willing to keep trying but want to speed up the learning process, just ask me. I don't know everything, but I can say I do. More or less.

I just have one simple question: How do I deal with boarding parties without holing up in the med bay and waiting for them to rampage through my ship until they eventually decide it's time to take on the crew?

I just now had the worst screw up in my FTL history.:

If you want to force them into the medbay, vent the air out of the rest of the ship. Simple as that. Also if you buy blast doors, and vent only the room they are in, they will head towards oxygen but will take damage as they have to break through the doors.

Hey, I did a little better this time. I actually encountered the Rebel Flagship. Too bad there's no actual way to beat it.

If you want, I could give you some tips on that. Also, congratulations!

This may be my best run yet. Can't say for sure yet. If I can get an Weapon Pre-Ignitor, Drone Control, Defense Drone II, Anti-Ship Drone II, a Burst Laser III and enough upgrades to use it all at once, I might win. If not, my 4 Shields won't be able to get me through.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH

I had full shields! I had a Burst Laser II and III! I had 3-star operators on everything! I had a Defense Drone II! I had power to everything! It was just short of the perfect set-up! And I still died at The Last Stand before I even got to the flagship!

This last one was my best so far. I embraced the concept of boarding parties and had two Mantises taking down the crew. I also started upgrading my engines so that I could dodge more. By the time I got to the flagship, I had full shields, a defense drone, one level under full engine power, an Engi on the engines with 3 stars, a 3-star pilot and a 3-star shield operator. I would've had a 3-star weapons guy, but he died in a random event. My boarding party also died aboard an exploding enemy ship. I might have managed to beat the flagship if my missiles hadn't run out. Between my Ion cannon and my Burst Laser II, I could barely take it'[s shield down. Forget doing damage.

Update!

So, I managed to unlock the Kestrel B. Once I eventually ended up back at the hangar, I thought I'd give it a look. I immediately noticed a full complement of weapons instead of the Kestrel A's half-stocked arsenal. I thought about it for 0.2 seconds before I was absolutely sure that it was superior in every way to the Kestrel A. The weapons it starts with could take down a fully upgraded shield (Although it couldn't do damage), all the major systems are at the back of the ship, letting you vent the air from the middle and right up to the control room without having to run people around to avoid asphyxiation, it gives you the proper amount of crew members and some of them are even useful.

So I started a game up with it and immediately discovered that I was right. With careful targeting, I could tear down enemies and they could hardly touch me. I blasted my way through two stages, which got my gunner up to two stars. I quickly came across enough scrap to start upgrading and even managed to catch a store that was selling a Burst Laser II, which meant that I could punch through the strongest shields and then damage the ship. I upgraded my engines for dodging and my shields for defense. I either never got the chance to get a Crew Teleporter or just passed it up for other things, because I never got one. Maybe that's where I went wrong.

I got very near the end and got myself Drone Control and a Defense Drone II. I upgraded the Drone Control enough to let me use it, but I was out of Scrap by that time and lacked the power to activate it. I did manage to use it when I needed it by taking my Med-Bay and one Basic Laser offline. The loss of the Med-Bay was fine, but without that Basic Laser I seemed to be getting nowhere. I did, eventually, manage to kill an unmanned drone in The Last Stand and get enough scrap to fully power everything.

Then it finally came time to fight the Flagship. I turned on my drone, targeted the Shield Room with all my weapons and waited. Eventually, with minimal damage to me, it went down. But, of course, there's a second round in which the Flagship activates drones of it's own. It sent two to attack my ship from the outside and one to attack the crew on the inside. It landed in the door control room and created a hull breach. It then immediately proceeded to destroy my door controls. Which would have been fine, if I hadn't been aerating my ship at the time, after having expected living people to board instead and opening half the doors and airlocks.

My gunner was the first to fall. Unable to close the doors, most of the crew quickly suffocated. The two Mantises did their best to take down the drone so the Engi could repair the hull, but the effort was in vain.

I'm glad you have made a lot of progress!

Here are some tips for beating the flagship, if you want them.:

I will say that I have had a lot of luck with the Red-Tail, including a run in which I upgraded to four BL IIs which meant a volley of 12 shots every charge, perfectly in sync (which is very good. If you say have a BL III and one BL II it is better to wait for them to both charge and fire them off at once, unless the enemy has no shields, because otherwise the BL III would spend some of its shots going through the shields again. Its especially important to wait on beam weapons, because they can only partially pierce low level shields.) I tend to stray away from missiles and drones especially early game, because I don't like to rely on finite resources. Even though it is entirely possible to manage them so that you have enough whenever you need them, I find myself running out of parts or missiles before the boss all too often. Also, the BL III is good if you don't have anything else in its place, but it seems like it just takes too long to charge to be worth it for the five shots in general.

I got really lucky this time. I made it past the drone phase of the flagship and on to the next one. I even fought a ship in between and used the resulting scrap to get repairs. But then was phase 3 (Which I didn't know existed) where it shoots roughly 42 energy shots while hiding behind a super-huge Zoltan shield. I had all my guns (Burst Laser II x2, Burst Laser I & Basic Laser) firing on the shield and aimed at the missile control room. I died before I ever punched through.

Once again, congratulations! Baby steps. Well, as baby as destroying a giant flagship of the rebel fleet can be. Remember to sync up the shots!

I think I could do it if everything wasn't totally random. And I'm not just talking about loot drops, I mean everything. Three identical random events, two times I'll have a successful outcome so I think it's safe the next time, then boom, one of my crew members die on the third. I only ever find good stuff at stores when it's either too early to have been able to collect any scrap or when I've given up on finding anything good and upgraded my systems, instead. I was lucky to get a Burst Laser III one sector before The Last Stand the last time I played. Up until then, I was still using the four Basic Lasers you start with.

Yikes. That is some really bad luck. If you really, really, REALLY want to make it easier, I believe there are some mods out there to do so.

I've checked the Steam workshop. It refuses to load anything when I search for FTL. I assume that means there's nothing there about it.

I don't think there is a steam workshop for FTL yet. I forget what site I saw them on, but I know I saw some mods to make it easier. As well as some nifty ship mods and a mod that makes the textures nicer and higher res, but keeps the same look.