Of Space Slugs and Broken Drones: Let's Play Faster Than Light (FTL)

This. They are slavers, so they must have booze! (as per the rules of popular literature)

Since we don't have a teleporter yet we can't kill them without also destroying their ship. Which means destroying their booze supplies. But destroying their booze is a sacrifice we'll have to make for the greater good I'm afraid.

Standing together, proud and valiant, the crew of the Grogaboo refuses to dignify such drivel with a reply. Flight Officer Soli-chan silently turns off the comm channel. Steely gazes trained on their monitors, each crew member readies at their station.

"Weapons. Online." Gunnery Sergeant Kalle murmurs quietly. "Let's do this."

And the battle begins.



Our Artemis missiles hit full charge first, though it looks like they have some kind or beam weapon and a burst laser readying as well.

Kalle queues up the targeting vector and launches Artemis missile at the enemy ship...



...direct hit. Enemy weapons offline!

With Soli's help, Kalle lines up the targeting for the burst laser, which comes online just after missile impact. Another hit! Enemy shields are down!

The emergency comm blares to life as the slavers feverishly wave the space equivalent of a white flag.



Fearing our obviously superior combat aptitude, the slavers offer a bargain if we let them live:

Do we accept one of their slaves (aka gain a crew member) and let the slave ship leave, or blast the ship into space-dust, killing everyone aboard?

I'm torn, but an extra body is always useful. I mean, we're gonna need a boarding party sooner or later. I'm hoping for a rockman.

A ghostly Federation captain appears on the bridge!

"Use the Force, crew of the Grogaboo! And accept their offer. You need that crew member more than the satisfaction of killing the slaver scum."

THE DOGS HAVE SURRENDERED ME HEARTIES

Take the prisoner! With their booze!

I think possibly, one of my favorite things about the exploration of space is the fact that you can get to know a lot of different people and see all manner of lovely things so definitely would graciously accept another to the crew. ;4

The first time a Mantis boarding party appears on the bridge, Soli's going to give them hugs and kisses right on their mandibles.

Excellent diversionary tactic, that.

But yeah, new crew member is definitely a good idea right now. We're only halfway through Sector 1 - I've never gotten two more crew members this quickly. Hell, last game I went through three whole sectors and before I got even one.

Alright, let's see who's joining the party...

Untrue! You can disable their weapons and then destroy their Life Support. That will choke them to death, leaving you with a nice, clean, intact ship. The pirate's technique of choice!

Grogaboos, meet Sophia. Sophia, this is the crew of the BFS Grogaboo. Welcome your new home, hope you like drinking and blowing shit up!

(Anyone reading along who feels like playing the role of Sophia, speak up! I can't change her name in-game but I might be able to edit the screenshots or something. Maybe there's a mod...)




As she gets settled in - we're stashing her in the Medbay for the moment, since it's centrally located - Soli opens up the map so we can pick a destination.



We've got plenty of room between us and the Fleet right now, so let's jump to the beacon below our current position, since it gives us access to several other beacons.

"FTL jump in 3... 2... 1!"

We arrive in the new area:



Only to find... nothing.



No point in lingering. Jump again!




As we coast out of hyperspace, an immense crash rocks the ship's hull and the crew is pitched to the deck! Soli fights the controls to maintain a steady course as more deep booming noises echo through the corridors. Finally the visuals come online as everyone pours onto the bridge:



Asteroid belt... and a Rebel ship. This is going to get interesting.

The Borg have arrived. Resistance is futile.

Just kidding. Those rocks will do a number on your paintjob, but I think this should be a cakewalk for you.

Well Quat, remind me never to be pitched against you. Dastardly, aintcha? ;3

The crew rushes to battle stations as more asteroids drift dangerously close, but RyanMM manages to keep the shields recharging quickly, so we manage to avoid any impacts. Fortunately, the asteroids fall on the just and the unjust alike, so the Rebel ship has to deal with them too.

Weapons charging:




They get their lasers up first and fire, just as an asteroid hits our shield's energy field. Ryan can be heard cursing as his console. Our missiles are about to come online and Kalle readies the targeting telemetry.

"Missile away!" He yells, bringing his hoof down on the Fire button. (Unbeknownst to the rest of the crew, he's changed into his Pinkie Pie costume.)



Just as we fire off the missile, we get hit twice - once by the laser bolt and once by another asteroid, both of which managed to slip in while our shields were down. They're coming back up but we've sustained minor hull damage and have some slightly malfunctioning Weapon Systems. Shaking his luxuriant mane out of his face, Kalle crawls under the console and begins repairs. Until we get that system fixed, we've only got the Burst Laser available - the missile battery can't be powered up.

Meanwhile, the missile scores a hit, damaging enemy systems and taking their weapons offline.




Kalle crawls out from under the console long enough to make with the pew-pew:



Shields offline! The Rebel ship is now a sitting duck for asteroids - before we even get our weapons back online, he takes two more hits - one that inflicts more hull damage and another that hits his weapon systems again. This poor automated drone just cannot catch a break.

Well, maybe we can help with that. One more laser burst and BOOM.




ARRR PLUNDER THE BOOTY MATES




Alright, let's blow this pop stand. These space-rocks are totally cramping our style.

What's this? A Distress beacon. Hmm, I'm sure whomever is in distress totally needs our help and couldn't possibly betray us and/or cause our untimely deaths. Let's go!



BAMF

ETA: I'm going to leave it there for now, and will pick up again in a couple days. Hope you guys are having fun, thanks for reading and playing along. :)

I'd never heard of this game and don't check out the LP forum very often, but thanks to landing on the crew I suddenly have the urge to pick this one up.

THANKS, OBAMA.

I shall call this technique, "baiting the trap!" and utilize it in my own LPs.

That is, argh cliff hanger!! *gong* Also, this really is doing a number on my perceptions because you give little words but they do so much for characterizations m'glot. And, bit tempted to get this myself. Good thing I have no monies. :D

I leave to go update my own thread, and everyone starts having fun without me! Ah, man...

If no-one else wants it, I'll be Sophia.

Awesome! I'd love to have you get involved. I promise I will try and keep you alive for at least the next sector or so.

I just took a quick look at FTL mods and don't see anything for renaming characters - just a mod that adds more names to the pool. Fat lot of good that does.

Not at all. I'm just efficient. Why risk crew fighting for a prize ship when you can simply let them die in the airless hell that once was their own beloved ship?

Okay. Maybe I'm a little dastardly.

edit: Hah! And that was apparently my 1000th message. How fitting!

YOU'RE WELCOME AMERICA

But yes, I highly recommend the game. It's only $10 at full price on Steam, and I got it on sale for 50% off. This is an absurd amount of fun to have for $5, but the LP is making it more enjoyable too. If you read up on the thread in Games Discussion, two primary problems become clear: the unlock system for gaining new spaceships and the final boss. I've only fought the boss once and it was obnoxious, but the rest of the game is cool and I haven't even started seriously looking at mods yet.

Oh c'mon, I'm sure you LP veterans have mastered such basic mechanics of dramatic pacing by now! :)

I'm really glad you like it, though. Reading through it today, I can tell where the cold medicine kicked in / wore off yesterday, and where I got tired and was just pushing words and pictures onto the intertronz without much inspiration. But it's a surprisingly fun writing exercise and I love having other folks involved. Games like these are great for producing unique, emergent stories, so it's not too hard to add a bit of narrative to connect the events in the game. Plus, the pacing of this game is naturally suited to an LP, since it's broken up into modular pieces via the FTL jumps from beacon to beacon and the sectors functioning as chapters.

I think I am going to have to speed it up, though. We're not even done with Sector 1 yet.

Man, all that missile usage just feels like such a waste in Sector 1. You'd better hope for some good weapon drops if you keep using your rockets like that.

No use of missiles or bombs is ever a waste, as bullet hell enthusiasts always say. And there's still plenty left in the bag.

POWAA UNLIMITED POWAAA

I'd be fine with dramatically skipping past encounters that don't have an interesting hook. Unless you manage to get half of us killed, then you probably need to write up what happened.

Yeah, I'm planning to condense / summarize more of the encounters once we get out of Sector 1. I wanted to provide a more detailed play-by-play at first so that people unfamiliar with the game could get a sense for how it works. Now that we've laid the groundwork, it should be easier to follow. (But as always, if any of you have questions, just speak up. Interaction is the best part.)

Honestly I am rather enthralled with this game as has been LP'd and would not mind it continuing in such a fashion thus. ;w;

I love this game, I've sunk so many hours into it. (Engie Cruiser ftw)

I played the shit out of the old Escape Velocity Mac shareware games back in the day. This is making me nostalgic. Must...restrain...Steam....store....no time for more games....