FTL: Faster Than Light - DRONE AND RACES TIER LIST - Which Alien Races to Prioritize on Every Run!
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- čas přidán 5. 03. 2021
- Hey guys, in this (final) tier list, I'm bringing you a two for one special with the Drone and Races tier lists. Make sure to subscribe and let me know what you think of my choices in the comments below!
Another reason zoltan are S tier : if you have two of them on shields, that shield bubble is IMMUNE to ion damage.
That is hilarious.
Yeah, having your final shild bubble be immune to ion is incredibly valuable. This doesn't even just apply to shields. Any power provided by them can't be taken offline by ion damage, so a ship with a lot of Zolron could (for example) see a shield bubble, defense drone, low power weapon, and one point in engines (preserving the evasion bonuses from ) all immune to ion damage, which is pretty OP around a neutron star.
The power they provide is also not reduced by ion storms in nebula beacons.
Easy s-tier. Any desired crew roster should have at least 2 (+1 engi)
That's true but I always forget it lol
only draw back other than hp is their high scrap cost to hire
I never knew this appreciate it
The slug tier placement confuses me because they're basically straight upgrades to humans apart from the almost negligible 10% faster skills. Way more blue events, being able to guarantee pilot won't be mind controlled... Honestly, I'd totally rather take multiple slugs over a human unless I'm buying them from a shop and have to pay the price difference
They cost the same 45 scrap
They're rather rare I think, whilst good, they don't appear often
@@kotzpenner he said hes not ranking on rarity though
I was thinking this! Slugs are easily superior to humans. Also he said the ability doesn't stack and then goes on to mention how if you only have one slug then someone else will be mind controlled. A crew full of slugs (admittedly needs to be 100% slug) is immune to mind control. Maybe he's just got a vendetta against slugs? Keep eating his garden plants?
Personally, I'll take my first slug over a human any day - the added "sensor", the blue events, the pilot who can't be mind controlled...
After the first slug, I'll take the faster training of humans over having one more unit that can't be mind controlled - having an all-slug crew would make you immune to mind control, but mean missing out on various blue events, and other racial bonuses, so I'm going to be looking for a mixed crew anyway, so the enemy's always going to be able to mind control someone, meaning that trait doesn't offer much benefit...
Slugs make the best pilots because a piloting system is affected most by the sudden loss of a controlling crew member. Sheild guy mind controlled? Ten percent difference. Pilot mind controlled? Between fifty and a hundred percent reduction depending on how upgraded your autopilot is
Yeah, this. MC on pilot can be disastrous.
The best way to use Lanius in my opinion is to use them to destroy O2 rooms in a boarding action, then send them around the other ship sucking the O2 out of vital rooms, they are practically unique in this style of boarding
Since the enemy crew leaves the room they're in if it's running low on oxygen and they're low health, I prefer to send them to either the clone bay, or the medbay that I destroyed beforehand, so they can't fix it.
Lanius are especially strong against clone bays. If the enemy crew is at low health, they'll avoid any oxygen-depleted room. This means that you can have your lanius destroy the clone bay while the whole enemy crew waits around with low health. Then, all that's left is to go around the ship finishing off every remaining target.
Destroying the O2 room takes too long in my eyes. You can end the battle way faster by just immediately hunting down the enemy crew instead of first waiting for the oxygen to be destroyed.
@@bobthebox2993 Use a hacking pod on the O2 room and it drains the oxygen from the entire ship super fast.
Slug are essentially humans with mind powers. A tier plox
They have exactly the same ship board abilities as humans do besides the faster training which you mentioned was not a big deal. their immunity to MC and life scan abilities makes upgrading sensor systems unnecessary, saving scrap. And they have more blue events.
Slug in piloting is amazing. Huge swing in hit probability if that gets targeted. Slug sight works in nebula so if you have them MC is still useful there.
@@TheMelnTeam Slug in piloting is definitely their best use imo (unless you have a fully trained pilot by the time you get the slug, then I'd say it's not worth training them).
I disagree with the Nebula bit. One, you spend very little time in nebulae; you want to avoid nebula sectors as much as possible, so you'll just have short stints in them as you slow down the Rebel fleet. Two, that information is rarely helpful. As Spearmintz said, most FTL action is ship-on-ship. The location of their crew is pretty much never relevant, unless you get the chance to wipe out the crew with your weapons. It's obviously a bonus, but it's worthless outside a niche scenario in an already niche scenario. I felt they were placed pretty well in the video.
Everyone knows if you start with a human, you put them on weapons, save positions, and ideally forget they exist till you have to take a fight there.
They'd be better if stacking them gave more sensor levels for free. The first slug is really good, especially if you start a run with one. But slugs depreciate in value over time, and not getting one early means their primary benefit often doesn't matter. That's why they suck.
Life Scan is build-dependent. You only really need to know what the other ship's crew is doing if you're boarding or running an anti-crew build. MC immunity is useful but not a game-breaker. You can sit your slug in a system room that you want safeguarded from mind control.
If you don't have a slug, then get a slug. If you already have a slug, don't bother with more.
1) The bonus scrap you get for boarding needs to be considered. I only destroy a ship that I cannot board successfully. So I value Mantis more than you do, and I devalue Engi much more, usually keeping at most 1 for doors or sensors to run around for repairs. 2) Lannis can board drones and get massive combat experience doing so.
Year the second part was quite overlooked. You can board autoships with the rockguys too, since you can get them out quickly enough again, but its way easier with Lanius
You can also board drones with any race with a lvl 2 teleporter. Gets em back with 10 hp left. Just make sure the drone doesn't have cloaking or mind control.
The slug/human thing exposes a weakness in the tier system. Given a choice of recruits, if I have no slugs, I'm taking a slug over a human every single time; if I have at least one slug, then I'm taking humans. Which ends up higher tier when you take that into account depends on whether you think you're more likely to be considering your second slug or your first.
It's similarly context dependent with the Mantis/Engi question, if I'm on Engi A, I always take the Mantis because my Engis get rekt by any boarders
I'd always take slug over human however in most other cases I want a balanced team
1st slug, I place in Door room for free buff. His telepathy lets me see boarders and vent more effectively in nebula.
@@ynraider There's a strong argument for putting a slug as pilot, particularly if you get them early - you get all the free information (and blue options on events) no matter where you put them, they'll get up to level 2 piloting only slightly slower than a human would (if you manage to find an enemy that's incapable of damaging you, then you can get them to max level in a single encounter) and their immunity to mind control means you're not going to lose your piloting bonus nor stop charging the FTL unexpectedly...
Lanius are absolutely amazing because of AI behavior. Use them for area denial. When boarding, they quickly cause the enemy to abandon the room, leaving you to munch on the system (no weapons for you folks!). They're also amazing for boarding defense because they discourage enemies from attacking critical systems. They're worth at least A tier.
Rocks are terrible firefighters. They may not take damage while putting out fires, but it takes them a long time to get to the fire and they only put it out at normal speed, so your system takes MORE damage than if you had sent any other race to help. Because Engies move at normal speed and put out fires twice as fast, they're by far the best firefighters in the game. Similarly, the slow Rock movement speed means they're not good at chasing boarders. They are, however, the best anchors in the game when no Lanius is available, particularly as a pilot. They keep your evasion up with their ability to hold out for a long time under fire/in combat. I would never take more than one Rockman unless I'm going for fire boarding. C tier for me.
Slugs have a lot of blue events (and some of those are critical), which by itself is worth B tier in my opinion.
Offensive drones are not good for damage because you can't aim manually and they often shoot rooms that don't matter. Combat drones are better than beam drones because they help your weapons get through shields.
Hull repair drone is easily S tier if you get it in an event or in an early shop, the free 3 HP repair without spending a drone part every jump will save you so much scrap and being able to patch up between flagship stages is also super useful.
Agree on drones.
The Combat Drone 1 is pretty okay, it's two power to essentially permanently reduce the enemy shield by 1, and maybe damage rando systems that the AI might fix instead of more important ones. It's probably worse than a basic burst laser... but if you already have three weapons, it's free.
And the Hull Repair drone is great, IF you get it for free. It's way too expensive to buy, unless you're playing a miracle game and already have everything else you want.
Maybe ironically, the hull repair drone is pretty awful if you're using a drone build, since they can't be reclaimed by the arm.
I also think there's kind of a unique problem to Zoltans. Most crewmembers, when they die it's sad, but no biggie. Maybe losing some mantis boarders might suck if you've invested in boarding.
Losing a Zoltan could throw your entire power balance off, and cost extra Scrap on death to upgrade the grid, or possibly be permanently messed up if you were already at max.
@@aprinnyonbreak1290 They are reclaimed, you just let it heal you twice and then jump. Then your drone heals you 2 hull every jump, for free.
Not true actually. Rockmen put out fires at greatly increased speed. Compare Human's 1.2x fire removal speed with Rockman's 2.0x. It's Crystals that suck at firefighting, with their 1.0x speed (Fire Suppression speed)
@@Pe6De And why is that not listed on the wiki?
@@peterni2234 Do not ask me, ask those responsible for the wiki. Rockmen put out fires quite fast compared to humans, and that neither the game mentions nor the wiki.
System repair drone is a trooper, I don't NEED one on my runs, but I'm always happy to get one. I've had one carry me through the fire and flames of the flagship at least twice, its a champ at fixing breached oxygen rooms. Its also common to be the drone included when buying the system if your ship doesnt start with it.
Agreed! He's a helpful little guy, especially for one power
If you have a drone system but your build is around something else, they really are maybe the best way to spend a single power point (unless you can get and fit in an Ion Blast 1) :D
System repair drone is never necessary and always useful. Clear B tier.
@@dylandugan76 Well, 'never' necessary is a bit harsh. I dare you to repeat that with your crew confined to medbay and your O2 broken and breached ^^
I love them but my only complaint is they repair things in their order. Fixing my doors is great and all but when the engines are down and the shields are failing i wish I could tell them to focus there instead.
22:00
If you have drone recovery arm, use the hull repair drone, and jump after getting a few heals, you will gain the drone used and keep the health healed. Broken.
A lot of my wins used this strat. Feels good man.
Smart!
I would say Slug is at minimum B tier, if not actually A tier. Your points about stacking them is valid, however they're strictly superior in every way to a human, barring the xp gains which, as you said, are minimal at best. It might not be enough better to bump them up a tier, but they should, at a minimum, be at the same tier as Human. A single slug can be quite a useful crew member, especially as your pilot.
Fully agreed.
Sectors tier list?
please
The thing about anti-drone drone is, it can stop the most annoying drone in the game, the hacking drone (provided that you remember to activate your drone before the enemy's hits you). It really helps with the flagship's first stage as well, because of this.
I gotta put Zoltans in A, moving them around always ends up wrecking my power grid & I've ended up not noticing I'm down a layer of shields or one of my weapons is offline for a couple seconds because of them
i agreed with you
The low health really hurts them as well, definitely an A tier
@@devyboo2 i agreed with you too
Personally I'm not even sure I would give them A, but rather B... they're like a crutch that breaks easily and always at the worst times (if your crew is taking damage you're probably under a lot of pressure, relatively speaking) and that's exactly when you have to pull your Zolt off your shield or your weapons or engine or whatever to heal or flee, and lose additional evasion/a shield point/a weapon, when you were already in trouble. They give a false sense of security and artificially inflate their importance, because it so often ceases as soon as you're actually up against it.
You guys are all wrong. Getting 2 and putting them on shields is OP.
What about a system/subsystem tier list? Which ones to buy, and which ones to prioritize upgrading, and maybe some tips specific to them
This would be cool, but proooobably too ship and run specific. Sometimes you get good weapon drops and really want to upgrade your weapons right away. Sometimes you've got good defenses, and another layer of shields will make you untouchable for 1 or 2 sectors. If you're boarding, then you want a good medbay.
It'd be pretty much impossible to convey all this nuanced info in a traditional tier list.
@@BrisingrFan55 To be fair, this is true for most lists he has done.
12:12 the anti drone is an S tier because it gets rid of the annoying drones in phase 2 which makes it almost entirely harmless, especially if you get two
You definitely need two. It spawns like 7 drones
Making it S tier for that alone seems too much, but I do agree that it has not been done justice in this list. Being able to fully negate the dangers of a single phase for barely any power, makes it at least B tier for me.
Slug's are not C teir. Slug pilots are THE BEST because when they pilot they cannot be mind-controlled. You only need 1 however.
1st slug, I place in Door room for free buff. His telepathy lets me see boarders and vent more effectively in nebula.
I like having Lanius, and than just full venting everything but whatever room any normal crew are in. Boarders just suffocate, and not having to worry about them is soooo nice
If you have doors, you can do this on most ships by de-powering oxygen and venting. The rooms drain out oxygen pretty fast, so the difference in damage to hostile boarding crew between say Kestrel A vs Lanius A isn't too large and you can still weaken/kill/force TP back using vents on standard ships with at least doors 2 (upgraded or from manning). Unless you're in rock B or mod ships with no vents to space.
Even better, you can use the oxygen deprivation to steer boarders by leaving oxygen in places like the medbay.
AI lanius boarders can't be steered this way, and are thus the most annoying/dangerous boarders by far for normal ships, and still annoying for lanius ships.
Also, fire doesn't spread. And if boarders do require attention, they'll already be severely weakened before the Lanius needs to enter combat. Their mediocre battle stats don't matter since the enemy is under constant DoT.
Real talk I would definitely watch a music tier list. Be interesting to see a tier list with all A's and S's.
The boarder drone is fucking terrifying.
Kestrel, almost to the end. One proceeds to land and distract 4 of my crew inbetween a round of heals, in my damn shield room.
After I kill it, it then comes back in my engines, before I die to missiles.
Boarding drones I agree, are terrifying, but from a user’s perspective, they aren’t good. You can’t select where to board, which is a bummer for a boarding run to maximise crew damage.
The only advantage is that it can take on ai ships, but i much rather use a lanius for this. Or a suicide ship (FED C).
The reason why the anti-drone drone is good is that it requires only one power slot. It feels like it's practically free when you use it so you may as well.
That thing was what kept me alive in the 2nd phase of the flagship in my first victory, it is genuinely brilliant for that.
Great video! Loving FTL content in 2021 lol.
I agree on all of them except for the Slug. They have good blue events & they’re basically just better humans once they max skills (which isn’t that hard rly). IMO, they’re A tier. Everything you said is right I just think it warrants A
When I was younger I rarely picked up zoltan bc the health. I know they’re good I just rarely used them.
We need a FTL Tier List . . . Tier List! I love them!
Lanius is great for defence for ships with a lot of airlocks. Keep lots of rooms without oxygen is great at pervent fire and boarding. Also, lanius boarding is great with boarding drones and breach weapons. I often send 2 lanius into a breached room (often shield) and and everyone enters the room dies in 5 seconds...
Heck yeah ! A race tier list, my favorite kind of tier list
I think one point you missed with the lanius is they're ideal for repairing breached systems.
Not the biggest fan of drones unless playing on a ship which can support 3 at a time, though in certain situations I would consider buying the drone system just for the defense drone mark 1 by itself. Also I never use shield overcharger drones too often, though they can be helpful in extending the life of your zoltan shield if have the augment - awesome list, would love to see more videos like it!
Thanks man! I agree with the drones, I like what they're going for, but alot of times you have to commit super hard to a drone build to really make them effective. Glad you enjoyed the video
One overlooked thing for Mantis is the speed bonus partly negates the repair debuff, they can get to a system to help repair it faster than any other crew. Also means they can get to fires to put them out faster than other crews as they have no penalty there.
I argue the system repair drone is actually S tier
A) Cheap
B) Can go into dangerous environments for normal crew
C) Low power consumption
D) Doesn't have to be permanently powered, you can keep it unpowered and when one of your vital systems gets damaged you can reroute the power to the drone for repairs
E) Only requires one drone part to create and won't be destroyed by jumping.
Only downside is they're kinda dumb and have gone into rooms with borders only to get fucking yeeted.
I feel like you forgot that Zoltan shields can block teleporters and mind control. The utility boost of the overcharger drone comes from the fact that you can block these disruptive effects from harassing your ship as frequently, especially with a high dodge chance to stop the overshield from being taken down. It's still not S-tier, but it's at least B-tier.
Always put slug on pilot
I don't understand how they're worse than humans when they're literally just like humans but with extra abilities, they're at least the same tier
They do lose the ability to level up faster, which can be good if you need a replacement close to the end
@@michaelFrotaFokkens The Human xp boost almost never matters, even when you get them late game. Usually, you find an enemy to farm xp on, so you'll max any crewman. In the situations where you can't, the human xp boost still often does nothing. "Yay, my human crew member got to level 1.5 instead being a alien at 1.4!" Whup de doo. The only real benefit that humans have is that they are the budget option, being cheaper than aliens from stores.
P.S.
Maybe you can get more value from the human xp bonus, if you're specifically running a cloning bay suicide team, but that's far more niche than any other "bonus" off the tier list.
@@CatacombD ye, i guess
Great tier lists! Too bad it's final one, I kinda hoped for augmentations list as well.
Also, sys. repair drone is easy S tier for me because of how effective it is: 1 drone part that can last entire run, consumes only 1 power bar and can be de-powered when not needed, fast movement, really fast repair/fire extinguishing, no need for oxygen and finally, it can heal itself in drone control if damaged. VERY good for a default drone, that you get for free when purchasing drone control system.
Hmmm augment tier list you say🤔
@@spearmintz1 Yeah. And there is a lot of them too. Probably enough for another 30+ min video.
Yah I agree on the argument tier list can super nice to see
Repair drone is awesome, but I think A is a fair rating, because they're not as needed if you have a large crew. You can't control them either, so they might not repair the most important system at the moment.
If Humans are B tier, then Slug should be at least B tier too. Mind control immunity, blue events and telepathy surely beats out learning skills slightly faster.
Next tierlist you should do is sector tierlist. Which sectors should you jump to? How much does the chance at Zoltan shield impact the choice of Zoltan Homeworlds? How much do abandoned sectors ruin runs with poor weapon layouts? Are uncharted nebulas complete trash sectors with no scrap?
I understand your reasoning for the slugs. Personally I am a little biased because they are my favorite race, but I’d probably put them as the lowest A tier. Only because, in my opinion, they make the best pilots. Having a pilot who cannot be mind controlled is super helpful because it prevents the enemy ship from instantly decimating your dodge chance via mind control.
You know, these tier lists are entertaining, and it's neat to see your analysis of the good and bad points of everything. Also, I can relate to you not caring much for drones. I too am not a fan of the automation; I'd rather choose the targets of my weapons. That being said...
21:49 How the heck is Hull Repair not S tier? O_o It's a drone system that actually pays for itself, because it repairs more cheaply than shops do, and it does it *in the field!* That's huge! I think you're vastly underestimating how valuable it is to not be dependent on stores for repairs, but even setting that aside... do the math... depending on what sector you're in, buying 3-5 hp of repairs from a shop will cost you between 6 and 20 scrap, while drone parts cost 8 scrap. You could be saving as much as half your repair money with this thing! Once I get this system, (which is always worth buying) I never get repairs in shops for the rest of the game, spending the scrap on drone parts instead, because I know I will profit on that. (No exaggeration; this system pays for itself... especially if you get the drone recovery augment, which makes the repairs free)
Like... as I said above, I'm not a fan of drones, but if I get the opportunity to get the Hull Repair drone, no joke, I will adjust my overall strategy mid-stream to accommodate it, even if I didn't have a drone control system up 'til then, because it is that much of a game-breaking advance that dramatically improves my chance of winning.
Hey, there! I didn't know you did FTL as well!
Are you willing to do a LP of FTL Advanced Edition in the near future?
Whenever I play FTL, this is the crew I use for all my ships.
Shields: zoltan
Weapons: zoltan
Engines: zoltan
Pilot: Human
Sensors: Slug
Doors: Lanius
Boarding Party: Mantis and Rockman
I pretty much only ever use Defense I, and I always buy drone control because of that. Defense I is pretty common to find, and it neutralizes so many annoying attacks. Fire drones are great in theory, but they never seem to hit any critical systems when I use them.
Mantis are A tier, they can run a minor system like security and ditch it at any point to save your other crew when you're boarded by an enemy
I know this old but after a recent FTL binge I found these. Mantis is so A tier. There are so many BS boarding events that throw 2-4 guys at you. Plus, you don't need a ton of repair ability for subsystems that benefit from being manned but only have a couple of bars. Also, you did anti-drone and shield overcharge so dirty! Anti-drone can hit hacks, both boarding drones, and sometimes gets in the way of an enemy missile. It's useful even in the endgame. Shield overcharge is great because just one bar of Zoltan shield blocks missiles entirely and prevents boarding and mind control. Those two defensive drones have gotten me through so many runs.
But great otherwise, now I want to try a fire drone build
I like having a single human on weapons if I have one early, purely based on the fact that weapons level up by firing and reward you with a faster cooldown. I feel you get a little more value out of it since the benefit feeds the rank up process.
I kind of agree with the assessment about Lanius. I feel like Lanius are great at boarding if you can stack them, but good luck doing that.
Piloting, too. I think there's an argument for Slug pilots, since mind control on the pilot hurts more, or Rocks because your pilot usually isn't going anywhere, but piloting has a lot of room for exp to improve your game, from beginning to end, and a human at the helm gets that evasion online faster.
Not like it's a super volatile niche, most people park someone in the pilot seat at the start and never move them, but if an unfortunate accident strikes your pilot.
@@aprinnyonbreak1290 Core system xp is worthless. In any given run you *will* sooner or later run into a ship that doesn't threaten you. For example, a ship with 2 heavy lasers when you already have 2 shield bubbles. As soon as you do, you can max out your piloting, engines, shields, and weapons by simply idling in the fight until all your crew members max out. Hell, if you're anal about it, you can even max out all those skills on all of your crew!
The only xp's that have value are repair xp and combat xp. (although in some rare situations you can farm combat xp too)
On Anti-Personal Drones I've had good luck with them; you can send them out and fight and drain the O2 from the room to kill boarders faster. Great for Flagship 3. Also good for Flagship 2 until you can disable enemy drone systems.
I find the best set up is to leave it powered down until you need it and keep another Drone (Defense, Offense or Boarder) that you use when it's not needed.
Pairing boarding with a boarding drone can be whacky good thoo but it’s definitely one of those specific setups.
I can't believe you did my mantis boys dirty like that. Nice vid though.
im just starting out, playing kestrel B atm and realised that the zolton is also a great counter to ion, if you put him near the shieldroom and walk into it after being hit by ion, power will go back into your shields even during the effect
I love the Mantis and Engi have a Yin Yang relationship going on.
At first glance, they are opposites; Mantis are good at fighting and bad at repairing, Engi are bad at fighting and good at repairing.
But if you have Mantis as dedicated security guards and Engi as grease monkeys, you will use the Mantis for repairs and the Engi for combat, because they don't have a dedicated station and therefore can do things around the ship without having to abandon their station. So every Mantis has a bit of Engi in them and every Engi a bit of Mantis.
I used an Anti-Drone Drone once when facing the flagship second phase, I just had 2 slots and switched out the first one while keeping the second one always the defense drone. The order was: flagship stage 1 - hull repair, stage 2 - anti drone, stage, stage 3 - anti personnel
My strategy with crews is as this follows with the crews.
Humans : shield early game because level shield can be complicated at time, it's less farmable (every inch of exp counts ) than let's say weapons/engine/piloting. then I replaced them as soon as I can with zoltan for more power.
Engy : they're just good, I love them all around but ... they are weak a shit if you get boarded by Lanius crew / rocks if there is fire.
Lanius : I prefer them over human tbh, because the boarding is never going to happen in a vented room, you can put them in some specific key strategic location to deny places you don't want to be boarded and oh boy have 2 lanius + teleporting is fun + it makes boarding a lot more viable vs scouting ship. Lanius also extinguish fire faster which can spiral out of control but my favorite use is to use a Lanius to repair breaches.
Slug : 1 in the door room to ensure control/flow in your ship or weapon to be able to reliable mountain control of your offense or pilot to ensure you maintain piloting dodge chance from MC. They are more of a safety net than anything else really.
Rocks : I usually put them in system centralized/close to medbay of the ship due to their low speed.
zoltan: I like putting 2 zoltan in shield so I have a guarantee 1 shield that cannot be ioned.
Crystal crew : OP AS FUCK for boarding / defense from boarding and they resist oxygen depravation, what's not to love about this race.
Mantis : Rip and tears, until it is done. I put them in empty room JUST in case they get MC cause I usually level them max fighting then move them in a system room.
I was doing a run with the stealth ship and had no shields but I had the option to use shield overcharger drone or defense drone mk2. They both have the same power requirements. I had a tough time deciding. The cloak gives an opportunity for the overcharger to actually stack up shields.
Any thoughts on what you would pick in that specific scenario? I have a Vulcan and an ion blast for weapons. I also have hacking.
Hmm that’s an interesting one. I think the defense drone would get you farther. Overcharger with cloaking is pretty good, but the rate at which it charges probably isn’t as good as how efficient the defense drone is. I would definitely try to get one more cheap laser weapon or beam to go along with the ion and hacking, since you can put out quite a bit of shield damage with that build, and a beam to do actual hull damage to enemies would set you up for the win in my opinion. Good luck on the run!
@@spearmintz1 I picked up the augment that lets you fire while cloaked and I thought I had a good shot but I got shredded by the drones in phase 2 of the final boss. It thought it was a good run for an early attempt at doing a “shieldless” run. I’ve unlocked everything and only missing a couple achievements. I have to keep finding ways to challenge myself.
Oh man...that race tier list triggered me. Here's my take:
S: Mantis
A: Crystal, Slug, Rock
B: Zoltan, Lanius
C: Engi
D: Human
I just don't understand how you value fast repair that much (and the human who does almost nothing). Also, the slug's anti-mind control is huge in hard runs, and makes them easily the best pilot race in the game IMO. Lanius can be excellent boarding mates with a boarding drone as well. They're a beefy combo.
When ion intruder used realy good it deals a lot of ion damage while you shot out the whole ship and it hardly can get stoped by the crew cause they get shocked from it.
About the Linnaeus I agree with or you put them but I would like to note that they're very useful for repairing Hall breeches or any time where there's no Oxygen in a room
Also with the larger variant of the Drone ship on one half is weapons and generally drone control and on the other half is Shields and engines
One of the things I use Lanius for is area denial. Boarders often appear in one area, and if I have a Lanius, I will vent on both sides of the boarders, especially if the Lanius is combat experienced. They expedite the process of venting oxygen in areas, especially once you turn off the Oxygen. In effect, funneling them where you want them to go and forcing them to play in no oxygen environments, minimizing the damage they do to systems and instead funneling them to combat lanius. I'm not sure, but I think Lanius with higher combat experience vent rooms faster. Ignoring rarity, having lanius, crew teleporter, and small bomb could effectively shut down oxygen, and then allow you to vent critical parts of the ship while you hunt enemy crew.
Plus, as much as you dunk on the Lanius oxygen sucking/immunity ability, I've found it to be useful in other situations.
1 - Fires. Fires aren't that big of an issue most of the time, if anything it is more of a disruption, but if you have a Lanius sitting on shields or weapons, that system is effectively immune to fire weapons of any sort. They will take damage, but taking minor damage is preferable to that module being damaged or possibly destroyed by aggressive enough fires.
2 - Fixing breaches/damaged oxygen rooms. Sometimes, if your oxygen is shut down and your crew is basically stuck in the medbay unable to repair the oxygen room without dying, having a Lanius on hand trivializes the situation entirely. Same goes for breaches if they are serious enough. Lanius trivialize the whole situation.
I've found that enemy Lanius boarding, if I don't have appropriate combat crew, are actually decently scary to deal with. They are immune to one of your biggest sources of damage against enemy boarders (Venting rooms), infact doing so only helps them fight you. If sufficient enemy Lanius teleport onto my ship and I don't have enough combat crew, I am effectively on a timer to force them to teleport back unless I want them to have free reign over my ship. If enemies could vent rooms, I imagine that the Lanius would be far more beneficial to have given that they could turn venting rooms against the people trying to do so.
Call me a Lanius Stan, but I disagree with their placement in C tier. They're B tier IMO. Not insanely powerful as to be broken. Infact if the enemy AI got more powerful (Enemies with door subsystems vent rooms with your crew in them if you are boarding them) they'd be A tier boarders as your objective with the Lanius would be to vent rooms. Also, their room venting thing isn't that bad. Yeah it's a possible problem but if you manage your crew correctly, this doesn't become such a huge issue as to be worth considering them weaker. It's a consideration yes but it's a consequence of that ability. It balances the ability IMO. If you have emergency respirators it makes the ability kinda broken powerful in the relevant situations because it renders the downside almost entirely inconsequential to the point where, as long as you micromanage health properly, you effectively no longer have to worry about that in any sense.
a thing you missed about the lanius is they also act like an airlock, say youre using Rock B, now you have a walking airlock with you, AKA they can put out fires in the rooms that you open the doors of towards them.
I like to pick up 2 anti-drone drones along the way and have em sit in my inventory until I've defeated the 1st flagship phase, at which point, I'll equip them in order to make the 2nd phase a breeze. They only cost 1 power so they're easy to tack on.
‘Sorry if i offended anybody who loves drones’
*immediately does a mocking voice of a response*
slugs are A tier for me personally they are propably the best pilots in the game(cause of their mind control immunity) and their life detection abillity is really useful too me since i am addicted to using mind control so when i have a slug i can save money on sensors so i can get mind control sooner.
You can always make a tier list of all your tier lists
I normally only ever use drones when I have a back up battery. They're hard to fit into a normal ship but with a battery you can just send out a 4 power drone pretty cheaply with not too much down time
Cool vid, next to real life races.
do a captains edition tier list, the weapons especially
Do the multiverse mod stuff too, im struggling to find tips and advice.
drones are all dependant on what ship your using personally, like the engi cruiser it works for them, while something like the federation cruiser...not so much unless your doing it for a defence drone
if you have more then one lanius bording at one time that can be good plus they are the only crew that can bord a drone ship with out dieing
Anti-personnel boarding drone supplements a boarding party well, IMO. You can either support it with your boarding party directly, or split the defenders between two rooms. Either way, for an all-in boarding strat, I think it works wonders.
having said that, I think it's perfect in B-tier here. It has a niche but there are better drones to take up your slots.
A race tier list oh lord
How about ranking the characters you can collect, like Virus, Envoy, Translator, Slocknog and Kzzztpklk (whatever the spelling is)?
Music tier list or riot :O
If I find a Slug, it becomes the pilot in AE for me. No worry of an mc stealing the evasion.
I have never though of the Fire Drone causing chaos before, nice to get a new perspective on it.
Ironically I took a break from playing FTL just now and I was on the kestrel got the translator event and that lanius saved me twice, I got breached in the O2 during phase 2 boss fight lanius saved me from suffocating then same happened in the Piloting, they're just super niche which makes them not very useful unless you have one and happen to get messed up in a way that they have advantage.
I think an all Lanius crew is fun and bumps them up a couple of tiers. I turn off o2, boarders and fire pretty much do no damage.
Lanius seems really good if you’re able to manage to get 2 of them with a boarding build. Maybe I’m wrong someone please correct me if I am, but send both of them in the ship and whatever they attack they have a huge advantage with bc unless the enemy also has a lanius they can go back to your ship at any time and will take the oxygen out of a room while destroying it or killing the other ships crew
I'd switch Mantis and Rock but otherwise, pretty accurate. I just hate being slow, the putting out fires is something you can do with venting, and you need a decent anti boarding crew and the mantis are the best for that
Favourite thing to do with the Lanius A is hack oxygen down to 40ish percent then send in both Lanius crew members to destroy the oxygen system while its still drained.
This basically causes the enemy to panic. One by one they then break into the O2 room, get shit stomped by two lanius whilst suffocating, realise they've fucked up and try to escape (door is locked by hacking) and then they die.
The last few crew members normally stay away and try to fix other systems. But the O2 level is below 20% at this point so I basically just wait for them to suffocate too.
Only other thing to keep down is the med bay then
My ideal crew.
1. Slug (pilot)
2. Engi (engineering)
3. Zolton (shields)
4. Zolton (sheilds; 1 shield is now immune to ion)
These first 4 are a lock for me. The next 4 is a little more up in the air.
5. engi (weapons)
6. rock (teleporter, or oxygen if no teleporter. )
7. ??? rock, mantis or crystalman are all good here (teleporter or doors)
8, ??? Rock, mantis or crystalman are all good here. (teleporter or sensors)
Last slots are open to choce. Mantis does do more damage, but for the dedicated teleport crew, the extra 50 hp is REALLY useful when damaging ai ships with no oxygen. You can just barely get back without dying when using a level 2 teleport, I believe, with a rockman. Plus if you have firebombs, then a bomb plus rock works better. I really like teleporting when possible. Prefered add ons are teleport, zolton bypass, transporter reconstruct, and oxygen breathers. Teleport, mind control, and cloning bay really take boarding to the next level.
Also important go get a variety of weapons installed, even if you don't use them. Beams, missiles, and fire, can all give blue events. Basic lasers, and rock launchers, don't.
I think crystals have a hidden 15% penalty to fire fighting or something. That, alongside its slow speed, makes fires really annoying to deal with. That brings them down a tier for me, personally, as getting a fire in an important system with a crew of only crystals can be quite bad.
The overcharger sounds like a great way to troll boarders. Boarder hops on ship, overcharger activates, and now they can't tp back.
Combat drone 2 is a shield stripper to support your guns with. It has a very high rate of fire and while 4 power is a lot, putting 4 power into drones and 4 power into weapons is much more doable than 8 or even 6 weapon power all at once.
Lanius: use in combination with Breach missile / Breach Bomb I / Breach Bomb II to get past shields and destroy the Oxygen room / Weapons instantly, then use the Lanius to drain all the other rooms of oxygen, particularly the weapons room and/or drone room if this is the flagship or other ship with too many offensive drones. 2 Lanius as a boarding team (with clone bay as they're hard to replace) targeting 2 tile rooms to prevent being overwhelmed, and then there's no O2 on the ship since you blew up their oxygen room.
Kinda want cloaking to delay damage to your ship still, it's a little slow to take down the weapons system this way, but your lanius can run around the enemy ship if they don't have doors system or door upgrades, and theyre draining oxygen as they run. This damages enemy crew while you're avoiding taking damage.
You really want 2 Lanius to pull this off well, but if you can KO the oxygen room, 1 lanius boarder can do significant damage simply by running around the enemy ship draining rooms of their oxygen. Once a room is drained enough to damage enemy crew, it becomes much easier to make a stand and damage systems in that room, or fight enemy crew. Even if it's a fight your 1 lanius will lose one on one, if theyre silly enough to send a bunch of crew into an oxygenless room, theyre all being drained of health.
This is the only time when boarding drone also feels like an asset. It beefs up your 1 lanius boarder strategy, because they can fight together and both cause breach-like effects and both can survive without oxygen.
More lanius is better, but 1 lanius and 1 boarder is roughly the same as 2 lanius, and its more common to buy boarding drone than buy a lanius, since theyre so rare.
Do a multiverse tier list pls
Hull repair actually saved my ass during the boss fight. Had spare power from other damaged systems and df1 was down for the count. Healed 4 health and ended the game with 2 health.
Mantis boardings with boarding drones as a supplement is very fun, when they drain the o2 they can even kill mantis.
System rep is my favorite drone, buy every time.
I always keep one mantis on my ship if I can just to protect against any boarders
Lanius is at least a B tier, they can't synergize with other non-lanius while doing boarding missions but otherwise are amazing since they can fix hull breaches and assault automated ships without a care in the world. Lanius are also pretty good boarders when you've got at least 2, since the lack of O2 in the room will damage non-lanius pretty fast. Also, a pretty a minor upside is they're good firefighters if you for some reason cant use airlocks to vent somewhere.
Mantis are s teir after you get someone on sheilds, piloting, weapons, and engines or just all the critical systems.
I wouldn’t necessarily agree, after critical systems I always staff people in doors and sensors, which can be staffed by pretty much any race, and need to be repaired often as well. Mantis don’t do much that other races can’t also do. If you have mantis just idling around in case of boarders, they have a bit more use, but even then I find with enough crew to have people idling in the first place, a mantis or two doesn’t help too much, at least not S tier worthy.
I think Lanius should be A tier.
1. They can board AI-Controlled Rebel ships and take them apart from the inside safely. This basically guarantees a clean win against all such ships.
2. On an enemy ship, once the room runs out of oxygen, the enemy crew stops contesting the fight. This makes Lanius incredibly powerful on the offense even if you have only 1, but OP if you have 2.
3. On defense, they can fix rooms that experience hull breaches, including fixing rooms without oxygen. Their presence also helps oxygen out the rooms and assists with putting out fires. They're also good in defending against boarding drones.
Slugs don't stack it is true, but you want a slug as pilot specialy in the late game: if they mind control your pilot you insta lose 40% or plus of evasion..that is HUGE. Also the reveal enemy crew is very usefull to use your mind control one enemies in nebulas or in no sensors ships. I guess the first slug you get is at least an A.. The others I agree with you.
For me, Engi and Zoltan are A, because they're really good, but Crystal are on a totally different level. They have so much utility when boarding. They can fairly safely board automated ships. They can lock enemies out of the room so that you can wail on a single enemy and stop them from getting to the Med bay, or take down the system one or two bars if you're alone in the room.
I'd swap Slugs and Humans, since Slugs can do everything Humans can do, but they also some extra abilities and lots of blue events.
Lanius are at least a B because they have good utility. They're good at repairing breached rooms, and they're a total life saver if say, your shield room gets breached by a drone. They're also great at beating on intruders as they try to run away from airless rooms. To be honest, pretty much all the races are at least decent. I'd never turn an extra crew member down!
When it comes to drones, I think the Damage Beam Drones are all C. While they do a bit more damage than a combat drone, combat drones have more utility by helping you take down a layer of shields, so that your own aimed shots can land somewhere more important. Fire Drones aren't S, because they're not very useful for certain builds (mantis boarding).
I found that beam drones outperform laser ones when you have something like engi permanent ion disable on their shield
I didnt like Zoltan that much until I saw how much easier and how large my scores were with the Zoltan ships. All that extra energy is really good. Just need a Rock or two (other races work but Rock compensates for health) to defend them
The Ship Repair Drone you keep at your cargo, just put it at the drone bay to fix between battles and change back to the cargo, thats why i think its S tier, it makes the repair much better and DONT occupy a drone space, you can still use other drones at the same time you have this one
do one for multiverse :D
Race tier list confirmed
The rocks can also be good at boarding because of their high hp the'll win most fight even if they do it slower than mantis. I like the rock/mantis combination to board. I use the rock to tank damages, while the mantis does dps. I'd put the mantis and the rock a higher tier, but it's mostly because I always end up buying a teleporter and making a mini boarding crew to try to grab more scraps when the ennemy ship doesn't have a med bay.
I really enjoy getting a rock and some kinda reliable fire weapon on my boarding runs. You catch a system on fire and drop the rock right on top. The game prioritizes combat over repairs so as the rock is tanking dmg with their big HP pool the fire spreads across the whole system room and eventually the rest of the ship
One Slug pilot is awesome, in special with mind control.
with mantis the speed is useless unless to get from the medbay to the teleporter or if the enemy has level 1 doors the only other purpose for faster move speed is to get to repairs faster so with skill they could be good repair crew being fast and all which I think was the intention but only works if they are skilled or you have to many
If you're at a point where you can afford, power wise, to launch shield overcharger drones and still maintain your weapons, shields and engines , you probably don't need the shield overcharger to be honest. I've never got much out of it personally.
And you need at least 3 in drone systems just to enable it.
I can see it being good in fringe circumstances but would say offensive drones would provide a far greater return on investment for the same power and credit cost. And you can then sell the shield drone :)
I'd consider Rockman and Hullrepair drones as S-tier, having a crewmember savely take out fire in a room thats difficult to vent the oxigine out is a problem i run into way to often.
and i basicly always Keep the hull repair drone in storage if i have drone systems, beeing able to guarantee hullrepair after a tough battle is.. pretty overpowered but also runsaving.
what about an augment tier list?
I've been thinking about it!
So...
Music tier list when?