Stealth C

This is my favorite ship of all in the game. I think it has the highest skill ceiling, for what an expert can pull off with it compared to average muddling around. It's still not good overall (Stealth A is just better), but it's the ship that I feel is most rewarding for your inputs. The Shield+ overcharger drone works better than you think, almost as good as a regular shields layer, and even better if you can time it just correctly to overcharge a shield barrier just before a missile comes in. And same as with Stealth A, the mini-beam is quietly highly underrated but extremely effective.

Sector 1: For the other Stealth ships, the important first upgrade is cloaking. For this one, that upgrade is the drone system, to be able to use the Shield+ and Anti-Drone together. This ship looked scary as hell - Burst 2 and mini beam - but my own weapons charged fast enough to hit theirs (unmanned) before they shot! Map reveal, could track a nice series of fights to the north ending up at that store. HA, got the legendary reward of a Fire Suppression from the research station on fire distress event. A Hull Laser dropped - decided yes, pump weapons to level 4 right away to use it. The quest was itself a store - where I sold the hull laser to buy a Flak instead! Got a Rock crew from a clone bay event, nice. And holy crap, a defense drone also dropped. This is like everything I could possibly want all in sector 1, about as good a start as imaginable.

Sector 2: Civilian over Abandoned, don't have a great way to deal with Lanius boarders. This fight super dangerous, asteroid field, and a z-shield on the opposing ship, I think the right call is defense drone rather than shield+, that will both stop asteroids and one out of each Flak burst, that worked, my flak hit weapons, theirs hit an empty room, and I won from there. This fight, first time I had to use the anti-drone. No stores, spent the scrap on an engines level and power bars.

Sector 3: Civilian over Zoltan of course: Several more fights, took some hull damage from ships with a lot of guns, but arrived at a store with the all-important 125 scrap in the bank and happily acquired shields. Next store: tough choice, a Halberd on sale!, or Automated Re-loader. I decided that as good as the Halberd is, it's still just a little premature right now, I already have a good beam and can't really afford more weapons system power, and the re-loader does make my fast weapons able to strike first significantly often (faster than a Burst 2 can fire, importantly.) Kept using the Shield+ drone for several more fights until getting real shields to layer 2.

Sector 4: Slug Nebula is only option, but I think we can handle it. Map reveal, wow that is a nice cluster of fights. Whoa, got galactically lucky when 4/6 shots missed from this double Burst 2 volley! I got like six of those tiny ships with the disconnected oxygen, crew-killed almost all of them by breaking that for suffocation, meanwhile shooting slowly at the weapons to keep just enough offline without killing the ship. Used this one in particular for evasion training, with the soft ions while the d-drone took care of the missiles. Anyway, got all those fights, store had nothing so shields to layer 3.

Sector 5: picked Mantis Homeworlds over another slug nebula, upgraded doors. Could really use a weapons upgrade, 5 projectiles is chancy against 3-shield ships. Store had a Burst 3... nah, can't do it, I like my fast weapons, that's too slow to match the others, particularly without cloaking to buy time. Also a small bomb on sale, would be great if this ship had a fourth weapon slot but it doesn't. Lots of scrap income but really nothing to spend it on!

Sector 6: Civilian again: phew, much better, two stores for my shopping needs. First one sold both cloaking and hacking, so really no need to go to the second one (and nothing left to spend anyway.) Sold the Shield+ drone now, won't be using drone parts on that again; anti-drone is worth keeping. YEAH FUCK YOU UNFAIR HACKING EVENT. Next store had this set of weapons... still not actually any upgrades over what we have. Um LOTS of fights again, all hail holy LRS, wow 6 fights is a lot for an entire sector but there are 6 adjacent to this single beacon! And again at the exit - holy crap this is the most fights I've ever seen in a civilian sector, anyway it resulted in a fortune of scrap. Expected offense to start becoming inadequate but these super fast weapons were still doing great, important point was I could get two volleys before enemy cloaking recycled.

Sector 7: Civilian yet AGAIN, fourth in the game, wow. Bought a map reveal and there's a ton more fights too. Store still not any weapons I really want, would put the Heavy Laser in a fourth slot if this ship had one, though did buy the Scrap Recovery Arm just because I could. And AGAIN at the next store no weapons I really want. Started to use hacking consistently - but wow is hacking good with the fast weapons - with a full level-3 (10 second) hack, I could drain shields and fire TWO volleys before they replenished!

Sector 8: a few fights for more scrap. I really didn't even know what to spend it on. It's pretty amazing that this run went all the way on just 4 weapon system power! That leavees a crapton of scrap for other purposes. I went to max shields and 7 engines and still had more to spare - even bought weapons level 5 purely for damage buffering. I don't think I've ever tried to beat the flagship on weapons so low before, but these super-fast guns have still been doing great all along. Really what's happening is each of the Dual Laser, Flak, and Mini Beam punches above its weight, undercosted on power, each really belongs on the scale at about one more power, so it's virtually like 7 power worth of weapons.

Anyway, phase one: precloak, hack shields, my super fast weapons broke the missile weapon before it ever fired, from there focused all my fire on the shields room to kill crew and got several and a fire helped. Phase two: neglected to precloak, but didn't matter, still hacked shields and broke the missile weapon before it fired, cloaked past drone surge and won on the fourth still very fast mini beam shot. Phase three: my pilot got MCed, so I decided it was indeed prudent to jump back to base to kill off boarding crew; cloaked past the missile weapon and the FTL charged before the laser surge fired (this doesn't always work but did this time with L7 engines.) Phase three part two: no damage taken when the missile weapon whiffed! Cloaked past its second volley and the laser surge together, then did enough damage to slow the missile weapon so its third volley also synched with the second laser surge, cloaked past those too... and oh yeah HOT SHIT pulled off a ZERO-DAMAGE FLAGSHIP WIN for the first time in this series!!

That run was also super satisfying! My favorite babe Stealth C delivered one hell of a showing here. 2000 scrap is hella high for a gunship and we didn't even need half of it.

Kestrel B

For this series, I wanted to get through the potentially difficult Stealth ships first, and now that's done. From here I wasn't targeting any particular ordering, just whatever I felt like doing at the moment. This day I wanted to just get a regular gunship done without worrying about any extra systems or boarding or achievements or gimmicks or anything.

Sector 1: Second fight had a z-shield and two heavy lasers, dealt 6 hull damage before I could break the weapons. Bypassed two stores because nothing to spend. First 50 scrap to shields, and got an Engi crew from a slaver, we're well on our way. Evasion trainer, this ship with a single laser and beam drone can't get past my two shields, could even also get weapons skill by autofiring just one of the basic lasers, and also even picked up shield skill too. Exit beacon a defense drone dropped for the second game in a row.

Sector 2 Engi or Engi: Got a crew kill by shooting out oxygen vs a ship that had only a Mantis to repair (their engi stayed on piloting and didn't move), rewarded with a human crew. Store, interesting choice, could buy the hull beam, but drones for defense is probably smarter, not desperate for a weapons upgrade just yet, and actually the drones was an offense upgrade too for coming with a combat drone. Good call because next store had a Flak, and also Long-Ranged Scanners!, had to sell the combat drone to buy the LRS but absolutely worth it.

Sector 3 Pirate over Mantis Homeworlds, both good choices, but not all that great equipped to deal with mantis boarders. Slaver yielded my 7th crew total. Bought a map but it showed few fights. Actually risked the "madman single life form" event but it killed one of my crew, but he was expendable. Got a 4-shot laser charger... nah, not a great match for speed/power with the basic lasers, held on to it for a little while in case another slowish weapon (halberd or flak 2) showed up, but then needed its sell value at the next store.

Sector 4 Rebel: Map routing: see the right way to do this: to navigate through all the interesting beacons with maximum scrap at the store, the right route is starting at the bottom left for three fights left-to-right to the selected beacon last, then the store, then the fight above the selected beacon, which is the one with more connections to go forward from there. Also with 230 scrap on hand, went shields to 3 now, will rack up scrap to replace that before the store. Did that, store didn't have anything I wanted besides the battery. But next store sold the charge laser to buy Cloaking, yes take that while available.

Sector 5 Zoltan over Slug, fast weapons should be able to take care of z-shields. Got a crew kill on a ship where two teleported over and a fire damaged the rest to low health, rewarded me with a Burst 2, obviously an upgrade. Then also bought a second Burst 1 at a store. With 7 crew, actually risked the Great Eye event (can lose crew) and got a scrap payout.

Sector 6 Rebel Stronghold! over Zoltan: some fights, upgraded weapons to 7 to use loadout of Flak + Burst 1 + Burst 1 + Basic Laser, although even 8 projectiles didn't feel all that reliable against 4 shields. Then at a store bought HACKING, that should be the end of any problems in that area. Also an Automated Re-loader. Found the flagship construction event at the very last beacon - after diving past the exit! I stupidly out of habit hacked shields (bad with L1 hacking) instead of evasion, but cloaking and the defense drone still worked, took only 1 damage from one missile and won, the weapon drop was a Burst 2, amazing!

Sector 7 Civilian over Engi: Second game in a row FUCK YOU UNFAIR SHIELDS HACKING EVENT. Weapons to 8 to use Flak + Burst 2 + Burst 1 + Burst 1. Accepted a Rock crew from a slaver, actually less value than killing the ship for scrap, but the only way I lose from here is to get overwhelmed by phase 3 boarders so that's insurance.

Sector 8: got to a store but it had nothing. Flagship phase one: hacked shields, combat drone helped take them down. Aimed my volley all over the place -- first weapon at ENGINES to kill the evasion, then everything else hit to break cloaking AND the missile weapon. Killed it on my second volley -- even without a beam weapon! Second phase, swapped in anti-drone, pre-cloaked 5 seconds, that gains enough time to break the missile weapon before it fires, then second volley as always focused my fire on the shields room to kill crew. Third phase, swapped combat drone back in to help with the z-shield. Got through that in two volleys, cloaked past laser surge, broke the missile weapon although just after it fired its second volley so I did take some damage, second laser surge launched but whiffed! Amusingly killed the last crewman in the shields room, and actually won on the next combat drone shot.

2050 scrap, again a lot for a gunship. That makes 12 straight wins. Although another streak got broken here -- every one of the previous 11 had a beam weapon for the boss, but this one didn't. I kinda wanted to keep up that streak too but never saw one to acquire, and that loadout of lasers was plenty enough anyway, and if there's any ship that should win entirely on laser shots it's Kestrel B to be sure.

Rock B

Now I am in the mood to get one of the clunkier ships done too.

Sector 1: First fight FUCKING REALLY? No, FUCKING REALLY?!?! Fucking blessedly, the drone's first two shots didn't go for my weapons, and my pierce laser hit enemy drone control, but fucking shit, that could have been a 100% RNG wipe right there. Evasion trainer next: the ship had a missile, but I luckily got a breach on the heavy pierce's first shot at weapons, so the missile would never repair and I could milk evasion (and shield) skill from the remaining single laser. First 50 scrap to shields. Hey, don't think I ever saw that blue option before, gave me a Hull Repair drone. Interesting drop, an Ion Blast 2?

Sector 2: picked Abandoned over nebula, would like a Lanius crew to virtual-vent fires and boarders. Got a weapons skill trainer by using the IB2, yes that is worth doing. Store didn't sell crew, but did sell a HALBERD BEAM, I decided, yes, go for it, we will play this as a gunship (beamship) and forget any teleporter. Sold EVERYTHING here (fire bomb, hull repair drone, rock plating, heavy pierce) to get weapons to 6 to use IB2 + Halberd together. Thank you for another beam? Actually might be able to use that, IB2 can make it work, yup here's one example when those two lasers can't touch me so I have unlimited time to kill, that yielded a swarm missile to get sold. Next store did have a Lanius crew on sale but I decided nah too big a scrap cost.

Sector 3 Rebel over nebula of course: Took a lot of attrition damage, Halberd can't get first strike on enemy weapons, IB2 sometimes can hit weapons first against 1-shield ships but not 2. A Small Bomb dropped, and yes weapons to 7 to use that along with IB2 and Halberd. Odd loadout but working at least for the moment.

Sector 4 Civilian over Pirate, need to find a store for repairs, low on hull. This fight looked almost impossible, 3 shields and a d-drone II to stop the ions! But a Small Bomb at drones took it offline, more bombs at weapons held off the enemy flak 2, and eventually I did get a crack for the Halberd and that's all I needed. Bought a map, wow that's kinda a hard arrangement to decide where to go, decided the left store was most important at low hull. Then through those ion storm beacons - upgraded piloting because there is one very common blue event for upgraded piloting that occurs at an ion storm beacon that doesn't show a ship - got it and a 4-shot laser charger, yes that's a better pairing for the Halberd than the ion blast. Shields to layer 3.

Sector 5 Mantis over Zoltan Homeworlds, not doing z-shields without the ion blast. Ooh nice, free scrap recovery arm. Got quite a few crew kills with the anti-bio beam. It took a lot of effort to fight off Mantis boarders without doors or mantises of my own, but we had enough crew to tag-team and swap around without any real danger of any dying. Finally got to a store to buy defense drone control but nothing else useful (damn where is cloaking/hacking.)

Sector 6 Pirate over Slug of course yes: Still getting high scrap income by getting anti-bio kills on about half of enemy ships, though not really much useful to spend it on, weapons to 8 to use charge laser + halberd + anti-bio all together. One crew kill yielded a Mantis for me, nice, needed that. Then the last store in the sector sold both cloaking and hacking and that should clinch a win from here.

Sector 7 Civilian over Zoltan: Offense having a little trouble, 4 projectiles from the charge laser alone isn't enough to clear the way for the Halberd, although hacking can always fix that, drone parts are limited. Store didn't sell any weapons, did pick up an auto-reloader.

Sector 8: Repair node did fix the problems with missile and drone supply. Then a sector 8 store had this! Yes, realign my entire loadout into Flak + Halberd + Halberd + Anti-Bio. Hacking can take care of the shields. Also did buy and upgrade doors because had the scrap for it and crew invasion seems like the only possible loss condition. Flagship phase one: hacked shields, powered up all three beams and aimed all three to instakill two crew! Then second "volley", did it again (flagship hacked my sensors but I had just seen the two crew in there), carefully damaging only the missile weapon and not any other rooms to avoid killing the ship to make sure those crew died first. Phase two, did it again, got three crew in a single stroke that time! Second volley, carefully did it again - note how the timing here is for the two halberds and bio beam to kill those two crew, BEFORE the halberds kill the ship by reaching the end of their stroke.

Phase three: triple laser blew up my defense drone! Missiles dealt bad damage and fire, and MC hit a bad target in my weapons, prudent to jump back to base and start over to clean that up... no wait can jump to the STORE instead to repair that hull damage! And even sell the bio beam and scrap recovery arm now! Phase three second try: now the missile weapon whiffed! My double halberds plus two flak shots stripped the super shield. Hack shields, cloak past the second missile volley and laser surge... and the twin Halberds plus just one more flak shot dealt enough damage to win. Hot shit again, zero damage flagship victory.

1750 scrap is lower than I thought, felt like more than that with all the crew kills, but never had LRS, and got a lot of sell value (~250) out of drops, plus the scrap recovery arm that doesn't count towards that stats number.

Lanius A

Let's do another of the slightly oddball ships. There's nothing fundamentally weird about it, but every element that you start with (hacking, chain laser, ion stunner) feels just a little off-kilter from what's usually standard. The achievements make you do some oddball stuff too.

Achievements to unlock Lanius B: Advanced Mastery: have hacking, mind control and the battery all active at once; Scrap Hoarder: have at least 600 scrap in storage; Loss of Cabin Pressure: get to sector 8 without your ship's net oxygen levels exceeding 20 percent. I hate that last one, I've never actually tried for it, there's all those horror stories about losing four hours of effort to one poorly timed door hack or just inattentiveness. The first two do have the problem of constraining your options (having hacking+MC locks out one of cloaking/drones), and each represents some sacrifice of win expectancy, but are usually doable with only minor risk.

Sector 1: Second fight, has nothing but beams, so I can do weapons skill training with the ion stunner, yes it's worth doing, I went to take a shower while it ran. Hacked weapons in several fights to buy time for a first strike. First 50 scrap to shields, and got an evasion trainer (yeah could also have been a weapons trainer here too.)

Sector 2 picked Mantis over Zoltan and upgraded doors: Breach Bomb dropped, that's interesting, got plenty of missile stock, do want to use it. Pulsar fight, alertly hacked DRONES when that beam drone was running loose when my shields got ioned. Store bought defense drone control because I could neatly afford it -- then realized an instant later that was a big mistake, since because we have to take MC for the Advanced Mastery achievement, the combination means we just locked out cloaking forever. Anyway, then sold the ion stunner and emergency respirators to buy MC at the same store, need it eventually for the achievement, just grab it now, and MC against evasion does work with the breach bomb. Neat detail: the room that a bomb targets becomes briefly visible, long enough to MC someone in it!

Sector 3 picked Pirate over Civilian, hoping to find some slavers for crew, and also this gave a choice between two nebula sectors next rather than just one. A Small Bomb dropped, weapons to 5 to use it, although the ammo can't hold out all that long for two bomb weapons. Offense is very awkward with a loadout of Chain Laser + Breach Bomb + Small Bomb, only way to win is breach shields while eating several enemy volleys, that is the war-of-attrition loss I said on the summary page. Could get fights done with support from hacking and MC, though wasn't exactly confident at all.

Sector 4 Uncharted Nebula over Slug, good thing I picked the pirate sector previously to allow routing to this one. Store had nothing useful except the backup battery, at least got the Advanced Mastery achievement. Sector was tough, MC is bad in nebula of course. Also low on fuel. Had to take several low-scrap surrender offers for stocks of fuel and missiles. Got a Zoltan crew, that helps a lot. But still not confident at all with this shaky set of offense.

Sector 5 Engi Homeworlds over Zoltan: Store finally got a weapon upgrade, a Hull Beam, not the greatest, but the sequence of MC pilot + breach shields + chain laser + hull beam does seem solid enough. As happened once before, got a trainer here for COMBAT and REPAIR skill! A breach bomb at its weapons (autoscouts can't repair breach damage) left it with only the single laser that couldn't hurt me, and it had level 1 MC, so it would forever MC one of my guys at a time who would damage his system 1 bar and then repair it. (Note how one guy had to move from level-1 piloting to my level-2 doors system to avoid hull damage.) I let that run overnight to max the skills. That fight dropped a combat drone, that could help on offense too.

Sector 6 picked Rock over Slug, I have a d-drone to deal with missiles but not enough offense to deal with Slug shields. Got a couple crew kills by MC... and HOLY MIRACLE JESUS THERE IS OUR RUN SAVER. Still far from ideal, now completely reliant on hacking shields, and not sure if 12 drone parts can hold out, but if we can make it to the flagship, a double-beam loadout will shred it. Store got in for repairs, but had to pass up an automated re-loader, to afford weapons to 7 and also save towards the 600 scrap achievement. Risked diving past the exit for two extra fights, got punished by about 6 hull damage at the exit beacon, still desperate to hold this together without spending the 600 scrap.

Sector 7 Pirate over Nebula: Crew is now my big deficiency, so a Mantis from a slaver is a big help -- just to have somebody to cover doors and sensors (to see for MC) instead of running my weapons guy over there all the time. Two more asteroid field fights knocked me down to 5 hull. Bought an absolutely critical map: WHAT THE FUCK IS THE STORE DOING WAY THE FUCK OVER THERE?!, so I never would even have seen it without that map. At this moment I decided I had to abandon the 600 scrap achievement and try again another time instead. Both because I needed to spend the scrap on upgrades (max hacking) right now and because there may likely not be 300 more scrap to be had. Now that's a surrender offer I can appreciate. Swapped in the charge laser over the hull beam for now (against the flagship will use both beams) to make it possible to deal damage without hacking, and also that stock of missiles made it worth adding the small bomb, so upgraded weapons to 8 to use Chain + Charge + Halberd + Small Bomb. Fights knocked me down to 3 hull, now 1 jump from the store... no have to say no to this fight, not dying on this hill. Yeah fuck you store, nice taunting, Scrap Recovery Arm and Long-Ranged Scanners both far far FAR too late. Anyway now finally got my strength together and should be able to win, although I'm never quite confident on the flagship without cloaking.

Sector 8: Found a store, bought an Engi crew, may need that, also more drone parts, then got a repair node so no worries about consumables. Phase one, took a total of 6 damage from the missile weapon and when everything else managed to hit and synch up, but did kill some crew in the shields room and after hacking shields did win on the second hull beam swipe. Phase two FUCK FORGOT TO UPGRADE MY DRONES TO USE DEFENSE AND ANTI-DRONE TOGETHER... but WAIT there is an empty beacon adjacent to the fight that I can jump to to do that! Trying again, everything worked, hacked shields again, killed off some more crew via MC and small bomb and beam hits, and won on the second Halberd swipe just as the drone surge launched, so no damage taken. Phase three as usual jumped back to base to kill crew. Phase three part two there was only one boarder left who was no problem, my combat drone hit most of its shots to help get through the super shield, missiles and one laser surge did some damage but I knew anything short of everything impacting weapons would keep both beams active to win on the second double-beam swipe and did.

1600 scrap is quite low, thanks to no LRS and having to skip a few fights in sector 7. So really couldn't make Scrap Hoarder this run, so will have to redo Lanius A again for the achievement to unlock Lanius B. But I can do better next time when I don't need shitty MC for the other achievement so can take cloaking instead.

Kestrel C

Back to another straightforward gunship.

Sector 1: First fight at a pulsar, smartly depowered shields just before the pulse timed to turn back on and recharge just before the second enemy weapon volley fired. Got a map reveal to find lots of fights, actually ended up bypassing the store. This fight hacked my shields and damaged my weapons, fuck, dealt about eight painful damage overall before I won, then shields to layer 2 right after that fight. Just in time for this, which I could use for an evasion trainer - it's not guaranteed that it can't get past my shields (the drone can fire twice quickly), but I kept the enemy weapon broken as much as I could and got evasion skill maxed with only one damage taken. Upgraded piloting for an ion storm beacon and got the piloting-explores-nebula event, a Hull Missile drop, not really worth using, is vendor trash. Another trainer that could have done evasion and did work to max weapons skill with the ion. Exit beacon was an event to give them 5 missiles to repair 10 hull, nice.

Sector 2: woah a completely split galaxy, took the Pirate sector here, fewer nebulas down the line. Rock crew from a slaver, nice. Got the piloting-explores-nebula event again, and woah, an Anti-Bio Beam!

Sector 3: Mantis Homeworlds over Abandoned, yeah I can handle Mantis boarding and ships are often weak enough to take the time for anti-bio crew kills. Twice actually used the hull missile to break weapons to buy time for an anti-bio kill. But then a store had a pike beam on sale, first decided defense drone control was first priority, then decided yeah the Pike is also worth it, sell the anti-bio and hull missile to commit to the more practical bursts-and-beams gospel. Got a Backup DNA Bank, actually does seem worth keeping around for insurance.

Sector 4 Engi: Silly fight here, enemy can't touch me, but with 3 shields and a d-drone II my ship can't touch them either. Only way to win this was to autofire my guns until they destroyed the d-drone enough times that they ran out of drone parts! Also I made sure to hold off a bit on damage to first bring the ship to exactly 5 health from where I could kill it in one Pike swipe, since I correctly sensed it might try to run away. Store bought a 2-shot charge laser to upgrade from the ion stunner.

Sector 5 picked Zoltan over Rock, think I can deal with z-shields well enough, not quite confident against Rock ships without cloaking. Store bought an automated re-loader and the battery. Next 100 scrap shields to layer 3.

Sector 6 Rock Homeworlds, guess we're doing Rock after all. Good scrap income, defense drone held out well against missiles, also upgraded engines several times as a backup against missiles. A 4-shot charge laser dropped and yeah worth upgrading weapons to use it, sweet spot is 3 charges at just faster than the pike beam. Well, defense drone held out well EXCEPT WHEN IT GOT SHOT!

Sector 7 picked Rock again over Slug Nebula, short on crew and not great at dealing with slug MC or hacking. Store did decide to sell the backup DNA bank in order to afford Cloaking, always need that against the flagship. Holy crap enemy double Burst 3, that is exactly what cloaking is made for, importantly I had to cloak the INSTANT they fired so the 20-second cooldown would recycle just before the projectiles from the second volley after a 19-second charge would reach my ship. Mercenary event gave a Chain Ion, that's crap, sell it. Last store: Hacking not available, went with MC, also on sale was a Flak and even a second Auto-Reloader. Bought it all to make the loadout Flak + Charge Laser + Dual Laser + Pike Beam with weapons to 8, and that's way more than enough to beat the flagship.

Sector 8: Three fights before flagship for important extra scrap, mostly for power bars - but wow THAT is one heck of a nice stroke, free Zoltan Shield Bypass to use MC on flagship phase three! Phase one, pre-cloaked 10 seconds, since I know that plus the pike beam is fast enough to break the missile weapon before it ever fires. Killed off three crew between laser shots and MC - actually waited to kill the ship until my second round of MC got its target killed. HA NICE that is the PERFECT drop to use for phase two!, even alert enough to upgrade drone system to use it and the defense drone together. Phase two pre-cloaked 5 seconds, which I know also buys enough time to break the missile weapon before it fires, and lines up the cloaking recycle with the drone surge; won easily but did take 3 damage between a hit from the beam weapon and when the boarding drone broke my mind control.

Phase three MCed the enemy pilot through the z-shield in hopes to get him killed but my MC ran out just before that happened. But I did jump back to base to kill off three boarders leaving only two crew on the ship so only one would board me on the second try. Phase three part two went textbook: countered enemy MC, took small damage from the missile weapon, stripped super shield in two volleys (makes a difference to not have a crewman on engines for evasion), cloaked past laser surge twice, broke missile weapon, won easily on the fourth Pike swipe after the super shield.

1580 scrap is actually the lowest so far in this series, and I spent a lot on weapons (charge, pike, flak, two auto-reloaders), but I didn't feel like I was missing anything at all, got plenty of sell value from drops, and never spent much on repairs. Another thoroughly average textbook run.

Fifteen-for-fifteen wins!

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