FTL

[Arlos]

Advice for final boss:

1) Get a crew transporter and 2 good combatants. Teleport them into the center right weapon room. (the one that fires triple missiles) That room is completely isolated from anything, so sending 2 attackers will kill the guy and burn it down fast. Then in phase 2/3 you don't have to kill anyone in there and can burn it even faster. Depending on timing, you can sometimes get the center left room blown out too. Note that the systems fix themselves between phases, but dead crew doesn't respawn.

2) Get at least a L1 cloaking device. Don't use it at the start of the fight, except in phase 1. In phase 2, only trigger it right as the swarm of drones arrives. In phase 3, wait until the burst goes out and the bolts are about to reach your ship, then trigger it. DON'T FIRE while cloaked unless you have stealth weapons. If you time things right, and only have a L1 cloaking device, you can fire it off every special wave. At worst you get every other wave, but that still cuts down the incoming damage by a lot.

3) Have at least a 40-45% dodge rate. I basically never have L4 shields, but I try and get to as much dodge as possible. I generally can never afford the reactor to get above the diminishing returns point, though. (where you get 3% per box instead of 5%)

4) A type 1 defense drone can be incredibly useful until you knock out the missile room. It's even more useful in phase 2, as it can shoot down that boarding droid before it hits your ship. Note: Do *NOT* use a type 2 defense drone for the boss fight. The fact that it shoots at beam shots means it's actually less effective at stopping missiles and the boarding drone.

Other useful tip: If you end up with a lot of extra scrap by the time you get to the boss, buy 1-2 extra system boxes on vital systems like weapons, engine, shields, etc. This gives you some buffer if that system takes damage. It'll come off the unused capacity before it hits the part you're actually using.

The best crew setup has 4 gold crewmen at the 4 stations. These can be anything, but rocks and zoltan are quite good for these roles. (Don't bother with a zoltan as pilot, though, it wastes his special ability as he doesn't power anything there) Rocks are good because they don't care if their room gets set on fire. Have 2 crew that are your teleport offense. Best combo is Mantis/Crystal, but Mantis/Rock works well too. Then, have a pair of Engi to be your repair crew. Especially once they're at green+ levels, 2 Engi will just blaze through any repairs you have.

Some of my favorite weapons:
Ion Blast II. Godlike weapon. Just set it to autofire at their shield room and wait. Unless they have an insanely high dodge or a high level cloak, they won't have any shields for very long.
Burst Laser II. 2 power, 3 shots, good charge time.
Small Bomb or breach bomb: Take out important systems on their ship without caring if they have a defense drone up or what their shield status is. Small bomb does it for 1 power, too. Ion Bombs are also quite good too, actually.

-Arlos