Introduction
So you wanna start playing Star Trek Online. but you have no clue as to the universe, characters or gameplay.
That's fine, and this is where this guide comes in.
Firstly you need to decide what faction you wish to represent either 25th Century Federation, Klingon Empire, The Romulan Republic or the Newly added 23rd Century Federation
Then comes your choice of Captain, either
Tactical:
Uses Martial arts moves, Grenades and party buffs like battle strategies and overwatch
Engineering:
Uses Turrets, Fabricated Med Stations or Shields plus a variety of Bombs
Science:
Uses Medic based heals, Debuffs and support powers
and i'll expand on these later on.
Once you have chosen this you get to choose your race, unlike most games STO gives you a massive choice when it comes to race (for the 25th Century federation especially) and each one has bonuses to a certain class or field.
that's not to say you cannot pick any race / class combination, it's just that some are better assigned to certain paths than others
Class Archetypes
So you want to know what each class does before you choose one, fair enough.
Tactical
Tactical Captains are the DPS (damage per second) class of STO, much like a rogue in WoW or a Ranger in Neverwinter, your job is to inflict as much damage as possible in the shortest amount of time.
and you gain the following abilities from rank to rank
At Lieutenant you gain the following 2 Abilities, 1 Ground, 1 Space
Target Optics (Ground)
A visor appears around you characters head and grants bonuses to Dmg, Critical Chance and Critical Severity, generally lasts 15 seconds and has a cooldown of around 1 minute.
your first power as a tactical captain cements what this class is about it increases all the things that make a Tactical Captain great, better at doing basically everything related to dealing damage for a short time.
Attack Pattern Alpha (Space)
A Red Triangle with the Greek letter for alpha appears over your vessel and grants bonuses to Dmg, Critical Chance, Critical Severity and Flight Turn Rate, Lasts 30 Seconds and has a cool down of around 1 Minute.
This makes it easier to destroy enemy ships and also the added turn rate makes it easier to perform Hit and Run tactics, which later on if you choose an escort class ship with be a speciality.
Engineering
Engineer Captains are the tanks (Defensive) class of STO, you could compare them to a Paladin in WoW or a Warrior in most other MMO games, there sturdy and are designed with survivability in mind, and it's your job to increase the defensive abilities of those around you.
at Lieutenant you gain the following 2 abilities
Reroute power to shields (Ground)
your captain brings up a display and taps into it, then you or the character you selected to receieve the buff glows yellow and there shield power regenerates
unlike the tactical abilities, most engineering ones can be used on other party members as well as yourself
reroute power to shields, gives to a shield regeneration buff, reduces dmg to the character you applied it to and sometimes although it's rare can place the expose debuff on the enemy targetting you.
this can be very useful if you have a tactical officer who can take advantage of the exposed trait and increase the damage against them.
Rotate Shield Frequency (Space)
Your ship gains a floating 2nd shield which spins a few times then vanishes, this ability as a engineering captain is priceless, it grants for a time of 30 seconds, a damage reduction of 20% and a shield recharge boost
this is very useful against a lot of enemies that use energy based weaponary that damage shields directly and can save your life often.
Science
Science Captain are an unusual choice in this game and are generally harder to play as in space than on ground, depending on how you build your science captain you can be any of the following
Mage Type
Focuses on Damage over Time powers that reduce the effectiveness of your current target while inflicting Damage
Medic Type
Focuses on Heals and buffs to health and health regeneration, and generally keeps people alive longer
Warlock Type
Focuses on Debuffs to reduce enemy effectiveness
The science captain probably has the widest range of kits available to them and is considered a support class, they also gain there own science specific vessels that can disable certain sections of an enemies ship over time.
The 2 Abilities you gain at Lieutenant are
Tricorder Scan (Ground)
Your science captain pulls out his / her tricorder and scans the enemy, granting a perception bonus to yourself and inflicting a dmg resistance penality and stealth penality to the enemy you used it on
much like most of the science abilities they act in a dual fashion, buffing yourself , while debuffing your foes while it only lasts around 12 seconds, it recharges very fast so you can keep debuffing enemies around you
Sensor Scan (Space)
Sensor scan is the space equiv of tricorder scan, and it does exactly the same function as tricorder scan, however there are times as a science captain where this will be very useful to use, against certain enemies like Klingons, the Romulans and the Borg.
Ship Archetypes Federation And Klingon
Ok so you have decided on what type of Captain you wish to place as, great now you need to decide what sort of ship you'de like, although you don't get to choose your ship until rank 10 / 11, till then you get given that factions starter ship to ease you into the gameplay
These are
For Federation players you get a Miranda Varient a Light Cruiser which can be configured into either a Miranda, a Centaur or a Shi'Karr class frigate
Klingons get a B'rel class Bird of prey type raider with a cloaking device
and finally the Romulans get a T'liss type warbird, with a battle cloak and a singularity generator which when charged releases a plasma wave.
all 3 starter ships gain a similar layout of 2 forward firing weapons, and 1 aft and you can configure what weapons go where as much as you like.
moving on though.
there are 3 Types of Federation ship, 7 Types of Klingon ship and 4 Types of Romulan ship
which seems a lot, but each one comes with it's own unique bonuses and abilitys
so lets start off with the Federation Ships
Escorts
Escorts are generally a tactical captain choice, that's not to say you cannot play one as Engineer or Scientist, in fact as a noob I played through my entire Engineering Captains Career using only Escorts which in theory proves it doesn't matter what type of ship you pick as long as you enjoy it
Escorts are the fastest ship type, they all gain a bonus to weapon power and are easy to play, they have lower armour and defenses than most other types, but make up for this by hitting hard
Pros
Fast
Easy to Turn
Can Equip the most variety of weapons
Cons
Lower Defense
Weaker Shields
Cruisers
Cruisers are a defensive choice of ship, they have stronger hulls and take a lot more to destroy, they all gain a balance to all power lvls and are considered a safe choice for new comers, in a recent patch they gained 3 powers to help increase there usefulness
these are
(Will fill these in once I have researched them properly)
Pros
Tough
Best Defense
Cons
Slow
Harder to turn
Restrictions on certain weapons
Science Vessels
Science vessel are a balanced choice of starship, they have an average amount of armour, but wicked strong shields, there easier to turn than cruisers, but are slower than escorts, all science vessels gain a bonus to Auxillary power and 4 Disable subsystem powers
which can target Weapons, Shields, Engines or Aux
Pros
Strong Shields
Subsystem Targetting
Balanced Abilities
Cons
Weaker Armour
Restrictions on certain weapons
Moving onto the Klingon Empire
The Klingons have the most variety of ships at there disposal, however a lot of these can only be bought with Zen or real money and I will go through which ones these are
so lets start with the most basic of ships the Bird of Prey
Raiders
The raider class of ship is much like a scout, it's very fast, can turn on a penny and has a cloaking device
Pretty much all Raiders are bird's of prey, there are some exceptions such as Breen Heavy Raider which plays more like an escort
The raider class is the first type of ship you fly as a klingon warrior, and it's easy to see why there a lot of fun,
Pros
Fast
Cloak can be used for ambushes
Can equip a lot of weapons
Cons
Weak Armour
Weak Shields
Raptors
Raptors are the true escort class for the Klingons, they have a similar play style as the Fed escorts with the exception of being able to cloak before battle.
Pros
Fast (though not as fast as a Raider)
Can equip all weapon types
Cons
Cannot Cloak mid battle
Weaker Armour
Battle Cruisers
Battle cruisers are the klingon tanks, they can equip all weapons types, unlike there Federation counterparts, there incredibly tough, but move very slowly and turn like a tank, this can be ofset slightly with the right consoles equiped to increase turn rate. but they are a good choice for a starter klingon player
Pros
Tough as Hell
All Weapons Available
Cons
Moves like a Slug
Can take ages to get to where you want to
Now we move into the Pay for section of the Klingon Arsenal.
Destroyers (Zen Purchase Generally)
Destroyers in the Klingon Navy are a fun ship to fly they gain bonuses to weapon power and engine power and a faster than most cruisers, while being a cross between a Cruiser and an Escort, the first Destroyer you can buy is the Vandal Destroyer a Nausicaan ship which costs 1000 Zen (about £10)
all pay for ships gain bonus one off consoles and this one has the plasmodic leech, which drains an enemies power and shields and adds it to yours, while i'm generally against buying ships in game the consoles from any ones you do buy can be transferred generally to any other ship, so you don't just gain that ship for 10 lvls then that's it
Pros
A Balance between Escort and Cruiser
Cool Consoles
Cons
You gotta pay for em
Worth it??
Support Vessels (Zen Purchase Generally)
The support vessels are the science ships for the Klingons, and this is where you have a problem if you want to play a science captain as the Klingons, all your specialist ships from rank 20 Onwards you have to buy.
If I had know this when I had first started my science captain I would have changed it's career, and why, well the Klingon science vessels are much like the Federation Vessels, they share the same abilitys and the same lvl of use the only difference is you have to buy them
the first of these is the Gorn Phalanx Support ship, it costs 1000 Zen (£10) and looks a lot like a tampon it does have a cool console which is the barrier field generator, which throws up an energy shield that nothing can get through for a limited time
Pros
Science Vessel for the KDF
Balanced
Cons
You gotta pay for it
looks like a tampon
Flight Deck Cruiser (Zen Purchase Generally)
The flight deck cruisers are mostly of Orion design and unlike the standard cruisers have a balance of power levels for the klingons and one of the best abilitys ever, a hanger bay
this is by far the coolest ability your ships can have, and you can change what fighter craft you can launch by changing the respective fighter ship console, this ofsets the cruisers sluggishness greatly, as having a squadron of fighters attack can also fill in some gaps in you offense and unlike the Federation who don't get there Carrier Based cruisers till later you can gain this as early as Captain (Rank 30)
But there had to be a downside and it's again that you have to pay for it, and again like most early game ships it's 1000 Zen (£10), but in comparison to a destroyer I would and have bought this and it's a lot better for your money
Pros
Has Fighters
Tough
Beats most Early or Equiv Fed Vessels
Con's
You gotta pay for it
Doesn't last as long as you'de like
Carriers (Zen Purchase Generally)
The Carrier class of ship is the Largest ship class in STO and for good reason they support 2 hanger bays of fighters and are by far the toughest ship in STO to destroy
Carriers aren't available till rank 40 (Admiral / General) and they cost a lot while some can be purchased for dilithum (About 120'000) ,most cost between 1'500 Zen (£15) to 2'500 Zen (£25) and it's here that you move into end game territory and the costs mount
Are carriers worth it? in my opinion? no. there slower than flight deck cruisers which makes aiming at anything hard, there slow to turn which can be a nightmare and having more fighters doesn't generally make it easier
Pros
Toughest ships in the game
has lots of fighters
Cons
Expensive to buy
Slowest ships available
Takes a lot of practice
Ship Archetypes Romulan
which brings us to Romulan ships.
Romulans have the smallest selection of ships available that are romulan in design, however at rank 10 / 11 you get to ally with either the Federation or The Klingon Empire and you can also buy the ships from those factions
the romulans don't gain any diversity in there ships till Commander (Rank 30) and all before that are of the Warbird / Escort Variety
So lets start
Warbirds
All warbirds are equipped with Cloaks, and singularity generators, everytime a warbird fires it's weapons, gets hit or uses a power generates singularity, and the meter can build to 5 levels
which increase the power and duration of the singularity ability you use with it at first you only have the plasma wave on the T'liss but you gain more and more singularity abilities with each new ship threshold
so at Lieutenant you have 1, Centurion 2, Sub Commander 3, Commander 4 and finally Admiral 5
and all are very useful, and it lends a certain flair to when playing as the Romulans, the warbirds themselves are easy to manuvere, and are as fast as a Federation escort this makes the romulan faction very easy to play as, plus you have a battle cloak, which unlike the Klingons can be used mid fight to get away.
Pros
Fast
Singularity Abilities
Battle Cloak
Cons
Average Armour
Armour Shields
No Diversity
Romulan Battle Cruisers
There are very few romulan ships in this class but the most iconic one is the first one you can get which is the D'Deridex or Big D to most people, the big D is bigger than a galaxy class starship and is very much a cruiser ship, while you don't get one till Commander (Rank 30) this is the first true Romulan engineer ship and it's a beast
it has very high armour and decent shields plus for the first time as a romulan player 7 weapon slots, while it's turn rate and speed are terrible it lends itself more so than federation cruisers to the term Broadsiding, if you have ever played Empire Total war you'll know what I mean, as you have to use the sides of your ship to inflict the most damage by lining up both your forward and rear weapons so they over lap creating a killzone in the middle where you can be firing all 7 weapons at once.
It's not an easy class of ship to fly and most people who have been used to using escort style warbirds will hate having to adjust,but it's very cool to use and rewarding if used correctly
Pros
Tougher than 10 Day old meatloaf
Heavy Armour
Battle Cloak on a cruiser (Genius)
Cons
Slow to Turn
Will find Haters
Sluggish
Romulan Destroyers (Pay with Zen or Lobi Crystals)
Romulan Destroyers play much like there klingon counterparts, there a cross between Escorts and Cruisers, but with a power bonus instead to Weapons and Aux
there's not a lot to say about this type of ship as there are only 3 in the romulan force and the first you can get your hands on is the Talveth Temporal ship, it's a nice ship handles well and has a cost of 800 lobi crystals (unsure of how much this works out to) and the only way to acquire Lobi crystals is to open lock boxes or compete in special events that give you them as a reward
You get a special console called the Mainheim device which creates duplicates of you to fight for you, which is nice but considering you cannot get hold of this till at least rank 40 (Sub Admiral) your best off focusing elsewhere.
Pros
Nice Balance
Good Alternative to Warbirds
Cons
Uses a funny currency to buy it
Not Worth it
which brings us finally to romulan science vessels
Romulan Science Vessels
You picked a romulan science captain only to find that for most of your career you have had to
A. Use Federation Science vessels (Fed Allied only)
or
B. Go without, unless your willing to buy them (KDF Aliied)
but fear not by the time you hit rank 40 (Sub Admiral) you now have a Romulan science vessel YAY, the first of these is the Ha'Nom and it's a Beaut, it's combines a Fed science vessel with romulan escort abilitys, what you get is a fast science vessel that can target sub systems, cloak and has reasonable armour.
Pros
Fast
Cloak
Sub System Targetting
Cons
You have to wait forever to get one
Might be best sticking with escorts at this point
while there are other ship types I will cover them when I have the time.
Weapons And Energy Types
Through out your career in STO you'll get to fly lots of different starships, meet loads of different races and customise to your hearts content
the things you will change most often on your crew members and starships are the weapons, each weapon type has a specific function depending on how you want your characters to work
for example Tetryon weapons do more damage to shields, an put your opponent at a disadvantage sooner, the downside is that they do less damage to everything else.
so lets look at the energy types standard weapons
Phaser
Phaser energy is the standard for all Federation Vessels, it's bonuses are to accuracy and to disable random subsystems
Disruptor
Disruptors are more common on Klingon ships, there bonuses are to lower the targets resistance to dmg by 10% over time
Plasma
The Romulan choice, plasma weapons do damage over time, even though they appear to weaker than most
Tetryon
Found on ships belonging to the Tholians, Tetyron weapon do more damage to shields
Polaron
The weapons of the Dominion, have a chance to lower all power levels by 25
Antiproton
Anti Borg and Voth weapons, increase the chance to do more damage per critical hit
however these only apply to the energy weapon such as Beams and Cannons
Torpedoes are different in nature and sometimes cooler, torpedo features are
Photon
50% chance of - 20 able crew, less crew = less hull repair and systems repair
Quantum
10% chance of -10 able crew, see above They also deal significantly more damage, or so I am told
Plasma
chance to inflict fire damage to hull and cause damage over time
Transphasic
Increased shield penetration, useful against science vessels and the Voth
Chroniton
-100% flight speed and turn rate for 10 seconds, a good torpedo type to use if your up against faster ships i.e. a cruiser against an escort
Tricobalt
A slow moving heavy torpedo that can disable a target for 2 secs, it also stacks if other people hit at the same time
Hargh'peng
An unguided radiation filled torpedo that cause radiation damage for 15 seconds, radiation is brilliant against most living creatures, but terrible against tholians and borg.
Weapon Strategies
So you had a look at all the weapons available, but are unsure of what build is best for you never fear I have some you might want to try and see how they work for you
1. The All One Type Build
Quite often you'll see many high lvl players using just one weapon type, be it Phaser or Plasma or any of the above, why do that you may be wondering?
Well it all comes down to the consoles you have on your starship, in the early lvls of 1 - 30 your buffs to using certain combinations aren't as noticable so you can have that rainbow firing starship and be ok, later on however you'll find that enemies seem tougher and that you die more, this is to be expected as after a while the game does get harder
so going back to the question why 1 energy type?, well
lets take into account a mid lvl ship like the Galaxy Class Cruiser you gain it as a Federation player at the rank of Captain (Rank 30)
it has 4 forward weapon slots and 3 Aft
and the standard layout is
2 forward phaser arrays, 2 Forward Photon Torpedo Launchers and 2 Aft phaser arrays and 1 aft torpedo
which is a nice balance between energy and kinetic weapons,
and this is where consoles come in to make it better
A Galaxy Class Cruiser has 2 Tactical console slots, to make the most of your phaser damage you could fill these slots with Phaser Relays.
at captain lvl the Mk VIII common phaser relay increases the potency of your phasers by 16.9%, and that just one of them so instead of doing your normal 100% Damage you doing instead 116.9%
say we add another Mk VIII common phaser relay, most people would think tha it justs adds another 16.9% percent, it actually doesn't it adds the 16.9% to your existing (at this point anyway) 116.9% and this is where a bit of maths is involved
16.9% added to 116.9 isn't 133.8% like most people would think because 10% of the new figure is 11.69 not 10
which means your closer to 150% than that (sorry couldn't work it out in my head)
which means your weapons are doing nearly 50% more damage than before, and if all your weapons are of the same type, well you get the idea.
2. The fire and forget build
This is a nice build I use on my escorts, it's a quick way to swap between targets and do a modest amount of damage to them all
for this build i'm using an Akira Class Heavy Escort which you gain at Commander (Rank 20) and you can add more weapons as wanted on later escorts down the line
this build specifically works well in both PvP and PvE
what you'll need
2 Plasma Torpedo Launchers, 1 Plasma Mine Launcher, 1 Tetyron Dual Cannon, 1 Tetyron Turret
All rank VI as that's the highest rank a Commander can equip, firstly place the dual cannon and both Plasma Torpedoes in your Fore weapons slots
and the Plasma Mine Launcher and Tetyron turret in the Aft Slots
you'll also need to place 2 Tetyron Pulse Generators in 2 of the Tactical slots and a Plasma Infuser in the last
the way this build works is it uses 1 of the aft slots to work at a forward firing weapon, so instead of firing 3 forward you have infact 4 forward
the Tetyron Damage helps lower the shields quicker so your dual Plasma torpedoes can rip through the hull, plus with 2 plasma torpedo you have a greater chance of getting a DoT fire going and killing your foe quickly, but why mines you may ask
well mines should be left of autofire, so that as you pass you enemy, you can drop them right on them, plus as there a plasma weapon they take advantage of the extra damage gained by the plasma infuser
while you could do this with 1 Tetyron Pulse Generators and 2 Plasma Infusers, the extra Tetyron Pulse generator is there to make sure you open a window in his shields for both the torpedos and the mines.
Currencies And Things To Buy With Them (Part 1)
If you've been playing a while, you'll notice you have earned a lot of different types of money, the mains ones you'll gain while playing are
Energy Credits
Dilithium
Latinium
Lobi Crystals
Marks
Zen
So what does each Currency do, and how best to spend it
Energy Credits (EC)
Energy Credits will be the stuff you get the most of and will have to spend to upgrade weapons, shields and parts of both your ground officers and your starship, and you earn it from doing everything,
Selling Unwanted Items
Completing Missions
Trading on the Exchange (more on that a lot later)
Generally everything you can do normally in the game will earn you EC at some point, so how best to gather it for that 1 Mk (pick a number) console that you really need.
well the best ways of gathering EC really quickly are farming missions, you'll find these under the Foundry section of the mission logs and most of these will be listed as not allowing any bonuses, this shouldn't worry you as your not playing them to earn anything but EC.
A typical farming mission will last about 15 Mins, less if you have pimped out your Starship right and you'll have to destroy waves and waves of static enemies that while have there shields down (usually), they will fight back.
and to do them quickly you'll want to place Torpedo launchers and nothing else on all your fore weapon sockets, this will cause massive amounts of kinetic damage, which to an unshielded foe makes it all the easier.
However for all the people that doubt using this method, and i'm sure there will be lots, your gaining gear which you can sell either to a merchant on the exchange or using the replicator and who know's you might get lucky and get the console that you wanted to buy in the first place.
but best places to spend EC are on the exchange, you can usually (and i use this term loosely) find what your looking to buy at a reasonable price, although there are some people that think it's ok to sell a Mk IV Photon Torpedo Launcher for over 100,000 EC.
Dilithium
Dilithium is a premium currency in Star Trek Online and don't let anyone else tell you different, it's used to buy the most expensive early and mid game items, want that extra starship well it's gonna cost you, to illustrate this point well lets look at the starship prices in Dilithium
At Lieutenant (Rank 1) a starship costs 8'000 Dilithium
At Lieutenant Commander (Rank 10) a starship costs 15'000 Dilithium
At Commander (Rank 20)a starship costs 40'000 Dilithium
At Captain (Rank 30) a starship costs 80'000 Dilithium
At Admiral Lower Half (Rank 40) a starship costs 120'000 Dilithium
At Admiral Upper Half (Rank 45) a starship isn't available to buy as it's only a small shift
At Vice Admiral (Rank 50) a starship costs 2'000 Zen or 200'000 Fleet Credits (if your in a fleet)
which as you'll have probably noticed if you can only refine 8'000 Dilithium a day, (9'000 if your in a fleet with that ability) it's going to take a while to buy a better starship, which is 15 days of earning 8'000 and then refining it
but very few people earn 8'000 consistantly every day, because the ways you earn Dilithium are few
the best ones are doing a spotlight foundry mission, this can earn you around 2'000 if you haven't done any foundry missions that day, or doing any of the following
Complete a Exploration Mission (Fed only)
Do a Empire Defense Mission (Kdf only)
A Daily Mission, such as Tau Dewa
Doing an Academy Event (These are awesome and can net upto 3'000)
Doing a Lore Mission (try to do these when the bonuses apply)
Asteroid Mining (Can earn around 1'500 if you good at the minigame)
Duty Officer Missions (After Rank 11, some of these can earn 150 Dilithium a time)
Turn over Contraband (a good mission to keep rolling as every 4 hours you gain 2'000 Dilithium)
Currencies And Things To Buy With Them (Part 2)
Gold Pressed Latinum (GPL)
Latinum is one of the more unusual curries in the game, you aquire it through various duty officer missions which you can get after reaching rank 11 or by playing Dabo at the various Stations and Planets that offer it
GPL is spent mainly on cosmetic items such as Holographic Projectors, Trophies and one shots, its a fun, but generally useless commodity in the STO game and you won't be able to buy anything particularly useful with it
Lobi Crystals
Lobi on the other hand is very much a Premium currency, you gain Lobi through featured missions and unlocking Lockboxes, Lobi can be traded in for special duty officers, ships and equipment and is well worth it
To cash in your Lobi crystals, you must travel to the Drozana station located in the Eta Eridani sector block
Zen
Zen ahh wonderful zen, there are only 2 ways to aquire this lovely stuff, the first is to actually buy it or recieve it through a monthy membership to the game. The second is to trade in your hard earned Dilithium through the Exchange at a very steep ratio
Zen buys all the lovely things in STO, from Vice Admiral level ships, to extra character slots and the rarest items, while I believe that F2P shouldn't have a currency such as this, as it generally promotes a Pay to Win attitude, Zen is easy enough to aquire to not make this so much of a problem.
Currencies And Things To Buy With Them (Part 3)
Ok so far we have covered the basic currencies, the ones that are easily obtained, these next ones however are much harder, and grant the best bonuses and gear
So ladies and Gentlemen, we come to the Marks, I'll split them into Fleet Based and Individual based for reference
Fleet Based Marks
Fleet Marks
upon joining a fleet, you gain the option through various starbase tasks and fleet events to earn "Fleet Marks", are earned through STF's PVE quests
and help with the upgrade, of various Starbase, Embassy or Dilithium Mine projects, most events involve defending a Starbase, Escorting a Convoy or Defending Territory from the opposing faction.
Fleet Credits
Fleet credits are what you earn, by donating resources to your fleets projects, for example if you donate 10,000 Dilithium then you might end up with around 5,000 fleet credits.
But what are they used for?, well once a fleet gains a Starbase and a Shipyard or other special attachments, you can spend these credits on Purchasing special enchanced versions of your factions starships that have increased armour and hulls or other special bonuses, so I emplore you guys, find a group of people that you like to play with and think about creating a fleet as you'll end up being able to get some of the best stuff in the game.
Individual Marks
Individual marks don't come into play for most players until they reach rank 50 with there respective faction/s and are considered all to be End Game Currencies, so you've got to rank 50, so what now? well this is where you gain the most benefits and coolest stuff
Omega Marks
Omega marks are earned through completing tasks for Task Force Omega, which you gain an invitation to join around rank 44, most involve stopping the Borg from taking over or changing the past
Omega marks can then be used, once the reputation system unlocks at rank 50, to start Omega projects, which give you borg themed weapons and gear for both your Captain and your Starship and are well worth the effort.
Nukara Marks
Nukara Marks are earned from taking on the tholians on the planet Nukara, a demon class world where you'll need an enviroment suit or be burned to a crisp, Nukara marks are quite easy to come by the missions are repeatable with no cooldown and you'll find tholians to be very easy targets on the planets surface
So why get them?, Nukara marks gain you access to Nukara projects, which also unlocks at rank 50, and some of these are genius, on average it will take a few days worth of grinding Nukara Marks to gain a Cryo Launcher or an armoured enviromental suit, or even Tholian based Tetyron weapons for your starship which are awesome for a science captain or science starship.
Romulan Marks
Romulan marks focus on missions that take place in the Tau Dewa sector block, you get two daily missions, one to take on tholians or borg in red alert events, (of which I never seem to get) and two to complete tasks for the various planets in the sector
while I've heard the Red Alert event is very good at gaining marks, I would need somebody to tell me how many as like I've said I have never managed to get one,
The Second Mission however grants you 60 to 75 (on a Bonus Marks Event) and generally involves doing around 5 to 8 Missions for the various planets in Tau Dewa, these are quick to complete and will only take you around 1 hour to do the amount you need to gain the marks
So why bother with Romulan marks?, well the romulan and remans offer some nice gear and the ability to call in re-enforcement squads of either romulans or remans or can be spent on romulan projects to gain bonuses to your captain and starship and some cool gear for your ship.
Dyson Marks
Dyson marks arrived with the advent of season 8, and focus on the dyson sphere gateway located in the Tau Dewa sector block, this gateway warps you to a Dyson sphere in the Delta Quadrant thats currently under siege from a dinosaur like race called the Voth.
All missions in the area grant Dyson marks, and there's a lot of missions in this area, from basic defense to cargo scanning and everything in between, there's also a cool battlefield where captains can with the help of some of there bridge officers fight the Voth on the ground to capture areas and earn even more marks
So why bother with Dyson Marks?, Dyson marks grant Mark XII gear from the off, which makes getting other Marks, such as Omega, Nukara and Romulan that much easier, but that's not all Dyson marks can also be traded in for Dyson commendations, and it's these that are very useful
Ever had that 2nd or 12th character that you really don't want to have to aquire marks over and over for, well never fear, Dyson Commendations, unlike the other marks can be traded between characters, this means that you can use your Primary character or Main to level other Alternate characters that you might want to End Game with and want a jump on getting better gear from the start.
Walkthroughs Introduction
Hi LB here writer of this guide, and if you've got this far please leave comments at the bottom, as they help both my Ego and with points I might have missed
The way i'm going to go about writing the walkthrough's will seem weird to most of you, but I'll try to explain it the best I can
The layout will typically be a synopsis of the mission i.e. tasks to do, items to grab, and special sections that are class specific which I will mention at the time they appear like so
Tactical Only Objective
these are to help new people, who might be completionists like myself to know when to give up trying to complete an objective that you just can't as your class, such as an early on which involves trying to revive crew members as an engineer, when you really need to be a science captain.
Also will cover what upgrades, you should want at certain points and what equipment might be helpful
So lets go Boldly forth, to seek out new life and new civilizations, and generally have a good time
Federation Walkthrough From Rank 1 To 10
We are going to start as the Federation, so get ready with the character creator and lets get started
Your class is really important as a Fed player, as the choice of powers, ships and equipment will either bolster your choice or cover any weaknesses.
Starfleet Academy Cadet
Welcome to the year 2409, your a fresh faced cadet who's done extremely well on his/her studies and are now ready to accept your first commission
For the most part this will involve walking around the grounds, talking to the new graduates and following the mission guide, nothing too hard
At some point you will get to speak to the captain, you need to ring the doorbell then walk in, and shock horror to be told your going to be offered a position on his bridge crew, but you didn't do the firing range task to qualify so you'll need to speak to elise flores to continue.
She will be stood outside the building ,so you won't have to look far, she will then talk to you about life at the academy, then will offer to race you to the administration building.
Klingon Walkthrough From Rank 1 To 10
Playing a Klingon is generally all about war, honor and generally killing things YAY after character creation you start your career in the Klingon Defense Force aboard a B'rel class Bird of Prey as the captains 2nd and are on a routine prisoner transfer mission to Kronus
Bird of Prey
Romulan Walkthrough From Rank 1 To 10
Playing a Romulan is all about stealth, suprise attacks and generally being sneaky, you start on the Romulan colony of Virinat as one of the Colonists, but adventure and betrayal are soon to come calling
Virinat
United Federation Of Planets Circa 23rd Century Walkthrough
When I first started this Era I squee'd, your brought back to where Trek first began in the 23rd century where women's skirts were tiny and you ended up generally having a fist fight in some sand.
You start your career as the first officer of Captain Isaac Garrett, his right hand and trusted friend.
Rank 11 And The Duty Officer System
So you have reached rank 11 and have been told to go back to your home planet to collect your duty officers, fair enough
for Both Fed and KDF you have to go to your respective Acadmies and speak to either
For the Federation it's who can be found near the daily dilithium mission giver
For the KDF it's Lieutenant S'tass (Maybe, Need to check) and he can be found in the academy building near the Warrior Recruiter
The Romulans have Centureon Velaar and she is in the right hand area of the main command centre on New Romulus.
Once you have recieved your first compliment of duty officers, what do you do?
well once you have them I suggest talking to the personnel officer for your Fed / KDF contact and start earning more, you have 5 duty missions you can accept to earn general, tactical, operations, science and civilian officers and for the romulans you can earn your own faction and your allied faction which means Romulans can easily get the jump on the DoFF system.
Joining A Fleet And Getting The Most Out Of STO
**** Coming Soon ****
End Game And Beyond
So you've been playing for a while and you've reached Vice Admiral, Lieutenant General or Sub Admiral II, what now?
well if you were like me and did a lot of foundry missions instead of the main quest path, then you will still have a lot of these to do, you don't have to complete all the story episodes but you do get the chance to build sets of faction specific items and some of these are very useful for the next tasks.
Task Force Omega
While you can start this at Rank 44, Task Force Omega doesn't come into it's own until rank 50, ay this point by clicking on the PvE button you'll get a list of Special Task Force missions of STF's that you can compete in.
The Omega ones are funnily enough the ones that reward Omega Marks, these will help you earn reputation with this faction.
For space missions ideally you want to be building towards getting a full set of MkXII space gear in blue or better
For ground missions you can get away with the Jem'Hadar gear for a very long time, but again eventually you'll want to get gear MKXII.
You can also go to the Defara system to stop a borg invasion, this will award small amounts of Omega Marks, for decent amounts stick to the STF's
Nukara
Chances are you read Nukara marks, and was thinking but how do I get these?, well unlocked at lvl 50 you get a mission called "Hot Lead", this involves you travelling to the Nukara system in the Eta Eridani system. upon which you will need to beam down.
Note: You cannot do Nukara without an enviroment suit, the planet is demon class and you burn to death without one.
Nukara as a rule is a very easy to do, it mainly involves Tholian bashing, good gear involves getting an armoured enviromental suit and either a cryo or sonic weapon and before you know it, you'll have around 200 marks in about an hour (I have actually done this, before people say it isn't possible)
Romulan
Romulan marks are some of the hardest to acquire, don't belive me, try , you get given 2 mission to get these
Tau Dewa Sector and Tholian Red Alert
Tau Dewa Sector
You get given a percentage bar and have to complete task in this sector to earn a percentage to build it eventually to 100%
the easist mission I have found is Japori, it involves blowing up 5 waves of Narcissican Ships, it can be done at any Tier 5 ship and drops a good amount of lockboxes and gear as well.
This can be repeated 5 times to get you your 100%
Tholian Red Alert
This mission is hard to find, hard to acquire and doesn't give that many romulan marks for your trouble, to be honest, your best off avoiding this one.
Season 8 Additions And Onwards
Season 8 The Dyson Sphere
While most of you will have played this now, there are some of you that are still leveling to 50 so you can try this, Season 8 sets you against the reptilian foes The Voth who if you watched star trek voyager should be familar.
The Voth are a race of Dinosaur like humanoids that use advanced technology and cybernectics, and most of there missions take place on the Dyson Sphere, to unlock this you'll first need to do the special mission involving Worf, the romulans and an Iconian gate
Dyson
The dyson sphere is a massive battleground for both space missions and a ground arena where you fight off against the Voth to stop them from stealing Omega Particles.
Your currency here is Dyson Marks and Voth Cybernetics and these are both very easy to acquire very quickly
Season 9 A New Accord
Ahh the Undine or Species 8472 if you prefer.. telepathic, Telekinetic and out to destroy everyone in our universe
Undine Battleground
As a section available in the Dyson sphere you fight as part of a group using your starships to fulfil various tasks such as restart Klingon weapons, Bring a Romulan Singulary to a generator and restart Federation Technology.
It's a fun little diversion and once all of the battlefield has been changed to blue, you face off against three planet killers to earn Isomorphic Injectors and Undine Marks
Your Build for this section is more important as you can (And Will) be destroyed more often, so defensive builds are better.
Season 10 Iconian War
For many years in Trek the Iconians were rumoured to be the boogey men the great evil should they return, and that's roughly what we got
instead of a new battleground or area, which is a shame Iconia would have been perfect.. we got 1 ground PvE and 2 Space PvE's in which to earn Iconian Marks and Datacore..
Not my favourite one.. but oh well
Season 11 A New Dawn
And we come back to our favourite Enemies The Mirror Universe.. they made changes to the Badlands to allow for the Mirror Universe Invasion point, helping out the commander of the Defiant, to push back the Terran Spacedocks and there Allies
You Earn Mostly Terran Marks here and the usual secondary object for reputations these days
The weapons are withering Phasers or Disruptors which cause weakening radiation and a small damage over time
Season 12 Agents of Yesterday
A new season a new section, helping out Agent Daniels and the Temporal Investigations, we have 2 New Space PvE's to earn Temporal Marks.. (Anyone else spot a theme here?)
It's interesting as these take place in the 26th Century Alongside Chekov and co
Rank 52 And The Admirality System
Starting at Rank 52, your captain (Admiral in this case)
Can unlock the admirality system, this plays very similar to the Doff system, but instead of using Duty Officers that you gain at every tier, you use copies of every ship your captain possessed during there time levelling to Rank 52
So how does this work?, well each ship has a rank and amount of points as per determined by it's tier
so the tier 1 ships you have will have much lower scores than say a tier 5 battle cruiser
Each ship also has higher scores depending on what it's role was, so a Science ship has a higher Sci score, Cruisers tend to have higher Eng scores, while Escorts have Tac
there are also the composite ships that have higher scores in two areas, such as the Ferengi Nandi, which has decent Tac and Sci scores.
It's a fairly simple system, you pick a mission say protect the fleet and you get given 3 totals such as
Eng 30
Tac 50
Sci 30
In this case you'll want more Tactical based ships than the others, if you succeed there is chance your ship won't be put into maintenance, this doesn't happen often, but it's nice when it does.
As you progress through the campaign you will get tour of duty Missions, these are a seperate resource that you can use once per day to increase your tour bar
Federation Tours grant Energy Credits
Whist
Klingon Empire Grants Dilithium
Rank 52 And The Admirality System Cont'
Now the problem with this system is, if you play F2P you will progress very slowly, sure you can gain extra ships as a critical success, and these are only for this system
So if you earn a [T6] Intel Escort, you don't actually have that ship in your shipyard to use normally, you still have to acquire it with Zen or through the Delta Pack.
Now as you level a new Character or Toon, (Depends on your MMO playing)
You might actually want to not go with the ships that are for your class, so you get a wide range of ships for use when you reach Rank 52, and thus make the system easier.. also any Zen ships you own will be added once you have them in your shipyard at least once.
Again this encourages a Pay 2 Win playstyle now.
Source: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=202052659
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