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[Arcvasti]

Flak Cannon II is pretty great, particularly when combined with the new tricks to give enemy ships 0 evasion.  It fires 7 shots at once.  Seven.

It is probably one of the only weapons I can think of that basically goes "Shields? What shields?" without draining resources.

Besides maybe a pair of autofiring Ion Blast IIs, yeah they're awesome. Especially with beams.

The Stealth C is actually a decent little ship. Its shield drone keeps you from taking too much hull damage on the first sectors before you get your shield and then protects you after wards. Its almost like an extra level of shield, especially against missiles. Plus that anti-drone drone is really good. And the starting loadout isn't that bad. Its certainly different, but not worthless.

[Leafsnail]

Just got my first Hard/Advanced victory!  The Kestral is probably the second best B side ship after Mantis, so I was using that.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Comments:
- As previously stated, flak is pretty awesome.  The double flak setup I had ripped straight through the shields like there was nothing there (although you usually have to try and aim at the centre of the ship for them to work well).

- Upgrading mind control isn't massively useful, except as a boost to your boarders I guess.  The main purpose of it is to give the enemy ship 0 evasion during a volley, and level 1 does that just fine.

- I didn't really get that much of a chance to see how well hacking works in the final battle, my hacking station kept getting breached for some reason.

- Final battle casualties: My pilot and the engi door guy who started with gold combat for some reason

[Thexor]

Flak Cannon II is pretty great, particularly when combined with the new tricks to give enemy ships 0 evasion.  It fires 7 shots at once.  Seven.

It is probably one of the only weapons I can think of that basically goes "Shields? What shields?" without draining resources.

Oh man, you aren't kidding. I had a Flak II, and it turns out it can remove 4 layers of shields and deal 1 point of system damage with a single shot. All that for 3 power and no ammo requirements. 

[Arcvasti]

Just got my first Hard/Advanced victory!  The Kestral is probably the second best B side ship after Mantis, so I was using that.

Kestrel B is really awesome, but I prefer Stealth B. When trying to unlock the Stealth C ship, I got that ship to sector 6 or 7 on Hard before I realized I could just have done that on normal to unlock it and abandoned that game. Glaive beam and Cloaking are really huge advantages and it starts with both. My personal favourite there.

[Leafsnail]

Stealth B is a cool and interesting ship, but it's really difficult to get started.  Any enemy with a beam or a drone can potentially kick your ass before you get a shield.

[Leafsnail]

Run away from Zoltan shields.  You get enough bonus scrap and items from every other fight to make up for it.

Also check if a ship has a medbay before boarding it

[Arcvasti]

Hacking helps. Turning their medbay of salvation into a death trap is really fun. I usually don't have any problems with the Basilisk besides the Rebel Flagships guaranteed level 3 medbay or losing my boarding crew in events or dying to early fires my pathetic mantises can't put out.

[Thexor]

Run away from Zoltan shields.  You get enough bonus scrap and items from every other fight to make up for it.

Or invest in a Zoltan Shield Bypass upgrade, which lets your boarders laugh at the funny green shield.

Seriously, between the shield bypass, the Reconstructive Teleport (full heal when you teleport), Hacking/Mind Control, and the Clone Bay, this upgrade was really nice to boarder strategies. If you can find enough of the combo components, at least!

[Leafsnail]

Oh yeah I really want a go with Reconstructive Teleport on a boarding ship.

e: I kindof expected the flagship to have both a medbay and a clone bay, so it could be worse.

[Nighthawk]

Heh. Having a great run, then suddenly I run into a Mantis warship with 3 shield layers, insane HP, and enough crew members to send SIX of them on-board my ship. I warped out of the fight before I got wrecked, but the six mantis remained. I moved all crew members to the front of the ship and began venting the oxygen, which weakened them considerably, but they broke through the doors, most of them still alive, and slaughtered my remaining three crew in a last stand at the bridge....

A glorious death, if a bit unfair.

[Leafsnail]

Kinda hard when they (and their asteroid allies) constantly work to take out your engines and bridge.

If you had four crew spare you probably could have kept them up.  Although really since you start with two shields and a defense drone this scenario seems less likely with Mantis B than any other ship.

Incidentally I'm trying to get Stealth B off the ground in Hard Mode and it's kindof... not happening.  I have learnt some strategies like "watch to see if a beam drone is aiming at your weapons before hitting cloak" though.

[Leafsnail]

There's your problem.  I mean damn the defense drone would have fended off all the asteroids and saved you in that scenario.

I'd say Defense Drone I was the second best drone after Hull Repair in the non-advanced version (haven't really tried any of the new ones yet).

[Lightningfalcon]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Moments before it was to fire a final trio of missiles, a fire managed to finish off the weapons control room.   Probably the closest victory I've ever had.   
Hacking is incredibly overpowered, especially when fully upgrade.  If I just had beam weapons nothing would of been able to stand against me.  I lost my shield operator and my mantis bodyguard in the fight to mind control, as they were stuck in a room that had no air and I couldn't get them out. 

[Arcvasti]

Incidentally I'm trying to get Stealth B off the ground in Hard Mode and it's kindof... not happening.  I have learnt some strategies like "watch to see if a beam drone is aiming at your weapons before hitting cloak" though.

As far as that goes, the early game is mostly "Hope they don't have an early beam drone". Most other weapons are pretty easily dodgeble and you usually only take 1-3 hull damage from a normal drone[Unless it hits your weapons]. But rapidly attacking beam drones are pretty much "run away or die". In my experience, getting Level 3 Cloaking first is better then shields because its cheaper, you don't need to find a store to get it and you only need shields when the Glaive Beam can no longer one-hit things. Once you get level 3 cloaking, you can pretty much stay safe long enough to instagib most ships if you only cloak right before the first volley is about to hit you. Luck is a pretty big part of it, but so is knowing exactly when to hit the cloak button.

[GlyphGryph]

Presumably long enough to jump out. Also you had mantis vs. zoltan - even with a medbay, enough time should have made  a boarding victory easy.

Defense Drones are, imo, the single best drones in the game. I dont know why you would ever sell it. Even post nerf defense 1 is awesome.

Also above post ninjaed what I was gonna say about stealth B. I think another level in stealth to avoid even quick beam weapons is important to grab asap, and that shields are only really important later on.