Re: Balance thoughts after 59 hours.
Posted: Sat Nov 03, 2012 8:29 pm
Tal wrote:For me, the biggest issue FTL has is teleporting. For a small investment (75scrap), you can consistently capture ships - which has huge benefits - more scrap, more crew, and more weapons. It pays for itself very quickly.
You also don't need to invest in weapons (a bomb or missile to take out a medical bay/ reduce their firepower) is all you really need. Because weapons and weapons systems are so pricey, not having to do this lets you spend more on defenses, which means you take less damage, and get more money etc etc. It's also brilliant against the last boss. To put it simply, teleporting is reliable, predictable, and too good.
I disagree that teleporting is too good. In order for teleport to be reliable you need to upgrade it right away, otherwise you risk losing your crew if your tele is on cooldown. This means a huge initial investment. Not only do you need to upgrade it for it to be effective, but you need proper crew in order to invade an enemy ship. Mantis and Rockmen are my favorite, but if you don't have any of those it's more of a gamble. And every crew member that you designate as invasion is one less crew member manning systems on your own ship. Teleporting is also slow to win battles and without adequate defenses that buy you time while your invasion party does damage, you can take a lot of damage from their weapons, especially missiles.
Teleporting is also not effective against unmanned drones, and it's only effective against the last boss when taking out the weapon systems. You cannot beat the last boss with a teleport strategy alone. You need to do damage.
75 scrap is not necessarily a small investment because that's almost a double shield upgrade (100 scrap is 2x shields and 2 energy to support it), or more points into evade or weapons systems. It makes me wonder if you consistently play on easy. I rarely upgrade into a tele strategy simply because I am more focused on getting weapons that will secure any kind of victory, i.e., lasers.
Tal wrote:The boss
I like the last boss - he's a nice challenge at the end of the game. But taken with the rest of the game, he creates a weird problem. The problem is because he's such a challenge compared to the rest of the game, you need to have a very good run to have to beat him. On most winning attempts, I get lucky/do well in the early sectors, and then can farm for the next 4-5 in relative safety. This was ok the first time, but not so afterwards.
In contrast to this, all my favourite games of FTL involve going from crisis to crisis, limping to a store, not being able to afford what I want because I'm spending so much on repairs, and each battle nearly being my last. But if you have a game like that, there's no chance at the end. This tension between the most enjoyable games, and winning the game seems strange, but I don't have solutions for this.
I completely agree with this. The last boss is somewhat disconnected from the rest of the game. I can usually tell if I will win the game or not based on the first 3 sectors. If I am behind in my shields or weapons, or am spending too much repairing or getting fuel then I know I won't have enough later. Some ships, such as the Engi or Stealth or even Rock, I almost need to get a few lucky weapon drops for my games to go well. When you start going up against level 3 shields and can't do damage you are going to lose.
Tal wrote:Missiles
Missiles are fine for enemies, but for players they're just much worse than bombs, because doing hull damage is way less important than disabling systems, so missiles aren't efficient.
I agree with this too, I think missiles are a waste of time. I will use them if they drop for me and I have a few extra missiles sitting around but in general they are slow and easy to counter. Defense drones will shut you down if you go with missiles, PLUS they use ammunition.
My ideal strategy is a couple of burst lasers mk. II, a hull laser, and a teleporting bomb, either breach or fire. 8 shots and teleporting bombs is going to win every time.