Your favorite ship/layout and why...

[robolove]

I've only unlocked two ships so far... the Engi ship and the Federation ship.

The Kestrel B
I've spent the most time with the Kestrel B "Red-Tail" and I love it for a few reasons.

Due to the amazing airlock distribution, the B layout is quite defensive when it comes to boarding parties and great for putting out fires. It seems you never have to vent more then two rooms to vent a fire. Most of your crew are centered around each other for quick consolidation in the event of invasion or repairs. The exception being the pilot. I can imagine a situation where your pilot is FUBAR due to hull breaches, fires or boarders. Door upgrades are smart to buy time and I can see an argument there for auto pilot though I didn't need it to beat the boss.

The starting guns are great for the first few sectors and overwhelm two shield bubbles easily but you rely heavily on luck acquiring weapons for the late game. If you get unlucky you're in bad shape. The Kestrel A's weapons are much more versatile late game and can function tactically, allowing you to save money otherwise spent in stores for system upgrades. The resell value isn't great on the basic lasers but that's offset by starting with level 4 weapons systems.

The Federation Cruiser A
Second favorite ship is the Federation one. I'm eager to try layout B but just unlocked it and am about to complete my first solid playthrough with layout A. Room placement is a bit jarring coming from the Red-Tail, but functional. I had 4 Rockmen on my crew so I speak from experience when I say the length of the ship has been an issue with slow moving races.

In terms of crew, I prefer to use my Mantises for away teams. That meant I took my Mantis off his starting post as gunner when I got a teleporter and it took his replacement till the end game to catch up skill wise. Getting more crew is top priority for me early game with this ship.

I found this ship to be a tougher go early game than the Kestrel, especially with the low starting shields. It's strength lies in the artillery but the super low rate of fire has meant prioritizing the engines and shields for survivability. You just can't take damage. It's much more difficult to vent fires and get people in position for repairs. I was wishing the teleport room was more central but I managed. The biggest advantage of the layout is the engine room being next to the cockpit. Since you need both to dodge and charge FTL, that meant my pilot and engineer always shared repair duties. The danger lies in the pilot getting trapped if the engine room is compromised, so that's a liability.

The great thing about this ship is if you can negate incoming damage, you win every time. The artillery is an ace in the hole. It works well in tandem away teams if you time it carefully, and there's strength in the fact that if your plan A fails, you can always blow the jerks up, even if they have 4 shield bars, 6 crew and defense drones. Definitely weighted for late-game dominance, which is fine because getting there is no cakewalk in my experience. I was down to 1 hull point 3 times before sector 5. Some nasty matchups but super satisfying run.

Anybody else want to talk shop?

[Storm]

The Basilisk

4 slot teleporter, need I say more ?

It's the ship with the one I beat the game more often on normal, even though some starts are rough, 2 mantis to board/repair/man the rooms is clearly low, but once you get teleporter rank 2 and 2/3 more crewmembers (invading slaver ships let you choose wich slave you want on your board, I ll take the mantis ) it's a very good ship : the teleporter rank 2 makes you able to invade 1 room in the AI ships and be able to pull off with 5/10 HP.

[fall_ark]

The Basilisk

4 slot teleporter, need I say more ?

It's the ship with the one I beat the game more often on normal, even though some starts are rough, 2 mantis to board/repair/man the rooms is clearly low, but once you get teleporter rank 2 and 2/3 more crewmembers (invading slaver ships let you choose wich slave you want on your board, I ll take the mantis ) it's a very good ship : the teleporter rank 2 makes you able to invade 1 room in the AI ships and be able to pull off with 5/10 HP.

[SECRET HIDDEN SHIP SPOILER]

Crystal Type B (Carnelian) also has 4 slot teleporter right next to the medbay. With 3 Crystals to provide constant lockdowns you can comfortably board enemy ships without worrying about their medbay.

Of course, it starts with no weapons and no drone system. So it comes across even more problems than Basilisk early on.

[User232365]

Crystal Type B? I am curious to see what that looks like. Have a pic you can upload?

[fall_ark]

Crystal Type B? I am curious to see what that looks like. Have a pic you can upload?

Here you go: http://i.imgur.com/AeVlX.jpg

[Storm]

True , seems really nice, can't wait to try it

[Axel]

I second The Basilisk. It's not just the four pad teleporter, its two shields and defense drone make your defenses formidable from the very beginning. Two mantis can easily kill someone healing in an un-upgraded medbay which makes the first seven sectors a cakewalk.

Of course, this is biased by my luck with it. By the third sector of my first runthrough I had four mantis which could kill the enemy crew before the first volley of shots were fired.

[User232365]

Ah, another Boarder ship? Was hoping for another unique battle strategy concept rather than just another boarding-centric vessel. Guess the developers ran out of ideas. Red crystal looks super neat, though.

[icepick]

I really like the Kestral. Either variant. I am the generalist in every game, haha. So this is my ship. It's the middle of the road all-arounder.

I love all 4 of the ships I've played, though. Osprey is probably my next favorite so far.

[fall_ark]

Ah, another Boarder ship? Was hoping for another unique battle strategy concept rather than just another boarding-centric vessel. Guess the developers ran out of ideas. Red crystal looks super neat, though.

It's a boarder ship with Crystals. Medicbay? Never heard of them. Same number of crew? Oh let us just overwhelm you one at a time. It almost feels like cheating, until you meet an auto or a Zoltan.