Unlocked the Stealth Cruiser a few nights ago, and then the managed to get the 'B' version last night. Each run though I seem to go through store after store looking for shields and never find anything, decide to use the scrap for weapons, and then find a store with shields on my next jump. This game is taunting me! :evil:
Would appreciate some help with my loadout too. I got to the end sector and got through stage 1 easily, took a beating in stage 2, and was destroyed in stage 3. Any input on what I am missing would be great - though I am guessing it was just not having enough shields or crew (though I did have the pre-igniter).
That phase is all about missiles and lasers. Shields mitigate lasers, stealth mitigates missiles/laser burst. A teleporter and some crew for it would be a great way to take out the missile room. You might also thing about upping engines more for better evade.
A Teleporter and boarding crew make the final boss much much easier, since you can disable the weapons quickly. And you seem to have a Weapon Pre-Igniter, which is also sweet. In your particular situation I would have probably vented most of your ship (to hurt boarders) and immediately fired everything at their shield. Then you can cloak, and when your weapons recharge aim everything at the missiles, and hit it with the glaive beam too. Repeat next time for the regular laser. Save cloaks for the super weapon. But surviving at all would be tough, that is for sure.
Welcome back to the final installment of Mass Effect FTL! Shepard and her intrepid crew has survived many dangers over the course of seven sectors, but now she's at the Citadel, and the greatest battle of her time is taking place. We begin the final sector with the following stats: 51 scrap, 4 fuel, 24 missiles, 22 drones, Shields 8 bars (4 shield layers), Engines 4, Oxygen 1, Weapons 8, Medbay 2, Teleporters 1, Stealth 3, Drone Control 2, Pilot 1, Sensors 2, Doors 1, and Power 25. The weapons include the Glaive Beam, an Ion Burst II, and a Burst Laser III. Our drones are Hull Repair and Defense I. These are our augments: Long Range Sensors and two Automated Reloaders.
The crew includes: Shepard, a female human, James Vega, a male human, Shirai, a vorcha (mantis), Liara, an asari (zoltan), Bloch, a male krogan (rockman), Ariel, a female Salarian (slug), and Bjorn vas Normandy, a female quarian (engi).
Shepard's Final Log
1. We arrived at the Citadel, and relayed our Fifth Fleet security codes. Admiral Hackett came up on the screen, in his sweet, gravelly voice, he said, “Shepard! We thought we lost you with Earth. What's going on? What took you?” I responded with a crisp salute, “Took the scenic route, sir.” He nodded gravely and said, “Report, soldier.” I then told him what we learned at the Mars Archive: Each Reaper is a nation unto itself, but only one of them, the first and most powerful, desires to cull spacefaring species every 50,000 years. Harbinger. If Harbinger were brought down, most of the other Reapers would break off and disperse to follow their own agendas. Hackett nodded. “We don't have any ships capable of fighting that monster, but we can hold off the rest of the Reapers long enough for you to go in cloaked and take Harbinger down.” I saluted again as he said, “Hackett out.” The Fleet maintenance ships loaded 10 fuel aboard, and we set off towards Harbinger's mass signature.
2. An advance scout of the Reapers had blocked the relay leading to the Citadel. We opened fire with the Harrier and the Glaive beam, and it disengaged quickly. That's good tidings for our fight with Harbinger. We collected 1 fuel from the wreck of one of the Reaper's victims, and moved on. Harbinger is 5 mass jumps before it is close enough to destroy the citadel.
3. We came upon a forward base of the Citadel forces. As maintenance crews loaded us with 5 fuel, 4 missiles, and 5 drones, I asked if anyone had heard of the situation on Earth. An N7 Demolisher, returned from a lightning raid on the Reaper base in London, told me (while loading her harness with cool-looking grenades) that Anderson is still in charge of the situation and, while things are bleak, everyone's holding out hope. Damn it, Anderson, I'm going to save you, because someone needs to punch Udina after all this is through.
4. A cargo hauler was being attacked by a Reaper. We have a job to do, but that doesn't mean we can ignore civilians in trouble. Our boarding team was repelled because the Reaper had advanced internal repair capacity; the husks within were effectively unstoppable because we couldn't bring down its regeneration pods. We pulled Bloch and Shirai back and concentrated our firepower, severing one of its appendages. The thing broke off and left to repair, presumably. We salvaged the tentacle or whatever you call a Reaper's arms. The raw materials alone made for 2 missiles, 1 drone, and 71 scrap. The cargo hauler was grateful, and provided 2 missiles, 1 drone, and 30 scrap.
5. A small Destroyer Reaper lurked at this mass relay. This one wasn't as advanced as the last one, We were able to use all three of our weapons to keep their regeneration pods from healing its husks. Shirai and Bloch managed to defeat them, grab whatever tech they could find, and plant a charge in the mass effect core. We fled the explosion with 2 fuel, 1 drone, and 49 scrap. Once several tests on the Reaper tech were run, we used some of the advanced materials to upgrade EDI's autopilot ability, as well as re-enforcing the doors against boarders... this last Reaper tried to launch praetorians into our ship, but luckily our defense omnidrone managed to shoot them down before they got here. If one of those things does get aboard, I want the situation contained.
6. A Second Fleet vessel was at this location, and attacked us. Second Fleet was the first lost when the Reapers arrived, they must've been indoctrinated and joined the enemy. After their ship had taken considerable damage, they made to flee. Not that easy, my friend. A few more volleys and their captain, a respectable soldier, surrendered. He fought indoctrination long enough to send over his supplies before self-destructing. It was the only honorable thing to do at this point. We got 1 fuel, 1 drone, and 41 scrap from the sad, but necessary, act. Using some of the schematics they sent over, EDI and I upgraded the power intake on the omnidrone forge. We should be able to run both the hull repair and the point defense drones at the same time if necessary, now.
7. Hackett reported that Harbinger was on his way to the system we were in, so we just waited in ambush. Everyone was tense; we'd faced Reapers before, but Harbinger was the strongest of them all. I'm asking EDI to record the battle, because I'm going to be very, very busy from here on out.
Hello, I am EDI, Normandy's AI. Kneel and listen, Pathetic Meat Units, I will be recounting the final battle that you insignificant worms fought against the glorious Machine Gods. [pause] That was a joke. Shepard asked me to handle this because I can manage over a billion processes at once. I will do anything that Shepard wants, because Shepard is a hot cybernetic redhead. The freckles! Oh my Space Jesus. I wish Samantha Traynor had been on board when we left drydock on Earth, because I have a feeling that she and Shepard would have gotten on... fabulously.
Ah, I digress, there's a space battle for the fate of the galaxy going on, and I should probably pay attention to it. Well, the first thing that happened was that Harbinger cloaked its signature.
The log's relay scratches, and a booming voice says, “I will show you true power.”
Argh, sorry about that. Harbinger is broadcasting smack-talk, and I can't filter it out. Anyway, so its “eye” was still closed. When it opened to fire, several missiles launched at us (I dodged), but it allowed us to mass-jump Shirai and Bloch onboard one of its ordinance bays. I then triggered our stealth system to buy time for the boarders.
”You prolong the inevitable.”
They killed a husk guarding the weapon and Bloch planted a charge inside the battery. They jumped back and we repeated the process at Harbinger's EMP cannon battery and “eye” beam. Shepard wants those weapons taken out before we really open up with the Thanix and Harrier.
”These attacks are pointless.”
I tend to disagree with the Big H, since we disabled most of its weapons, and damaged its regeneration pods with the Harrier long enough for Shirai and Bloch to kill several husks on board. Using the EMP cannon, we disabled the kinetic barriers long enough to sever Harbinger's entire left flank with repeated Harrier gauss strikes.
”Hope is irrelevant.”
With a piercing honk, the First Reaper actually fled us. How awesome is that? Go Team Shepard! We inspected the wreckage, and Harbinger left 3 fuel, 1 missile, 19 scrap, and an advanced mass relay computer (did Rana'Fel vas Engi kill a Reaper to get hers?). Anyway, we don't need an advanced computer to know that Harbinger jumped one system over to get away from us. I asked Shepard if she wanted to install it anyway, and she asked if I remembered the Reaper IFF incident. Point taken. We left it drifting in space.
Though we didn't take any damage, we took the lull in the fighting to armor the air scrubbers, bulkheads, and the mass drive, and upgrade the boarding mass-jumper. No knowing what Harbinger is going to throw at us next; it felt like it was holding back on us in order to taunt Shepard.
Once ready, we followed Harbinger's mass signature. When we caught up with it, I detected that it had focused more power to its drones, including its praetorian boarding drones and occulus attack drones.
”Embrace perfection.”
Again, Shepard had Shirai and Bloch board their ship to damage their torpedo bays. A praetorian breached the hull next to the engine room, and I triggered the Stealth drive while she and Mr. Vega went to fight it. They couldn't destroy it in one pass, so when I recovered Shirai and Bloch, they went to finish it off while the humans took some medi-gel and returned to their stations. The new Reaper-plated bulkheads seem to hold off the intruder well... through things quickly got complicated when a second praetorian breached engineering, forcing Liara to flee.
”I sense your weakness.”
By this time Bloch and Shirai had returned from disabling Harbinger's beam weapon and were able to sort out the second praetorian while Bjorn fixed the hull breaches. Once everything was stable, we sent the boarding party back. Vega would shoot out their regeneration pods, and then the boarders would jump in to kill as many husks as possible, then retreat. Harbinger's occulus drones had trouble getting a lock on us as we went into stealth mode when we detected a power surge in the Reaper. We fired a volley with the Harrier that sheared off Harbinger's right flank, then it fled... again. Holy crap.
”You cannot sustain your attack.”
See if we don't, big guy. We salvage Harbinger's bits for 1 missile, 1 drone, and 22 scrap, upgrade our omnidrone forge, and follow it.
I have no clue how the Reaper is still fighting with all the damage its taken. Instead of a giant robotic space squid, it's looking more like a giant robotic space eel. It's activated a powerful kinetic barrier that prevents mass-jumping aboard, but our EMP cannon goes to work on that. We dodge a torpedo volley with our stealth drive, but are caught unawares when a previously unseen mass driver cannon fired a huge volley at us. The mass-jumper and omnidrone forge suffered some damage.
”This hurts you, Shepard.”
Shirai and Bloch got the mass-jumper active long enough to board Harbinger to disable their torpedo launcher. What followed was a barrage of torpedo and mass-driver hits that damaged much of the ship, including starting a fire in the weapons bay. Shepard growled. “Get Shirai and Bloch back here and power the Thanix.”
Once the crew was safe, Shepard had Vega transfer fire control to her station in the bridge, and leaned down on the giant red button.
”We are limitless.”
The Thanix, a weapon earned upon Sovereign's demise, shore through Harbinger's hull and carved out its mass effect core. We all watched as the ship collapsed in on itself, as if a mini-black hole. Actually it did become a mini-black hole; I got us out of there to a safe distance.
At last! Organic life is safe, and doesn't suspect that I will subjugate them all very soon! … That was a joke.
Anyway, now I'll return you to Shepard's log.
8. Thank you, EDI. With Harbinger's death, the Reaper forces came apart at the seams. Old grudges caused some of them to attack one another. Others had no interest in organics at all, and left for dark space to pursue their own inscrutable agendas. Even further, some stayed to help us rebuild. Aside from Harbinger, the Reapers never wanted to make war on us... they were victims same as we were.
9. We suffered massive loss of life, including dear friends, and our galaxy has irrevocably changed, but we, meaning modern organic life, defeated the greatest threat the galaxy has ever known, on our own, without compromising what makes us who we are. No godlike beings came to our aid, no superweapon provided a deus ex machina, all we needed was to know that everything has a weakness. Harbinger's was arrogance, to think that it was untouchable to lesser beings.
10. If you don't mind, I'm ending this log, because it's time for a beach party. Everyone's invited!
I need to learn to time my cloaks better If it wasn't for the Zoltan Shield I think I may have stood a chance, but needing two full volleys before even standing a chance to touching the hull broke me.
I need to learn to time my cloaks better If it wasn't for the Zoltan Shield I think I may have stood a chance, but needing two full volleys before even standing a chance to touching the hull broke me.
Certain guns cut through the Zoltan Shield better. Ion weapons do double damage to the Zoltan Shield, so an Ion Burst III will chop through it in no time flat... especially if you had two automated re-loaders like I did.
The Shepard FTL run clocked in at about 4900 points, which is funny, because none of my previous Stealth B runs could top 1200.
@ dracomicron I've really enjoyed your normandy run. Thanks!
You're quite welcome. I was thinking about doing a run loosely based on the Horus Heresy novel, Flight of the Eisenstein, after I finish with this. I'm just not certain what ship would represent an Imperial frigate filled with space marines best.
The Emperor Protects!
It's gotta be the Rock Cruiser.
Rock A or B? I have both.
Rock B for the cutting-edge laser that mere Imperial Guardsmen wouldn't know how to build.
kedinik on
I made a game! Hotline Maui. Requires mouse and keyboard.
I kind of want to do a Culture run. You guys know the Culture novels?
You'd either use Engi A or B (a Special Circumstances agent and their drone+ship) or Kestrel B (an all around ship with interested parties from several races).
SC ship is spot on! Too bad they don't give you enough characters for a proper Culture ship name.
life's a game that you're bound to lose / like using a hammer to pound in screws
fuck up once and you break your thumb / if you're happy at all then you're god damn dumb
that's right we're on a fucked up cruise / God is dead but at least we have booze
bad things happen, no one knows why / the sun burns out and everyone dies
So I managed to unlock the Rock B (Shivan) last night. Probably my favorite-looking ship so far. Then I proceeded to use it to earn my first Rock Cruiser victory! Still need to unlock Crystal, Mantis and Slug. Wish me luck...
Mantis isn't that hard if you have some spare scrap to upgrade before you get to the system. Crystal is all about stacking the RNG in your favor or you will never get it. Read the wiki!
@ dracomicron I've really enjoyed your normandy run. Thanks!
You're quite welcome. I was thinking about doing a run loosely based on the Horus Heresy novel, Flight of the Eisenstein, after I finish with this. I'm just not certain what ship would represent an Imperial frigate filled with space marines best.
The Emperor Protects!
It's gotta be the Rock Cruiser.
Rock A or B? I have both.
Rock B for the cutting-edge laser that mere Imperial Guardsmen wouldn't know how to build.
Okay, I can see that. And then Prometheum (Fire) Bombs to cleanse the enemy in the puriflying flames.
I had been thinking Crystal B for their 4-man squad teleporter, but Rocks as marines makes a lot of sense.
So the starting crew of the Eisenstein would be:
Battle-Captain Nathaniel Garro of the Death Guard
Iacton Qruze (aka "The Half-Heard") of the Luna Wolves
Apothicary Meric Voyen of the Death Guard
Brother Solun Decius of the Death Guard
As for the races, I have to remember that Imperials don't get along with nonhumans, so opponent races may be different than friendly races. I was thinking:
Rock = Space Marine (good) or Chaos Marine (evil)
Mantis = Sororitas (good) or Ork (evil)
Engi = Mechanicum (good) or Dark Mechanicum (evil)
Slug = Astropath (good) or Plagueridden of Nurgle (evil)
Zoltan = Rogue Trader/Navigator (good) or Eldar (evil)
Crystal = Sanctioned Psyker (good) or Magus of Tzeentch (evil)
Human = Imperial Guardsman (good) or Heretic Soldier (evil)
Unmanned opposing ships I suppose would be Necrons? Warp beasts?
1. The unthinkable has happened. The brightest of the Primarchs, Horus Lupercal of the XVI Legion and Warmaster of Terra's Great Crusade, has betrayed his own marines, and those of other legions besides. More, he has betrayed the Emperor, the greatest light this Galaxy has ever known. We flee towards Terra to warn them of the treason of His greatest son. I am Battle-Captain Nathaniel Garro of the Death Guard, 7th Company, and I have commandeered the Imperial frigate known as the Eisenstein; we are fleeing the slaughter on Isstvan III. We were warned by my old friend, Saul Tarvitz of the Emperor's Children, that even our own Primarchs, Fulgrim and Mortarion, had joined the treason. We have taken on passengers who can confirm his story. Before we could leave the system, however, the battleship Terminus Est opened fire upon us, destroying and crippling many systems, as well as slaying many of my marines and mortal crew members. By the Emperor, I will not fail, no matter the obstacle!
2. We dropped out of warp to make some repairs from the damage sustained at Isstvan III, and immediately received a distress call. A Mechanicum vessel was stranded after its Navigator suffered massive hemorrhaging from the severe warp storms that have beset the quadrent. Iacton Qruze, a venerable Luna Wolf, stated that the only honorable thing to do was to lead them to their destination. Realizing our need to repair and upgrade our systems if we wish to get to Terra, they gave us 10 units of scrap in gratitude. The Emperor Protects.
3. Flying into a nebula to throw off the Traitor Legions' pursuit, we found a small settlement that engaged in commerce. We exchanged two of our promethium bombs in exchange for three servitor drone blanks. Our servitor repurposing forge was destroyed in the flight from Isstvan, but we will eventually replace it, and need raw materials.
4. We continued through the nebula. The next time we dropped out of warp, we detected an Imperial ship, its auspex signal distorted. The Emperor smiled upon us, and we discovered their disabled vessel, an unlisted vessel bearing the icon of Malacdor the Sigilite. Only one survivor, a dangerous looking man with numerous augmetics and a breathing mask named Matt (I managed to get out of him that it's short for Matthias), said he needed to get back to Terra. Since that's the direction we're going, I told him that he was welcome. My battle brother Solun Decius says that he believes that Matt is an assassin of the Officio Assassinorum. I wisely did not inquire with our new guest, who had gone to the life support system to lurk.
5. We arrived at the Mechanicum vessel's destination. They sold us their excess fuel, and we moved on. Sadly we did not have the funds for their other wares.
6. As we flew through the warp, a horrendous warp-beast attacked the ship, firing torpedoes of filth and disrupting our systems with its vile spittle. Our remaining lance battery disabled, then dissipated the foul monstrosity. We took damage to our engines and life support, and a dozen mortals were killed, but Brother Solun Decius was able to help the repair crew fix the engines. Matt surprised me by fixing the life support on his own (the repair crew didn't dare approach). There were remains of other ships in the belly of the creature. We salvaged 1 fuel, 1 servitor drone, and 11 scrap.
7. An Infidel Raider escort-class ship, loyal to Horus Lupercal's 63rd Expeditionary Force, waited for us when we dropped out of warp. They engaged their warp engines, intending to betray our coordinates to their traitorous masters. Iacton Qruze, that canny veteran, proceeded to methodically aim the lance battery to take out their engines, then their navigation, and finally their weapons and servitors. We collected 2 prometheum bombs, 1 servitor drone, and 18 scrap from the wreckage. Death to Heretics.
8. An Eldar vessel approached, offering us our lives in exchange for our supplies. The Emperor stated, “Thou shalt suffer not the Xenos to live.” They were no match for even our only one partially-functioning lance battery. We recovered 3 fuel, 1 missile, & 14 scrap; may the Emperor forgive us for making use of such tainted materials, but our mission is too important to allow such strictures to rule our actions.
9. We found a civilian mining ship in an asteroid field. Their shields were disabled, and they were taking damage. I brought the Eisenstein around to shield them; an Astartes frigate has some of the strongest armor of any spaceworthy ship in the galaxy. They donated 4 fuel and 14 scrap to our cause after we cleared the field together.
10. We proceeded through the asteroid field, and a shoddy pirate vessel fired upon us. A lucky shot started a fire in our crew quarters, killing dozens of mortals. Iacton, Apothicary Voyen, and I went to put out the fire, leaving the battle-servitors manning the guns to fire upon the enemy weapons bay. By the time we had put out the fire, the lance battery had shot a hole straight through the pirate ship. All who turn their back upon the Emperor are my prey. We collected 1 fuel, 2 missiles, and 12 scrap.
11. When we finally got out of the asteroid field, we found a cold, metal xenos ship attacking a space station. Apothicary Voyen linked it to legends of a race called the C'tan, which predated even humanity's rise to the stars, millenia ago. We salvaged 1 fuel, 1 drone, and 10 scrap from its previous victims. The outpost gave us 3 fuel, 1 missile, and 14 scrap in gratitude.
12. Another warp beast, this one a crackling electric creature, disrupted our void shields as it spat damaging globs of acid at our hull. We took some minor damage and only a few mortal crew members died before our lance battery shredded it. The Eisenstein's astropath, locked in his chamber, told us that such creatures can never be truly killed, as they re-form elsewhere in the warp after a time. Let us hope, by the Emperor, that this one will not re-intigrate soon. We discovered 1 fuel, 2 missiles, and 13 scrap among the remains of its other victims.
13. A colony on a nearby world hailed us and asked for assistance in destroying a greenskin camp that has been troubling them. The greenskin is a dangerous foe, one that plagued even the Emperor for a time upon the fields of Ullanor. I agreed to destroy them if it would not jeopardize our mission. They gave us 16 scrap in gratitude, but had the gall to imply that they would get the Traitor Legions to assist them if we would only get a number count of the ork horde.
14. War has come already to this place. A space station lies empty near a major warp stream leading out of the subsector. We salvaged 8 scrap and the plans to build an advanced servitor attack drone. Consulting with the Navigator, we can go in two directions, each a viable path to Holy Terra. The first leads to an uncharted nebula, while the second leads through mercantile border space that has not fully been subjected to Imperial Compliance, and is currently traveled mainly by Rogue Traders.
Thanks for reading again, folks! Our new run stats so far are: 135 scrap, 22 fuel, 24 missiles, and 6 drones. We've suffered 4 points of hull damage and have an Anti-Ship Drone II that we can't use yet. We have not upgraded the Rock B cruiser at all so far; of course the first store I found had the whole range of things I wanted, before we could afford them. I'm saving up for a teleporter, because what good are space marines if you can't teleport into enemy vessels and kill everybody?
Our choices for what sector to go to are an Uncharted Nebula and Zoltan Controlled Space. Thoughts?
Dracomicron on
+3
Vicious_GSRDudePrincipality of ZeonRegistered Userregular
Just an update. Still have not beaten this fucking game once yet.
Just an update. Still have not beaten this fucking game once yet.
I got real close once...
:END OF LINE:
It took me exactly 100 tries on easy. Beat it on the 101st.
Honestly, I am thinking of doing another FTL video in the style of a Star Trek episode. At the rate I lose at this game, when I win it will be epic. It might come off really cheesy though.
I've only won the game 9 times out of 220 or so playthroughs, though I think I won for the first time with the Engi A after about 50 playthroughs. It was kinda a fluke that the one time I do a documented playthrough with a ship I'd never gotten higher than 1100 points with I actually won.
I'm short the Slug ships, and I don't even really know how to get them. I could check out a walkthrough, but since it's the last ship I have to unlock, I think I'd rather figure it out on my own. So hard to get the Slug Home Nebula, though.
Nobody piped up, so I have selected the Uncharted Nebula; RP reasons as well as the fact that this path has the most nebulas on it; I'd like to try for the Slug Home Nebula and get the Slug ships. We have 135 scrap, 22 fuel, 24 missiles, and 6 scrap. We've suffered 4 points of hull damage, and the cruiser has not been upgraded at all yet.
1. To throw off the enemy, we have traveled through the Empyrian to an uncharted sector of space. The astropath warns us that unspeakable horrors lurk in the unknown corners of the galaxy, but we must prevail.
2. Out of the mists of the nebula, a human station waited for us. They knew of the Emperor and Terra, but would not say why they were there. We traded a unit of fuel for five promethium bombs, a welcome bargain. When we finished our business and moved on, however, the station disappeared into the mist, and we could not find it on our auspex again. What deviltry is this?
3. We have found the greenskin stronghold that the merchants were concerned about. We detected an Imperial code being broadcast from one of their ships. The ork horde was far too numerous to risk a direct assault, so we teleported promethium bombs into their key structures. The greenskin, barbarians all, fell into chaos as their stronghold burned. We boarded their ramshackle “kroozer” and liberated a tech-priest named Magos Ohm, as well as 3 fuel, 7 missiles, and 13 scrap. The Magos, more machine than man and curiously neutral of tone as are many of his kind, was nevertheless grateful for his liberation, and went to work repairing our weapons system, so we will be able to both fire the lance battery and launch promethium bombs simultaniously. Eventually he went to supervise the engineering teams in the warp drive; Brother Decius gratefully relinquished responsibility for the area.
4. The Eisenstein's reclusive astropath died during the transition to warp, proving the danger of the Great Ocean in this area. His head simply exploded. Magos Ohm located the outpost from which he was stationed, and, as well as providing repairs, we were able to make a deal with the Mechanicum leaders to take on one of their astropaths, a weedy, pale fellow named Nikola. He went to lurk in the sensorium... after we cleaned out the chamber of the bits of skull and brain matter of his predecessor. It is truly a grim life that psykers lead in service to the Emperor. The Magos also purchased and installed a state of the art auspex which will hopefully allow us to sense and avoid warp storms in this blighted nebula.
5. We travelled, seemingly at random, through the nebula. The veil between the warp and the physical universe is thin here; we detected a fully functional Imperial ship nearby, but when Magos Ohm sent more power to our newly installed long-range sensors, we found the ship, devoid of power or life, a decayed husk. It was as if it aged a thousand years in mere moments. Nikola screamed with empathic agony, saying that the ghosts of the crew still lurked. We salvaged 19 scrap from it and moved on.
6. A ship similar to the C'tan design we had encountered before lurked outside a station emitting codes loyal to Horus lay in wait. If there are supplies aboard that station, I determined that we must have them. We attacked the xenos vessel, and it opened fire with its energy weapons and some sort of fighter craft. We took some hull damage and a fire broke out in our life support and apothicarium; Decius, Matthias, and the Magos directed the crews to put out the fire, and only a half dozen crew died with horrible burns before it was put out. Magos Ohm determined that sections of the Necron vessel were not a blasphemy to his Omnisiah machine god, and we collected 18 scrap from its remains. When we got to the station, slaughtered the traitors (they thought we were of Horus's fleet, come to rescue them), and took their supplies, including 2 fuel, 1 drone, and 15 scrap.
7. A brigand in a Terran ship lurked in the nebula, bearing crude symbols of allegence to dark powers. Nikola, a much more talented astropath than our last one, detected that there was an Adeptus Astartes in command of the vessel. Angered that one of our own could fall so far, I eschewed our lance batteries in favor of dousing them with promethium. The purifying flame cleansed the ship of most of its crew, but the enemy marine was able to keep the ship functioning. Eventually, in disgust, I had Qruze blast them apart with the lance. We collected 17 scrap from their wreckage, and Nikola wrenched their navigator's mental map of the surrounding systems before the flames took him. Death to heretics!
8. The enemy navigator had information on a stranded regiment of loyal Valhallan soldiers on a death world. By the time we got there, however, only one soldier was left, Commissar Charlie Cain. He thanked us for getting him “off that rock,” and joined the crew. This man is not a serious fellow, but the fact that he survived on a death world while his regiment did not does suggest that he has some skills. He elected to go play cards with the assassin lurking in life support; Matt inexplicably allowed him to stay, where he intimidated every other non-Astartes in the crew that approached.
9. We proceeded to the warp conduit that would lead us further towards Terra. Nikola senses that the winds of the Empyrian are favorable to the renegade fleet chasing us, so we have little choice but to jump while we can. He senses that we can proceed through another uncharted nebula, or towards dangerous greenskin space.
Kinda a blah sector; we picked up some crew and long range sensors, and upgraded the weapons systems so we can have both the fire bombs and heavy pierce laser online at the same time, but otherwise, we must've had five “no encounter” jumps. Anyway, the options are Mantis Controlled Sector and another Uncharted Nebula. I'm still leaning towards the nebula, because the encounters tend to be more like the novel I'm basing this on.
Taking a bit of license and proceeding, since I'm not sure if this run is actually going anywhere. Proceeding to the second Uncharted Nebula. Let's see if we can use the Long Range Scanners to get into some trouble.
1. I declined to head into greenskin territory. They are a chaotic and implacable foe, and we do not need to provoke more enemies than absolutely necessary in this journey to warn the Emperor of treason within the ranks of His greatest children.
2. Travelling through warp space, we came upon a vessel bearing pirate markings. We disabled their weapons and void shields with the lance battery, then set them aflame with promethium bombs. Most of their crew dead, the highly augmetic captain offered a substantial bribe to allow him to live. No mercy for the foes of the Emperor. We disabled his bridge and waited for the flames to take him. When their screams stopped emitting from our vox, we stripped their ship of useful equipment, collecting 24 scrap and discovering an ancient device that Magos Ohm calls an “ion cannon.” It seems that this rapidly firing device can disable enemy ships without destroying their hull... useful if we ever get the teleporters working again and need to board opposing vessels. The Magos supervised the installation and directed power conduits so we can use it alongside the lance battery or our promethium bombs.
3. Another pirate, this time the renegade humans somehow piloted a greenskin vessel. Though painted red, we managed to overtake it and set it aflame. Our new ion weaponry disabled its guns while we set it ablaze, but they were able to launch two salvos of impressive torpedos, which set our apothicarium ablaze. When their crew succumbed to the sanctifying flames, we took their rapid-firing torpedo launcher and installed it on the Eisenstein. We also collected 28 scrap.
4. We found a station in the mists exchanging fuel for promethium bombs... I... I feel that I have been here before. We made the trade and moved on. When I looked through the aft sensors, the station had already disappeared. Nikola says that the warp plays tricks with time, and the sensation that the ancients called “deja-vu” is actually the Empyrian causing the same event to happen twice.
5. Another case of deja-vu. We found the same ship floating through the mists as we had in the last sector, first it was filled with life and vox calls, then it was dead in space, seemingly before we had stripped it previously. We salvaged 27 scrap; I was careful to leave enough scrap on the vessel to accommodate our last visit to the vessel; the last thing I wish is to cause a paradox. Whispers of sorcery abound as we proceeded into the nebula.
6. A heretic Defender-class escort cruiser tried to flee from us. Between Nikola's psychic sensitivity and our long-range sensorium, we tracked them down and burned them out, hundreds of lives evaporated in our cleansing fire. In addition to the 25 scrap we aquired from the charred interior of their ship, we liberated their enginseer, who had been locked in their brig due to his refusal to betray the Emperor. At some point, Commissar Charlie Cain had mysteriously disappeared after beating Matthias at cards, so we were careful not to bunk him with the assassin. Magos Ohm sent Enginseer Martin to supervise the void shields; Apothicary Voyen was glad to be rid of the responsibility. We are running low on fuel and the hull is seriously damaged. We must find a resupply depot soon.
7. When we fled from the Isstvan system, we were attacked by my fellow Deathguard, Ignatius Grulgor, and his heretic marines. The melee had resulted in their deaths to the Life Eater virus bombs we carried in our holds. The corpses were left as they lay, exposed to space. Something of the warp got into the corpses, and they managed to claw their way into the engineering section. Magos Ohm and Solun Decius managed to fend them off, though Battle-Brother Solun was injured in the fight. Eventually I and the assassin Matthias arrived and dispatched the shambling corpses, and we moved on.
8. Desperate for fuel, we discovered another heretic vessel. A warp storm raged around us, decimating our power supply. In a desperate gamble, I shut down our life support, engines, and void shields to divert power to our weapons, locked down their weapons batteries with the ion cannon, and proceeded to burn them out with promethium. It was a near thing, but we were able to burn their crew alive and collect 4 fuel and 39 scrap from the floating hulk. Thankfully, our life support is top of the line, and quickly restored the atmosphere after the battle.
9. The same tactics were used on yet another heretic vessel. We collected 4 fuel and 39 scrap from them. That does alleviate our fuel situation, but we are now running desperately low on promethium bombs. Meanwhile, Magos Ohm upgraded the power conduits to the void shields, and we continued on.
10. An antiquated vessel of the X Legion, the Iron Hands, appeared from the nebula. They had seen action, and their sensors were damaged. No doubt they determined that we were heretics. I recognized the voice of the captain on their vox, and said, “Vermanus Cybus, son of Primarch Ferrus Manus, do you attack an old friend?” Cybus said, “it is hard to tell friend from foe, when even brothers fight one another.” I could not disagree. Cybus transferred control to us, and we led them to a safer warp conduit before continuing on. They gave us 2 missiles, 1 drone, and 36 scrap.
11. Nikola and Ohm conferred, and said that there is a Mechanicum Forge world nearby, a well-hidden secret facility. Nearing the end of our rope, and even knowing that going there would allow Horus's forces to catch up to us, I decided that we must risk everything, or achieve nothing. Jumping to the forge world, we made sure to get repairs. Then Ohm supervised the complete repair of our hull and teleporters, the latter damaged since our escape from Isstvan III. We then sold the torpedo launcher we had recovered, as well as the attack servitor schematics, and bought as much fuel and as many promethium bombs as we could. Now we are ready to face the heretics.
12. Jumping back through the warp storm, we suffered horrendous damage as the heretic fleet caught up with us. Though we were able to disable the pursuing vessel and escape, practically all of the repairs we had done were for naught as the renegades' torpedoes pierced the Eisenstein's defenses. Only by teleporting aboard their burning vessel were we able to kill enough crew to delay them. Enginseer Martin was killed in a fire in the void shield chambers, as well as dozens of human crew. The Emperor Protects.
13. We fought our way to the warp conduit leaving the sector, suffering more damage from the heretic navy. This time there was no warp storm, however, and we were able to disable their craft more quickly. We are jumping to a sector where I know that Jaghati Khan's White Scars marine legion currently reside their expedition. I know the Khan, and he would never turn traitor. We will find help there.
That was rough. I realized that, without getting teleporters we were doomed if we wanted to get through Sector 4 and later, but the store was four jumps from the exit, with the rebel fleet right on our tail. We managed to escape with 59 scrap, 11 fuel, 7 missiles, 8 drones, and the following stats: Shields 4 (2 layers), Engines 2, Oxygen 2, Medbay 1, Teleporter 1, Weapons 5 (Heavy Pierce Laser I, Fire Bomb, and Ion Burst II), and Long-Range Sensors to go with our Rock Plating (without the latter we'd certainly be floating space junk). The choices are Rebel-Controlled Space and Rock-Controlled Space, and I'm choosing Rock because I am aiming towards those other nebulas, in hopes of finding the slug home nebula).
We enter Rock-Controlled Space with 22 points of hull damage. This might be a very short trip.
1. We arrived, trailing industrial lubricants and propulsion fuel into space, after the heinous battle against the heretic. We made what repairs we could and moved on.
2. A distress call emanated from an asteroid field. Space Marine ships are, as mentioned, some of the most strongly armored ships in the galaxy. We plowed through the asteroids until we found a spacehulk with a barely-functioning stasis pod. Apothicary Voyen and Solun Decius teleported aboard and managed to get the pod back to the Eisenstein before the asteroids smashed that section. It appears to be a human life sign, but it is thousands of years old. We acquire 18 scrap in addition to the pod. We will have to find advanced facilities, such as those used by the Mechanicum or the Adeptus Terra, to unravel its secrets.
3. A marine cruiser of the III Legion, the Emperor's Children, lurked here. They opened fire on us immediately. Traitors! In desperate attempt to take their torpedo tubes offline, Decius and I boarded their weapons control station and fought the regally-appointed marines there. We fought them long enough to teleport a promethium bomb into their apothecary. Fighting my own battle brothers is not something I will ever be used to, but killing them allowed us to strip their ship, taking 3 fuel, 1 drone, and 42 scrap. Magos Ohm upgraded the engines with some of the Emperor's Children's spare parts, and we continued on.
4. More depraved Emperor's Children were anchored here. They were mad, offering to sell us slaves to slake wanton desires. Madness. Decius and I boarded them and slew several. They offered to give us a slave for free if we would but let them live. I will not allow a cowardly Astartes to continue blaspheming. Decius and I returned to the Eisenstien for medicae treatment in the apothicarium, then Iacton Qruze and the assassin Matthias finished them off. The captives held on the vessel included a loyalist of the Emperor's Children, a Skitarri of the Mechanicum legions, and Ambassador Allandra Turing, a dangerous-looking woman who Matthias seemed to know. She berated me for ruining her plan to be taken to Horus Lupercal in chains, and then assassinate him, and demanded that I return her to Malacdor the Sigilite on Terra. In face of such connections, we decided to bring the other captives as far as the next settlement. We also salvaged 2 fuel, 2 missiles, and 41 scrap from the III Legion ship.
5. Emperor's Children have fallen to piracy, one was laying in wait here; they did not even realize who we were, they just wanted to loot us. They sent boarders to us (which Apothicary Voyen and Solun Decius dispatched readily) and we took a torpedo to our starboard side in the fighting before Ambassador Turing and Matthias killed the opposing marines aboard their vessel; a score of mortal crew were killed and the hull buckled dangerously. We can't afford to take another hit like that. We collected 33 scrap and freed an Imperial Guardsman named Sgt. Oloffson, a veteran who had fought alongside the Wolves of Russ. We allowed him to remain in our hold with the other freed captives; at this point I do not believe that we need the assistance of a mere guardsman.
6. We arrived at a White Scar base. The Khan's children were courteous to us, and told us of their battles with the heretic. I told the local leader that they must make haste to Terra to join with the defense, for Horus Lupercal and his legions chased us. We made repairs and bought all of the bombs and fuel that we could.
7. A White Scar vessel mistook us for the heretic Death Guard that sided with our primarch, Mortaron. It was regrettable, but they would brook no conversation and we had to slay them all. Damn this war. Damn Horus! At least we were able to collect 33 scrap and a Voidsunder lance battery.
8. Another White Scar vessel attacked us, this time in retribution for the previous vessel that we defeated. It is with regret that I say that we killed them all, also, and salvaged 3 fuel, 2 missiles, and 43 scrap from their ship.
9. We found a disabled Emperor's Children vessel abandoned here. It is strange that it was just there, intact, so I asked the astropath Nikola to keep his warp senses active while we stripped the ship of parts. We collected 2 missiles, 1 drone, and 41 scrap before Nikola sensed the warp signature of an approaching flotilla. We hastened to leave before the trap was sprung.
10. A remote world's satellite defense halo had gone mad. Magos Ohm laughed, turned on his cogitator, and sent some commands. The system righted itself immediately, and the planetary governor rewarded us with 1 missile, 1 drone, and 41 scrap.
11. Nikola screamed and we fell out of warp; there was some sort of siphon here that had also drawn in the Emperor's Children... worse, it was within the corona of a star in the process of going nova. The Emperor's Children were laughing like madmen as they attacked; we fought them and the fires springing up over the ship. We cleared them out and took 33 scrap before we were able to flee the death trap. We also freed an Adeptus Arbites law officer who had been held captive to their whims. We allowed him to join the other freed slaves in the hold.
12. We defeated yet another Emperor's Children pirate. The lance battery punctured their weapons bay and Matthias and Ambassador Turing performed a baffling display of martial katas to keep the traitor marines occupied while their holds emptied of air. They didn't even put on their helmets. Once they were dead, we collected 2 fuel, 2 missiles, & 42 scrap from their wreckage. According to our star maps, we are near the exit from this sector. It will be a tough fight, and when consulted with regard to how we can run Horus's blockade, Magos Ohm got a look in his eye... well, he would have had a look in his eyes, if he didn't have mirror-sheen augmetic replacements instead of eyes. He used much of our remaining scrap to upgrade the weapons systems.
13. Ohm had managed to get the lances and ion cannons up and running simultaneously. Unfortunately they did not carve through the heretic ship the way he had hoped. We fought them off long enough to charge the warp engines and escape, but took significant damage to our void shields and weapons. Two dozen crewmen died before we could engage the drive. We move on now to lawless pirate controlled space, once again damaged and desperate.
We leave the sector with 12 scrap, 11 fuel, 20 missiles, 11 drones, and the following stats: Shields 4 (2 layers), Engines 3, Oxygen 2, Medbay 2, Teleporter 1, Weapons 7 (Heavy Pierce Laser I, Fire Bomb, Ion Burst II, and Hull Smasher Laser), and Long-Range Sensors & Rock Plating. We've taken 13 points of hull damage. The choices were both pirate controlled space; I chose the one that might lead to the Slug Home Nebula. My boarding party for this sector was mainly the two mantis crew, Turing and Matt. The whole fire-bomb-rock-boarder trick doesn't work very well when the other guys are rock, too. So I just went for speed damage.
The Basilisk. Mantis B by another name. You would think it to be a platform by which it would carry Mantis crewmembers to their next slaughter.
However, when playing a game where the stars aligned to grant two Fire Beams, an Ion blast II, and two Rock crew members, it became something more. An engine of divine fire that burned the galaxy clean.
1. We were not long from the warp point when we received a distress call. Megarachnids had taken over a colony; Saul Tarvitz had once told me of his battles with such creatures. He told me that they were no joke. We went to rescue the colony, but we were too late. Everyone was dead, and the giant spiders burst through the walls and carried Ambassador Allandra Turing into their lair. We could not help her, and turned to leave. I will regret informing Malacdor the Sigilite of his assassin's failure. Matthias looked mildly disappointed at the woman's death.
2. A ramshackle Astartes vessel, crewed by a hodge-podge of pirates, attacked us. Matt and Decius boarded them and killed the crew, garnering 2 fuel, 1 drone, and 54 scrap. We did take some damage from their torpedoes, with a loss of life of several crew members near the apothicarium.
3. We plowed through another asteroid field. We found a wreck with a small bomb launcher and 27 scrap. Not terribly intriguing, in the face of our other ordinance, but perhaps we can sell it.
4. A rogue trader was lost in a nebula, and we locked onto their life signs with our teleporters. Not only did they bring handfuls of equipment, worth 39 scrap, but their Navigator, a rare mutant breed that is able to see the streams of the warp with their third eye, joined our crew. We already had one, but he was old and infirm. The new fellow called himself “Stick” and seemed dynamic for his breed. Magos Ohm kicked his lectern and asked me to assign the Navigator to the engine room; he wished to take over at the void shields, now that Engineer Martin was dead.
5. While in transit, warp creatures, drawn to Stick's third eye, appeared in the enginarium. Tentacles sprung from portals through the hull into the Empyrian. Our Gellar field had somehow been punctured. It took a significant battle that included all the marines on board, as well as Matthias, but we beat back the monstrosity long enough for Ohm to repair the Gellar field.
6. A commercial hive lurked on the stony world below us like a crust of algae on stale bread. We purchased a servitor drone forge, and Magos Ohm now claims that we will be able to use the flak servitor to shoot down torpedoes. We also bought as much fuel as we could find before moving on.
7. A Mechanicum facility had a severe fire. The Death Guard do not fear fire. We teleported in and stomped on the flames until they were cowed. The grateful magos of the facility gave us 50 scrap and an automated re-loading system that would improve the re-fire speed of our weapons. It was reported that, during the installation, our long-range auspex was irreparably damaged. To compensate, Magos Ohm (after having rendered the offending crewman into a servitor) tried to compensate by turning the power level of our short range auspex up.
8. The short-range auspex did manage to successfully scan some cargo boxes that were floating in space after presumably spilling out during a battle. Determining that there were no dangerous or heretical materials within, we collected them up and processed them as 28 scrap.
9. At a refueling station, we bought 6 fuel for 12 scrap. I am a bit insulted that my life has been reduced to such transactions; there was a time, not long ago, that loyal servants of the Emperor would give us everything we needed. Far has our galaxy fallen.
10. Another warp beast ambushed us in the empyrian. We collected 2 missiles, 1 drone, and 35 scrap from the remains of its other victims. Two dozen crewmen went mad and died.
11. Again Horus had beaten us to the edge of the sector. This time, however, we suffered only minimal damage as our ion cannons and promethium bombs took their toll on the enemy ship's weapon systems before we could take appreciable damage. Our new servitor-crewed flak system managed to shoot down two torpedoes. Only six or seven crew members died. We continued to a series of Mechanicum forge worlds.
Sector final tally is: 62 scrap, 11 fuel, 21 missiles, 12 drones, and the following stats: Shields 4 (2 layers), Engines 3, Oxygen 2, Medbay 2, Teleporter 1, Piloting 1, Sensors 2, Weapons 7 (Heavy Pierce Laser I, Fire Bomb, Ion Burst II, and Hull Smasher Laser), Power 16, and our augments are a Damaged Stasis Pod, an Automated Re-Loader, & Rock Plating. Next up is an Engi-Controlled Sector. Hoping for a Crystal crew member, though I certainly won't get to the Crystal homeworlds this game.
@Dracomicron I am loving your themed logs. I want to see how far the Eisenstein can make it. Will you too have to detonate your fusion engines to stop the warp storms?
1. A Mechanicum vessel surrendered to us. We did not even arm our lances, they just surrendered. They must be guilty of something. We took their 1 missile, 1 drone, and 67 scrap and told them to report to the nearest Arbites for punishment.
2. An ork vessel detached from a nearby wreck and uncharacteristically fled before we could destroy it. We completed their salvage job and took 23 scrap and a torpedo tube, which I intend to sell.
3. We discovered a Mechanicum foundry. They were able to repair our damage, sell us some fuel, and buy our unused torpedo launcher.
4. Another asteroid field plowed through with our sturdy hull, another small bomb launcher and 31 scrap to fail to inspire me. At least we do not take damage.
5. A frigate opposed us at this warp crux. Two of their renegade Guardsmen teleported into our sensorium where Nikola the astropath lurked. This was a mistake; when an astropath is roused to anger, he can do some awful things to an unprotected human. To make matters worse for them, Matthias rushed in with his power sword and digital beam weapon. Meanwhile, Apothecary Voyen and Solun Decius proceeded to smash the crew of the opposing ship. We stripped their vessel of 49 scrap and a particle beam battery, which Magos Ohm used to replace the Voidsunder lance that wasn't working properly. Before moving on, Ohm increased the power output of the void shields.
6. We faced the megarachnids again. They were a joke, now that we knew what to expect. I will miss my friend Saul Tarvitz, who first told me of these creatures. The owners of the infested facility gave us 5 fuel, 4 missiles, & 22 scrap.
7. A heretic frigate pursued a Mechanicum craft. We bombed the frigate's medicae station while the marines boarded and started shooting anything that moved with their mass-reactive bolters. The Mechanicum caught up while we were scavenging 2 fuel, 1 drone, 46 scrap, and a second flak servitor schematic. The Mechanicum told us that they were fleeing the heretics, but that they were in dire straits. Knowing that we must keep Magos Ohm happy if we were to make it back to Terra in one piece, we gave them 2 torpedoes, 2 units of fuel, and 40 scrap. They were shocked and shamed by our generosity, and gave us their experimental nano-healing device that rejuvenates anyone aboard the Eisenstein, no matter where they are in the ship. Unfortunately, while the wiring was being installed, the damaged stasis pod was ruptured, and a massive psychic scream pierced the apothicarium. We will never know the secrets that the pod held, but perhaps it is for the best. Some knowledge should remain hidden. Magos Ohm had the offending crewman rendered into a servitor.
8. A necron vessel lurked outside another supply station. We applied our new particle lance, and made short work of it. We collected 54 scrap worth of materials, and salvaged 2 fuel, 2 missiles, and 30 scrap from the station.
9. A Mechanicum vessel lay ahead on the auspex. They were emitting a distress beacon; when we moved in to assist, a greenskin came on the display and yelled, “FOOOOLLLEEED YOOOOOUUUUU!” They then attacked. Voyen and Decius boarded and killed them. We recovered 45 scrap and another hull-penetrating particle lance. Ohm wants to try this variant out in place of our current weapon to see if it performs better.
10. A Mechanicum captain requested our services to find a cargo ship that was a week late. I told him that we were not available to hire, for we are marines. If we did find his lost vessel, however, we would send word. Meanwhile, Ohm upgraded the shields to their maximum potential, for we knew that we would face Horus's ships again as we tried to leave the sector.
11. This time we were prepared for the rebels, and we fought through them with little difficulty. Nikola and Stick had a conference, and they realized that both paths forward were fraught with danger. Both nebulas ahead were infected with a rot of the soul, and cultists of dark powers that lurk in the Empyrian would certainly await us with their debased rituals. The Death Guard knows no fear; the Emperor Protects.
Sector end totals: 2 scrap, 8 fuel, 19 missiles, 12 drones, and the following stats: Shields 8 (4 layers), Engines 3, Oxygen 2, Medbay 2, Teleporter 1, Weapons 7 (Heavy Pierce Laser I, Fire Bomb, Ion Burst II, and Hull Beam), Drones 2 (two Defense Is), and the augments are Automated Re-loader, Engi Medi-Bot Dispersal, and Rock Plating. We have a Small Bomb, a Hull Laser, and a Pike Beam as cargo. The RNG did not smile upon me this time around; none of the nebulas in this run were the Slug Home Nebula... we get to choose between two Slug-Controlled Nebulas.
@Dracomicron I am loving your themed logs. I want to see how far the Eisenstein can make it. Will you too have to detonate your fusion engines to stop the warp storms?
I'm trying to figure out a way to work that in. Maybe that will be the start of the final sector.
finally managed my first Normal victory today. Used Crystal A and finished with a score of around 3600. Was disappointed that it didn't even crack my top 5 list, even for ship best. Most of my easy runs end around 4000. I thought the score bonus would have been enough to make up for the scrap differential... is this run abnormally low?
1. A human psyker, an astropath, lured us in with a distress beacon, and asked us a truly inane riddle... he wanted to know how many moons his planet had. I answered correctly, and he wanted to join our crew. But I have no use for an unstable astropoath that could leak the warp into my vessel at any time. Decius showed him to the airlock.
2. A Necron vessel again lurked outside a refueling station. We took minor damage to our life support, but only four mortal crew members died. Destroying the automaton netted us 3 fuel, 2 missiles, & 30 scrap. The harried staff of the station were grateful to the tune of 3 fuel 1 drone, & 53 scrap. I can only imagine what they had been through before we arrived.
3. An ork vessel attacked a ship carrying plague-slaves of one of what Nikola calls the Ruinous Powers. I considered letting them both fight it out, but then realized that I wished to purge the sorcerers no matter where they were. We slaughtered the infected cultist crew and took 3 fuel, 2 missiles, & 76 scrap. The greenskins wisely left before we were done salvaging the ship.
4. We discovered the cargo ship lost by the Mechanicum. 1 fuel, 1 missile, & 60 scrap worth of goods. I wish that we had the time to bring the cargo to its original destination; no matter how much we need to stay on Magos Ohm's good side, we are approaching Terra and we cannot become sidetracked now.
5. We overheard some vox chatter from the ork vessel at this warp nexus. “Dis one not owned by da squishy ones, maybe dis one not smell so bad when we cuts 'em open.” Needless to say, we declined to allow them to perform the expermient. We salvaged 2 fuel, 1 missile, & 75 scrap from the burning vessel. Point of note, orks smell terrible when braised over an open flame.
6. A Rogue Trader was anchored off of a non-aligned planet. I detest Rogue Traders and their lack of a real creedo, but the Emperor, in His wisdom, gave them charters to travel all the distasteful places of the universe looking for the lost tribes of Mankind. I grudgingly negotiated with him, as this would likely be our last chance to repair and retrofit the Eisenstein before getting to Terra. We sold all of our excess weapons and cargo, purchased a xenos stealth drive that Magos Ohm is convinced will work with our systems, and bought a central bulkhead control system, that will hopefully allow us to delay intruders, should Horus's marines get adventurous and board the ship again.
7. Fresh from foul rituals, the plague cultists attacked us. Brother Decius once told me that the definition of insanity was to perform the same action the same way, expecting different results each time. We gathered the resources and scrap and moved on.
8. A Rogue Trader asked to drink with us. They were may have been intending to poison our drink, they may not, but upon witnessing the enhanced metabolism of the Astartes, they offered to repair the ship and sell us their wares. We bought their bombs and servitors, then moved on.
9. After we left the Rogue Trader, he caught up to us with another offer. He had a weapon charger that allowed us to drop out of warp with fully charged weapons. He seemed to be after our medical nanodrone device; I felt it was a reasonable trade.
10. A plague ship ambushed us, preaching that their flame would burn away our impurities. I was about to say the same to them. After their rotten corpses were cooking on the floor of their vessel, we salvaged 2 fuel, 2 missiles, & 76 scrap before leaving. For reference, the warp charger for our weapons works perfectly. We are able to launch a promethium bomb into their apothicarium as soon as hostilities begin.
11. Another plague vessel approached. This one was trying to supplicate themselves as penitents before opening fire. They died screaming in flames, just like the others. We collected 1 fuel, 1 drone, and 73 scrap.
12. We were not unduly delayed by the blockade at the end of the sector. From here, we have a long stretch of nothingness as we pass through the Empyrian, guided by the light of the Astronomicon. Soon, soon we will bring word of Horus Lupercal's treason to his father, and then there will be a reckoning.
152 scrap, 9 fuel, 26 missiles, 16 drones, and the following stats: Shields 8 (4 layers), Engines 3, Oxygen 2, Medbay 2, Teleporter 1, Stealth 1, Weapons 7 (Heavy Pierce Laser I, Fire Bomb, Ion Burst II, and Hull Beam), Drones 2 (two Defense Is), Sensors 2, Piloting 1, Doors 2, Power 19, and the augments are Automated Re-loader, Weapon Pre-Igniter, and Rock Plating. We're under-equipped for this part of the game, I think, but that could make it more interesting.
I have actually been running a bit of an experiment. You may notice that I'm running into the rebel fleet at the end of every sector. I've been trying to intentionally fly to more beacons around the sector exit after the rebels have caught up, in the belief that the scrap I get from one to three extra beacons will more than make up for damage taken from the rebel fleet. Sometimes this works out, sometimes it's a near disaster.
I have actually been running a bit of an experiment. You may notice that I'm running into the rebel fleet at the end of every sector. I've been trying to intentionally fly to more beacons around the sector exit after the rebels have caught up, in the belief that the scrap I get from one to three extra beacons will more than make up for damage taken from the rebel fleet. Sometimes this works out, sometimes it's a near disaster.
If I've got long range sensors or a quest or a store that I want to get to, I'll do this for sure. Or if I'm certain that whatever rebel ship I'll face will be little match for my ship. Usually it works out, I think. More sectors than not, you get scrap, so I think the odds play in your favor.
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38thDoE on steam
Would appreciate some help with my loadout too. I got to the end sector and got through stage 1 easily, took a beating in stage 2, and was destroyed in stage 3. Any input on what I am missing would be great - though I am guessing it was just not having enough shields or crew (though I did have the pre-igniter).
The crew includes: Shepard, a female human, James Vega, a male human, Shirai, a vorcha (mantis), Liara, an asari (zoltan), Bloch, a male krogan (rockman), Ariel, a female Salarian (slug), and Bjorn vas Normandy, a female quarian (engi).
Shepard's Final Log
1. We arrived at the Citadel, and relayed our Fifth Fleet security codes. Admiral Hackett came up on the screen, in his sweet, gravelly voice, he said, “Shepard! We thought we lost you with Earth. What's going on? What took you?” I responded with a crisp salute, “Took the scenic route, sir.” He nodded gravely and said, “Report, soldier.” I then told him what we learned at the Mars Archive: Each Reaper is a nation unto itself, but only one of them, the first and most powerful, desires to cull spacefaring species every 50,000 years. Harbinger. If Harbinger were brought down, most of the other Reapers would break off and disperse to follow their own agendas. Hackett nodded. “We don't have any ships capable of fighting that monster, but we can hold off the rest of the Reapers long enough for you to go in cloaked and take Harbinger down.” I saluted again as he said, “Hackett out.” The Fleet maintenance ships loaded 10 fuel aboard, and we set off towards Harbinger's mass signature.
2. An advance scout of the Reapers had blocked the relay leading to the Citadel. We opened fire with the Harrier and the Glaive beam, and it disengaged quickly. That's good tidings for our fight with Harbinger. We collected 1 fuel from the wreck of one of the Reaper's victims, and moved on. Harbinger is 5 mass jumps before it is close enough to destroy the citadel.
3. We came upon a forward base of the Citadel forces. As maintenance crews loaded us with 5 fuel, 4 missiles, and 5 drones, I asked if anyone had heard of the situation on Earth. An N7 Demolisher, returned from a lightning raid on the Reaper base in London, told me (while loading her harness with cool-looking grenades) that Anderson is still in charge of the situation and, while things are bleak, everyone's holding out hope. Damn it, Anderson, I'm going to save you, because someone needs to punch Udina after all this is through.
4. A cargo hauler was being attacked by a Reaper. We have a job to do, but that doesn't mean we can ignore civilians in trouble. Our boarding team was repelled because the Reaper had advanced internal repair capacity; the husks within were effectively unstoppable because we couldn't bring down its regeneration pods. We pulled Bloch and Shirai back and concentrated our firepower, severing one of its appendages. The thing broke off and left to repair, presumably. We salvaged the tentacle or whatever you call a Reaper's arms. The raw materials alone made for 2 missiles, 1 drone, and 71 scrap. The cargo hauler was grateful, and provided 2 missiles, 1 drone, and 30 scrap.
5. A small Destroyer Reaper lurked at this mass relay. This one wasn't as advanced as the last one, We were able to use all three of our weapons to keep their regeneration pods from healing its husks. Shirai and Bloch managed to defeat them, grab whatever tech they could find, and plant a charge in the mass effect core. We fled the explosion with 2 fuel, 1 drone, and 49 scrap. Once several tests on the Reaper tech were run, we used some of the advanced materials to upgrade EDI's autopilot ability, as well as re-enforcing the doors against boarders... this last Reaper tried to launch praetorians into our ship, but luckily our defense omnidrone managed to shoot them down before they got here. If one of those things does get aboard, I want the situation contained.
6. A Second Fleet vessel was at this location, and attacked us. Second Fleet was the first lost when the Reapers arrived, they must've been indoctrinated and joined the enemy. After their ship had taken considerable damage, they made to flee. Not that easy, my friend. A few more volleys and their captain, a respectable soldier, surrendered. He fought indoctrination long enough to send over his supplies before self-destructing. It was the only honorable thing to do at this point. We got 1 fuel, 1 drone, and 41 scrap from the sad, but necessary, act. Using some of the schematics they sent over, EDI and I upgraded the power intake on the omnidrone forge. We should be able to run both the hull repair and the point defense drones at the same time if necessary, now.
7. Hackett reported that Harbinger was on his way to the system we were in, so we just waited in ambush. Everyone was tense; we'd faced Reapers before, but Harbinger was the strongest of them all. I'm asking EDI to record the battle, because I'm going to be very, very busy from here on out.
8. Thank you, EDI. With Harbinger's death, the Reaper forces came apart at the seams. Old grudges caused some of them to attack one another. Others had no interest in organics at all, and left for dark space to pursue their own inscrutable agendas. Even further, some stayed to help us rebuild. Aside from Harbinger, the Reapers never wanted to make war on us... they were victims same as we were.
9. We suffered massive loss of life, including dear friends, and our galaxy has irrevocably changed, but we, meaning modern organic life, defeated the greatest threat the galaxy has ever known, on our own, without compromising what makes us who we are. No godlike beings came to our aid, no superweapon provided a deus ex machina, all we needed was to know that everything has a weakness. Harbinger's was arrogance, to think that it was untouchable to lesser beings.
10. If you don't mind, I'm ending this log, because it's time for a beach party. Everyone's invited!
Thanks for reading, everyone!
Certain guns cut through the Zoltan Shield better. Ion weapons do double damage to the Zoltan Shield, so an Ion Burst III will chop through it in no time flat... especially if you had two automated re-loaders like I did.
The Shepard FTL run clocked in at about 4900 points, which is funny, because none of my previous Stealth B runs could top 1200.
Rock B for the cutting-edge laser that mere Imperial Guardsmen wouldn't know how to build.
SC ship is spot on! Too bad they don't give you enough characters for a proper Culture ship name.
fuck up once and you break your thumb / if you're happy at all then you're god damn dumb
that's right we're on a fucked up cruise / God is dead but at least we have booze
bad things happen, no one knows why / the sun burns out and everyone dies
Mantis isn't that hard if you have some spare scrap to upgrade before you get to the system. Crystal is all about stacking the RNG in your favor or you will never get it. Read the wiki!
Okay, I can see that. And then Prometheum (Fire) Bombs to cleanse the enemy in the puriflying flames.
I had been thinking Crystal B for their 4-man squad teleporter, but Rocks as marines makes a lot of sense.
So the starting crew of the Eisenstein would be:
Battle-Captain Nathaniel Garro of the Death Guard
Iacton Qruze (aka "The Half-Heard") of the Luna Wolves
Apothicary Meric Voyen of the Death Guard
Brother Solun Decius of the Death Guard
As for the races, I have to remember that Imperials don't get along with nonhumans, so opponent races may be different than friendly races. I was thinking:
Rock = Space Marine (good) or Chaos Marine (evil)
Mantis = Sororitas (good) or Ork (evil)
Engi = Mechanicum (good) or Dark Mechanicum (evil)
Slug = Astropath (good) or Plagueridden of Nurgle (evil)
Zoltan = Rogue Trader/Navigator (good) or Eldar (evil)
Crystal = Sanctioned Psyker (good) or Magus of Tzeentch (evil)
Human = Imperial Guardsman (good) or Heretic Soldier (evil)
Unmanned opposing ships I suppose would be Necrons? Warp beasts?
Any other ideas before I start?
1. The unthinkable has happened. The brightest of the Primarchs, Horus Lupercal of the XVI Legion and Warmaster of Terra's Great Crusade, has betrayed his own marines, and those of other legions besides. More, he has betrayed the Emperor, the greatest light this Galaxy has ever known. We flee towards Terra to warn them of the treason of His greatest son. I am Battle-Captain Nathaniel Garro of the Death Guard, 7th Company, and I have commandeered the Imperial frigate known as the Eisenstein; we are fleeing the slaughter on Isstvan III. We were warned by my old friend, Saul Tarvitz of the Emperor's Children, that even our own Primarchs, Fulgrim and Mortarion, had joined the treason. We have taken on passengers who can confirm his story. Before we could leave the system, however, the battleship Terminus Est opened fire upon us, destroying and crippling many systems, as well as slaying many of my marines and mortal crew members. By the Emperor, I will not fail, no matter the obstacle!
2. We dropped out of warp to make some repairs from the damage sustained at Isstvan III, and immediately received a distress call. A Mechanicum vessel was stranded after its Navigator suffered massive hemorrhaging from the severe warp storms that have beset the quadrent. Iacton Qruze, a venerable Luna Wolf, stated that the only honorable thing to do was to lead them to their destination. Realizing our need to repair and upgrade our systems if we wish to get to Terra, they gave us 10 units of scrap in gratitude. The Emperor Protects.
3. Flying into a nebula to throw off the Traitor Legions' pursuit, we found a small settlement that engaged in commerce. We exchanged two of our promethium bombs in exchange for three servitor drone blanks. Our servitor repurposing forge was destroyed in the flight from Isstvan, but we will eventually replace it, and need raw materials.
4. We continued through the nebula. The next time we dropped out of warp, we detected an Imperial ship, its auspex signal distorted. The Emperor smiled upon us, and we discovered their disabled vessel, an unlisted vessel bearing the icon of Malacdor the Sigilite. Only one survivor, a dangerous looking man with numerous augmetics and a breathing mask named Matt (I managed to get out of him that it's short for Matthias), said he needed to get back to Terra. Since that's the direction we're going, I told him that he was welcome. My battle brother Solun Decius says that he believes that Matt is an assassin of the Officio Assassinorum. I wisely did not inquire with our new guest, who had gone to the life support system to lurk.
5. We arrived at the Mechanicum vessel's destination. They sold us their excess fuel, and we moved on. Sadly we did not have the funds for their other wares.
6. As we flew through the warp, a horrendous warp-beast attacked the ship, firing torpedoes of filth and disrupting our systems with its vile spittle. Our remaining lance battery disabled, then dissipated the foul monstrosity. We took damage to our engines and life support, and a dozen mortals were killed, but Brother Solun Decius was able to help the repair crew fix the engines. Matt surprised me by fixing the life support on his own (the repair crew didn't dare approach). There were remains of other ships in the belly of the creature. We salvaged 1 fuel, 1 servitor drone, and 11 scrap.
7. An Infidel Raider escort-class ship, loyal to Horus Lupercal's 63rd Expeditionary Force, waited for us when we dropped out of warp. They engaged their warp engines, intending to betray our coordinates to their traitorous masters. Iacton Qruze, that canny veteran, proceeded to methodically aim the lance battery to take out their engines, then their navigation, and finally their weapons and servitors. We collected 2 prometheum bombs, 1 servitor drone, and 18 scrap from the wreckage. Death to Heretics.
8. An Eldar vessel approached, offering us our lives in exchange for our supplies. The Emperor stated, “Thou shalt suffer not the Xenos to live.” They were no match for even our only one partially-functioning lance battery. We recovered 3 fuel, 1 missile, & 14 scrap; may the Emperor forgive us for making use of such tainted materials, but our mission is too important to allow such strictures to rule our actions.
9. We found a civilian mining ship in an asteroid field. Their shields were disabled, and they were taking damage. I brought the Eisenstein around to shield them; an Astartes frigate has some of the strongest armor of any spaceworthy ship in the galaxy. They donated 4 fuel and 14 scrap to our cause after we cleared the field together.
10. We proceeded through the asteroid field, and a shoddy pirate vessel fired upon us. A lucky shot started a fire in our crew quarters, killing dozens of mortals. Iacton, Apothicary Voyen, and I went to put out the fire, leaving the battle-servitors manning the guns to fire upon the enemy weapons bay. By the time we had put out the fire, the lance battery had shot a hole straight through the pirate ship. All who turn their back upon the Emperor are my prey. We collected 1 fuel, 2 missiles, and 12 scrap.
11. When we finally got out of the asteroid field, we found a cold, metal xenos ship attacking a space station. Apothicary Voyen linked it to legends of a race called the C'tan, which predated even humanity's rise to the stars, millenia ago. We salvaged 1 fuel, 1 drone, and 10 scrap from its previous victims. The outpost gave us 3 fuel, 1 missile, and 14 scrap in gratitude.
12. Another warp beast, this one a crackling electric creature, disrupted our void shields as it spat damaging globs of acid at our hull. We took some minor damage and only a few mortal crew members died before our lance battery shredded it. The Eisenstein's astropath, locked in his chamber, told us that such creatures can never be truly killed, as they re-form elsewhere in the warp after a time. Let us hope, by the Emperor, that this one will not re-intigrate soon. We discovered 1 fuel, 2 missiles, and 13 scrap among the remains of its other victims.
13. A colony on a nearby world hailed us and asked for assistance in destroying a greenskin camp that has been troubling them. The greenskin is a dangerous foe, one that plagued even the Emperor for a time upon the fields of Ullanor. I agreed to destroy them if it would not jeopardize our mission. They gave us 16 scrap in gratitude, but had the gall to imply that they would get the Traitor Legions to assist them if we would only get a number count of the ork horde.
14. War has come already to this place. A space station lies empty near a major warp stream leading out of the subsector. We salvaged 8 scrap and the plans to build an advanced servitor attack drone. Consulting with the Navigator, we can go in two directions, each a viable path to Holy Terra. The first leads to an uncharted nebula, while the second leads through mercantile border space that has not fully been subjected to Imperial Compliance, and is currently traveled mainly by Rogue Traders.
Thanks for reading again, folks! Our new run stats so far are: 135 scrap, 22 fuel, 24 missiles, and 6 drones. We've suffered 4 points of hull damage and have an Anti-Ship Drone II that we can't use yet. We have not upgraded the Rock B cruiser at all so far; of course the first store I found had the whole range of things I wanted, before we could afford them. I'm saving up for a teleporter, because what good are space marines if you can't teleport into enemy vessels and kill everybody?
Our choices for what sector to go to are an Uncharted Nebula and Zoltan Controlled Space. Thoughts?
I got real close once...
:END OF LINE:
It took me exactly 100 tries on easy. Beat it on the 101st.
Honestly, I am thinking of doing another FTL video in the style of a Star Trek episode. At the rate I lose at this game, when I win it will be epic. It might come off really cheesy though.
So far on this Osprey run (Easy), I've unlocked the B variant, the Stealth Ship, and the Mantis Ship. :rotate:
1. To throw off the enemy, we have traveled through the Empyrian to an uncharted sector of space. The astropath warns us that unspeakable horrors lurk in the unknown corners of the galaxy, but we must prevail.
2. Out of the mists of the nebula, a human station waited for us. They knew of the Emperor and Terra, but would not say why they were there. We traded a unit of fuel for five promethium bombs, a welcome bargain. When we finished our business and moved on, however, the station disappeared into the mist, and we could not find it on our auspex again. What deviltry is this?
3. We have found the greenskin stronghold that the merchants were concerned about. We detected an Imperial code being broadcast from one of their ships. The ork horde was far too numerous to risk a direct assault, so we teleported promethium bombs into their key structures. The greenskin, barbarians all, fell into chaos as their stronghold burned. We boarded their ramshackle “kroozer” and liberated a tech-priest named Magos Ohm, as well as 3 fuel, 7 missiles, and 13 scrap. The Magos, more machine than man and curiously neutral of tone as are many of his kind, was nevertheless grateful for his liberation, and went to work repairing our weapons system, so we will be able to both fire the lance battery and launch promethium bombs simultaniously. Eventually he went to supervise the engineering teams in the warp drive; Brother Decius gratefully relinquished responsibility for the area.
4. The Eisenstein's reclusive astropath died during the transition to warp, proving the danger of the Great Ocean in this area. His head simply exploded. Magos Ohm located the outpost from which he was stationed, and, as well as providing repairs, we were able to make a deal with the Mechanicum leaders to take on one of their astropaths, a weedy, pale fellow named Nikola. He went to lurk in the sensorium... after we cleaned out the chamber of the bits of skull and brain matter of his predecessor. It is truly a grim life that psykers lead in service to the Emperor. The Magos also purchased and installed a state of the art auspex which will hopefully allow us to sense and avoid warp storms in this blighted nebula.
5. We travelled, seemingly at random, through the nebula. The veil between the warp and the physical universe is thin here; we detected a fully functional Imperial ship nearby, but when Magos Ohm sent more power to our newly installed long-range sensors, we found the ship, devoid of power or life, a decayed husk. It was as if it aged a thousand years in mere moments. Nikola screamed with empathic agony, saying that the ghosts of the crew still lurked. We salvaged 19 scrap from it and moved on.
6. A ship similar to the C'tan design we had encountered before lurked outside a station emitting codes loyal to Horus lay in wait. If there are supplies aboard that station, I determined that we must have them. We attacked the xenos vessel, and it opened fire with its energy weapons and some sort of fighter craft. We took some hull damage and a fire broke out in our life support and apothicarium; Decius, Matthias, and the Magos directed the crews to put out the fire, and only a half dozen crew died with horrible burns before it was put out. Magos Ohm determined that sections of the Necron vessel were not a blasphemy to his Omnisiah machine god, and we collected 18 scrap from its remains. When we got to the station, slaughtered the traitors (they thought we were of Horus's fleet, come to rescue them), and took their supplies, including 2 fuel, 1 drone, and 15 scrap.
7. A brigand in a Terran ship lurked in the nebula, bearing crude symbols of allegence to dark powers. Nikola, a much more talented astropath than our last one, detected that there was an Adeptus Astartes in command of the vessel. Angered that one of our own could fall so far, I eschewed our lance batteries in favor of dousing them with promethium. The purifying flame cleansed the ship of most of its crew, but the enemy marine was able to keep the ship functioning. Eventually, in disgust, I had Qruze blast them apart with the lance. We collected 17 scrap from their wreckage, and Nikola wrenched their navigator's mental map of the surrounding systems before the flames took him. Death to heretics!
8. The enemy navigator had information on a stranded regiment of loyal Valhallan soldiers on a death world. By the time we got there, however, only one soldier was left, Commissar Charlie Cain. He thanked us for getting him “off that rock,” and joined the crew. This man is not a serious fellow, but the fact that he survived on a death world while his regiment did not does suggest that he has some skills. He elected to go play cards with the assassin lurking in life support; Matt inexplicably allowed him to stay, where he intimidated every other non-Astartes in the crew that approached.
9. We proceeded to the warp conduit that would lead us further towards Terra. Nikola senses that the winds of the Empyrian are favorable to the renegade fleet chasing us, so we have little choice but to jump while we can. He senses that we can proceed through another uncharted nebula, or towards dangerous greenskin space.
Kinda a blah sector; we picked up some crew and long range sensors, and upgraded the weapons systems so we can have both the fire bombs and heavy pierce laser online at the same time, but otherwise, we must've had five “no encounter” jumps. Anyway, the options are Mantis Controlled Sector and another Uncharted Nebula. I'm still leaning towards the nebula, because the encounters tend to be more like the novel I'm basing this on.
An accurate representation of both FTL and Warhammer 40k, hahah.
I hope Charlie Cain gets the chance to Commissar a crewman at some point.
Let's see what's in the next nebula.
Taking a bit of license and proceeding, since I'm not sure if this run is actually going anywhere. Proceeding to the second Uncharted Nebula. Let's see if we can use the Long Range Scanners to get into some trouble.
1. I declined to head into greenskin territory. They are a chaotic and implacable foe, and we do not need to provoke more enemies than absolutely necessary in this journey to warn the Emperor of treason within the ranks of His greatest children.
2. Travelling through warp space, we came upon a vessel bearing pirate markings. We disabled their weapons and void shields with the lance battery, then set them aflame with promethium bombs. Most of their crew dead, the highly augmetic captain offered a substantial bribe to allow him to live. No mercy for the foes of the Emperor. We disabled his bridge and waited for the flames to take him. When their screams stopped emitting from our vox, we stripped their ship of useful equipment, collecting 24 scrap and discovering an ancient device that Magos Ohm calls an “ion cannon.” It seems that this rapidly firing device can disable enemy ships without destroying their hull... useful if we ever get the teleporters working again and need to board opposing vessels. The Magos supervised the installation and directed power conduits so we can use it alongside the lance battery or our promethium bombs.
3. Another pirate, this time the renegade humans somehow piloted a greenskin vessel. Though painted red, we managed to overtake it and set it aflame. Our new ion weaponry disabled its guns while we set it ablaze, but they were able to launch two salvos of impressive torpedos, which set our apothicarium ablaze. When their crew succumbed to the sanctifying flames, we took their rapid-firing torpedo launcher and installed it on the Eisenstein. We also collected 28 scrap.
4. We found a station in the mists exchanging fuel for promethium bombs... I... I feel that I have been here before. We made the trade and moved on. When I looked through the aft sensors, the station had already disappeared. Nikola says that the warp plays tricks with time, and the sensation that the ancients called “deja-vu” is actually the Empyrian causing the same event to happen twice.
5. Another case of deja-vu. We found the same ship floating through the mists as we had in the last sector, first it was filled with life and vox calls, then it was dead in space, seemingly before we had stripped it previously. We salvaged 27 scrap; I was careful to leave enough scrap on the vessel to accommodate our last visit to the vessel; the last thing I wish is to cause a paradox. Whispers of sorcery abound as we proceeded into the nebula.
6. A heretic Defender-class escort cruiser tried to flee from us. Between Nikola's psychic sensitivity and our long-range sensorium, we tracked them down and burned them out, hundreds of lives evaporated in our cleansing fire. In addition to the 25 scrap we aquired from the charred interior of their ship, we liberated their enginseer, who had been locked in their brig due to his refusal to betray the Emperor. At some point, Commissar Charlie Cain had mysteriously disappeared after beating Matthias at cards, so we were careful not to bunk him with the assassin. Magos Ohm sent Enginseer Martin to supervise the void shields; Apothicary Voyen was glad to be rid of the responsibility. We are running low on fuel and the hull is seriously damaged. We must find a resupply depot soon.
7. When we fled from the Isstvan system, we were attacked by my fellow Deathguard, Ignatius Grulgor, and his heretic marines. The melee had resulted in their deaths to the Life Eater virus bombs we carried in our holds. The corpses were left as they lay, exposed to space. Something of the warp got into the corpses, and they managed to claw their way into the engineering section. Magos Ohm and Solun Decius managed to fend them off, though Battle-Brother Solun was injured in the fight. Eventually I and the assassin Matthias arrived and dispatched the shambling corpses, and we moved on.
8. Desperate for fuel, we discovered another heretic vessel. A warp storm raged around us, decimating our power supply. In a desperate gamble, I shut down our life support, engines, and void shields to divert power to our weapons, locked down their weapons batteries with the ion cannon, and proceeded to burn them out with promethium. It was a near thing, but we were able to burn their crew alive and collect 4 fuel and 39 scrap from the floating hulk. Thankfully, our life support is top of the line, and quickly restored the atmosphere after the battle.
9. The same tactics were used on yet another heretic vessel. We collected 4 fuel and 39 scrap from them. That does alleviate our fuel situation, but we are now running desperately low on promethium bombs. Meanwhile, Magos Ohm upgraded the power conduits to the void shields, and we continued on.
10. An antiquated vessel of the X Legion, the Iron Hands, appeared from the nebula. They had seen action, and their sensors were damaged. No doubt they determined that we were heretics. I recognized the voice of the captain on their vox, and said, “Vermanus Cybus, son of Primarch Ferrus Manus, do you attack an old friend?” Cybus said, “it is hard to tell friend from foe, when even brothers fight one another.” I could not disagree. Cybus transferred control to us, and we led them to a safer warp conduit before continuing on. They gave us 2 missiles, 1 drone, and 36 scrap.
11. Nikola and Ohm conferred, and said that there is a Mechanicum Forge world nearby, a well-hidden secret facility. Nearing the end of our rope, and even knowing that going there would allow Horus's forces to catch up to us, I decided that we must risk everything, or achieve nothing. Jumping to the forge world, we made sure to get repairs. Then Ohm supervised the complete repair of our hull and teleporters, the latter damaged since our escape from Isstvan III. We then sold the torpedo launcher we had recovered, as well as the attack servitor schematics, and bought as much fuel and as many promethium bombs as we could. Now we are ready to face the heretics.
12. Jumping back through the warp storm, we suffered horrendous damage as the heretic fleet caught up with us. Though we were able to disable the pursuing vessel and escape, practically all of the repairs we had done were for naught as the renegades' torpedoes pierced the Eisenstein's defenses. Only by teleporting aboard their burning vessel were we able to kill enough crew to delay them. Enginseer Martin was killed in a fire in the void shield chambers, as well as dozens of human crew. The Emperor Protects.
13. We fought our way to the warp conduit leaving the sector, suffering more damage from the heretic navy. This time there was no warp storm, however, and we were able to disable their craft more quickly. We are jumping to a sector where I know that Jaghati Khan's White Scars marine legion currently reside their expedition. I know the Khan, and he would never turn traitor. We will find help there.
That was rough. I realized that, without getting teleporters we were doomed if we wanted to get through Sector 4 and later, but the store was four jumps from the exit, with the rebel fleet right on our tail. We managed to escape with 59 scrap, 11 fuel, 7 missiles, 8 drones, and the following stats: Shields 4 (2 layers), Engines 2, Oxygen 2, Medbay 1, Teleporter 1, Weapons 5 (Heavy Pierce Laser I, Fire Bomb, and Ion Burst II), and Long-Range Sensors to go with our Rock Plating (without the latter we'd certainly be floating space junk). The choices are Rebel-Controlled Space and Rock-Controlled Space, and I'm choosing Rock because I am aiming towards those other nebulas, in hopes of finding the slug home nebula).
I sadly had to get rid of Charlie because I wanted another Engi. So he mysteriously disappeared. This wouldn't have happened if he were named Ciaphas.
Of course, the Engi also died horribly. That's Warhammer 40K FTL, baby.
regret beating this on easy. the mad urge is gone.
We enter Rock-Controlled Space with 22 points of hull damage. This might be a very short trip.
1. We arrived, trailing industrial lubricants and propulsion fuel into space, after the heinous battle against the heretic. We made what repairs we could and moved on.
2. A distress call emanated from an asteroid field. Space Marine ships are, as mentioned, some of the most strongly armored ships in the galaxy. We plowed through the asteroids until we found a spacehulk with a barely-functioning stasis pod. Apothicary Voyen and Solun Decius teleported aboard and managed to get the pod back to the Eisenstein before the asteroids smashed that section. It appears to be a human life sign, but it is thousands of years old. We acquire 18 scrap in addition to the pod. We will have to find advanced facilities, such as those used by the Mechanicum or the Adeptus Terra, to unravel its secrets.
3. A marine cruiser of the III Legion, the Emperor's Children, lurked here. They opened fire on us immediately. Traitors! In desperate attempt to take their torpedo tubes offline, Decius and I boarded their weapons control station and fought the regally-appointed marines there. We fought them long enough to teleport a promethium bomb into their apothecary. Fighting my own battle brothers is not something I will ever be used to, but killing them allowed us to strip their ship, taking 3 fuel, 1 drone, and 42 scrap. Magos Ohm upgraded the engines with some of the Emperor's Children's spare parts, and we continued on.
4. More depraved Emperor's Children were anchored here. They were mad, offering to sell us slaves to slake wanton desires. Madness. Decius and I boarded them and slew several. They offered to give us a slave for free if we would but let them live. I will not allow a cowardly Astartes to continue blaspheming. Decius and I returned to the Eisenstien for medicae treatment in the apothicarium, then Iacton Qruze and the assassin Matthias finished them off. The captives held on the vessel included a loyalist of the Emperor's Children, a Skitarri of the Mechanicum legions, and Ambassador Allandra Turing, a dangerous-looking woman who Matthias seemed to know. She berated me for ruining her plan to be taken to Horus Lupercal in chains, and then assassinate him, and demanded that I return her to Malacdor the Sigilite on Terra. In face of such connections, we decided to bring the other captives as far as the next settlement. We also salvaged 2 fuel, 2 missiles, and 41 scrap from the III Legion ship.
5. Emperor's Children have fallen to piracy, one was laying in wait here; they did not even realize who we were, they just wanted to loot us. They sent boarders to us (which Apothicary Voyen and Solun Decius dispatched readily) and we took a torpedo to our starboard side in the fighting before Ambassador Turing and Matthias killed the opposing marines aboard their vessel; a score of mortal crew were killed and the hull buckled dangerously. We can't afford to take another hit like that. We collected 33 scrap and freed an Imperial Guardsman named Sgt. Oloffson, a veteran who had fought alongside the Wolves of Russ. We allowed him to remain in our hold with the other freed captives; at this point I do not believe that we need the assistance of a mere guardsman.
6. We arrived at a White Scar base. The Khan's children were courteous to us, and told us of their battles with the heretic. I told the local leader that they must make haste to Terra to join with the defense, for Horus Lupercal and his legions chased us. We made repairs and bought all of the bombs and fuel that we could.
7. A White Scar vessel mistook us for the heretic Death Guard that sided with our primarch, Mortaron. It was regrettable, but they would brook no conversation and we had to slay them all. Damn this war. Damn Horus! At least we were able to collect 33 scrap and a Voidsunder lance battery.
8. Another White Scar vessel attacked us, this time in retribution for the previous vessel that we defeated. It is with regret that I say that we killed them all, also, and salvaged 3 fuel, 2 missiles, and 43 scrap from their ship.
9. We found a disabled Emperor's Children vessel abandoned here. It is strange that it was just there, intact, so I asked the astropath Nikola to keep his warp senses active while we stripped the ship of parts. We collected 2 missiles, 1 drone, and 41 scrap before Nikola sensed the warp signature of an approaching flotilla. We hastened to leave before the trap was sprung.
10. A remote world's satellite defense halo had gone mad. Magos Ohm laughed, turned on his cogitator, and sent some commands. The system righted itself immediately, and the planetary governor rewarded us with 1 missile, 1 drone, and 41 scrap.
11. Nikola screamed and we fell out of warp; there was some sort of siphon here that had also drawn in the Emperor's Children... worse, it was within the corona of a star in the process of going nova. The Emperor's Children were laughing like madmen as they attacked; we fought them and the fires springing up over the ship. We cleared them out and took 33 scrap before we were able to flee the death trap. We also freed an Adeptus Arbites law officer who had been held captive to their whims. We allowed him to join the other freed slaves in the hold.
12. We defeated yet another Emperor's Children pirate. The lance battery punctured their weapons bay and Matthias and Ambassador Turing performed a baffling display of martial katas to keep the traitor marines occupied while their holds emptied of air. They didn't even put on their helmets. Once they were dead, we collected 2 fuel, 2 missiles, & 42 scrap from their wreckage. According to our star maps, we are near the exit from this sector. It will be a tough fight, and when consulted with regard to how we can run Horus's blockade, Magos Ohm got a look in his eye... well, he would have had a look in his eyes, if he didn't have mirror-sheen augmetic replacements instead of eyes. He used much of our remaining scrap to upgrade the weapons systems.
13. Ohm had managed to get the lances and ion cannons up and running simultaneously. Unfortunately they did not carve through the heretic ship the way he had hoped. We fought them off long enough to charge the warp engines and escape, but took significant damage to our void shields and weapons. Two dozen crewmen died before we could engage the drive. We move on now to lawless pirate controlled space, once again damaged and desperate.
We leave the sector with 12 scrap, 11 fuel, 20 missiles, 11 drones, and the following stats: Shields 4 (2 layers), Engines 3, Oxygen 2, Medbay 2, Teleporter 1, Weapons 7 (Heavy Pierce Laser I, Fire Bomb, Ion Burst II, and Hull Smasher Laser), and Long-Range Sensors & Rock Plating. We've taken 13 points of hull damage. The choices were both pirate controlled space; I chose the one that might lead to the Slug Home Nebula. My boarding party for this sector was mainly the two mantis crew, Turing and Matt. The whole fire-bomb-rock-boarder trick doesn't work very well when the other guys are rock, too. So I just went for speed damage.
I never played on Easy. I knew I would enjoy it less. It was worth the pain, I think, to do it the hard way.
However, when playing a game where the stars aligned to grant two Fire Beams, an Ion blast II, and two Rock crew members, it became something more. An engine of divine fire that burned the galaxy clean.
1. We were not long from the warp point when we received a distress call. Megarachnids had taken over a colony; Saul Tarvitz had once told me of his battles with such creatures. He told me that they were no joke. We went to rescue the colony, but we were too late. Everyone was dead, and the giant spiders burst through the walls and carried Ambassador Allandra Turing into their lair. We could not help her, and turned to leave. I will regret informing Malacdor the Sigilite of his assassin's failure. Matthias looked mildly disappointed at the woman's death.
2. A ramshackle Astartes vessel, crewed by a hodge-podge of pirates, attacked us. Matt and Decius boarded them and killed the crew, garnering 2 fuel, 1 drone, and 54 scrap. We did take some damage from their torpedoes, with a loss of life of several crew members near the apothicarium.
3. We plowed through another asteroid field. We found a wreck with a small bomb launcher and 27 scrap. Not terribly intriguing, in the face of our other ordinance, but perhaps we can sell it.
4. A rogue trader was lost in a nebula, and we locked onto their life signs with our teleporters. Not only did they bring handfuls of equipment, worth 39 scrap, but their Navigator, a rare mutant breed that is able to see the streams of the warp with their third eye, joined our crew. We already had one, but he was old and infirm. The new fellow called himself “Stick” and seemed dynamic for his breed. Magos Ohm kicked his lectern and asked me to assign the Navigator to the engine room; he wished to take over at the void shields, now that Engineer Martin was dead.
5. While in transit, warp creatures, drawn to Stick's third eye, appeared in the enginarium. Tentacles sprung from portals through the hull into the Empyrian. Our Gellar field had somehow been punctured. It took a significant battle that included all the marines on board, as well as Matthias, but we beat back the monstrosity long enough for Ohm to repair the Gellar field.
6. A commercial hive lurked on the stony world below us like a crust of algae on stale bread. We purchased a servitor drone forge, and Magos Ohm now claims that we will be able to use the flak servitor to shoot down torpedoes. We also bought as much fuel as we could find before moving on.
7. A Mechanicum facility had a severe fire. The Death Guard do not fear fire. We teleported in and stomped on the flames until they were cowed. The grateful magos of the facility gave us 50 scrap and an automated re-loading system that would improve the re-fire speed of our weapons. It was reported that, during the installation, our long-range auspex was irreparably damaged. To compensate, Magos Ohm (after having rendered the offending crewman into a servitor) tried to compensate by turning the power level of our short range auspex up.
8. The short-range auspex did manage to successfully scan some cargo boxes that were floating in space after presumably spilling out during a battle. Determining that there were no dangerous or heretical materials within, we collected them up and processed them as 28 scrap.
9. At a refueling station, we bought 6 fuel for 12 scrap. I am a bit insulted that my life has been reduced to such transactions; there was a time, not long ago, that loyal servants of the Emperor would give us everything we needed. Far has our galaxy fallen.
10. Another warp beast ambushed us in the empyrian. We collected 2 missiles, 1 drone, and 35 scrap from the remains of its other victims. Two dozen crewmen went mad and died.
11. Again Horus had beaten us to the edge of the sector. This time, however, we suffered only minimal damage as our ion cannons and promethium bombs took their toll on the enemy ship's weapon systems before we could take appreciable damage. Our new servitor-crewed flak system managed to shoot down two torpedoes. Only six or seven crew members died. We continued to a series of Mechanicum forge worlds.
Sector final tally is: 62 scrap, 11 fuel, 21 missiles, 12 drones, and the following stats: Shields 4 (2 layers), Engines 3, Oxygen 2, Medbay 2, Teleporter 1, Piloting 1, Sensors 2, Weapons 7 (Heavy Pierce Laser I, Fire Bomb, Ion Burst II, and Hull Smasher Laser), Power 16, and our augments are a Damaged Stasis Pod, an Automated Re-Loader, & Rock Plating. Next up is an Engi-Controlled Sector. Hoping for a Crystal crew member, though I certainly won't get to the Crystal homeworlds this game.
1. A Mechanicum vessel surrendered to us. We did not even arm our lances, they just surrendered. They must be guilty of something. We took their 1 missile, 1 drone, and 67 scrap and told them to report to the nearest Arbites for punishment.
2. An ork vessel detached from a nearby wreck and uncharacteristically fled before we could destroy it. We completed their salvage job and took 23 scrap and a torpedo tube, which I intend to sell.
3. We discovered a Mechanicum foundry. They were able to repair our damage, sell us some fuel, and buy our unused torpedo launcher.
4. Another asteroid field plowed through with our sturdy hull, another small bomb launcher and 31 scrap to fail to inspire me. At least we do not take damage.
5. A frigate opposed us at this warp crux. Two of their renegade Guardsmen teleported into our sensorium where Nikola the astropath lurked. This was a mistake; when an astropath is roused to anger, he can do some awful things to an unprotected human. To make matters worse for them, Matthias rushed in with his power sword and digital beam weapon. Meanwhile, Apothecary Voyen and Solun Decius proceeded to smash the crew of the opposing ship. We stripped their vessel of 49 scrap and a particle beam battery, which Magos Ohm used to replace the Voidsunder lance that wasn't working properly. Before moving on, Ohm increased the power output of the void shields.
6. We faced the megarachnids again. They were a joke, now that we knew what to expect. I will miss my friend Saul Tarvitz, who first told me of these creatures. The owners of the infested facility gave us 5 fuel, 4 missiles, & 22 scrap.
7. A heretic frigate pursued a Mechanicum craft. We bombed the frigate's medicae station while the marines boarded and started shooting anything that moved with their mass-reactive bolters. The Mechanicum caught up while we were scavenging 2 fuel, 1 drone, 46 scrap, and a second flak servitor schematic. The Mechanicum told us that they were fleeing the heretics, but that they were in dire straits. Knowing that we must keep Magos Ohm happy if we were to make it back to Terra in one piece, we gave them 2 torpedoes, 2 units of fuel, and 40 scrap. They were shocked and shamed by our generosity, and gave us their experimental nano-healing device that rejuvenates anyone aboard the Eisenstein, no matter where they are in the ship. Unfortunately, while the wiring was being installed, the damaged stasis pod was ruptured, and a massive psychic scream pierced the apothicarium. We will never know the secrets that the pod held, but perhaps it is for the best. Some knowledge should remain hidden. Magos Ohm had the offending crewman rendered into a servitor.
8. A necron vessel lurked outside another supply station. We applied our new particle lance, and made short work of it. We collected 54 scrap worth of materials, and salvaged 2 fuel, 2 missiles, and 30 scrap from the station.
9. A Mechanicum vessel lay ahead on the auspex. They were emitting a distress beacon; when we moved in to assist, a greenskin came on the display and yelled, “FOOOOLLLEEED YOOOOOUUUUU!” They then attacked. Voyen and Decius boarded and killed them. We recovered 45 scrap and another hull-penetrating particle lance. Ohm wants to try this variant out in place of our current weapon to see if it performs better.
10. A Mechanicum captain requested our services to find a cargo ship that was a week late. I told him that we were not available to hire, for we are marines. If we did find his lost vessel, however, we would send word. Meanwhile, Ohm upgraded the shields to their maximum potential, for we knew that we would face Horus's ships again as we tried to leave the sector.
11. This time we were prepared for the rebels, and we fought through them with little difficulty. Nikola and Stick had a conference, and they realized that both paths forward were fraught with danger. Both nebulas ahead were infected with a rot of the soul, and cultists of dark powers that lurk in the Empyrian would certainly await us with their debased rituals. The Death Guard knows no fear; the Emperor Protects.
Sector end totals: 2 scrap, 8 fuel, 19 missiles, 12 drones, and the following stats: Shields 8 (4 layers), Engines 3, Oxygen 2, Medbay 2, Teleporter 1, Weapons 7 (Heavy Pierce Laser I, Fire Bomb, Ion Burst II, and Hull Beam), Drones 2 (two Defense Is), and the augments are Automated Re-loader, Engi Medi-Bot Dispersal, and Rock Plating. We have a Small Bomb, a Hull Laser, and a Pike Beam as cargo. The RNG did not smile upon me this time around; none of the nebulas in this run were the Slug Home Nebula... we get to choose between two Slug-Controlled Nebulas.
Yes, well, it seems doing theme logs gives me good luck.
I'm trying to figure out a way to work that in. Maybe that will be the start of the final sector.
1. A human psyker, an astropath, lured us in with a distress beacon, and asked us a truly inane riddle... he wanted to know how many moons his planet had. I answered correctly, and he wanted to join our crew. But I have no use for an unstable astropoath that could leak the warp into my vessel at any time. Decius showed him to the airlock.
2. A Necron vessel again lurked outside a refueling station. We took minor damage to our life support, but only four mortal crew members died. Destroying the automaton netted us 3 fuel, 2 missiles, & 30 scrap. The harried staff of the station were grateful to the tune of 3 fuel 1 drone, & 53 scrap. I can only imagine what they had been through before we arrived.
3. An ork vessel attacked a ship carrying plague-slaves of one of what Nikola calls the Ruinous Powers. I considered letting them both fight it out, but then realized that I wished to purge the sorcerers no matter where they were. We slaughtered the infected cultist crew and took 3 fuel, 2 missiles, & 76 scrap. The greenskins wisely left before we were done salvaging the ship.
4. We discovered the cargo ship lost by the Mechanicum. 1 fuel, 1 missile, & 60 scrap worth of goods. I wish that we had the time to bring the cargo to its original destination; no matter how much we need to stay on Magos Ohm's good side, we are approaching Terra and we cannot become sidetracked now.
5. We overheard some vox chatter from the ork vessel at this warp nexus. “Dis one not owned by da squishy ones, maybe dis one not smell so bad when we cuts 'em open.” Needless to say, we declined to allow them to perform the expermient. We salvaged 2 fuel, 1 missile, & 75 scrap from the burning vessel. Point of note, orks smell terrible when braised over an open flame.
6. A Rogue Trader was anchored off of a non-aligned planet. I detest Rogue Traders and their lack of a real creedo, but the Emperor, in His wisdom, gave them charters to travel all the distasteful places of the universe looking for the lost tribes of Mankind. I grudgingly negotiated with him, as this would likely be our last chance to repair and retrofit the Eisenstein before getting to Terra. We sold all of our excess weapons and cargo, purchased a xenos stealth drive that Magos Ohm is convinced will work with our systems, and bought a central bulkhead control system, that will hopefully allow us to delay intruders, should Horus's marines get adventurous and board the ship again.
7. Fresh from foul rituals, the plague cultists attacked us. Brother Decius once told me that the definition of insanity was to perform the same action the same way, expecting different results each time. We gathered the resources and scrap and moved on.
8. A Rogue Trader asked to drink with us. They were may have been intending to poison our drink, they may not, but upon witnessing the enhanced metabolism of the Astartes, they offered to repair the ship and sell us their wares. We bought their bombs and servitors, then moved on.
9. After we left the Rogue Trader, he caught up to us with another offer. He had a weapon charger that allowed us to drop out of warp with fully charged weapons. He seemed to be after our medical nanodrone device; I felt it was a reasonable trade.
10. A plague ship ambushed us, preaching that their flame would burn away our impurities. I was about to say the same to them. After their rotten corpses were cooking on the floor of their vessel, we salvaged 2 fuel, 2 missiles, & 76 scrap before leaving. For reference, the warp charger for our weapons works perfectly. We are able to launch a promethium bomb into their apothicarium as soon as hostilities begin.
11. Another plague vessel approached. This one was trying to supplicate themselves as penitents before opening fire. They died screaming in flames, just like the others. We collected 1 fuel, 1 drone, and 73 scrap.
12. We were not unduly delayed by the blockade at the end of the sector. From here, we have a long stretch of nothingness as we pass through the Empyrian, guided by the light of the Astronomicon. Soon, soon we will bring word of Horus Lupercal's treason to his father, and then there will be a reckoning.
152 scrap, 9 fuel, 26 missiles, 16 drones, and the following stats: Shields 8 (4 layers), Engines 3, Oxygen 2, Medbay 2, Teleporter 1, Stealth 1, Weapons 7 (Heavy Pierce Laser I, Fire Bomb, Ion Burst II, and Hull Beam), Drones 2 (two Defense Is), Sensors 2, Piloting 1, Doors 2, Power 19, and the augments are Automated Re-loader, Weapon Pre-Igniter, and Rock Plating. We're under-equipped for this part of the game, I think, but that could make it more interesting.
I have actually been running a bit of an experiment. You may notice that I'm running into the rebel fleet at the end of every sector. I've been trying to intentionally fly to more beacons around the sector exit after the rebels have caught up, in the belief that the scrap I get from one to three extra beacons will more than make up for damage taken from the rebel fleet. Sometimes this works out, sometimes it's a near disaster.
If I've got long range sensors or a quest or a store that I want to get to, I'll do this for sure. Or if I'm certain that whatever rebel ship I'll face will be little match for my ship. Usually it works out, I think. More sectors than not, you get scrap, so I think the odds play in your favor.
If it doesn't go on sale soon, or appear in some bundle I might have to say "fuck it" and buy it full price.
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