Mike’s FTL stuff > Crew speed measurements

FTL crew speed measurements

Summary of results

Crew are slowed slightly by doors (open or closed). To an even smaller extent, they appear to be slowed by changes in direction. Here are the speeds for a Human:

	Description	Tiles per second	Seconds per tile
Fastest	No doors	2.28	0.438
Slowest	A maze of doors	2.17	0.460

Possibly as a result of this, the game’s description of crew speeds (and Mantis Pheromones) are not quite accurate in “real-world” conditions. The following times are from tests running around the Mantis C:

	Speed vs. human	Seconds per tile	Tiles per second
Human	1	0.46	2.19
Engi	1	0.46	2.19
Slug	1	0.46	2.19
Zoltan	1	0.46	2.19
Mantis	1.18	0.39	2.59
Rock	0.51	0.89	1.12
Crystal	0.81	0.56	1.78
Lanius	0.85	0.53	1.86

Mantis Pheromones gave about a 23% boost here, not the advertised 25%.

Test methods and data

“Realistic” tests (Mantis C)

These tests used Mantis C, running circles from Piloting –> Shields –> Teleporter –> Piloting. Each test was 10 laps, so 240 tiles total movement.

I used timer software with stop/start bound to the FTL pause buttons. Crew movement was continuous with no diversions, pausing only at the end of lap 10. Mantis Pheromones were sold before starting (except when testing the augment itself).

I took the mean of only 3 measurements for each race, since the results were always extremely close. The small difference in timing is explained by small differences in pausing at the end of the last lap.

	Human	Engi	Slug	Zoltan	Mantis	Rock	Crystal	Lanius
1	109.51	109.37	109.67	109.57	92.84	213.34	135.08	128.38
2	109.59	109.65	109.64	109.57	92.86	213.46	135.08	128.55
3	109.51	109.59	109.60	109.54	92.83	213.53	135.07	128.68

Because the first four races are so extremely close, I pooled their results when calculating the mean and derived values. It would be silly to say that Slugs are 99.91% as fast as Humans.

	Human, Engi, Slug, Zoltan	Mantis	Rock	Crystal	Lanius
Mean time	109.5675	92.8433	213.4433	135.0767	128.5367

For Mantis Pheromones, I only did 3 tests with a Human:

1	2	3	Mean
89.08	88.97	89.15	89.0667

“Synthetic” tests

I recorded these on video (main, extra). These tests used custom layouts and Humans only (no Pheromones). Each scenario was tested twice (once in each direction).

Description	Number of tiles	Time	Tiles per second
Horizontal movement with few doors or direction changes	149	65.45, 65.48	2.28
As above, but with lots of doors	149	68.08, 67.79	2.19
As above, but with the doors open	149	68.08, 67.96	2.19
“Maze” with constant changes of direction (and doors)	149	68.50, 68.54	2.17
Vertical movement with few doors or direction changes	149	65.46, 65.68	2.27
Pure diagonal movement, no doors	12.73	5.60, 5.55	2.28
“Diagonal” movement across square rooms	71.43*	32.15, 32.22	2.22

* 30 diagonal movements and 29 straight movements. A diagonal movement should be √2 tiles distance (about 1.41).