I started playing starsector over the last month and finally am about finished with my first playthrough. I had an incredibly hard time learning the game because of the paucity of clear or still relevant information out there for new players. After a lot of struggle (like 3 weeks of nonstop playing struggle), and a lot of searching, I became successful at things which I couldn't get right otherwise - combat, colony management, etc. Here are the notes I made that will be immensely helpful to any new player, and the things I wish someone laid out plainly for me.
Note that some of this will be spoiler-y, but you also won't know what the spoiler parts are talking about if you're new, so maybe don't worry so much. Also, this game is incredibly overwhelming with all the different weapons, damage types, ships, addons, systems, planets, and all. But it's also just incredible, period. It's a great game, and the complexity is part of what makes there so much to explore.
Mission stuff:
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The best way to make money early appears to be doing scan type hyperwave missions (survey planet, scan drone/ship/mining station/research station/habitat/cache).
Trading on the black market is the best way to make money once you can afford decent freighters and starting capital for goods.
The best money later is from successful colonies, but it typically takes like $10 million if you don't have good planets found, due to high price of hazard pay.
Hyperwave missions raise faction reputation by 5 when completed (those from Intel screen -> Missions). Only available from inhabited sectors. Pause to accept them, they are withdrawn unbelievably quickly.
Approach a comm relay station in an inhabited system in dark mode to install a hack (comsniffer?) that will let you get missions from factions in that sector.
Taking a commission seems like a bad deal, really? You can find good capital ships eventually without it, and it seems easier to not have other factions hostile.
Spaceport bar missions can be based on your fleet statistics. You only get large trading missions with large cargo space.
There is a spaceport bar mission where a guy offers the location of a technology cache if you give him the alpha core from it. You can accept and just keep the core.
Random rare spaceport bar mission of a person with a paper book = historian lady who will find rare blueprints and offer them.
How does the main quest line start? I believe from a random spaceport bar interaction? Can't remember.
The main questline teaches transverse jump. If already taken, maybe try using a story point to respec so you get it for free?
There is a secret cache of super weapons in the alpha site zone (need transverse jump to enter) northeast of the planet (a bit far).
Research stations are where you really get the most blueprints and good items.
Research stations are more common in black hole systems.
Coronal hypershunts are only in blue giants right?
A system with a remnant nexus will have no remnant fleets if the nexus is destroyed (even if you never killed the patrolling remnant fleets). You can max burn to drag away remnant fleets and then close in (maybe dark mode) to fight the nexus alone. 2 Paragons + Ziggurat is best for fighting nexus it seems. Carrier spam doesn't work vs it. Non capital ships get destroyed easily.
Doom with reapers can be very good vs stations (cloak in/out, fire through hole in shields).
Positive faction reputation does not prevent factions from attacking your colonies (these attacks are called expeditions).
Rarely a spaceport bar mission for illegal weapons production is available. This is how you can get stuff like doom or paragon ships without the blueprint yourself.
I have found derelict paragon, doom, legion, onslaught ships. The paragon was a bit out of the system center (not a normal location).
It seems you can find blueprints for anything that isn't a remnant ship design or hypershunt fight special weapon drop. Plasma cannon, tachyon lance, paragon ship, doom ship, etc.
Really good weapons can sometimes be found on the black market.
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Good Ships / Weapons
Favorite small slot point defense: vulcan, burst pd laser (but pd laser and long range pd laser are ok too)
Ballistics:
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Medium:
Hypervelocity driver (one of the best weapons to put on ships because AI is good with it)
Neelders of all kinds
Large:
Gauss cannon is fantastic (also appears to be better large ballistic weapon overall than the storm needler)
Other large ballistic are all just ok.
Small slots should almost always be vulcan cannons it seems.
Railgun on front small is ok for long range anti shield build
Devastator/dual flak can be pretty great point defense, but those slots are usually for real anti-ship weapons.
Energy:
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Large:
Autopulse cannon might be the best common large energy weapon.
Plasma cannon and tachyon lance are super good, but rare.
High Intensity Laser
Medium:
Ion pulser is great but low range.
Heavy blaster is pretty good.
Phase lance is pretty good, but no hard flux, so if you cant overcome shields (like you are a small ship with low damage output vs a larger one) it is useless.
Heavy burst laser is good point defense (put on back of ship).
Antimatter blaster is so good (if self piloted) that you should consider putting it in medium slots. Note it has limited ammo.
Small:
Antimatter blaster for ships you will pilot or small ships.
Tactical laser is just really, really nice. Not excellent, but it's nice.
Burst pd laser, pd laser, and long range pd laser are all good point defense.
Autopulse cannon + ion pulser setups are really powerful burst setups.
Antimatter blaster setups are extremely powerful burst but very limited ammo (so it is good for one strike ship you probably will pilot, not your whole fleet). Antimatter blaster is pretty good on small ships like a wolf, because they can overpower and kill other small ships.
Tactical lasers are really nice just because it forces enemies to keep shields up. Very very very useful.
The energy weapons on a small ship should have one tactical laser (or soft flux weapon) max because you need as much hard flux as possible to actually break through anything's shields. Some fights have two small ships with only soft flux lasers fighting each other forever, it is ridiculous.
Missiles:
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Small/Medium:
Reapers of all kinds (player use only, AI isn't incredible with them)
Sabot of all kinds (great in player use, AI uses them, but tends to waste them upfront)
Salamander (best for AI use, best for passive ships in the backline, useful in general on ships)
Large:
Hurricane Mirv (amazing)
Squall seems really good from AI use
I really just use hurricane mirv
Salamander missiles are not essential on any ship, but great filler on any ship. Better than a few extra cap/vent, but not better than 10 cap/vent for the 10 point pod salamander. Passive ships (carriers like condor) benefit from them more than cap/vents. It is better when almost your whole fleet has salamanders.
Some of my setups:
Doom - 30cap/29vent, 4 antimatter blasters, 2 ion pulsers, 4 burst pd lasers - built in mods: auxillary thrusters, reinforced bulkheads, unstable injector (reapers are really good on phase ships too)
Paragon - 27 cap/60vent, front 2 plasma cannons, side 2 paladin pd and 2 phase lance, back 3 burst pd lasers and 2 heavy burst lasers, small sides all tactical lasers, small missles all salamader mrm. Built in mods: hardened shields and flux distributor. Mods: shield conversion, stabilized shields, solar shielding, advanced turret gyros.
Paragon - 60 vent, 4 autopulse lasers, 4 ion pulsers, back 3 burst pd lasers and 2 heavy burst lasers, small sides all tactical lasers, small missles all salamader mrm. Built in mods: hardened shields and flux distributor. Mods: shield conversion, stabilized shields, solar shielding, heavy armor, advanced turret gyros.
Condor - 2 longbow bombers, 2 vulcan cannons, salamander mrm pod. Could work in the expanded deck crew mod and go down to only Salamander MRM.
Condor - 2 dagger bombers, 2 vulcan cannons, sabot srm (single).
Hammerhead - 15cap/30vent, 2 hypervelocity drivers, 2 sabot srm pods (reapers if self piloting), 4 vulcan cannons.
Sunder - 23cap/30vent, plasma cannon, 2 salamander srm (reapers if self piloting), 1 vulcan cannon in the back. Mod: Integrated targeting unit.
Eagle - 6cap/40vent, 3 hypervelocity driver, 3 phase lance, 2 salamanders (reaper if self piloting), 5 pd laser. Mod: integrated targeting unit.
Ziggurat - 60cap/37vent, 2 autopulse lasers, 6 antimatter blasters, 4 ion pulsers. Built in mods: Heavy armor, unstable injector, reinforced bulkheads. Mods:integrated targeting unit. Blast doors might also be good.
Always always always set weapon groups after changing a ships weapons. It is so *** easy to forget, and it can royally screw you if you try to pilot that ship. You won't need to for passive carriers (like condor).
Wolf are good ships to have a few of even in a large fleet. They seem like the most survivable really fast small ships.
Capital ships benefit much more from vents than capacitors.
Phase ships don't have increased phase time from more vents (the vents don't counteract flux during phase).
4 Prometheus tankers and 2 atlas freighters (or 5 colossus freighters) can support an endgame fleet.
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Combat
The only orders I usually need to give in combat are 1) if using carriers, put combat ships in one spot out front, and force carriers to one spot far below them. 2) send a small ship to capture an objective for more deployment points.
Range is an enormous deal, primarily because AI can't determine when it's a great idea to go in and taking a ton of damage to do lots of damage of your own. Ships tend to stick together, so lots of ships in a clump with a longer range than your ship could obliterate your ship before you get close enough to even fire.
It's effective to have the only weapons on ships be long range, like hypervelocity driver. Point defense weapons can still be added as well of course.
When ships are sticking together, their point defense weapons will help cover eachother, reducing utility of missles/fighters/bombers/etc. by a ton. Mass bombers (from carrier ships) is still very effective in most fights. This is called carrier spam.
Small ships, like the Tempest or Wolf, can take map objectives for more deployment points or just help distract ships that would otherwise be in the main fight.
Carrier spam combat 120 deployment points - Deploy 2 good ships (1 capital 60 points, one destroyer 10 points, 5 condors OR early on maybe one cruiser 25 points, one destroyer 10 points, rest condors?). Have combat ships rally at a point lower middle of map. Group carriers at a point considerably below that. This way combat ships ward off attackers, and carriers stay behind them in a safer area.
More than 50% of carriers filled with longbow (anti shield) seems much better than 50/50 anti shield to anti armor bombers. So deploy like 4 longbow carriers and 2 dagger carriers.
I never even used fighters on carriers, bombers just seem way better.
Early on a good combat strategy is have your main ships fight while you are in a Sunder (using maybe autopulse cannon, but plasma cannon or tachyon lance is probably better) attacking from the side. Hammerhead is good at this too with ballistic weapons and missiles.
The Doom is completely insane when piloted by the player because you can place mines behind an enemy, causing AI to raise shields on that side, then just start firing at them from the front while their shields are not defending them. Mines can be placed while phased, and can even be placed on top of fighters/bombers/missiles to destroy them like point defense. Mines alone can kill many ships, including an Onslaught.
Paragon really is the best capital ship, but it seems better to let AI use it because AI can perfectly time the shield special ability to avoid damage.
2 paragons can take most fights in the game. For big/hard fights, you will need more ships though.
My lategame fleet has been 4 phaeton tankers, 3 colossus freighters, 1 atlas freighter, 1 ox tug, 10 condor carriers, 2 paragons, 1 doom, 1 ziggurat, 1 sunder, 1 hammerhead, 1 eagle, then wolf ships or tempests if I can find one.
Colony stuff:
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Requirements on Special Rare Items For Planets (plan colonies around using these)
+3 volatiles - Gas giant
+heavy industry (Nanoforge) - adds pollution on habitable (corrupted and pristine both)
+2 light industry - habitable
+3 ore, transplutonic (rare ore), organics - not habitable, not gas giant (Organics only found on toxic planets and habitable planet types)
+3 fuel - no atmosphere
+100% fleet size - extreme hot
+30% accessibility - no extreme weather, no extreme tectonic activity, not gas giant
+2 farming - no rare ore, no volatiles
An item counters cold, extreme cold, dark, poor light but requires 10 volatiles.
Hypershunt tap adds +1 to a single colony within 10 light years but requires 10 transplutonics.
Almost all the more habitable planets are from orange/yellow star types.
Terran and Tundra can have the best farmland. Tundra are good because cold can be countered by an item. Both terran and tundra can also have mild climate (-25% hazard) and all have habitable -25%.
Ultra rich mining (normal and rare) is most common on volcanic worlds, which are most common around blue giants (but there's a lot of them everywhere).
Volcanic worlds can be 175% hazard rating if only hot (not extreme), tectonic (not extreme), and thin atmosphere.
It would be extremely rare to find a planet which would be good for the +3 organics item. Organics are only on habitable worlds, except toxic. Toxic planets very very rarely have organics. Toxic planets are rare to begin with. It is even more rare that a Toxic planet would have good organics as well as ultrarich ore and ultrarich rare ore.
Some gas giants rarely only have high gravity and volatiles for mining, meaning hazard rating is only 150%.
Colony placement didn't actually seem to matter to me (unlike what everyone says) because it wasn't actually necessary for me to defend my colonies personally vs attacks except once when Sindra tried to orbital bombard. Colonies near gates are much more convenient though. Colony distance does affect accessibility rating, though.
All of my colonies had -10% accessibility but were fine, very profitable in the end. Counteracted by starports and story points and special items easily.
Colonies should have hazard pay on until they are size 6 planets (very expensive on >100% hazard planets, but the only way they will ever grow usually). Maybe $5million per >100% planet to pay up to size 6.
Colonies need to aim to have needs fulfilled by other colonies if you want profitability. The amount of production is like a level of production not pure counts. A planet producing 4 fuel satisfies any number of colonies with a need of 4 fuel or less, you don't need one planet making fuel for each colony, etc.
Upgrade planets when you think the needs will be met. Don't keep adding station upgrades and so on until you know your production from other colonies is good enough for it. Of course in the very beginning, all needs won't be met, so you have to run deficits.
It's not actually a huge deal if your planets lose a fight to an expedition, you just won't get much income if at all from the colony for a few months.
The only real danger to colonies is when a faction decides to saturation bomb the planet. This can destroy your planet. You must defeat the fleet. This is rare (and I believe only when a colony is making significant income).
Factions don't send attacks to colonies that aren't making money, so you're safe in the startup stages.
You can use story points to improve colony output by clicking on: the industry icon, the population center, the starport. Story points on patrol or ground defenses don't seem necessary.
You can increase stability after a disaster/attack on a planet by clicking on the colony's stability bar and then paying tons of money (100k per stability point?).
Best Planet Setup hypothetical?
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Gas giant - +2 volatiles plentiful - mining (+3 volatiles item) - 150% hazard rating (only high gravity, is rare)
Terran or Tundra - +2 farmland bountiful, no rare ore (no volatiles not an issue) - agriculture (+2 item), light industry (+2 item) - <100% hazard rating (cold can be countered)
Volcanic - +3 ore ultrarich, +3 rare ore ultrarich, extreme heat - mining (+3 item), military (+100% fleets extreme heat) - 225-250% hazard rating
Barren - no atmosphere - heavy industry (+3 pristine nanoforge), fuel production (+3 item) - 150% hazard rating
Water or other habitable - +2 organics plentiful - mining (mine organics until you find a Toxic world with one) - <75% hazard rating
Toxic - +2 organics plentiful - mining (+3 item) extreeeemely rare?
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Topic: What I Wish I Knew About Starsector (new player guide) (Read 23951 times)