FTL - Faster Than Light

[Racheya]

So FTL is a game that came from Kickstarter, I hadn't even heard of it until everyone and my boyfriend were playing it. I gave it a try and I've found it to be an amazing game. Don't be fooled by simplistic graphics, its far more engaging than any other game I've played recently. It has such solid mechanics.

 

I would say more but I'm making this thread on a phone. I know I'm not the only one playing here!

[All_Bogs]

I recently saw a couple of videos on this game, and it definitely caught my interest. It's on the ever-growing list of stuff I need to play when I have time :D

 

 

Quick overview of the game with TotalBiscuit:

 

[nine naked men]

Yeah, this game is really good and everyone should buy it. It's only $10 and since the Kickstarter was so successful (I think they asked for $10k and got about $100k? Something like that) there will probably be more content added/continued support for it.

 

As for giving people some idea of what it is, FTL is kinda Roguelike-esque in its design. Permanent death, progressive difficulty, randomised events and loot, etc. but there's RPG elements in upgrading different aspects of your ship, training your crew, etc. You're a Federation ship which needs to get home to warn your bosses about the Rebel Fleet's really balla' flagship through 7 sectors w/various races and I guess level conditions.

 

Continuing chat from the prev thread:

 

I've only got about 4 hours in ftl and I've not managed to finish a run on easy yet. I like how challenging it is, its not a cakewalk even on easy, but its not too hard either - yet.

 

I'll go make a thread, ask and ye shall receive, langzor!

For my first win I used the Engi Cruiser with a tonne of ion weaponry/bombs and a couple of anti-ship drones. I think the biggest problem is generally the missile launcher so being able to lock that down pretty much continuously with an ion bomb or two helps a bunch.

 

As for me I've been trying out boarding ships and killing the crew rather than just destroying them. It works really well if you manage to get two Mantis guys to fight for you. Gonna hope to unlock the Mantis ship because I assume it comes with a teleporter since Mantis are so board-happy.

 

And thanks for making the thread, I probably would've eventually made on but I'm lazy.

[Racheya]

Yeah, I haven't branched out on strategies much. I tend to use missiles to take out shields then use lasers to do hull damage and blow them up. I also am interested in unlocking the mantis ship since I think sending your crew over would bring quite a different dimension to it.

 

I bloody hate solar flares, closely followed by asteroid fields!!

[Racheya]

Yeah, I haven't branched out on strategies much. I tend to use missiles to take out shields then use lasers to do hull damage and blow them up. I also am interested in unlocking the mantis ship since I think sending your crew over would bring quite a different dimension to it.

 

I bloody hate solar flares, closely followed by asteroid fields!!

[Randox]

Am I the only one who things that watching and listening to that guy is quite possibly even more fun than the game itself (and I'm sure the game will be lots of fun, which is why I just bought it)? He's just so into it. Fortunately, in my experiance with my vast collection of space ship games (he loves the Armada sound track too <3: though Red Alert 2 has the best game soundtrack of all time for an RTS ), I get into space games like no other, so I probably have that covered anyway.

 

Looked at this and thought it would be like all teh space games I already have, but this is actually really cool, and looks to be quite a challenge.

[decebal]

Am I the only one who things that watching and listening to that guy is quite possibly even more fun than the game itself (and I'm sure the game will be lots of fun, which is why I just bought it)? He's just so into it. Fortunately, in my experiance with my vast collection of space ship games (he loves the Armada sound track too <3: though Red Alert 2 has the best game soundtrack of all time for an RTS ), I get into space games like no other, so I probably have that covered anyway.

 

Looked at this and thought it would be like all teh space games I already have, but this is actually really cool, and looks to be quite a challenge.

As a guy that has been subscribed to TB for 2 years, I agree with this statement.

 

Really tempted to buy it, that's for sure :P .

[Randox]

Hard. Fricken. Game.

 

In my first playthrough, I got up to a crew of six and then go slaughtered in a boarding action. I hate being boarded. On my second play through, I learned that blast doors are awesome, and all fights should take place in med bay whenever possible.

 

I lost my second round shortly after getting to sector 5, when I got boarded (again). I was like 'lol I'll just run to med bay and depresurize the entire rear half of the ship'. Apparently Zoltans don't suffocate, and I failed to notice the enemy ship until it started shooting me. At this point I re-took the weapons room which had been utterly destroyed (but I still had oxygen unlike the last time I got boarded and depresuraized everything but med bay). I then scrambled to try and get weapons back online while trying to maintain my shields, but I was never able to bring both primary weapons back to life, and the Zoltan ship blew me out of the sky.

 

I also learned to buy all the fuel, and take all options that give fuel, since I was in a constant state of running low during the entire fourth sector, and had to cut out a lot of my exploration.

 

Might try for one more round tonight. I need to get more outloud 'getting into it' rather than just having my crew creatively string together expletives interlaced with declarations of bloodlust. I also really need a security officer if I can get one because damn. The only thing that takes down the mighty randox (on easy mode) are boarding parties.

 

Also, when you first get your second shield, it's all win because nothing will really be able to hurt you for a while. but you can't get to the end of the game on 2 shield bars, eventually your going to need a third

[Racheya]

Managed to win twice now, first with the starting ship and then with the Enji cruiser. I quite like the playstyle of the Enji ship, focusing on drones. I did get cloak with the augmentation that lets you shoot through cloak without reducing it, so that probably helped. Cloaking when the Flagship is about to launch the missiles is a good way to avoid death!

 

I struggled with the Federation Cruiser to get past the first 2 sectors, maybe I need a little practice with it. I've unlocked the Stealth ship as well so I've got to give that a try yet.

[Randox]

The stealth cruiser is tricky from what I have seen, what with not having any shields (you'll probably want to buy some before the boss).

 

I finally managed to beat the boss on easy, so now I have the engi ship and the cruiser. The problem with the cruiser is the starting weapons are just terrible. That said, the artillary beam has promise. It's very effective, but it is also pretty much a garunteed 4 damage, that will damage at least a couple systems, regardless of defenses. While it costs a buttload to max out (and run, at a mighty 4 power), it does give you a third offensive system (along with guns and drones) making it a little bit harder to cripple your offensive power.

 

I am learning the value of getting good engines. When I beat the boss with the Kestral on easy, I did not have nearly enough evade, and only my defense drone saw me through it. I also suspect that a transporter and a couple mantis would do wonders against the boss. With a high evade and shield and teleporter, rather than focus on a huge array of big scary weapons that can beat down 4 shields and keep them down. Beam in, blow the shields, then use your weapons to demolish their helm and weapons. I'd like to try that.

 

I've also watched an unhealthy amout of lets plays for this (which is a first for me). Game is almost as fun to watch as it is to play, though if I have to see one more ship named with the maturity of the PoopNFartz I might scream. It's an interesting look into the dominant demographics we are aiming at with these things.

 

Not sure I like the engi ship or not. I seem to have generally bad luck with drones, and I'd probably end up at the boss with a Mk1 attack drone and a couple to repel boarders.

 

I would also love an extra sector to get more money, but I guess thats part of the challenge. However, a sandbox mode where you just keep going through sectors and the enemies just keep getting better would be very cool. This game might also get me back into Starpoint Gemeni. I sort of stopped playing that game when I got myself a dreadnaught and the enemies never really scaled up to match it (or the arguably more dangerous battleship predecessor), and thus all encounters are either me basically swatting flies, or running for my life because I got mobbed by a small fleet.

[nine naked men]

The stealth cruiser is tricky from what I have seen, what with not having any shields (you'll probably want to buy some before the boss).

 

I finally managed to beat the boss on easy, so now I have the engi ship and the cruiser. The problem with the cruiser is the starting weapons are just terrible. That said, the artillary beam has promise. It's very effective, but it is also pretty much a garunteed 4 damage, that will damage at least a couple systems, regardless of defenses. While it costs a buttload to max out (and run, at a mighty 4 power), it does give you a third offensive system (along with guns and drones) making it a little bit harder to cripple your offensive power.

 

I am learning the value of getting good engines. When I beat the boss with the Kestral on easy, I did not have nearly enough evade, and only my defense drone saw me through it. I also suspect that a transporter and a couple mantis would do wonders against the boss. With a high evade and shield and teleporter, rather than focus on a huge array of big scary weapons that can beat down 4 shields and keep them down. Beam in, blow the shields, then use your weapons to demolish their helm and weapons. I'd like to try that.

 

I've also watched an unhealthy amout of lets plays for this (which is a first for me). Game is almost as fun to watch as it is to play, though if I have to see one more ship named with the maturity of the PoopNFartz I might scream. It's an interesting look into the dominant demographics we are aiming at with these things.

 

Not sure I like the engi ship or not. I seem to have generally bad luck with drones, and I'd probably end up at the boss with a Mk1 attack drone and a couple to repel boarders.

 

I would also love an extra sector to get more money, but I guess thats part of the challenge. However, a sandbox mode where you just keep going through sectors and the enemies just keep getting better would be very cool. This game might also get me back into Starpoint Gemeni. I sort of stopped playing that game when I got myself a dreadnaught and the enemies never really scaled up to match it (or the arguably more dangerous battleship predecessor), and thus all encounters are either me basically swatting flies, or running for my life because I got mobbed by a small fleet.

 

If you look around, there's a mod or something that disables the rebel fleet. It's not a sandbox mode but it's pretty close. It makes the game much more easier, though, so it doesn't really cover what you're looking for. A neverending dungeon style mode would be pretty great, I agree.

 

Maxed out engines are pretty spectacular, I think with that and a two-star pilot I was up to 50%ish evade on the final boss.

 

Been trying to unlock the secret ship but I can never fulfill all of the conditions. Either I find it but not the right sector, or I find it and miss the event to unlock it or I don't find it at all. Being intentionally vague to try and avoid spoilers, I guess. :v

[Randox]

Yeah, what I really want would probably be a survival mode. You can even keep the fleet. Eventually your ship will be maxed out (though I don't think any ship can power itself entirely when maxed, at least not without an entire crew of Zoltans), and then the enemies would just keep getting harder until you go boom.

 

I've also looked at the stats for that secret ship, and I'm pretty sure it's just there to give you a bit of a challenge, unless its crew are better than I think,

 

I also noticed that many (or just all) of the B variants aren't actually better than the ones you start with. Just the opposite in many cases. Or maybe I should say more advanced, like the B varient of the Engi ship which starts with one crew and two repair drones, The drones don't need sensors, and can't permanently die (which is good because it doesn't have sensors), but you have no one to man anything but the helm. Looks like a tough ship to survive long enough with to survive. And the rock cruiser A which starts with just missles, and you have to pray that you find something like a burst two which can deal with two shields all on its own in a pinch. The guy I was watching use it found a pegasus launcher (2for1) and then messed it up by using his artemis at the same time to speed the fight up, when he should have been using pegasus to nuke their shields and then his heavy laser (because he found a gun with no shield bursting power) to pummel them. Natually he ran out of missles a lot, and would have never survived the boss anyway because he essentially had to skip entire sectors.

[nine naked men]

Yeah, what I really want would probably be a survival mode. You can even keep the fleet. Eventually your ship will be maxed out (though I don't think any ship can power itself entirely when maxed, at least not without an entire crew of Zoltans), and then the enemies would just keep getting harder until you go boom.

 

I've also looked at the stats for that secret ship, and I'm pretty sure it's just there to give you a bit of a challenge, unless its crew are better than I think,

 

I also noticed that many (or just all) of the B variants aren't actually better than the ones you start with. Just the opposite in many cases. Or maybe I should say more advanced, like the B varient of the Engi ship which starts with one crew and two repair drones, The drones don't need sensors, and can't permanently die (which is good because it doesn't have sensors), but you have no one to man anything but the helm. Looks like a tough ship to survive long enough with to survive. And the rock cruiser A which starts with just missles, and you have to pray that you find something like a burst two which can deal with two shields all on its own in a pinch. The guy I was watching use it found a pegasus launcher (2for1) and then messed it up by using his artemis at the same time to speed the fight up, when he should have been using pegasus to nuke their shields and then his heavy laser (because he found a gun with no shield bursting power) to pummel them. Natually he ran out of missles a lot, and would have never survived the boss anyway because he essentially had to skip entire sectors.

 

Au contraire, Crystal dudes have a pretty useful ability. They can prevent people from entering and leaving the room they use it in, and it also prevents all damage to the room.

 

I really like the Federation Cruiser B, since it starts with an extra point in the artillery laser, but the rest seem like acquired tastes.

 

And I tried watching a dude play FTL but it was on Youtube and he was godawful and it made me very sad. I know someone who streams it semi-regularly but he's from the UK so I'm rarely online when he does it. Being able to advise/criticise in real time seems like it'd greatly increase my enjoyment of watching other people play videogames on the internet.

[Randox]

Perhaps I shouldn't say they are bad ships, but very different. The ships special ability is certainly interesting, as are the crystal people. Part of my problem might be that I looked at them a while ago, and my arsenal of tactics is now much larger and more competant, and I would love to give that B ship a try (the one without weapons). Crystal peeps should be the ultimate boarders depending on how long that lock out lasts, since they you are garunteed to go in and dismantle the shields and there is nothing that can be done to stop you. Of course, this assumes your ship can repel weapons fire long enough for you to make the weapons effective (just load it up with beam weaponry).

 

I do like that. Every ship is unique, and requires a different approach to the game. The most similar ones are the kestral and cruiser, though the cruiser because of its artilarry beam has the option of defencing the shit out of itself and replying mostly on the artilarry beam to make the world go round.

 

I have also discovered that many of the lets plays were a lot better before I got good at the game. Seeing people mismanage their weapons and zoltons (there is no excuse for having a zoltan pilot when you have literally any other species on your ship), and stuff. Also the guy I am watching now will run out of missiles, be having a hard fight by their shields are down enough for the beam weapon to work and he jumps out when you know that every ship in the sector will have at least a double shield that your beam can't penetrate.

 

Edit: I made a bad with the Kestral B. I had 3 of my starting guns, and a big missle launcher, and maxed out engines and shields and all that good stuff (and an evasion of 55). I steamroll the first boss form taking all of 3 hull damage (without any drone systems to boot), then realize that I can't damage the 2nd form at all because my missles can't get to him, and my lasers can't penetrate 4 shields (if only I have found a burst, it might have worked). I sold my breech bomb systems back, and I got 4 people killed trying to take down the shield generator by force with my boarding party (which has won me sooooooo much scrap), and my two fix it men. If I had many mantis, or even more rocks, it might have worked, but I suspect that to take the shields down by raid I would pretty much need to send in like 6 mantis to secure the entire ship. So note to self, don't sell the teleporting bomb, because I am going to need it.

 

What is nice is that all those weapons each only have 1 guard, so it's not impossible to take them out, though it does take a while. Also, breech bombs are the best because they damage the system, and force the crew to deal with a breach first.

 

Also, improved blast doors handle boarding drones suprisingly well (since I had had both 'teams' on the enemy ship while they were boarding me. The Kestral B is however an epic ship.

[Racheya]

Got to the second boss round using the stealth ship. I had a really great tactic at the start of the game. I would cloak when I first engaged the enemy, then use the dual lasers to knock the shields down or out then ram them hard with the laser.

 

only that stopped working when ships started getting 3 shields. Even with an extra burst laser 1 I struggled. Swapping it out for a breach bomb helped a bit with knocking shields out but I just didn't have enough firepower to cope with the boss. :(

[Ginger_Warrior]

My god... I bought a new laptop today, knew about this thread, bought it to see what all the hype's about and... it's incredible. I just wasted the past three hours of my life on this.

 

I've not managed to complete the game on easy yet. I'm trying to get ion weapons and fire beam early on so I can disable their shields, go after their O2 and basically suffocate them to death. I think I'm getting more scraps that way, plus weapons I can either use or sell for more. It was going well 'til I came across a cruiser in an asteroid field in, I think, Sector 6. He had three shields and I didn't have the firepower to knock out his weapons room.

 

So... off to Tesco to get food... go back home and try again. :^_^:

[Randox]

I find that knocking out the O2 system is mostly useful for keeping the crew busy. To actually keep it down long enough to kill the crew would take a lot of sustained fire, and against the boss, top notch defenses. Still, it's an interesting approach, and just might be crazy enough to work (with the right weapons ).

 

I've managed to luck my way into a few ships now. I've fallen in love with telepoters. It's a good way to take out the boss weapons as well, sine the weapons rooms are isolated. If you have 4 shields, take down their missile and then ion and you 100% safe on the first two forms I think (even 3 shields will work, though you'll want decent evade to make sure one is always up against the second form)

[Necromagus]

I had an incredible run with the Engi ship today, right up until I had to fight the flagship. I stacked three anti-ship drones on top of a fully upgraded shield, a stage two cloak and stage two doors. The few seconds of relief that the cloak bought me was incredibly useful, as it was usually just enough time to get my shields back up and reposition my crew as the situation dictated. I was also amazed at how good my build was at handling boarding parties, on top of the usual Engi upgrade that heals them throughout the ship. Most of the times I killed them off simply by opening the airlocks and forcing them to struggle through my blast doors. Plugging away at enemy shields with my ion cannon to clear a path for my drones worked pretty well right up until the flagship, where my inability to focus my offence ended up killing me.

[Ginger_Warrior]

Yeah, the strategy worked decently well with the augment that gives an extra 10% scrap. I wasn't left wanting for weaponry when I got to the flagship, for my first attempt at taking it down. I didn't read any strategy guides before taking it on though, preferring the challenge. First phase is easy, just missile the shields, use lasers when shields are down for extra damage, cloak the missiles. Didn't work the second phase because of the defence drone, and he raped me with the attack drone special.

 

I had two Rocks in the teleport room... I don't know why I didn't think of just beaming them onto the missile weapon room and then cloaking the drone special.

[All_Bogs]

So, I finally got around to buying the game last Friday. Or rather, I had a friend buy the game for me, because Steam figured a Dutch person temporarily living in Sweden surely doesn't want to use iDeal (common Dutch payment method) and thus disabled the option, leaving me with no way to actually buy it. The joys of paying for stuff over the internet.

 

I then proceeded to have the most amazing start to any game ever, and died right after making my first jump. There were asteroids, and an enemy ship, and lasers and missiles, and then no shields, and a fire in the med-bay which ended up escalating a little leading to a situation where I could not heal my crew to make them extinguish more fires. I did end up destroying my assailant (or rather, the asteroids did), but I was unable to power the FTL-drive and high-tail it out of there with the steering wheel also being on fire, and eventually the asteroids consumed me. Lovely. Subsequent attempts got me to the third and fifth sector, prompting me to switch the difficulty to easy.

 

The difference was obviously pretty noticeable, and I managed to get to the final boss two times in a row. The first time around I took significant damage in the first round, and ended up being shredded during the second battle. The second time around, a combination of both poor planning and bad luck left me without enough weaponry to pierce four layers of shielding and a defence drone, which essentially meant the second phase was unwinnable. As it turns out, the third time's the charm, and some lovely teleporter action allowed me to quickly take out the missile launcher and the triple laser cannon, which made tanking the drones a whole lot easier. The last phase was a breeze, with blast doors and a full compliment of eight crew easily being able to handle the invaders, and the special weapon by itself unable to do a whole lot of damage. Some damage was taken though, as it takes some time to take out the missile launcher and the other weapon each time, and to be perfectly honest I might not have survived if it wasn't for an extremely conveniently placed shop.

 

Along the way I unlocked both the Engi ship and the Stealth Cruiser, though I haven't played either of them. I did give the Federation Cruiser a shot, planning on just messing around and unlocking some achievements for the alternate lay-out. If you rush for two shields, taking out an enemy with just the artillery beam is a rather trivial achievement, as you will eventually run into a poor bastard who has nothing but a laser and a beam, leaving them unable to do any damage whatsoever. The other achievement involved making it to the fifth sector without upgrading weapons, which wasn't too difficult. However, at some point I got into a fight where four Mantis boarded my ship while theirs bombarded the crap out of me, leaving me with only two crew alive and a ship full of holes as I drifted into sector five.

 

I figured I would try to keep going and see where I'd end up, since my upgrades were pretty decent. I ended up reaching sector eight with just about everything I wanted, including an extra burst-II laser and some missiles. Sadly, I only managed to pick up a Rock-man crew-wise, and going up against the Flagship with an entire three crew members seemed slightly suicidal. It was, because as soon as it pierced my shields and their beam cut across my ship, it was panic all over as my crew valianty tried to extinguish all the fires. By the time the situation was under control, my weapons had managed to take out their missile launcher and ion cannon, and the Flagship was ... down to four hull points?? As it turns out, the Artillery Beam is pretty good against it. It pierces shields, and hits a TON of rooms, so each swipe deals a lot of damage. The later two phases took a similar route, with my meager crew running around like headless chickens while automated weapons-fire and the beam did the damage required, and so I surprisingly defeated the boss with a mere three crewmembers.

 

 

Thus far, I can't say I have too much criticisms about the game. Renaming your dudes at the start is a bit of a pain, with having to type their name, press enter, and then click accept. Sincetyping with two hands is rather ingrained into my head, I find myself wishing I had three hands going through the ordeal. As for the game itself, the controls are pretty pristine, and the ability to issue commands while the game is paused really eliminates any problem it might have otherwise.

 

Your crew's ability to gain experience in certain tasks is somewhat easily exploited. If you encounter a ship early on that is unable to damage you, you can essentially just leave the game running until the crew manning the helm, engine and shields are all maxed out, earning you +20% shield recharge rate and +10% avoidance for free really early on.

 

The main beef I have is that there are so many things that ruin the sense of immersion a little bit. For starters, why is my ship the only one with 30 hull points? Why are the majority of enemies totally suicidal, and why does the game explicitly state that they are powering up their FTL? I mean, they are dodging, so they obviously have working engines and a guy piloting, so shouldn't their FTL be charging anyway? Your ship just seems to be a special snowflake for no real reason. Also, judging from the in-game events, the Mantis have ludicrous names such as KazaaakplethKilik, so why are my Mantis crew members called Tom Jones and John Doe? (I understand they awarded some amount of people who donated with having their name appear in-game, but they could've just made that human-only)

 

But yeah, immersion aside, the entire thing seems to be pretty well thought out. Definitely enjoying it thus far, and it's only 10 euros too!

[Kaida23]

Curse you, Rach! As if RS wasn't addicting enough, you had to introduce me to this. :P

 

So far, I haven't been able to make it past the first couple of jumps into sector six. The first time, I got boarded by 4 Mantis who utterly destroyed my crew and the second time I was in the Slug nebula and couldn't see half the ship so I fell way behind on putting out fires and everyone pretty much burned to death.

 

I've read lots of tips that I should be getting all kinds of extra crew members, but I don't know how these people are doing it. I'm lingering in sectors, checking out every ship location I can and doing every side quest I come across, and still only have 4 crew when I enter sector 6. At least I unlocked a Zoltan ship, so I have something new to try. |^_^|

[nine naked men]

Curse you, Rach! As if RS wasn't addicting enough, you had to introduce me to this. :P

 

So far, I haven't been able to make it past the first couple of jumps into sector six. The first time, I got boarded by 4 Mantis who utterly destroyed my crew and the second time I was in the Slug nebula and couldn't see half the ship so I fell way behind on putting out fires and everyone pretty much burned to death.

 

I've read lots of tips that I should be getting all kinds of extra crew members, but I don't know how these people are doing it. I'm lingering in sectors, checking out every ship location I can and doing every side quest I come across, and still only have 4 crew when I enter sector 6. At least I unlocked a Zoltan ship, so I have something new to try. |^_^|

 

It's mainly luck. I usually come across 2-3 slaver ships, and they usually offer crew members as a surrender term. I also gamble more than I should with random events (like the dude living on a planet, exploding scientist station, abandoned space station, etc.) and they sometimes pay off with crew members. Most of the time I'll have one in each enhance-able station and at least two people to punch dudes with in around sector 7.

 

I really need to copy my FTL save data onto my new computer, I haven't played it in days and I can't stomach the default ship anymore.

[Ginger_Warrior]

I always keep an Engi in the pilot room too, with one of the humans you start with actually doing the piloting. If your pilot subsystem goes out, you're relying completely on the shields. Given you can boost evasion up to 55% without cloak, it's really not to be sniffed at. Bottom line is: it needs fixing, fast. Plus you need to boost engines up to get it that far, meaning if you're really in dire straights (like if the Rebels have caught up and you have to get raped by a cruiser) you can just FTL jump away from it more quickly than you would otherwise with a bad engine.

 

On the FTL wikia's page on 'Piloting', in the comments section... there's a guy who recommends boosting O2 supply at the expense of piloting... There's either some genius reason behind that, or it's the best lol I've had in a while.

[All_Bogs]

The FTL Wikia seems to be in a pretty bad shape right now, and the comments sometimes reflect this. Regardless, even "pointless" boosts to systems like O2 and the medbay have their uses, because even if you don't have sufficient juice to actually power these updates, they can still take a single hit without instantly being disabled. It's the same with the piloting subsystem, really - even though the auto-piloting upgrade seems relatively pointless, the ability to take a stray shot to the bridge without losing ALL of your avoidance right away is really nice.

 

Plus, upgrading systems across the board allows you to make the most of certain events. For example, with a level 2 medbay, you can basically cure the "dude living on the planet" of his mental disorder without fail, resulting in a free crew member every time. Often you can also buy crew at shops, which is something to consider if you're really hurting for dudes. Humans only cost 40 scrap, after all.

 

As for boarding, having strong doors is a really big boon as well. Being able to suffocate invaders helps a great deal, even if it does not always outright kill them. Four mantis with 20 health each are a lot less dangerous than four who are fully healed, after all.

[Ginger_Warrior]

No... you're right, blast doors fully upgraded are a must. When I finished the game on Easy I had enough scrap to "protect" systems like O2, Med and Drones, it's definitely a good idea. Losing your Defence drone against a ship with rockets is a real killer and makes a small problem much more serious.

 

I need to learn about all the events and how to deal with them. Haven't had time to research it properly.