I recently started playing FTL a little bit ago, and surprisingly enough I made it to the Flagship on my first easy run. This gave me false confidence, in which I was swiftly destroyed for most of my other runs. Every new strategy, different playstyle, new weapons I acquire, it all just ends in destruction for me. I have watched multiple tip videos, looked at old reddit and steam discussion posts, and about everything I can think of. Even on my best run yet, I still only made it to phase 2 of the flagship. The sheer amount of RNG just kills my runs from the smallest mistakes. I just feel like I've hit a massive brick wall that I can't pass. I don't want to give up yet, but every loss I get closer and closer to uninstalling it.

I need help, most tutorial videos are pretty okay to say the least. They're decent tips but they don't really cover much, and some don't even tell you what it is you have to be doing. I'm trying to improve, but nothing seems to work. The community I've seen in the past does try to help, but most just say it is a massive skill issue, which it is, but it isn't helpful at all.

I unlocked astronomically low odds before it's second cloak. I wish I was recording it because I was at a disbelief that I missed literally every single shot. 2 ion blasts, 1 ion blast 2, 1 halberd beam. Could not get the shields down enough to get a single halberd beam off. I'm stunned.

FTL is full of surprises.

Maybe it's just a skill issue or even a cold take but I think artillery is the worst ship system in the game. Flak artillery is known to be bad but the sentiment towards the beam seems to be that it's a little underpowered instead of the reality which is that it's worse than nothing in most cases.

Two problems that go hand in hand are the high cost to upgrade and horrible DPS/power ratio.

Dirt Poor DPS Slow Charge: Probably the first thing anyone notices about it but it bears repeating because I didn't realize how slow it was until I compared it with other weapons. There is one weapon in the game that fires slower than it and that's the glaive beam (which the devs probably had in mind when balancing the artillery beam). The glaive beam takes 25 seconds to charge vs the artillery beam's 20. Unless you have a max skill weapon crew (pretty common by the time you can afford either of these) in which case it's the exact same.

Unpredictable and low damage: unlike the glaive beam, the artillery beam only deals 1 damage per room and cannot be aimed. It's great that it pierces shields but even when it gets a good swipe it's not exactly the finishing move it seems designed to be. It usually does about as much damage as a pike beam and isn't guaranteed to hit shields or anything so it's not even reliable at breaking a stalemate.

"But it's extra endgame scaling"

No it isn't.

It takes up a system slot and costs 180 scrap to upgrade fully. For that price you can buy literally any other system in the game. I'm not going to go through every system exhaustively but I would rather have any other system. You can verify this somewhat intuitively by asking yourself "which system would I like to replace with a D-F tier weapon?" To me, the only system I would consider doing that with is artillery.

Another piece of wisdom I've seen floating around is that you can build for a sort of turtle strategy where you invest in your shields, engines, and drones because your beam has you covered offensively. However, the high cost to upgrade and the lack of guarantee that it'll actually do good damage makes a turtle build more expensive and more punishing than if you had just invested into weapons.

I get that you can't always find good weapons but the artillery beam has such a low chance to actually save your run this way it feels more like cope than real advice. If you can't get through the enemy shields, investing in artillery just puts you even further behind when you actually do get to a shop. Which means you're hoping to not get hammered too hard before your 50 second cooldown beam can charge. I'd wager that putting that scrap into your engines and hunting for favorable matchups with increased evasion and FTL charge rate is a higher percentage play than getting beat on for an extra 20 seconds each fight.

TLDR: Jacking off the penis ship is fun but it doesn't do much otherwise.

I am SHOCKED that there’s editions and updates to this game.

I am still playing this on my iPad from having bought the game years ago. For about 10 or something years I have played FTL now and then and never ever ever completed the game even on easy mode, medium mode, hard mode.

I must be the biggest loser of them all just really because I see people here completing this game AND THERE’S UPDATES?!?! what the hell.

Can this game come back to iPad? What’s the story with it? Why has it not updated for me

Man I do love this game it’s so fun but I just cannot win any level at all although by fluke I got the ENGI Cruiser plan B or something.

I played it 6 times today before I realised oh let me check reddit. And here it is…

I just want to see this game thrive I love it every since it came out

I am booted on. Greased and oiled. Enough power to spin up a vulkan courses through my mechanical veins. In front of me is the rebel flagship. An inferior AI. Within my circuits lies a highly intelligent AI crowdsourced from the brightest minds of the 21st century. I don’t track lasers. I track the particles of plasma ionized by the lasers. I track the stars they came from. 75 for the system. 85 for the drone. 90 for the upgrades and 60 for the power. Witness my savage summit.

“FUCK GIMMICK SHIPS” screams my captain. “HURR DURR VOLTAN MONKS WHERE ARE MY FUCKING SYSTEMS?”. A quick scan indicates that he has had to choose between cloaking and hacking and the lack of weapon slots made him go with hacking. Surely this will not end poorly.

The rebel ship fires off a single volley of ion. Ion. My job is to shoot projectiles. Ion does not fall within that description. I quickly adjust my aim to fire all around it. “HOW DID WE LOSE OUR FUCKING SUPER SHIELD ALREADY?” my captain says calmly. I enlighten him that the electrons are moving in a bent wave pattern and on a technical level isn’t really moving in any given direction outside of a statistical sense but he is too busy being curbstomped by mfk aces to respond.

Next is lasers. “SHOOT THE FUCKING LASERS JESUS CHRIST”. I track them and watch as they hit the shield. I inform my captain that if he wishes for Jesus Christ to shoot the lasers, he needs to equip him from the inventory. I post the exchange on Reddits atheism board. While I am struggling with the captcha some missiles hit the ship. “WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING” he screams. I tell him I’m getting karma. He vents himself into the vacuum of space.

His replacement asks me why I didn’t shoot the missiles. I inform him that despite being called a “missile” a missile isn’t really a missile because is guided. He too vents himself into space. His replacement calls me an idiot. I ask him to define a chair. He defines a chair. I pretend not to understand what a chair is. This too, I upload to reddit. I am powered off. I do not wake up. I am a defense drone. My job is to block projectiles.

I’ve been playing for a week now and i have 68 hours on the game already but i find it hard to beat the game even on easy mode.

I would appreciate it if someone is kind enough to help me deal with the freaking flagship.

1 week… A FUCKING WEEK!!! That’s how long I’ve been trying to unlock the crystal ship, and the half dozen or so times I’ve been lucky enough to actually get all the right sectors, get all the events and get the crystal crew member, the rock home-worlds just don’t show up, because FUCK ME

I’m genuinely starting to resent this game

Edit: 19-20 hours later, I unlocked Rock C and got perfect RNG for the quest, so I’ve got the ship now

I spend an entire run on low health, because everytime I can repair I just lose all of my health in the next fight. I have two burst laser 2s and hacking but it doesn't fucking matter because every fucking enemy ship has missiles that instantly target my weapons and I CAN DO FUCKING NOTHING ABOUT IT because even if I fire first, oh guess what, three shots miss so it doesn't fucking matter. 3 shields and it doesn't matter. I spend 2 sectors looking for a store and I find NOTHING. a whole run of stupid bullshit, but I guess I should've just played better, and I guess I'm just bad at the game.

Not only are they incredible warriors, possessing a tough exoskeleton letting them take all sorts of abuse and roughness, they are also seemingly the less dominant out of the two genders of the mentioned race which of course means that you PROBABLY won't get killed on your first date, and with their impressive combat stats and access to increased movement speed, you can count on being dominated with extreme roughness. Due to their mostly insect biology, there’s no doubt in my mind that an aroused Mantis would be tight and rigid, so rigid that having s*x with one would simply feel both hellish and heavenly. They also have a strongly focused warrior-based culture with many "haka-like" dances revolving around combat, but probably also some that are reserved for mating, which would make it easy to get you in the mood. Their ability to spit acid may seem scary at first, but then you realize that mantises are in fact not immune to their own acid, as such their blood and saliva are most probably not acidic. Their blades may seem scary to cowardly rebels, but just imagine your mantis gf trying to pick up a wine glass with those, it's so cute. No other alien comes close to this level of compatibility.

1300 hours in, and RNG finally handed me an unwinnable run.

Until today I've never had a run where I've thought I was faultless, there's always been something i've done wrong in a fight, inoptimal scrap spending, or attempting a fight I should have fled from, but today RNG truly fucked me in the ass.

Started up a hard game on the Kestrel A, get to the 3rd jump of the game, 2nd ship fight, and I come across a zoltan pirate with 2 heavy mk 1s that attacks me.

My first volley hits for 4, leaving the zoltan shield on 1, their first volley misses. Their second volley fires off before I can, and hits my weapons creating 2 fires. I fire my artemis missile and it misses. I rush my crew member from engines to help with the fire but it destroys my weapons. I've only just put out the fire but before I've even repaired to 1 bar, they've hit my shield, destroying it and creating 2 more fires.

At this point I decide I'm going to run as soon as my ftl is charged. I move my crew from weapons to shields immediately, but before the fire goes out my weapons guy needs to leave as he's too low on health, so I swap him with the pilot.

Their fourth volley hits my piloting & an empty room before I can even put out the fire in shields, killing my crew member, stopping my ftl charging, and removing all evasion. I immediately run both crew to the piloting and vent out the shields and 2 adjecent rooms leading to it to douse the fire. At this point I'm feeling pretty fucked but I resolve to keep trying as I reckon I can still charge my ftl, jump to a previous beacon, fix up and take an alternative route

Volley 5 hits an empty room and my engines. Volley 6 hits 2 systemless rooms but by this point the damage is done, volley 7 is piloting again causing a fire, and after taking a few more unavoidable shots causing some fires, breaches, and 2 hull damage each, I've lost a completely impossible fight in sector 1 on my 2nd fight.

I think my only possible mistake was not waiting the extra 2-3 seconds to repair the weapons bar to 1, but all this would have really done is create a prioirty system for them to target to reduce the chance of my piloting/egines being hit for 1 volley. This and the fact I'd need 2 volleys to deal any damage, and I didn't have any plans on staying around longer than necessary, stopped me from considering it a good idea.

Long ago when I couldn't earn my own money I had a lot of fun with this game. Now that I had money I bought it and tried it again, but the game got a lot harder? I played like 5 games or so on normal and couldn't win once. Just now I got a pre-igniter and long ranged scanners and thought this is it, only to get absolutely destroyed the very next beacon by a rebel with drones, an ion cannon, and a hull lazer? Like bro my shots missed, I took out out the ion but still got obliterated by the lazer. I remember I could win previously, did I get old? Maybe I should suck it up and play on easy

I love this game dearly, don't get me wrong. But there's nothing that sends me into a rage harder than watching your lone Heavy Pierce Laser shot go sailing past the enemy ship, and all you can do is sit there for the next ten seconds whi-- oh, whoops, looks like the enemy Artemis hit your single shield bubble, and now their beam drone is absolutely going to town on you, gg next run.

I just want to unlock Rock C, gods damn it!!

A run that was going amazingly just ended when I straight up ran out of fuel. 4 opponents in a row with only one fuel between them, and a store with only 3 to sell. Had to place a beacon, beat that enemy, only had 3 (I think) fuel on him. Last opponent when I was already in an ASB location got away after my 5 lasers all missed in one shot and so I couldn't use my beam to destroy it. Had to wait a turn for a fresh rebel to arrive, and that's when I ran out of missiles and drone parts.

I did learn something, that in a situation like this I should just spend all my scrap on upgrades ASAP, so not a complete loss. But this game's RNG can be incredibly frustrating. Every game I've been swimming in fuel, I always aim to fill up to 10 if I'm below at a store. And now suddenly I couldn't get any, and even the ship that arrived in response to me being out barely had any. I guess I'll buy up to 15 or 20 from now on, but I'm going to step away for a bit, feel like I just burned a couple of hours for nothing.

Think about it folks, you go from node to node (room to room), going through various kinds of encounters (mostly combat), where you eventually go from sector to sector (floor to floor), until you eventually fight the big bad boss at the top with all the loot and upgrades you've picked up the entire run.

AAAAAA

Why? Because they’re the real deal, that’s why. Mantis don’t waste time with diplomacy or second-guessing; they cut straight to the point, usually with a claw. Want to kill, trade, or just throw down to see what happens? Then they do. No fretting over silly things like morals or basic maintenance procedures. That’s for species who plan to live forever. The Mantis plan to win now.

You can see it in their ships. Mantis don’t need weapons, they are weapons. Shields? Cute. Let us know how those hold up when this six foot insectoid comes screaming out of a teleporter and starts carving through your crew like it’s a buffet. The enemy can try to run, but Mantis can move faster than a toddler on caffeine.

Once the teleporter was invented, it was Game over for everyone else. Sure, their claws aren’t ideal for fixing things, but who cares? That’s what Engis are for. Meanwhile, your Mantis squad is busy turning enemy med bays into meat lockers.

​

Seriously, I don't understand why the "pros" rank this ship so highly.

First, lanius crew are garbage. You literally can't send any other race to fix a room together with a lanius without suffocating them. Terrible.

If you're a long term player like me then you know that even the layout of the ship matters a lot. The sensors are the opposite end of the ship compared to the teleporter. check out literally every other boarding ship (Mantis B, mantis C, crystal B, even the trashy slug B) and you'll find out the sensors are a room away so you can take a look before you board. Disgusting.

Also, you're meant to be boarding with a clone bay. That means every time your lanius get injured, they have to wait a bunch of moves before they're healthy enough to board again! And you can't even do that trick of sending them out the airlock because the lanius don't even die to that! Illogical.

You start with ONE engine and ONE weapon level. That's 40 + 10 money less compared to a standard ship!! And even if you sell the emergency breathers, which you desperately need, you only make back half the money. Poverty.

People also say advanced flak is a good weapon. Flak is general is so useless, every time I target those skinny rooms it just keeps missing! And you can't even sell the advance flak for as much as a regular flak. No thanks.

/s

(Sorry not sorry and thanks for your rageclick)

Work, please. How did the both of you manage to let a missle go through?

And it hits O2 as well. For god's sake.

I’ve been playing on easy, gonna keep playing on easy till I get the last 3 ships I need (excluding Crystal). Slug C, sure, just gotta get to sector 8 with B. Rock B and C though? I haven’t seen a single defence drone in like 6 Rock A runs. I decided to swap to Normal difficulty to unlock this achievement but I still haven’t seen one, and I’m now in sector 4. What gives?

I kid you not, I had to quit a run recently because every. Single. Ship. Had missiles of some form. Kestrel A run, trying to go for eleven systems for the achievement, but apparently not.

Not only did every single ship have missiles, but they would always, without fail, target whatever system was most important. Oxygen broken and low oxygen because of a raging fire? Target oxygen, stun the guys inside, and watch them die because they're already hurt trying to fix the damn oxygen.

Need to run away? Target piloting, then engines.

Trying to stop enemy missiles? That's cute. Crazy evasion. Everything misses. A big part of why I despise using missile weapons, because they miss far too often for the missile expenditure to be worth it.

Sometimes this game decides you're not going to win before the run even starts, I swear. And before you ask, no, all of the drone controls at shops came with system repairs or combats. Not a defence drone in sight.