Gila Monster tips?

[tecetyeintyale]

I can't seem to get the hang of using this ship, and I'm wondering if anyone has some tips that might help. I've only been playing the game for a little under a week now and haven't really tried boarding until I decided to test this ship out, but I've been doing pretty well with the first four ships (Kestral, Engi, Federation, and Zoltan) and have managed to beat the flagship in layout A with all four of those. With the Mantis Cruiser, though, I can't even seem to make it TO the flagship, let alone beat it!

I've looked at a lot of info on boarding and I don't think that's my problem; I feel like I usually go for the right targets and kill off crews as quickly as possible. I think the main problems I run into are:

1. I can't seem to find a reliable way to keep my ship from getting pummeled while my boarding party takes everyone out. The initial bomb you get is great for keeping weapons systems down, but I can't use it too much or I run out of bombs.
2. I never seem to have enough scrap to do everything I need to do (probably partly because I have to repair so much more often with this ship). It seems to me like with this ship, I really need to upgrade my shields and engines quickly to help with my defense, I also need to upgrade my teleporter since that's my main "weapon," AND I need to try to find more reliable weapons and upgrade the weapons system before I start running out of bombs.

If anyone has any tips or general strategies they use when playing with Gila Monster, I'd really appreciate it! In particular, I'm wondering how best to prioritize upgrading. Maybe I just need better luck early on with getting more helpful events that will give me things like better weapons? I did have horrible luck on my most recent run and kept running into auto scouts that I had no way of taking out.

[5thHorseman]

The whole strategy with any ship is reducing damage (and repairs), and the Gila Monster is no different. The bonus you have with this ship is that you get more scrap per battle because you leave the enemy ships intact, and the downside is that you tend to take more damage because those battles tend to take longer.

Step 1 is to get your second shield ASAP. Like, don't spend scrap on anything until you get 50 (sometimes as few as 2 or 3 battles) and then upgrade your shields. Many many battles in the first 2 sectors can be completely lopsided into your favor by having 2 shields instead of 1. Another big goal is to get more crew, especially more mantises or rockmen. If you get one more guy, then you want a level 3 teleporter.

Here's a nice teleporter trick. Send 2 mantises down, and get 2 more guys in the teleporter ready to go. Don't use your mantises on the enemy ship to fight. Just run them around from room to room. Pretend you're watching Benny Hill while your teleporter recharges, and then send the other two guys down. Bam, poor man's 4-person teleporter!

Zoltans (Well, their shields) really hurt this ship, so avoid their sectors. Nebulas frequently give more people so go for those too. Don't do anything that will take crew away from you and chew through slavers with abandon.

[tecetyeintyale]

Ok, thanks. Maybe my issue has been not upgrading the shield quick enough--I don't usually make it priority 1, although it always is a high priority. I'll give it a try. Missiles have really been what have done me in most of the time, because usually I have no way to avoid them unless I can invest in drones with a defense I.

And good point about using the teleporter that way! I had one run where I lucked out with 2 more mantises from events, so I was running one boarding team of 2 over to start, then when the teleporter cooled down, sent the next 2. That's the run I got the furthest on, but I was still just taking too much hull damage in the end. But maybe running the two that get sent over initially around will help, then they can all 4 go at it at once when the last 2 get over there. Is the best strategy then to send them all into a 4-person room so they're all fighting in one place, or split them into two important systems rooms to split enemy attention?

I didn't realize nebulas gave crew more frequently! Is that just nebula beacons within any sector or nebula sectors that are good to go to for those?

[5thHorseman]

Is the best strategy then to send them all into a 4-person room so they're all fighting in one place, or split them into two important systems rooms to split enemy attention?

Yes. Usually 4-on-4 (or 4-on-2 if you can make it that way) is best, but sometimes you want to have 2 guys fighting 2 guys in a 1x2 room, and 2 guys breaking the medbay if they can. But usually the best thing is to go 4 on 4 and bomb the medbay when someone runs to it Even better, usually when the first guy runs to the medbay, the pilot leaves the cockpit to join the fistfight and guess what that does to their dodge chance?

I didn't realize nebulas gave crew more frequently! Is that just nebula beacons within any sector or nebula sectors that are good to go to for those?

I don't know the stats on everything, but I'm pretty sure it's both. I personally tend to avoid nebula sectors even in teleporter ships (unless I have Long Range Scanners) but try to hit EVERY nebula beacon in regular sectors, in all ships have they teleporters or not.

[cretin]

this ship is much weaker than the first 4 u named, only has 3 weapon slots and 2man teleporter, bad start weapons, no real benefit in exchange. one of the worst ships endgame imo (layout is also horrible, fires...)

unless u luck out on a decent 3+ energy weapon, the only way to progress is boarding (cant install many small weapons on 3slot ship) or weapons+drones. helps to learn all the mechanics about this:

-learn which rooms enemy defends the most, for example if u teleport to shield room ull have attention of all enemy crew members guaranteed
-crew cycling
-power lvling crew by destroying systems, while their crew repairs shield room(top priority)
-use mantis speed well, u can run away and nuke crew with a bomb in those 2vs3 situations where ur unlvled mantis are a little weaker than enemy crew (just an example).
-plan sector 1 very well, as it has many events which can give u additional crew / good random weapons. u want to take as many systems as possible. of course this applies to all sectors but crew wise u can mostly get 1 or sometimes 2 crew members for free in s1

dont know if anything is knew for you, just some hints collection. anyone feel free to add infos

[project_mercy]

The Gila Monster(GM) may not be great, but it's not bad. I would say the layout (as previously mentioned) is the worst thing about it. Because I'm a big fan of boarding, I still like this ship.

One tip that I find helps with bad layouts. Your standard way to deal with fires is to vent a path to an airlock. This works well many times, but bad layouts or destroyed door controls can render this unavailable at times. So what to do? Turn off your O2. The fire will eat the air in that room. If you've upgraded your doors (or have someone manning the door controls) then it's unlikely to spread before it's burnt out. If you have level 2 O2, then it's quick to recharge. Fire in rooms without system are a non-issue, unless you're standing in them. In fact, it's sort of anti-boarding protection for you. Also, if you're going to use Rockmen as crew, place them somewhere centrally located. If you have a door control or sensor option in the middle (not in this case obviously), they can get to a a fire and fight it long enough for the O2 to drain out, Then get them out of the room and let the fire die.

Let's look at the GM's strengths. It starts with a teleporter. It starts with mantis, and it starts with a small bomb. The small bomb is awesome, unlike a missile launcher, it's much more difficult to render void. The bomb is there for you to knock out the medbay/clonebay of the ship. Because you'll be capturing all non-AI ships starting in sector 1, you'll be rolling in resources and scrap. Because you only have 3 weapon points, you're likely going to need to augment your damage output to get past certain things (AI ships, zoltan shields) and to prepare for the Flagship boss at the end. To this end, I find it's handy to equip a drone bay. Keep defense drones around for dealing with missiles while you board. Keep combat (or beam) drones around for dispatching ships you can't board (like AI or Lanius if you don't have lanius or a clone bay). Zoltan Shield Bypass and Reconstructive Teleporting are really handy.

You'll always want additional crew, and in this case your choices may be slightly different. Yes, you need a few normal guys to man the ship while you're pirating, but Mantis aren't always the best option for boarders. Rockman can stand in a fire and melee. Crystals can lock a room down (hit it when they're about to flee to the medbay and you can kill them without disabling the medbay). Two lanius will pratically asphixiate the enemy before they have to kill them (especially if you hack the O2!). Try to juggle your borders some. You may find a clone bay provides you a cushion so you don't have to do the Keystone cops thing as often.

Speaking of which, to augment 5thHorseman's strat, the keystone thing is awesome, but always watch out for door upgrades. If the enemy ship's doors are two lines, you can run through them fine. If they're a single line or have a bunch of hashes on it, they're upgraded, you'll have to cut your way through. This will stop you from running around the ship waiting for the teleporter to cycle. You can also do this strat by locking out a room with a hacking module (or a crystal lockdown) and then hide in that room to temporarily keep guys away. Note, if you have Hacking Stun, this can get awkward.

As an aside, you can also use the keystone cops thing if the teleporter isn't cycled up yet and you're about to die (and you don't have a clone bay).

Being able to board early is a huge boon. Think of it as a strength.

[tecetyeintyale]

Thanks for the help, all three of you! After a few more failed runs, I was able to beat the flagship with Gila Monster last night. I didn't do it particularly well, but I did it. I managed to lose my entire 4-mantis boarding party in stage 1 (yep, forgot about those door upgrades...so my usual running around to stay alive while waiting for the teleporter to cool down and bring injured guys back didn't work ). But at that point I had killed off or severely damaged most of the crew except the one guy stuck in the left middle weapons room, and a small bomb to the medbay while they were trying to fix it did the rest. Luckily I had a good stash of missiles to use for stages 2 and 3 and a pegasus launcher to pair with my small bomb to take out systems as fast as possible. These took out his missile launcher and drone bay in stage 2 fairly quickly (I had intended to send over my 2 extra humans to take out systems right away, but they ended up having to stay on board to deal with the initial damage his missile launcher did and the occasional boarding drone that slipped through my defense drone) and then it was just a matter of taking down his shields and pinging away at him with my attack drone and burst laser I. In stage 3, I basically did the same thing--took down the zoltan shield ASAP, then used pegasus and small bombs to take out the dangerous systems so that I could then ping away until he died.

I think prioritizing upgrading my shield and engines early on really helped, as did lucking into 2 other mantises to make a 4-man boarding party. Clearly I need to practice with boarding a bit more so I don't lose my entire boarding team in stage 1, though. On to trying out a new ship!

[cretin]

gratz

i wasnt saying the ships totally bad, but kestrel zoltan engi a versions are among the strongest ships imo. i dont like fed but its also pretty balanced

nice hints on here