Basket takes the Federation Cruiser out again, the Osprey, on Normal with Advanced Edition content enabled. The crew list shows Frederic, Breckon, Mr Buga and Elnubnub, and the weapons bar holds a Burst Laser II, alongside the ship's Artillery Beam. This run has a goal, shown in the pause menu's achievement tooltip: Artillery Mastery, "Get to sector 5 in the Federation Cruiser without upgrading your Weapons system." The Osprey gets there, then is torn apart in Sector 5 for a score of 1625.
Part 1: Waiting on the beam
"It's going to be a really slow fight," Basket says, "because that means we have to wait for this thing to charge up every time." Sector 1 is a Civilian Sector. The first Pirate Interceptor tries to charge its FTL and gets cut apart by the Artillery Beam before it can leave. An automated ship guards a storage cache, a crew-teleporting pirate sends a boarder over, and a ship with a beam drone takes the shields down for a while.
The first store has a Weapon Pre-igniter that Basket cannot afford with 28 scrap, so the money goes into repairs and fuel. Sector 2 is another Civilian Sector ("Zoltan might be a pain"). A pirate surrenders, and Basket takes the scrap over the other offer. At the next store, with 95 scrap, Basket buys Drone Control, which comes with a free System Repair Drone. "Again with this particular mission, we want drones." The Osprey helps a Federation ship in a fight, chases the rebels behind a destroyed civilian ship, and stops at the exit.
Part 2: A full crew of eight
Basket picks the Pirate Controlled Sector for Sector 3. "Okay, I need to upgrade my shields big time." The scrap goes to shields first, and the next store adds an Anti-Ship Beam Drone so the ship has something to hit with once enemy shields are down. Basket refuses to hand a crew member to slavers ("We will never surrender one of our crew"), wins the fight, and one more crew member comes aboard.
Sector 4 is the Engi Homeworlds. A free Flak Gun Mark I gets sold, and scrap goes into the Artillery Beam instead. An Engi vessel asks for help with a "strange bug": "Found malfunctioning Mantis. Believes it is human." Basket sends a human to talk to it, and the Mantis joins the crew as Smith. A free Hull Smasher Laser turns up that the run cannot use ("we got a free thing that we can't use"), so it is sold, and Basket buys a Scrap Recovery Arm. After a rescue Williams joins, and at the exit a field of horse-like animals leads the crew to a crashed Engi ship, where Jack is reactivated. "You can only have eight, so our crew is full."
Part 3: Sector 5
The Osprey jumps into Sector 5, the Uncharted Nebula, and the Artillery Mastery popup appears, followed by Federation Cruiser Type B. "We got the achievement, we didn't get the other one," Basket says. "So now we can actually upgrade our weapons."
The next fights go badly. A fight with a Rebel Disruptor ends with a new quest marker. Then a Pirate Interceptor knocks out the weapons, Breckon drops off the crew list, and Basket accepts the pirate's surrender, some of its goods in exchange for its ship. With no scrap left, the store at the next beacon is little help.
How it ended
The last fight is an Auto-Hacker with three shields. It hacks the medbay, and after a fire Smith is gone from the crew list. The hull runs out, the Osprey breaks apart, and the Game Over box reads "One last explosion marks your fate as your ship is torn apart," score 1625. The hangar then shows the newly unlocked Type B, the Nisos, before the end cards.
