Difficulty?

I'd say create an insane level where the AI will band together and chase you.

In my experience I either play on easy for a casual play through and hard for the challenge normal isn't a thing I ever touch because it's just not appealing to me for some reason apart from that in a rogue-light difficulty doesn't matter too much to me (he says after beating FTL by just dying twice) to me the only thing I really want is a unlimited mode where my run ends when I get blown up and not when I have cleared out 4 sectors

My favorite challenge is to forbid any and all upgrades on anything except enemy-dropped weapons. Sometimes, I permit myself drones by allowing myself to invest in drone upgrades - but only with upgrade points gained by recycling dropped weapons, and only two upgrades.

I'm new and one of those Geezer mentioned who!feels that easy is too hard. Out of curiosity, since this thread has lots of people saying hard is too easy... What is your starting loadout and how do you survive the first few fights?

@Lurkily: haha, you're turning it into art I like it!

@GavinRuneblade: well, all depends.. also depends on what ship you have at the beginning. With carriers it's easy - just buy the bolter drones and upgrade their count and only then - their attack. For warships I'd say one of the best options is to first buy a laser, it has decent damage on both shields and hull, and good accuracy. A good warship with a laser can take down several fighters just okay. Then buy projectile cannons for quickly taking apart big ships when their shields are off...

These are some of my recent approaches.. but actually, just experiment! There's lots of fun. And always remember one thing: retreat IS an option! Keep your eye on the jump drive recharge meter, plan well the subsector of emergence - depending on your weapons and tactics you should either jump far from the enemy ships or right on top of them..

Maybe the other folks could share some more of their ways!

On hard I tend to run into situations where I die too quickly. So I'm still playing on Medium until I unlock the rest of the ships.

Running is an option, but it is a very poor option. Nine times out of ten you end up fighting whatever was in the new system, plus whoever was just beating you. Making a bad situation worse. All you get out of it is one load screen more time. That last one of ten I usually get chased and have to flee again, leading right back to the nine of ten odds. Thity something games and running has never once saved me, just delayed the inevitable.

I have tried, I think every combination of starting gear possible. Including one amusing game with all point defence weapons. Looked pretty, but totally useless. I have tried the bolter drones, but I don't often get to upgrade them last the third drone before dying. And while they are nice, they get swarmed and overwhelmed easy. Wanderers aren't as bad, they don't seem to field carriers right off the bat.

The issue is simply the colossal jump in difficulty after the fist few fights. Typically the first two or three systems have only fighters, then capital ships start appearing. This would be fine, except the ambushes of three enemy ships right on top of my Nightingale are unwinnable that early. Especially whichever tralgar ship it is that can spit out 12 fighters. It gets to five or six turns into the game, and I'm sitting on four weapons, two of them point defense and they have two main guns, two hangars and six point defense each. That doesn't fit my definition of easy.

I did get one lucky game wher3 I started with 2k scrap and 11 upgrades. Managed to complete three missions. No traps, no suicidal "dfend the starbase" b.s. But then I hit some enemy ship with a blue weapon that took me down in two hits. I'm guessing a plasma cannon since it was celestial and I've seen those as loot drops. But it didn't target my fighters and neither they or my point defence targeted it. Again, not my definition of easy.

In general, I kind of expect easy to be, you know, easy. Like you can make a lot of stupid mistakes and still win.

@GavinRuneblade. On the easy difficulty you will have much more of those neat Battlestations around, giving you support bases. Use them to your advantage as much as you can in the beginning. You can stay around one for a while and wait if enemies would come to it, or to nearby sectors.

Now when you jump in you can always escape back to the Battlestation, and if they follow, well they will be met with a nice surprise It's a trap! Just remember to jump really close to the Battlestation and hide behind it so that the enemies focus fire on it instead of you.

The distress beacons are superb for this, you can simply wait at a Battlestation sector, use it, and have them come right into the trap.

This tactic should give you that good start to a better fleet, and get you further into the game.

Easy, too hard? Bah its pretty good if you take it slow.

@GavinRuneblade: well, maybe you have already earned for something better than Nightingale? Try bigger ships - should be easier?

BTW, I wonder if the game adjust enemies to your ship class - does it make them stronger? If not, then effectively 1. playing with bigger ships is easier, and 2. it is not implied that you can finish the game on weaker ships at all, and them should be used to earn for bigger ships ???