Subset Games Forum

The Noether ship, which is the type B to the Zolton ship, only starts with one shield bar. That is fine, however it costs 100 scrap to upgrade to a second shield bar and get 1 layer of shields. Is it supposed to cost 100 scrap?

Short answer: yes.

Long answer: Use your zoltan shield as a temp buffer. Starting weapons are good enough that you can usually take their weapons down before your zoltan shield goes down.

It's one of the only two ships I've beaten the boss with. It's way awesome. It's just getting that first 100 scrap. :p

Sorry for the bump, but it's really bizarre that the 2nd bar costs 100 scrap and the 3rd and 4th are 20 and 30 scrap, especially when 10 -> 20 -> 30 would be such a logical progression in price. I guess if it's there to somehow balance things out, sure, but that's bound to have people wondering.

You are right that this could be a typo.

Thanks for bumping the thread back from the depth of the forum.

Also I checked and the layout A starts with 2 points in shields while the layout B starts with a single point. Besides shields, the differences are 2 bars in engines in B vs. 1 bar in A and 4 bars in weapons in B vs. 3 in A. In addition A has an extra bar in doors.

The bar in weapons is worth 35 scrap, the point in Engine is worth 15 and the bar in doors is worth 20 scrap. Doing the math, based on the power allocation alone, the prices between the layouts is (100 + 20 = 120) for A and (35 + 15 = 50) for B. Granted the 2nd bar in shields is much more powerful than a point in engines, but I don't think it's THAT much more powerful.

Layout A starts with a Halberd beam and a Leto missile while the layout B starts with two Ion blasts and a Pike beam.

As such, the weapons are arguably better in layout A, as the halberd beam can cut through a single shield point, but the pike beam can't do squat until you get the enemy shields down to zero (which, granted, the ion blasts help with).

So.... yeah. It seems super strange that the shield point would cost that much. :p

It's intentional. Basically the game is saying "You don't get to start with shields, but you also don't need to find a store before you can have shields." Normally when you buy the shield system, it costs 150 scrap and starts with 2 bars, so this is still cheaper than starting without the system would be.

IIRC the same thing goes with the Mantis B ship, which starts with no weapons, but doesn't need to buy the weapons system.

It is intended, it's the same as the Mantis B, which costs 100 for it's second weapons bar, it's probably to do with balance, or making the ship a bit more unique. Ships tend to have a challenge involved, the Noether's being the expensive shield.

TheAzryte wrote:It is intended, it's the same as the Mantis B, which costs 100 for it's second weapons bar, it's probably to do with balance, or making the ship a bit more unique. Ships tend to have a challenge involved, the Noether's being the expensive shield.

It's also the same with buying the second weapons bar with the carnelian.

You might think of it that a level 1 shield system isn't really a complete system, just a mounting frame and and a control panel and some blueprints. You have to finish building and installing the projectors and modulators and whatever, which is expensive. Once you've done that, you can start upgrading it incrementally in the normal way.

Alternately, you're modifying the Zoltan shield projector to also generate conventional shields--an extensive retooling.

It's intentional; they've said so elsewhere. 150 scrap if you don't have the shield system at all -- but you also have to find a store to sell it. 100 on these ships gets you a functioning shield system, whenever you get the scrap; no need to find a store, and a store with systems.