My Torus had had a pretty good early run, which then stalled out. I picked up a 4xcharge laser from some punk-ass kids I convinced to give up piracy on my very first jump. That, and the ion blast 2 made up the bulk of my arsenal, along with a small bomb I bought around sector 6. I happened to pick up a rockman and a mantis, so I decided to go for boarding and cloak. I found both a shield drone schematic and an anti-combat drone, but not a single defense drone 1 was offered the entire game.
I entered the last stand with a smallish crew for me: 1 Engi, 2 humans, and the mantis and rockman (I foolishly lost my other engi to a random event in sector 7.....
). First two forms weren't too bad...though oddly after jumping away from the first form after killing 3 of the 4 crew in the weapons room I saved and quit...just to find that they'd been resurrected when I played the next day. ;pI start form 3, and it doesn't go so well. It takes longer than usual to take down the zoltan shield. When it goes down I teleport my mantis alone into the missle room, and the exact same second my rockman gets MC'd and starts trashing my shields. No big deal, I think. I send some other crew to try and distract him. I don't actually remember how it happened (perhaps too many things going at once), but I don't get a chance to cloak when a simultaneous missile barrage and special weapon fly my way. Boom: several breaches, fires throughout the ship, and my weapons are damaged. In the midst of the chaos, three of the flagship crew teleport over to join the still MC'd rockman in trashing my ship. Which is very much on fire.
I want to get the heck out of dodge, but my mantis is still stuck waiting for the teleporter to cooldown. I vent the ship except for MedBay and the pilot (both happily undamaged), pull my mantis as soon as the teleporter is ready, and jump to a blessedly empty node.
Surprise, surprise, I take most of the flagship's crew with me! With them forced into the medbay (and there being room enough for my 5 crew) I take them out easily and repair my ship. I'm down to about 15 hp, though. I wait for the flag, and he comes my way.
Now, though, he has only two crew! I take out the shield and teleport over to take out the weapons. The mind control is still annoying, but not as bad. Out of nowhere, one of the remaining crew teleports over! I get him down to ~25% before he teleports away. Does he heal, though? No. He goes to fix the MC that I'd taken out with my small bomb. One more small bomb his way, and he's toast!
Once the weapons are out, I send my happy little mantis over, and he kites his way around the ship while I bomb the heck out of the pilot, shields, engine, MC, whatever. The lone crewman just can't keep up any more. The ion blast keeps the shields locked up, and the laser just keeps plinking away until it's over. My mantis teleports away just before the end with a grin on his face. Or, whatever they have for a face.
Anyway, was an interesting ending. I haven't beaten it all too often, and it was odd for me to have a comeback. Either I completely own the flagship, or vice versa.