It's Possible! All Ships Beaten on Normal!

[CebadaGago]

Last night, after more than a year on and off (mostly off and not playing FTL), I finally completed beating the game on normal in every single ship! It's entirely possible, so don't despair. Thanks to everyone here, I've been a long-time lurker of these forums for tips to pull it all off.

If there's any primary advice I can give, it's to not bang your head against the wall. If things just arn't working out, try a new strategy. Some runs are doomed from the beginning, but you should be able to tell, regardless of the RNG, how you're doing in general and if the choices you're making are working out. My feeling is that each ship has kind of a random starting spot (missing weapons or shields, etc.), and nearly all the ships you play are trying to get to a few builds by Sector 8 to win the game. How you evolve your ship then in the early stages to get there is cool as it shows off your creativity and flexibility. Good luck!

[Levgre]

Many people are well past that point and working to beat all ships on hard Congrats though, some of the ships are a real hassle even on normal difficulty.

[MightyThor2000]

I can't even beat it with the mantis ship on easy. I'm so amazing pissed off right now, just started 3 games, one a meteor took out the enemy ship with my two boarders on it cus I wasn't paying close enough attention. Restart, a sector in I'm on the enemy ship, turns on the entire crew is mantis even though it's not a mantis ship, they disable my teleporter by random chance and my boarders die again. This happens like every time, this ship has so many issues if you don't get super easy pickings early. Like miss one bomb on a medbay and it's gg you can't bring down the ship since you have nothing else to get through shields.

[CebadaGago]

Sorry, what is hard? Is Normal hard? I only have two modes on my game: Easy and Normal. I've beaten everything on the harder of the two modes.

[CebadaGago]

Well, just learned that there's a new Advanced Edition update haha! Awesome.

[5thHorseman]

Well, just learned that there's a new Advanced Edition update haha! Awesome.

You're in for a fun ride

And yes, what the game calls "Normal" mode is what most games would call "Hard" mode. The new "Hard" mode is closer to what most games would call "Nightmare" mode

[MightyThor2000]

I just think rng plays a much bigger role in the normal and hard modes unfortunately. It's not *really* that skill based once you figure out what combos work and what don't, that doesn't really change. All that changes is what is available to you and sometimes you get awesome stuff like a vulcan laser dropped in your lap (my highest score, easiest game yet) and sometimes you don't get a weapon upgrade til sector 6. On easy you can usually scrape by to 8 and have a 50/50 shot at the boss without optimal weapons. On normal if you don't get some juicy stuff by 2 or 3 you are done most times.

[ouyin2000]

Go fuck yourself.

[itg]

I just think rng plays a much bigger role in the normal and hard modes unfortunately. It's not *really* that skill based once you figure out what combos work and what don't, that doesn't really change. All that changes is what is available to you and sometimes you get awesome stuff like a vulcan laser dropped in your lap (my highest score, easiest game yet) and sometimes you don't get a weapon upgrade til sector 6. On easy you can usually scrape by to 8 and have a 50/50 shot at the boss without optimal weapons. On normal if you don't get some juicy stuff by 2 or 3 you are done most times.

It may seem that way at first, but when you get better at the game, you'll realize that despite the pervasive random events, skill really is the dominant factor, The best players can win virtually all games on normal and a very high percentage of hard mode games (the jury is still out on what win percentage is attainable, since AE is still very new). If you're not winning consistently on normal, you're making mistakes, most of which you probably don't recognize (obviously, or you wouldn't make them). You'll get better much faster if you look back on a loss and say to yourself, "what should I have done differently?" rather than just curse your bad luck--I'm not necessarily saying you do that, but it's a very common reaction from people who claim this game is too luck-based.

[MightyThor2000]

I don't agree with that, especially because I read somewhere the developers wanted to make a difficult game and shot for a 10% win rate initially (I'm assuming that's on normal). So I find it hard to believe anyone is getting much more than 50/50 on normal.

Basically the boss is the great equalizer because you must get through 4 shields while surviving. There are only a few weapon combos that can get through four shields. You either need a missile/bomb to take them down or you need a ton of lasers, period. If you don't get a combo that can do that or you get a combo that has a very small window to damage the boss you're relying on a lot of rng like not missing a crucial missile or ion bomb or or laser burst if you only have five shots that line up.