Crystal / B

[Gus Smedstad]

Wow, the Crystal / B has an annoying start, about on par with the Stealth / B.

The complete lack of weapons makes it impossible to touch Zoltan ships and AI scouts, which are quite common in sector 1. And I thought the Slug cruiser was bad in that respect! While you can get a ton of scrap from the ships you do capture, I was taken aback by how often I got pounded to scrap early in the game. Some of the common scenarios (AI scout in nebula, AI scout around flaring sun) become really brutal in this ship.

The high cost of acquiring a basic weapons suite is painful as well. It's probably going to set you back at least 110 scrap for the basics - 50 scrap for a weapon and 60 scrap for the upgrade to weapons-2 - and by the time you've got that, you probably need another 70-80 for an upgrade that can handle shields-2 AI / Zoltan ships.

On the plus side, enemy med bays aren't a problem with a Crystal crew, and that 4-space teleporter is amazing once you manage to get over the hump. Not so great against the final boss, since the extra boarders will end up in the main compartment instead of one of the weapon pods where you want them, but great for sectors 4-7.

[spacecadet13]

You can port your crystals into AI ships - they're are resistant to sufffocation, and can take down a system before they choke out - take out the weapons and get outta dodge,or, slightly cheesy, heal them and jump back to take down other systems and level them up fast.

For the boss, only send two at a time to begin with; once three of the weapons are down, that's when you send all four in to the one room - shields, or medbay if you've damaged it

[Number43]

Here are some pluses:

It only has one system it needs to buy from a shop, fewer than any other ship except the mantis b (which also lacks a weapon and lacks cloaking instead of lacking drones), and that saves you scrap.

Having all those crystal crew makes the boss unlikely to be a problem, as they make it easy to kill off the crew of the boss in the first stage.

Having crystal crew makes it likely you'll be able to access the secret sector.

[Gus Smedstad]

You can port your crystals into AI ships - they're are resistant to sufffocation, and can take down a system before they choke out - take out the weapons and get outta dodge

That's a good idea. I wasn't boarding AI scouts at all unless I had an asteroid field or flare sun, since doing the final point of damage would kill the boarding crew. It didn't cross my mind to use boarding parties to prevent damage even though I couldn't kill the scout.

[Number43]

Rockmen can also survive long enough for you to port them back (though just barely, not as long as crystals.) You can also do so with other races if you upgrade your teleporter.

[Hoa_Binh]

And it is to me the moste awesome ship!

Three crew member that can board well and all with a power that blocks the room they are in.

Board the enemy in the weapon room. Block weapon room. Kill crew controling the weapons. Block room again. Cloak their attack. Block room again. All weapons destroyed. Kill enemy crew.

And this works for any other room too. Medbay and shields being the most common.

Of course, no weapons at the start is a bother.

[BKT]

My first, and only, Crystal_b playthrough :



Nothing but borefest from sector 2 onward...