Two ion blast 2, thoughts?

[♥♥♥♥ Goblin]

Hey guys,

Any of you run with 2 ion blast ii? I am on a rock ship, I got 1 for free and a store has 1 for 60-70 scrap. They take 3 power and my other 2 power is used on laser burst ii.

I feel like it would be a greedy play to take 2 of them instead of having a more balanced loadout (or using the scrap for another upgrade), but they are just so powerful :P I'm thinking about end-game versus any ship.

[Ray Robertson]

You could also keep another weapon in the 4th slot and swop it out with one of the Ion Blasts Mid-battle. Once shields are down.

I wonder whether 2 Ion Blast IIs will keep the Flagship's shields ionized through its cloak, I don't feel like doing the math at the moment. Maybe later. (My gut says it will, easily.)

You could also ionize whichever system your heart desires with the second Ion blast once shields are down.

[FDru]

Originally posted by Ray Robertson:

I wonder whether 2 Ion Blast IIs will keep the Flagship's shields ionized through its cloak, I don't feel like doing the math at the moment. Maybe later. (My gut says it will, easily.)

I don't know about easily. If you can land 7-8 shots without missing you'll be fine, but any less and the ion stack will probably break.

[Skinny Pete]

Originally posted by ♥♥♥♥ Goblin:

Hey guys,

Any of you run with 2 ion blast ii? I am on a rock ship, I got 1 for free and a store has 1 for 60-70 scrap. They take 3 power and my other 2 power is used on laser burst ii.

Two Ion Blast II is pretty good and even allows you to stack ion damage. For a number of reasons, it's not quite as good as the 3 power Ion Blast II, but it costs one less power, so is arguably more energy efficient (while taking an extra slot).

It's a really nice combination with a beam weapon.

In fact, one of the better starting weapons combinations is the Zoltan ship that starts with two Ion Blast Is and a Pike Beam.

[gambit]

It really depends in what sector you are, difficulty, scrap and what others systems you already have.
Everybody just keeps posting what weapons, shields and engines they have, like that is only thing that beats game.

[Rodrigo]

I personally wouldnt go after flagship attempting to ionize its shields so you can get past, it may work yes... but it likely will take time and will def miss a few shots... flagship has a 4 bubble shield, so it will take some stack to have it downed and unoperation for as long as you need, and to me, flagship is always "beat it as fast as possible", so i'd rely on a triple/double missile launcher, hacks or boarding for that shield. a single ion could help AFTER that, keep that triple offline for a while, stop their mind control or hack grapple. I'm not a fan of ion yes ;)

[Reality]

Personally, (for normal AE) I'm fine with a combined 5 attacks and a halberd, (flak I - Burst laser I- halberd) (hull laser I- hull laser-2-halberd) Or an Ion and two lasers. Small/Ion Bombs and 2 lasers are fine too. It kinda dies a lot of ways.

It's very possible to take it out with default weapons and Level 3 hacking, although admitedly painful. Personally I would always recomend ion blast 1 and 2 together instead of the excess of having two, mostly because the big reactor requirment means you can't use it to hold you over until about sector 6, although conversely, you can easily make enough scrap to make up for skimped reactor/engines by going out of your way to fight in the last sectors and the last stand itself if you do purchase that kind of firepower.

Although that is a rule of thumb, and for the rock ship I actually would take it, since you can probbably keep one of them in the hold and then sell off some of the default equipment later when you're ready to transition to ion blast godhood, or if you accidently get to a point where you can survive attacks well but can't hit through enemies - at which point the rock plating is kind of a luxury anyway.

[♥♥♥♥ Goblin]

This was on hard, sector 6. I ended up taking them and absolutely crushed, lol.

I found that once you down the shields (even 4 shields), you can have 1 ion on shields and 1 ion on something else and the shields will be down indefinitely so long as you don't miss. Phase 1+2+3 of flagship had no shields except when cloaking / super shield, so it will pretty easy.

[xenxander]

http://steamcommunity.com/app/212680/discussions/0/627456487069321004/

Here I started a thread about a ship like that.

I have it saved too, at the last stand. If you want the continue.sav file, I can send it to you. It's a really fun ship to use against the flag ship ^_^

Edit:
Basically, I love 2 ion blast 2 guns, if you can get the scrap to update weapons that far, and have something to attack with (beam drone works great, burst 2 also works, or pike beam - also a really good choice)

[Panfilo]

Stacking Ion Blast are great. Like others have said, it has great synergy with beam weapons. 2 Ion Blast and 2 mini beams would likely be one of the most energy-efficient ways to destroy a ship. Particularly good for Zoltan sectors, since you'll wreck zoltan shields mighty quick.

Main challenge when dealing with Flagship phase 1 is that it is no slouch with evasion and has level 3 cloaking, which will intermittently give it a chance to restore its shields.