Whats The Worst Ship in FTL?

[MantisLord]

I've been playing FTL for 80 something hours now, and have beaten the game with 8 of the ships, and I'm curious about what the worst ship is. (The only ship I don't have is the Crystal Cruiser Type B, but I doubt that that ship is the worst).

Personally I think it's the Slug Cruiser B, although I haven't played with all the ships to get a better idea.

Dam, I with there was a voting system.

Anyway, please reply what you think the worst ship is and why!

[Leylite]

There's been a lot of argument over the years about this (and of course the arguments were revived when AE was released). It's important to draw distinctions between ships that are hard to win the game with, and ships that are legitimately powerful and just not as fun to play.

Anyway, I think the lead candidate is Engi B (although other contenders are Stealth C, Federation C and Rock A). Anyone who's played the Engi B knows its weaknesses - its starting weapon loadout can't pierce tier 2 shields, and is rather slow; it starts with just 1 crew and the crew-drones can't man systems; it has 1 engine power and no engineer so it will almost always get hit by missiles and bombs. You also don't start with sensors, which is usually just a minor annoyance, but does make mind control a less practical option. All of these problems can eventually be resolved through stubborn searching and upgrading as per usual, and at the end of the game you can have a fairly powerful ship.

There's one aspect of any ship you can't change, though, and that's the ship layout itself. The 2-square medbay is vital to surviving the early game, because only a maximum of 2 enemy boarders can fit in there (so 3 mantis can't gang up on your poor Engi and his anti-personnel drone), but it becomes a liability later since you can't fit as many crewmen in there to get healed, or repair it quickly (especially if it's on fire). It's handy that it's near the piloting and shields room, but it's pretty far away from weapons and oxygen (the people working in there you usually want to keep healthy). The venting layout is atrocious; venting through oxygen or doors is mandatory on this ship and you only get four airlocks (two pairs). If intruders spawn in piloting or weapons it is a huge problem, even with the anti-personnel drone. Furthermore (although this is really minor) intruders can sometimes get rerouted through the drone bay, meaning they'll destroy any leftover system repair bots and waste your drone parts.

The Engi B can get fairly powerful in the late game, and does start with some good equipment and advantages (small ship size for defense drones, 3 drone slots, a heavy laser), but it has a pretty rough early game, and that's the most dangerous part of the game since it's so difficult to run from nasty encounters that have gone sour.

But hey, at least it was buffed slightly in AE - doors can be manned now, and the Shields room is only 1x2 now so four boarders (or fires) can't spawn in there.

[stylesrj]

Worst ship ever? I'd say the Engi B for those aforementioned reasons but I'm going with the Unstealth C.
Sure, 3 Drone slots is awesome but it starts without a cloaking device and no shields except for a drone that blocks an enemy laser strike but not the missile that follows afterwards (or before).

But like all ships, the Stealth C could become something awesome if you can get past the early-game hell where you just don't have the Scrap for buying a shield, getting it up to 2 layers and getting the Cloak (325 Scrap in total! Good luck getting a real gun once two layer ships roll around!) Or alternatively, you can save a lot of Scrap by getting Hacking.

I can't complain too much about the Rock A but I hate missile ships. But then again on my first iPad run with the Rock A, I managed to get the Stasis Pod, unlock it and go to the Crystal Homeworlds and grab the Crystal Cruiser, so I think it's a decent ship, so long as you get some real guns for it (which usually is the first few stores and if you sell those missile launchers as soon as possible).

Federation C on the other hand... the Flak Artillery is pointless but the only thing stopping this ship from becoming great is another non-Zoltan crew. You're supposed to use the two Zoltan as bombers but if you can get an Engi or something, you can throw the Mantis and the Human into the teleporter and assign the Zoltan to Shields while the Engi flies the ship. If you get a second Mantis, then you have an awesome boarding team. Plus the Clone Bay can take a stray hit from a Leto.
But in later sectors, you'll wish that the Flak Artillery was gone so you can have Cloaking and Hacking.

Personally, I really hate the Cerenkov (Zoltan C)
The gun sucks, the drone sucks (gee thanks, a beam drone) and if you get boarded in the middle of combat, good lucky trying to deal damage.
Sure it has a battery but I'm a terrible micromanager if my videos are anything to go by - I tend to ignore the Battery. So that's my personal opinion on why the ship sucks but it's not a bad ship. I'm just a bad person. So it's not one of the worst ships out there. But it might be if you're bad as I am.

[erumsey]

For me, I HATE the rock A. I usually prefer bomb weapons over MISSLES... Omg autocorrect stahp. MISSLES... oh come on.
missles. Finally! *continue* because of defence drones, and i will never use any missle type weapon as my main anti ship battery. Also, no air locks, and how are my rock men going to put out fires when they are so slow?
Also, I don't have stealth b or c unlocked so I'm just trusting you guys on how stupid they are.
And my personal opinion on the cerenkov? I... I actually kinda like it. (Inbound enemy's with charged glacé... Autocorrect why?!??!?! glave beams approach) yeah yeah yeah, I know it's a bad ship and all but... I just like the charm about it. Seriously who doesn't want to kill a flagship with an under developed junk of flying scrap?

[stylesrj]

Also, no air locks, and how are my rock men going to put out fires when they are so slow?

I think you're confusing the Rock A with the Rock B. The airlocks for the Rock A are in the middle of the ship, like it's a tunnel or something. The Rock B has no airlocks, so Hull Breach Ventilation or Have The Rocks Stamp It Out strategies are required

Also, I don't have stealth b or c unlocked so I'm just trusting you guys on how stupid they are.

The Stealth B isn't too bad. I once got a Pre-Igniter on my first jump... using another ship. But it is possible to suddenly strike gold with the DA-SR12.

The Unstealth C... not so much. I'd say it should be burned, but chances are it's already from being unprotected.

[Twinge]

Leylite pretty much covers my thoughts. There are 4 contenders: Stealth C, Engi B, Rock A, Fed C. The Slug B, Zoltan C, and Stealth B are all difficult ships to do well with, but they aren't as bad as these 4 once you know how to use them well.


I still vote Stealth C for the worst because it simply has the worst defensive capabilities in the game, though this is somewhat offset by its fairly solid offense, decent crew, and decent layout. The only ship I've actually lost with on Hard without adding in extra challenges is the Fed C - the lack of support weaponry OR decent defenses *really* hurts its strength as a boarding ship early on (and is why the Slug B is a better ship), though I'm still hesitant to rate it lower than the other 3.

[athorist]

Just as well that none of the ships start with a Vulcan! At least a glaive only has to wait to charge up once.

I think the one I've had the most trouble with is the Kestral B. I only managed to win on normal yesterday, with 4818, when my sector 8 non-win was 4820. I think it's because it's so hard to judge when to get rid of the basic lasers.

I don't really play any of the C ships enough to comment (might try that now). I tried Kestral C on hard, which didn't go very well but that's probably more the difficulty than the ship.

[stylesrj]

Kestrel B?

That's my other go-to ship if I'm looking for some casual blasting. 4 lasers and four bars of power in Weapons? What's not to like? You could find a good gun early on and do some real damage too.

[athorist]

Yeah, but it's really inefficient to only get 4 shots from 4 power bars. I found a hull beam, but because I only had 3 other shots, it's not very reliable against 2 shield layers.

[stylesrj]

4 shots from 4 power bars? Every 10 seconds that's pretty good. Compared to a Dual Laser and Missile/Bomb Weapon combo of most other ships, that's a lot.