Struggling with hard

[Phineas Elloway]

Hello. I keep dying on hard around the formation of the alliance period. Twice now to the pirates behind every star quest I complete as much of the fans as possible before I have to decide and go for Valencia.
I want to play as a BH, EX, XH. So that I can be a xeno hunting hero late game so I start with 30 wisdom and quickness, and the Palace interceptor so I can have high attributes and skills. It usually goes really well up to the stated point.
I will upgrade my ship with plenty nav modules manly for escape or missile or torp softening but generally I avoid space battles. I'm holding out for the titan or sword. Is this my mistake should I be upgrading my ship to something between the two mass classes first or should I start with a different ship altogether like the vindex or other?

PS I have quite a lot of commanders and MO and my pilot and nav are at 200% it seems like I'm doing everything right going buy reading both forums. Evidently not though.

[daveal]

Pirates behind every star is a tough ship battle mission. Can you post a screenshot of your ship showing your components and dice pools? Do you look into the combat log to see the details of how your ship compares to the enemy ships?

[Cory Trese]

What is the template Captain's Fortitude and Strength score? Just curious what kind of HP we're working with.

[Phineas Elloway]

Jan 12, 2020 6:19:09 GMT -5 Cory Trese said:

What is the template Captain's Fortitude and Strength score? Just curious what kind of HP we're working with.

The fortitude is 30 and strength 14. Crew battles go pretty well to be fair.
I tried another playthrough using the vindex, then switching to the vengeance as a stop gap before the titan, which realistically I feel costs over 2 or even 3 million before it's late game ready. it seems to be going much better now with the vengeance. Pirates quest seemed easy. The titan is almost ready to have the champagne smashed across the bow.

[MTKnife]

I've done the Pirates behind Every Star mission with a Vindex armed with two torps and a missile battery. If you're trying to fight rather than run, go with Pilot Assists, not Nav Assists; IIRC, you can fit 2 Pilot Assists and a Sensor Array without too much trouble (the latter, which fits because it's ridiculously light, boosts Electronics, helping with both combat and running--and it's not like a Vindex needs much help running).