FTL: Limited Information (Federation Victory!)

[callforjudgement]

Both ships get their weapons up and running at much the same time. While that was happening, though, the enemy shield got thicker and thicker, and it took two full volleys from our ship to take it back down.

Being unable to keep our shield up, we were more or less at the mercy of the enemy ship; but once its shields were down, it couldn't stand up to the might of our weapons. Before long, it was as broken as the rest of the machinery around here.

Unfortunately, much of what was here was long since rendered unusable by nebula gas, but there's enough of it that we can still make quite a profit salvaging. I'm assuming that we go over to the machinery and search for usable equipment, as there's no reason not to; we pick up ⛯16 and some fuel, in addition to some assorted components.

[Enter]

We trying to go back to the store or find a different one?

[PvtUrist]

find a different one. Also suggesting to pool our scraps to Tech.

[the worst]

our shields are definitely a little too skinny atm.

[callforjudgement]

Jump 7

Beacon (n).

Two technological breakthroughs were necessary for FTL travel to become possible. One was the jump into hyperspace. However, because time doesn't flow in hyperspace, it's impossible to do anything while you're there; and thus the other necessary breakthrough was the jump back

out

. A beacon is a device that, periodically, automatically pulls anything nearby in hyperspace back into standard space, and as such, FTL jumps can only be targeted at the vicinity of a beacon.

Scouts are one of the more frequently encountered types of ship; however, the scout here isn't Rebel, but Federation. They've got a message they want to deliver, and asked us to help if we happened to be going that way. Unfortunately, the destination is too far out of the way; there's no way we'd get there without the Rebels catching us. So we ended up having to decline; the message is probably better delivered by a ship that the Rebels aren't hunting. They were pretty understanding, though, wishing us good luck and giving us some fuel.

[callforjudgement]

Jump 8

Spiralling (adj.)

. A state that beacons sometimes get into upon being buffeted by the solar wind of a nearby star. This disrupts the orbit of the beacon, causing it to lose speed and gradually move closer to the star. Beacons will send out a "do not use" alert when they get too close for a jump to be safe, but beacons found early in the spiralling process can safely be used for jumps, albeit with potential danger on arrival.

This beacon isn't where it's supposed to be; it's right next to the nearby star. This is a pretty dangerous place for the ship to be in; we immediately start heading directly away from the star, because falling in would be fatal. Even then, the heat here is horrendous; it's radiation, so the shields are dealing with the worst of it, but it seems likely to fry the ship before too long.

However, as we're making our way out, we come across an orbiting Rebel ship. This one's automated and heat-proofed, designed for operation near stars. A pity that our ship isn't. It seems to be a drone carrier; it launches a shield generator drone to protect itself, and a combat drone to attack us.

Even worse, it has weapons too. Although we manage to take them out, it gets off a Siege Ion shot on us in the process, disabling our shields for a very long period of time, and there's not much we can do about the drone in the process; everyone hears the heavy shuddering as the drone lands shot after shot on our ship. Eventually, we put enough distance on the star to be able to jump away, but at this point, the enemy weapons are down and our shields are back online, so there's no immediate reason to run. A few shots later, and it has no way to defend itself; and a few shots after that, it's destroyed. We quickly loot it, picking up ⛯12 and some fuel. We just about manage to repair everything we can before the next solar flare hits, but then it's time to jump out.

[callforjudgement]

Jump 9

Shipyard (n)

. It's hard to repair a broken ship in vacuum, so large "dry docks" known as shipyards are normally used; these are large hangars full of air, allowing mechanics to safely work on a ship both inside and out. Shipyards are a huge capital investment, but easily make their money back renting them out to captains who need to work on their ship.

We arrive at a civilian shipyard, but they're quite willing to work on military ships as long as the pay is good. There are plenty of merchants here, too.

Our ship just struggled through one battle; if we're facing more like that in the future, we're going to need a better ship to fight them with. There's a reason people don't normally use brand-new ships; over time, they tend to be customized to work better. So perhaps we can pick up some equipment to have a worthy ship for our flight from the Rebellion.

(I'll pause the game for 24 hours or so at this point: there's nearly always a lot to discuss when we get to a place with this many options. I'll post, in each player's PT, a list of what they can potentially buy and how much it'll cost; the items will be split up between the PTs based on what part of the ship they affect. For players who are aware of how vanilla FTL works: note that I'm treating system upgrades the same way as store purchases, even though they work differently in-game, but I'll add in system upgrade opportunities at other times too if we haven't had one for a while.)

[callforjudgement]

Oh, one option that doesn't go in anyone's PT, because it's tied into the mechanics of the game: there are crew here to hire. We can hire a Human for ⛯30, Mantis for ⛯40, or Engi for ⛯50. We probably can't afford any of these right now, but hiring crew would be one way to allow people on the waiting list to play.

[Enter]

If we pooled we could afford a human

[PvtUrist]

We don't have enough to spare for your slave fetishes, slug.

[Enter]

We don't have enough to spare for your slave fetishes, slug.

Why not?

Also quit being racist to me. Just cuz I'm a slug doesn't mean I don't have feelings!

Here, I'll give up not buying a better engine to buy a human

[callforjudgement]

OK, all the PTs are now updated with the purchasable options.

I'll wait for 24 hours or until everyone's agreed before finalizing any purchases.

[PvtUrist]

There's no good weaponry augment.

Weaponry/Artilery upgrade is a non-priority.

There's a Burst laser II and Chain Laser in the shop (chain laser got changed to similar stats to the Vulcan), but they'll take our entire inventory of scraps to purchase one of, and isn't gonna be powered until atleast another sector and a half worth of scraps.

Still wanting Shields upgrade unless there's something else we'd agree on.

[Enter]

I agree on a human. we could maybe even afford a mantis.

but if no one wants any of those, I'm fine with pooling towards shields 2

[the worst]

Yeah, I'd prefer to pool for a secondary shield layer as well.

[Varsoon]

So, folks, I didn't get to kill that chumpus who invaded us, which is a real shame--he got away when their ship did.
I've got ⛯19½. We need ⛯34 to get our ship back in working order.
We've used a lot of fuel, too, but have largely made up for our losses in what we've looted, so we're probably fine to get through the whole next sector at this rate.

I also really need to know what we're doing in the case of fires.

[Varsoon]

We could also upgrade our reactor for ⛯25, but I'd really prefer keeping our ship from falling apart--the extra energy would be nice, as it's a dream of mine to power all of our available weapons, if possible, so that you guys can shoot at their shields and weapons and once their shields are down, start pinning out their Engines or Bridge so that they can't FTL away. In fact, I'd argue focusing the Bridge/Engine is more important that their shields if we can consistently lay the hurt there when it seems like the enemy wants to retreat, because an enemy that runs is worse than nothing--we're not getting rewards, that enemy might signal rebels to our location, and we're probably taking damage from the encounter.

[Varsoon]

If we're really dividing this scrap evenly, that must mean we've got exactly ⛯80, yeah?
Unless you guys have been throwing it out the windows, I say we repair our ship and then put some scrap towards upgrades.

[callforjudgement]

I've seen a few suggestions about what to do in this thread, but remember that you'll have to move money around and actually buy the items.

I'm prepared to wait until everyone's ready.

[Enter]

we're buying shields 2

everyone is evenly giving money for shields 2

then we are jumping

[the worst]

Am I OK to say how much a shield improvement costs?

[Enter]

yes because it is money

[Enter]

we can talk numbers as long as it is only money

[Enter]

I recently started playing FTL again so I understand what yy'all are talking about

[callforjudgement]

Am I OK to say how much a shield improvement costs?

Yes, talking about quantities of scrap is allowed.