FTL Captain's Edition 1.308/Inf 1.301b/EL 1.308

[Russian Rockman]

You cannot copy augments...

Yeah you could change the crystal to red I think, but then it would be the same way for the Crystal A. It would be nice if the shard healed your crew, but the more important thing is that it shouldnt damage them when it hits a room they are in.

[Russian Rockman]

Hello. I am a electronic musician. I posted some FTL-inspired music tracks at reddit.com/r/ftlgame, and sleeper_service contacted me and told me that I should post here if I'd like to get some work featured in CE. So here I am. Fire away!

Could you post a direct link to some of your tracks? I'm always looking for music that sounds like the FTL soundtrack. I'm a really big fan of it.

I wish someone would make an FTL inspired track that contained the classic...
Do... do do do do Dooo Dooo Dooo Dooo... Do Do do do do DOO DOO DOO DOO

[rannl]

Hello. I am a electronic musician. I posted some FTL-inspired music tracks at reddit.com/r/ftlgame, and sleeper_service contacted me and told me that I should post here if I'd like to get some work featured in CE. So here I am. Fire away!

Nice job Aaron! Your slug waltz gave me a Star Control 2 nostalgic fealing.

Maybe you can do some sound editing for different effects as well ?

[Sleeper Service]

Hello. I am a electronic musician. I posted some FTL-inspired music tracks at reddit.com/r/ftlgame, and sleeper_service contacted me and told me that I should post here if I'd like to get some work featured in CE. So here I am. Fire away!

Hey Aaron, glad you replied! I just PMed you on that topic.

And just in case anyone is wondering: The whole mod makes excessive progress on many levels. The next release will be one of its most significant since a long time.

[Biohazard063]

And just in case anyone is wondering: The whole mod makes excessive progress on many levels. The next release will be one of its most significant since a long time.

And here I was thinking you were busy wrapping things up to be able to jump on making CE compatible with the Advanced Edition for when it (finally... ) get's launched.
Still no release date on that.
Anyway, I'm keeping my backlog short !
By the way, did that thing with CE infinite get fixed where someone got to the flagship without actually spending the fuel needed? Or was that a single occurrence?

[Sleeper Service]

I wait for more reports on that. No one else seems to have had that problem, but I can only tell if people actually report it.

In any case, I plan to enable jumping to deep space at sector eights start beacon, before having the player fully commit to the boss fight. That could be a possible fix. But if the described problem exists, than this might not even fix it, as you might just get send to the Federation base again anyway.

[Mr. Mister]

You know, I'm totally in for making the crystal vengeance deal no personnel damage. I think that's the finishing touch it needs to not be considered a hindrance, and after all, early-game it's designed to help deal with auto-ships.

The only way I've found to nerf the Carnelian to an accepteable degree without sacrificing on its identifying characteristics, and something I've been discussing with slowy on sMPK's thread, is to make it start with lv1 shields, like the Zoltan B. You can get the 100 scrap pretty easily in the first sector via boarding. It's also more protected against laser drones than the Stealth ships despite not having Titanium Casing, since you can always teleport two crystals immediately to the enemy drone control before someone gets in there and maybe even take the laser drone down before your cloak runs out. And with the light crystal, you should be able to kill the enemy crew even quicker.

Something else I convinced slowy to do on the alternate starting loadouts was to give the Zoltan B a Drone Jammer, since drones are what it fears the most, and with such an augment, you can postpone getting lv2 shields even more as a valid scrap management tactic.

Maybe you should revert the Bravais' starting weapons to the vanilla ones though, or at least use only blue ones. It would still be pretty balanced. To nerf it, consider making it start with two humans but only one Crystallite. Also, declare him first on the .xml, before the humans, so you can identify him as the one in charge of the ship.


What else I thought of: Take away the Mantis B's assault drone and instead give it a Hasta Beam. You won't be using its almost useless offensive potential against manned ships anyway (unless it has a medbay, which might let you take down the shields with the boarders while the enemy crew is healing, a nice tactic for the ship), and it'll make fighting door-less auto-ships much less of a long-drawn, boring russian roulette.

EDIT:
You can take a look at the changes I made yourself, I uploaded it as an attachement to this post of mine. I don'tn think the ships I declare have anything sMPK-dependant (like the Fed A's Burst Laser MkIV), but mind that they're changes made to sMPK-CE's loadouts, not CE's, keeping sMPK-CE's weapon stats in mind.

[Sleeper Service]

Maybe you should revert the Bravais' starting weapons to the vanilla ones though, or at least use only blue ones.

Check your wide band scanners, these weapons are totally blue in the current version.

I'm mostly OK with how the ships currently are. I don't see why Mantis B needs a way to destroy auto ships and why the Crystal ships have to be even more convenient beyond already being massive powerhouses anyway. As you pointed out, Carnelian with lvl one shields would just make the ship less reliable in the early game. But thats where it is most vulnerable already anyway. The rinse-and-reapeat late game would not change. I'm also totally fine with that this ship is powerful. I'd just think its play style should be made somehow less repetitive, but I don't really see a minimally intrusive way to do that.

[Russian Rockman]

And just in case anyone is wondering: The whole mod makes excessive progress on many levels. The next release will be one of its most significant since a long time.

You, Sleeper, are a cruel cruel human being... How can you give us an update like that with so few details...
*joking*
Anyway, I hope you and Aaron can somehow make some music or sounds that match the FTL style, I would love that very much. Try to keep classic things like the FTL melody in if you can and I'll be in heaven.

ALSO, I hope I can finish some of the stuff I was working on for you to "maybe" use for CE before the next update. I just haven't had much time because I've been busy working towards an engineering degree...

I wait for more reports on that. No one else seems to have had that problem, but I can only tell if people actually report it.

I think you should put right at the beginning of the OP in big noticeable writing a request for people to post here about any bugs they find and how much you and all of use would appreciate it. I think only a very small percentage of people who play the CE have ever actually posted here at all.

Sleeper, have you ever considered making other alternate ship loadouts? Like type X & Y ships? I'm not sure if that's something you would ant to spend your time on, but I would really like it. It would add even more playability to the game since what ship you use matters a lot. The AE will add more ship to each class, but I think even more ships that are not too far from the ships in vanilla would be awesome.

And then we could tal about tweaking them instead of the vanilla ones...

You know, I'm totally in for making the crystal vengeance deal no personnel damage. I think that's the finishing touch it needs to not be considered a hindrance, and after all, early-game it's designed to help deal with auto-ships.

I didn't want to make the Crystal ships more convenient, I only want to make the Crystal vengeance augment less sucky and more cool for the Crystal ships to have. I am all for nerfing the Crystal ships in fact, but I would like to make the Crystal Vengeance augment, which I consider the worst in the game, to be better.

The only way I've found to nerf the Carnelian to an accepteable degree without sacrificing on its identifying characteristics, and something I've been discussing with slowy on sMPK's thread, is to make it start with lv1 shields, like the Zoltan B. You can get the 100 scrap pretty easily in the first sector via boarding. It's also more protected against laser drones than the Stealth ships despite not having Titanium Casing, since you can always teleport two crystals immediately to the enemy drone control before someone gets in there and maybe even take the laser drone down before your cloak runs out. And with the light crystal, you should be able to kill the enemy crew even quicker.

I actually think that would be a good idea, paired with Crystal Vengeance it would help get rid of enemies quickly. What I really think should be done is anything to make the Crystal ships act more like a glass cannon. The Crystal weapons and crew are extremely powerful I think, but the defense of these ships should be compromised. Perhaps even removing the cloaking on the Carnelian isn't a bad idea. I don't see why it needs that.
BTW: I still remember the purple ion crystal thing, which I thought was actually a cool idea. At least some purple ion crystal weapons would be nice.

Something else I convinced slowy to do on the alternate starting loadouts was to give the Zoltan B a Drone Jammer, since drones are what it fears the most, and with such an augment, you can postpone getting lv2 shields even more as a valid scrap management tactic.

That's not a bad idea... I suppose CE has more drones so that helps balance things... However,I don't think the Zoltan B is that horrible compared to the Zoltan A if you use the CE loadouts. Every ship shuld have something they fear and something they are good at.

Maybe you should revert the Bravais' starting weapons to the vanilla ones though, or at least use only blue ones. It would still be pretty balanced. To nerf it, consider making it start with two humans but only one Crystallite. Also, declare him first on the .xml, before the humans, so you can identify him as the one in charge of the ship.

I was going to say that is a bad idea, but it actually sounds cool because its like the one Crystal you rescued to get the ship in the first place is now in command of his ship with two federation humans. In this case though the Carnelian should only have 2 Crystal crew which helps to nerf it even more.

Another way to nerf the Carnelian would just be to give it a level 2 teleporter and/or since its the best boarding hsip in the game, only allow it to have 3 weapons. Maybe that could make the late game less, rinse-and-repeat.

What else I thought of: Take away the Mantis B's assault drone and instead give it a Hasta Beam. You won't be using its almost useless offensive potential against manned ships anyway (unless it has a medbay, which might let you take down the shields with the boarders while the enemy crew is healing, a nice tactic for the ship), and it'll make fighting door-less auto-ships much less of a long-drawn, boring russian roulette.

Again, I think as the Mantis B, which can, potentially, become another OP ship you can just run away from auto drones early in the game. Although you probably would stay anyway since it is tempting to play roulette with it and our pride keeps us from admitting defeat ever. Soooo in that case its not a bad idea to give it A really weak weapon. Not sure it should be a hasta beam specifically though. Also, I never really like the idea of a Mantis ship starting with drones at all, I thought they were bad with machines?
Still would like it if the Mantis ship stared without a weapon system and came instead with a level 2 teleporter. I heard this messes with the UI, but how? It cant be that bad.

[The wise Sten]

Hey people and mantises, go give rannI some feedback in recolouring some of the weapons for CEi Loot:

http://www.ftlgame.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=23456