Clash of the Titans not unlocking - AE

[yossarian490]

Over the past couple weeks I've been attempting to clear the ship achievements, "Clash of the Titans" ended up being my last one. As of tonight, I've destroyed (and not boarded nor let surrender) 15 rock ships on four runs without unlocking it. At first I thought maybe some were hit by asteroids and so it wasn't counting the kill for me, but tonight I unambiguously got 18 rock ship kills by my weapons alone. I know there were definitely 4 rock pirate kills in that tally, but the achievement claims those count too, so I've run out of things to test besides somehow getting enough rock sectors to have the pirate kills not be a factor either.

Not sure if anyone else has had issues getting this one since AE has been released, but I haven't had anyone tell me they got it with AE enabled.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Matthew]

Sorry we redesigned the pirate ships which pulled them off a list of approved kills for that achievement. It will be fixed in the next update.

[rhaining]

OMG I wish I had checked for this months ago. I've tried ~50 times -- five zero -- to get this achievement on the iPad, playing exclusively on Advanced/Hard mode -- and I've been unable to do so. I'm very experienced with the game, been playing very frequently for 1.5 years. So experienced that I knew there was an old problem with this achievement that was fixed, so it didn't occur to me that such a problem could recur!

First off, thanks for fixing it! (And again, thanks for the best video game in many years!)

Second, when can we expect this fix on iOS?

Third, I'd like to officially request that this achievement be modified in some way. Of the ~50 runs, there are very few when I ever see 15 Rock ships. This is because Rock sectors, Rock ship events, and the Long-Range Scanner augment are all less common than they used to be pre-AE. This achievement was painful pre-AE, but now it's a complete crap shoot whether you will even have the chance to attempt it. Throw in the very rare but real problem of accidentally clicking to accept surrender (because the panel pops up right as you were trying to click on some other part of the UI), and this achievement has become very, very frustrating and un-fun. Unfortunately, I have no specific suggestion for how to restore balance to this achievement while still making it fair to folks who got it previously, but I'd appreciate it if you could give it some thought.

Thank you in advance!

[rhaining]

Re: IndustrialRobot's response. I'm just registering my preference, and needless to say, it's up to the game devs to decide what to do about it, if anything. I strongly dislike "achievements" that are "hey you just had something extremely rare that you couldn't control happen to you" -- how is that an achievement? I love achievements that are skill-based. The FTL achievements are a mix. In this case, Clash of the Titans was hard but well-balanced prior to AE, but now, on Advanced/Hard mode, it's extremely, extremely rare that you will ever see 15 Rock ships in your entire galaxy. Hence, I'm officially requesting a re-balance.

Similarly, when many players felt that the Ancestry achievement was more grind than fun, the devs rebalanced it. I was against that rebalancing, 'cause I *was* able to power through that one. Yes, I got Ancestry back when it was really fricking hard to get. I replied with tips to dozens of players who complained it was too hard. My point is, I'm not averse to a serious challenge. But I'm not enjoying Clash of the Titans on Advanced/Hard mode on v1.5.10 on iPad at all. (Plug: and if you doubt my bona fides as a hardcore player, check out my video "FTL challenge crucible" on YouTube. :^) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=siatyVUdn6A )

Let me put it another way: if anyone got this achievement on Advanced/Hard mode, I'd love to know how many runs it took you, and how many Rock sectors you found I'm over 50 runs and I'm not 100% certain I've ever seen 15 Rock ships. I have seen 2 Rock sectors in my galaxy twice in 50 runs, and I've never seen 3 Rock sectors.

[Ray Robertson]

I got it on my 13th attempt going for it specifically, although it was my 14th game with the Bravais. In my first game with it I was concentrating more on getting the other 2 achievements and achieving victory, although I was still looking out to destroy Rock ships. In that 13th attempt I was lucky enough to have 2xRock controlled sectors and the Rock Homeworld. I managed 16 Rock ships in total, so even with 3 Rock sectors I only just found enough to destroy. All games were played on Hard/Advanced.

IIRC I found 2xRock controlled sectors and/or homeworlds in 3 of the attempts prior to the 13th one.
"Diplomatic Immunity" with the Osprey actually took more attempts, 15.

I should add though, that I like the randomness of the galaxies. It plays a big part in making this game special.

[rhaining]

Thanks for your response, Ray! I've definitely seen way less Rock sectors than you, but your experience gives me hope I've just been unusually unlucky.

So, I'm just going to put my last 2 achievements on hold until the iPad version is patched. :^( (Clash of the Titans for Crystal and Loss of Cabin Pressure for Lanius are both buggy in v.1.5.10, which is the latest available for iPad.)

[rhaining]

OK, I've officially requested a rebalance of this achievement via getsatisfaction.com/ftlgame . I've now attempted this achievement ~100 times, and still don't have it yet. I'm no slouch! It's just extremely rare that the conditions I need are available.

I estimate that I've seen 3 Rock sectors a grand total of 3 times in those 100 runs. It's extremely difficult to get this achievement with only 2 Rock sectors, and still non-trivial even with 3. On top of that, I estimate that I've only seen a Long Range Scanner in ~25 of those runs, and in some of those cases, the augment came too late after I'd already passed through 1+ Rock sectors without sufficient ship hits.

The rebalance I've requested is to count either Rock ships or Lanius ships. That would restore the balance to roughly what it is with Advanced content disabled.

I'm not happy about giving up on this achievement, but I'm also just plain not having fun any more trying to get it.

[rhaining]

P.S.: I'm going to switch back to Crystal A and see if that makes a difference. I'd say ~85 of those runs were using Crystal B, as I prefer it and I tend to survive/win more with it. In ~5 runs, I encountered a Rock ship in sector 1 before having a weapon. In those cases I either sacrifice a ton of hull to kill the last enemy hull via Crystal Vengeance, or I just pass it by killing the crew instead (which I know doesn't count). But maybe there's something else I'm missing about the Bravais that makes this achievement a little easier??

[Ray Robertson]

Including Lanius kills won't suffice, as that would be unfair(not make sense) to those playing with AE content disabled.

I think simply reducing the required number of Rock ships to be destroyed will suffice.

[rhaining]

I actually have never played AE with advanced content disabled. I assumed that would turn off all the new-for-AE features including Abandoned sectors, Rebel Stronghold sectors, Lanius ships, extra augments, etc. etc., and play like it used to play under v.1.03.3. IF that's the case, then killing 15 (Rock+Lanius) should be roughly equally balanced whether or not advanced content is enabled.

With advanced content disabled, if it plays like v1.03.3, then 15 Rock ships is already balanced correctly.

With advanced content enabled, Rock sectors are a lot less common but if you also throw in Abandoned sectors, you should get much closer to having roughly equal opportunity as compared to v1.03.3. It's still harder because Rebel Stronghold comes into the mix which might make Rock+Lanius a bit less common than Rock alone under v1.03.3. And it's also a lot harder because Long Range Scanners are way less common with advanced content enabled. But this suggested remedy *might* be a way to preserve the original intent of the achievement without making it much harder under this mode.

But I don't presume to know the best way to address the issue. The game's randomness makes balancing this particular achievement across different modes very tricky. I suppose the only way to really fix a problem like this would be to avoid achievements that require many random events to all come out the way you need them to. This way, game devs could tweak game balance at will w/o throwing off achievement difficulty.