Rock Cruiser

[Cocapelli]

i have not unlocked the crystal ship yet, so i have played the last 70 or so games with the rock ship, the first 40 with A and 30 with B because i finally got a crystal guy to help me with killing a guy on fire.

i have to keep the rock plating because it may help me get the stasis pod, but besides that, it is good for scrap.

the Rock A is very luck based. you need a weapon. unfortunately i was often stuck with no missiles, or just scraping by with a few and my boarding party. often ended in a high turnover rate.

to me the B is much more fun.

omg a pierce weapon?!? only one i have seen and it is called a Pierce I. where is the pierce II dam it?

[Number43]

The only other weapons that pierce 1 shield like that I'm aware of are the crystal weapons. Despite the name on that one, there doesn't seem to be a Heavy Pierce Laser II.

Anyway, the crystal weapons work just like that except they can be shot down by defense drone I's as if they were missiles. There are 4 of those weapons. 2 are found on the crystal ship A, and the other 2 can only be obtained while exploring the crystal sector. The heavy crystal I is very similar to the heavy pierce I, the heavy pierce II does 4 damage instead of 2. The crystal burst I fires 2 shots that do 1 damage each, the Crystal Burst II fires 3 shots (bear in mind that means it can deal damage through a level 3 shield.)

[Aerowind]

I wouldn't really say that boarding ships have THAT big of a problem. A single bomb with a boarding ship will make the rest of the game a cakewalk.

[hybridfive]

I already know how powerful boarding is, and I never said it wasn't. Boarding ships simply have horrible early games against many ships.

auto scouts/fighters
Zoltan ships
anything with a medbay (with the exception of the Crystal ship since it can lockdown)

So... this is the reason people get so jazzed up about Rock A&B. Points 1 and 3 are wrong. Let me address them in separate paragraphs.

Rock ships with teleporters are not weak to auto-ships, because it has Rock men. Rock men do not die to suffocation during the amount of time it takes to charge a level 1 teleporter. I haven't played with that strategy in a while, but the Rockman ends up with somewhere near 20 hp remaining when you teleport him back. Meaning that you can sit him in the auto-ships weapons, defang it, then whittle it down in other areas (typically piloting) be repeatedly destroying the systems, and finish with a single missile. Doing so gives your combat crew a huge boost to training, making them deadlier in later encounters.

Medbays are not a big deal because you have missiles. If you understand the timing of the missile launch versus the time it takes a fleeing opponenet to get to his medbay, you kill the fleeing opponent before he heals. It actually ends up saving you health in combat, because you have to do 75 points of damage with your crew member, instead of the normal 100 Adjust the above comment for racial maximums as relevant. If you don't know the crew damage exchange ratio, it's 15 hp:1 hull. Meaning the Artimis does 30 hp, which is enough to kill any fleeing opponent.

Yes, your missile can miss. Against autoships you just fire another one. Against medbays, you should debate teleporting out and reset the sequence of events. That one you sort of have to assess during combat.

So Rock A&B are superior boarding ships, because they're not weak to as many of boarding strategy's traditional weaknesses. If I wanted to modify the original list, it's more like this:

Autoscouts with Cloak
Zoltan Ships
Any ship with both a medbay and a defense drone

If you want a breakdown of which enemy ships are even capable of having both a medbay and a defense drone, there's not a good player resource for that. I can give you what I remember off the top of my head, if you'd like. It is a much smaller number of ships than the ships that can have a medbay only. The most notable is that the Rebel Elite Fighter can not have drones.

[Fangz]

I'd like to try the fire+boarding strategy with the rock cruiser, I was just wondering if there was something else I was missing with that ship. Since it doesn't start with fire weaponry or a teleport system, getting that combo is something that would take some customization to achieve.

That's exactly the appeal of the Rock B, which starts with Fire Bomb and 4 Rock guys (+ Heavy Pierce). So if you want to try this out you better focus on unlocking Rock B.

[Neoviper]

I already know how powerful boarding is, and I never said it wasn't. Boarding ships simply have horrible early games against many ships.

auto scouts/fighters
Zoltan ships
anything with a medbay (with the exception of the Crystal ship since it can lockdown)

So... this is the reason people get so jazzed up about Rock A&B. Points 1 and 3 are wrong. Let me address them in separate paragraphs.

Rock ships with teleporters are not weak to auto-ships, because it has Rock men. Rock men do not die to suffocation during the amount of time it takes to charge a level 1 teleporter. I haven't played with that strategy in a while, but the Rockman ends up with somewhere near 20 hp remaining when you teleport him back. Meaning that you can sit him in the auto-ships weapons, defang it, then whittle it down in other areas (typically piloting) be repeatedly destroying the systems, and finish with a single missile. Doing so gives your combat crew a huge boost to training, making them deadlier in later encounters.

Medbays are not a big deal because you have missiles. If you understand the timing of the missile launch versus the time it takes a fleeing opponenet to get to his medbay, you kill the fleeing opponent before he heals. It actually ends up saving you health in combat, because you have to do 75 points of damage with your crew member, instead of the normal 100 Adjust the above comment for racial maximums as relevant. If you don't know the crew damage exchange ratio, it's 15 hp:1 hull. Meaning the Artimis does 30 hp, which is enough to kill any fleeing opponent.

Yes, your missile can miss. Against autoships you just fire another one. Against medbays, you should debate teleporting out and reset the sequence of events. That one you sort of have to assess during combat.

So Rock A&B are superior boarding ships, because they're not weak to as many of boarding strategy's traditional weaknesses. If I wanted to modify the original list, it's more like this:

Autoscouts with Cloak
Zoltan Ships
Any ship with both a medbay and a defense drone

If you want a breakdown of which enemy ships are even capable of having both a medbay and a defense drone, there's not a good player resource for that. I can give you what I remember off the top of my head, if you'd like. It is a much smaller number of ships than the ships that can have a medbay only. The most notable is that the Rebel Elite Fighter can not have drones.

I wouldn't quite say autoships are no problem at all, if the teleporter gets hit or a missile/laser hits you at the wrong time then you could lose your two boarding crew. I usually take the risk anyway, and try to prevent that from happening with whatever means I have at the moment, but it's a risk to be understood. Significantly better than "guaranteed to suffocate" mantis though in this situation. Spot on about the medbay though, outside of a poorly timed miss, you can usually beat any ship in boarding combat. Defense drones at least give you the opportunity to get an achievement towards the rock B, which is in my opinion a better ship overall. I'd say stronger early game, weaker mid game, and a bit stronger late game. Having that firebomb on hand with four rockmen makes taking out the bosses crew trivially easy.

[FDru]

The rock ships aren't even boardings ships. "Boarding ship" = comes with a teleporter and requires boarding as a primary strategy early game. Naturally, ships that don't come with a teleporter will have no issues with any ships once you buy one because they almost all start with good enough weapons to deal with the weaknesses of actual boarding ships.

[fylth]

Out of curiosity (asking as someone who doesnt yet have the Crystal ship), just how overpowered would a ship with 4 Crystal Burst II weapons be? By the sound of it they would overwhelm any ships defence drones easily, no idea how long the charge time on them is though

[hybridfive]

Out of curiosity (asking as someone who doesnt yet have the Crystal ship), just how overpowered would a ship with 4 Crystal Burst II weapons be? By the sound of it they would overwhelm any ships defence drones easily, no idea how long the charge time on them is though

The Crystal weapons are two power for two shots with the pierce 1 property, meaning they bypass a point of shields. It's not just a Burst II laser with a piercing upgrade. So with that in mind, it's less powerful than a theoretical ship with 4 regular Burst II. You'd rather have 12 shots than 8 piercing shots.