Luck and the last sector....

[Duke Leto Atreides]

It seems to me that no matter how great your ship is by the time you reach the last sector, the random location of the base, repairs and store will greatly affect the fight with the rebel flagship.

Hitting one repair or a store after the first round helps a lot. No repairs at all and /or needing to fight 6-7 elite ships just to get to the base will mess you up completely.

[Mhblis]

So I've been playing about a week. All group A unlocked so take what I say as personal experience.

I've found that if I'm still looking for that one last upgrade or key piece in the last sector is agree with you it feels luck based.

But on the other hand if I get to the last sector with all the bits I need even the elite ships prove no issue.

For me it's more the journey. At times you just seem to not find any working combination.


The final ship is always the same so honestly I've been finding I rarely take damage apart from the opening moments of the first wave. So the repairs themselves I've visited in sector 8 only should I need an extra drone or two and if they are on the way.

[dwarfie24]

I have beaten the flagship several times without relying on repairs. They help, but you shouldnt count on them.
As a friend says the better you play the less likelihood of loosing. Even extremely good players (I am not in this group myself just ok) can be shafted by the game.

[dwarfie24]

Also I am curious do you play normal?

[Duke Leto Atreides]

Easy, advanced content off for now. I'm trying to to beat the game with all the ships and unlock the B layouts.

[Fins]

Originally posted by Leto Atreides:

It seems to me that no matter how great your ship is by the time you reach the last sector, the random location of the base, repairs and store will greatly affect the fight with the rebel flagship.

Hitting one repair or a store after the first round helps a lot. No repairs at all and /or needing to fight 6-7 elite ships just to get to the base will mess you up completely.

Depends how good you are and what is the difficulty you play.

My last run, i had me exactly that situation: no store even spotted in sector 8, only one repair i was able to get on my way to the flagship fight, and absolutely no chance to repair or shop between stages of the Flagship fight. This was on normal with AE on.

Well guess what. During that sector 8, i lost 10 hull points - all before hitting that repair station (and most of them i allowed myself to lose, since i knew i'll get repairs). And i lost zero hull points afterwards. Including none in all 3 stages of the Flagship fight, of which i now making a video to be published in the nearby "Pyromaniac's diaries" topic in a couple hours or so.

"How"? As you will be able to see in the video, i had me a mighty Ion boat, going around with 3 Ion weapons operational in the same time (and even 4 Ion weapons in the same time during stage 2 of the boss fight). So, fighting all those ships in sector 8 - i just disabled everything which could possibly hurt me, and cloaked through anything i couldn't disable. I even did not have a single defensive drone while at it all (and indeed most of those 10 hull points lost were to missiles, if not all 10, i don't quite remember).

So you see, this is not the only possible way to do it - there are plenty other methods to prevent damage. Like, you can damage their weapons real bad and keep pounding them; you can hack them; use defense drones; and if you see a ship which you know will hurt you bad - jump away before it does, if you must. Use combinations of all the above as you see fit and find your own way with whatever weapons and ship you happen to be!

So, no, the game itself does not have the problem you say it does. Instead, you the player have this problem. You're unable to get through (any well) in such circumstances - for now; while somebody else - me, - is able to. This actually means real good news for you, you know? Because now you know that to solve that "problem", it's not needed to anyhow "fix" the game; you now know that sooner or later you'll possibly find ways to get through such "unlucky" sector 8s just fine.

And also because once you get to the point you can get past even most tough sector 8 "configurations", - you'll sure feel good, 'cause that will be something you became able to do, something you were not able to do before. And it always feels good becoming better at things, i mean. You know?

Good luck! ;)

[Mr. Broccoli]

I second the basic concept of what Fins said. I'm no expert for sure, but I've learned a lot from when I first started out. Early on I became addicted to repair drones, these days I (generally) do fine without, and often even avoid the repair depots unless I want to easily top off my drones/missiles, those elite ship battles give more scrap for last minute upgrades! :)

I'm not sure of a single piece of advice, other than to try to plan out a balance as best you can between offence and defence, and anticipate what you'll do when faced with different enemies, like with the 3 FS phases. Flexability and finding synergy with various systems is worth a lot more than getting lucky and finding the shiny super doodad that lets you win.

That said, I still need to figure out the Stealth B, only winning run there was the lucky time I found a weapon pre-igniter early on... Well, one of these days, we've all got stuff to learn!

[Bellomy]

Properly done your rig should be finished by sector 8. At best plan for one repair and don't count on it either.

Yes, this is even doable on hard mode.

[Skinny Pete]

I've found the usual way I somehow get all the way to the flagship and get stomped is the game just hammered me all along, forcing me to waste scrap on repairs, and then I get a horrible layout with no repairs or shops.

It's usually in the second phase of the ship because that's the one that punishes a weak ship the most (while phase three punishes a weak crew).

[Antifreedomring]

Everytime ive beaten the flagship on easy ive never needed to repair inbetween stages. Get a teleporter and take out its missle weapon asap to start

[Mercotroll]

i do agree that unlucky repair node placement definitely doesn't help. I have a question about sector 8. Are you supposed to just make your way to the Base node and wait? Or am I missing some deeper strategy regarding the map?

[Mc]

Repair should not be required, esp. on Easy. But if you depend on it, use drone system and keep repair drone. During fight you can use combat drone 1 and it helps taking down flagship fast once shields are down (also takes down zotlan shield fast). Alternatively you can use defense drone to shot down some of the missiles and with Mk2 even projectiles. It also helps against those elite ships, drone wrecks ships without shields fast so you just need enough weapons to keep 4 shields down and the drone does the rest.

Repair drone does not need to be installed during fight, just install it between fights, repair as much as you need, and install back whatever drones you want for the fight.

If you play without drones then your setup should be planned such that you don't need repairs (common way is cloaking + boarding + shield 4 + evasion ~40% + enough offense to take down shields and do damage is sure way to win on easy and normal without repairs if you know what you are doing).

If you play for other achievements (e.g. to unlock B version of ship) then you might end up with bad setup for flagship in sector 8 and it is normal to lose, but that is Ok since that was not your primary goal.

I very rarely have repair or store in such position, that I could repair between phases. Even if there is one close to base the rebels take it down quick. And to avoid fighting rebel fleet go straight for the base, don't sidetrack or your path will be cut and you might be in trouble.

[Duke Leto Atreides]

That was 2 years ago, I 100% the game since then. ;)