Boss Fight Essentials (SPOILERS)

[islesofurth]

This is a list of things to aim for. You will not need to upgrade past certain stages and despite what everyone says, cloaking is not needed it is only a bonus if you have the scrap when you encounter it.

STAGE 1: 4 weapon system (rocket, ion, laser, beam), lvl 4 shields.
[if you have a teleporter, stage 1 will be extremely easy]

Part 1 - Disable weapon systems: to permanently disable the weapon systems you will need atleast a lvl 1 teleporter.
{You can use fire, to kill the crew member but will take a much longer time and is not reliable as the fire may go out before it does enough DMG to the system}

Part 2: Once the weapons are down, stage 1 is easy pickings. 1 additional weapon to your starting kit should be enough to remove the shield and destroy the ships hull. Having more shields doesn't make them regenerate any faster, so 2 weapons is often all you need.

Useful systems:
Engines 4+ - the first rocket volley is unavoidable unless you have the Preigniter or the Zoltan ship.
Teleporter 1+ - The faster you can get your crew in and out, the faster the weapon systems become obsolete
Shield 4 - If you have the Shields maned, only rockets should be able to penetrate to your hull
Cloaking 1 - only needed for initial rocket volley

DO NOT KILL CREW IN MAIN SHIP AREA



STAGE 2: 3 Weapon systems (Rocket, laser, beam), Mass Anti ship drones, Boarding drone, MK2 Defense drone.
[This is surprising the the hardest stage by far, if your shield goes down, your dead.]

Part 1: As in stage 1, you will need atleast a lvl 1 Teleporter to permanently disable the weapon systems

Part 2: Either an Ion bomb or s-bomb, the MK2 does not target bombs and thus you should be able to disable the Drone control before you even finish with the weapon systems.
{if you use rockets, you will need to either send all your rockets at the same time, or to wait until the defense drone is opposite the drone room as you have a better chance of getting past}

Useful Systems:
drone control system - anti personal
drone control system - MK2 defense drone
teleporter 1+
Engines 4+
Shield 4
Weapons - bombs
Weapons - mass lasers
Cloaking- not that useful in stage 2, but will help a little against the laser drones. If you activate it correctly it can also prevent the boarding drone.
Doors 3 - The boarding drone will aim for your vital systems unless you have heavy doors to impede it. doors 3 should be enough keep it in the first room if you have bombs.

IF YOU KILLED CREW, YOU ARE LIKELY NOW DEAD



STAGE 3: 2 weapon systems(Rocket, Laser), Zoltan Shield, 6 laser burst.
[The 6burst laser is the biggest threat, focus on it not hitting and you will win]

Part 1: The shield is the hardest part in this stage, but if your at this stage your have the firepower to bring it down.

Part 2: Get those weapon systems offline

Part 3: kill the ship as fast as you can, its only chance that 1 of the 6 burst lasers doesn't hit your shield.

Useful Systems:
Weapons - lasers
Weapons - Ion
Shield 4
teleporter 1+
Engines 6+ or cloaking - this is where cloaking comes in handy, it will take you time to kill the shield and systems and also the 6 laser burst is something you want to dodge atleast 2 shots of. If you have the 150 spare when its available buy it, otherwise engines 6+ will almost garentee that 2 shots will miss.



WITH THESE SYSTEMS YOU CAN KILL THE BOSS WITHOUT MUCH TROUBLE, OF-COURSE UPGRADE THEM OR HAVE MORE AND IT WILL BE EVEN EASIER

[5thHorseman]

Welcome to the forum! Nice first post, chock full of stuff. I look forward to more!

However, some of what you say is quite different from my personal preferred boss killing method.

DO NOT KILL CREW IN MAIN SHIP AREA

For me, this is "DO NOT KILL THE GUY IN THE LASERS." I always go for missiles first, then ion, then beam, and always take them down with my away team. If I don't have a teleporter (a rarity!) I send everything at the shield and kill 'em quick.

Once you have those 3 weapons down you can go with 3 shields and drop your engines/cloak enough to power up all those weapons and whatnot you were holding back on. Then take out the medbay and send your away team in to mop up the entire ship crew. Then, the subsequent stages are FAR easier.

STAGE 2: 3 Weapon systems (Rocket, laser, beam), Mass Anti ship drones, Boarding drone, MK2 Defense drone.

It's a MK1 defense drone. Ruins missiles but your lasers and ions have no problems.

{if you use rockets, you will need to either send all your rockets at the same time, or to wait until the defense drone is opposite the drone room as you have a better chance of getting past}

Missiles are nearly useless in this stage. There is no way to time your shots to be on the opposite side because you have no way of knowing where your missiles will come from.

One thing: If you have 2 or more missile systems, or a Pegasus missile, it COULD be worth firing them but if you're relying on 2 missile systems and you have missiles left in stock when you reach the final boss, you're a far better player than I

Useful Systems:
drone control system - MK2 defense drone
Cloaking- not that useful in stage 2, but will help a little against the laser drones. If you activate it correctly it can also prevent the boarding drone.

I only ever bring a MK1 defense drone. It'll happily shoot down most boarding drones and only costs 2. I've found that 2 defense drones on opposite sides of the ship will pretty much end the boarding drone threat. And will also reliably shoot down most any single missile.
Cloaking is CRITICAL in this stage. Unless you ave a preignitor and 2 auto reloaders and a ton of lasers you're going to see at LEAST one or two drone spams, and at least one missile barrage. If you time it right you can cloak through ALL of it, or (what I prefer) wait until you're at one shield and hit the cloak while the drones are peppering you.

STAGE 3:
Engines 6+ or cloaking - this is where cloaking comes in handy, it will take you time to kill the shield and systems and also the 6 laser burst is something you want to dodge atleast 2 shots of. If you have the 150 spare when its available buy it, otherwise engines 6+ will almost garentee that 2 shots will miss.

In this stage I far prefer peppering his shield quickly to hopefully get my boarders in the missiles before they fire, and then lvl3 cloaking right when the missiles are about to reach my shield. If you don't fire any more shots (or have stealth weapons) usually your cloak will last through the first super-laser shot. Then their missiles are down and you can concentrate on ripping up those shields and killing the boss. High engines are nice for that 2nd super-laser volley but usually you only get a hit or two at most.

[The Captain]

If by "DO NOT KILL CREW IN MAIN SHIP AREA" you mean "kill all the crew in main ship area," then I totally agree with you. I leave the burst laser gunner alive and kill as many of the others as possible. Then they won't be around to repair stuff and board your ship in round three. Of course, it's possible you may not be able to kill them all - try and get as many as you can. If you can't kill them by boarding, try and have as many as possible repairing the Cloak and/or Door Control when you blow up the ship and finish round one - then they depart with that section of the ship.

Four layers of Shields are great, but you can win with three. Then you want Engines at least level 5, preferably more - as much as you can afford. And hopefully master pilot and engineer. If I can't afford all 8 bars in Shields, I try for 7, so there's one buffer.

The only time I used a Defense Drone Mk II against the boss was when that was the only Defense Drone I was able to acquire that game - and it was at the Sector 8 store. I find Mk I better, as I want missiles shot down far more than lasers. (I haven't done a no shield challenge - that would be a good time to have a Mk II.)

I don't always have an Antiship or Beam Drone when I'm fighting the boss, but if I do, I like to use it in round three to help take down the Zoltan Shield. Oh, and there have been some occasions where I needed the extra shot an Antiship Mk I or II provides.

[aaaaaa50]

If I have a good enough boarding crew/setup, I always go for killing all the crew except for the laser guy. This way the boss has only a tiny dodge chance (because its piloting is upgraded) and you can disable the shield system with boarders easily. And you only really need lvl3 shields and good engines to survive the fight. Cloaking is useful, but as long as you can keep your systems repaired then your hull will pick up the slack of keeping you alive.

[dirtyfool]

Couple more tips I have found to help with the boss.

- Teleport lvl 1 makes this fight much easier. Lvl 2 is not needed and unless you have had a boarding strategy earlier, it only adds a damage buffer. Reason: in the time it takes for your boarding crew to destroy a weapons system, even the lvl 1 teleport will be recharged. Granted lvl 2 or more will help you get your crew back out there sooner, but I think the time difference is still marginal if you account for time it takes to heal up and get in position.

- Speaking of position, when coming into each stage make sure your teleport is ready and boarding crew queued up. I have noticed that Stage 1, the boss cloaks right away when the battle starts. If you pause right at the start before it cloaks, you can teleport a group in before that first cloak. As others have said, missiles first.

-Ion Bust II is awesome. Set it (target shields) and forget it. Reload is fast, will get through those tough shields fast. Super helpful in stage 3 as Zoltan shields take 2x from ion.

-Cloak is great in general, but huge in stage 3. That power burst is nasty and only so much dodge/shield can mitigate damage. I feel like these green shots also have a high fire chance? Can anyone verify?

-If you are going drone heavy, remember that you can have multiple drones deployed, but they don't have to be active. E.g. have defense drones out, but only power them when missiles or boarding drones are launched, and power your anti-ship the rest of the time. A little pausing and power managing can go a long way.

[5thHorseman]

- Speaking of position, when coming into each stage make sure your teleport is ready and boarding crew queued up. I have noticed that Stage 1, the boss cloaks right away when the battle starts. If you pause right at the start before it cloaks, you can teleport a group in before that first cloak. As others have said, missiles first.

Do you happen to have a video of that? I have never, ever been able to pause that quickly but I would love to. Granted, I haven't tried that much because I've always assumed it was impossible.

-Ion Bust II is awesome. Set it (target shields) and forget it. Reload is fast, will get through those tough shields fast. Super helpful in stage 3 as Zoltan shields take 2x from ion.

-Cloak is great in general, but huge in stage 3. That power burst is nasty and only so much dodge/shield can mitigate damage. I feel like these green shots also have a high fire chance? Can anyone verify?

Ion II and Cloak are a bad combo (especially in stage 3 where frequently you need every second of that cloak to get through the missiles AND the superlasers) unless you have stealth weapons. Frequently it's a good idea to halt ALL weapons fire until you come out of cloak.

[dirtyfool]

Ion II and Cloak are a bad combo (especially in stage 3 where frequently you need every second of that cloak to get through the missiles AND the superlasers) unless you have stealth weapons. Frequently it's a good idea to halt ALL weapons fire until you come out of cloak.

Agreed. Cloak is great on stage 3 and you need every second. I generally don't mix the two.

I'll see if I can get a vid of the pre-cloak teleport.

[LRLTW]

Has anyone tried to win using only drones and boarding? I somehow made it to sector 8 in a Crystal-A with only the default crystal weapons, plus shields-6, engines-7, medbay-3, transporter-3, and drones defense-II and antiship-II. Not the best layout, and I made the mistake of killing all four weapons operators in round one. Still, I made it to round three and was in the process of taking down the shields before a laser surge killed me off. I did use the crystal weapons, but only after my boarders had reduced the shields to level 1. Haven't beat the rebel flagship yet, and I'm not sure if this limited-weapons strategy is something that I should keep trying, or if I should divert more resources on improving my weapons layout.

Ideas?

[zeek]

Has anyone tried to win using only drones and boarding? I somehow made it to sector 8 in a Crystal-A with only the default crystal weapons, plus shields-6, engines-7, medbay-3, transporter-3, and drones defense-II and antiship-II. Not the best layout, and I made the mistake of killing all four weapons operators in round one. Still, I made it to round three and was in the process of taking down the shields before a laser surge killed me off. I did use the crystal weapons, but only after my boarders had reduced the shields to level 1. Haven't beat the rebel flagship yet, and I'm not sure if this limited-weapons strategy is something that I should keep trying, or if I should divert more resources on improving my weapons layout.

Ideas?

You can win with just drones and boarding. Heck once I forgot to change my weapons layout and didn't have anything that could damage the hull. I killed all the crew and kept killing systems as the A.I. repaired them. Ended up sacrificing a human crewman to finish the phase off. So, it can be done at a price.