It’s been another busy week, not just for STO but me as well. I’m 6 weeks away from launching a new web project (not STO related), and the office has me chained to a cubicle. What makes the added work bearable is that Star Trek is being filmed a few hundred meters from me. Have I seen anything yet? Nope. But if you hear about a guy arrested hanging off the back of a food truck as it entered the studio lot, chances are it will be me.
Ok, maybe not;)
Lets start with the new Delta Fleet Holding
Trendy announced in Thursdays blog post that a new fleet holding – this time in the Delta Quadrant would be soon available to existing fleets. While it’s a work i progress, awe are starting to see a few interesting details.
From the original post:
At the conclusion of the Featured Episode “Time in a Bottle,” Captains successfully made contact with a population of Krenim survivors that had hidden themselves away in a pocket of time using a unique piece of temporal technology. This technology proved capable of shielding the existence of an entire planet away from the eyes of the Vaadwaur, the Heralds, and even the Iconian Council itself! With the assistance of Captain Nog, the groundwork was laid to form a cooperative research and development pact with the Krenim, potentially allowing the entire civilized galaxy to benefit from their incredible ability to directly manipulate the perception of time.
Players will have the opportunity to see that agreement through to its fruition by participating in the construction of the Fleet Research Lab – an entirely new Fleet Holding, available to all Fleets in Star Trek Online.
This impressive space station, hidden away in the Delta Quadrant, will be built for the primary purpose of assisting the Krenim as they further develop their expertise in timeline manipulation and temporal mechanics. With the guidance of these new allies, the Research Lab will take on many aspects of Krenim architectural design, but will remain fully owned and operated by the players’ Fleet.
While the focus of this facility will be temporal manipulations, the amenities it offers are uniquely qualified to make this the perfect location for R&D of all types. As such, this facility will offer many new opportunities for players to explore and participate in the existing R&D System in entirely new and rewarding ways.
Clearly based in part on the Krenim Weapon Ship designed by the scientist Annorax from the Voyager two-part episode “The Year of Hell“, the research facility will offer players a number of items to acquire through developing the stations various projects. Standouts include secondary deflectors, new kits, and the ability to buy additional trait and research slots. I wonder if this facility will have a temporal core to keep it hidden from the Iconians 😉
Big thank you out to @
Versatile [class] Kits MK II – costing 42K in Fleet Credits and 8K dilithium, these kits come with a fifth ability built right into the Kit. From the images below we can see more than a dozen possible variations just for engineers alone. While these are likely the *final* versions, as with anything else on Tribble, values may change before they arrive on Holodeck.
Trait Expansion Slots – While Trendy was posting updates on Holodeck, adventurous first timers were investigating the ‘work in progress’ on Tribble. A poorly titled post on Reddit, and a huge AATW assumption on my part (Always Assume the Worst) had me make a comment that we were about to see a nerf with traits. Nothing was farther than the truth. TY to Atheonyirh for setting me straight. In fact it looks like an expansion.
So what does it really mean? In the image we saw a 5th slot available for Starship Traits, and reputations (Space, Ground, and Active) all while maintaining nine active slots.
An expansion of traits. Given that Cryptic has spent a significant amount of effort in recent weeks to address the lag issues within the game, it’s a little hard to understand that they will be adding even more traits to contend with. Likely they saw an opportunity with the update to expand player options with without impacting lag. *fingers crossed*
The expansion appears to include additional R&D slots – something I would have loved to have purchased five months ago.
What we don’t know (yet) is whether these are limited in number. Given that the screen shot above shows 5 slots total – it’s safe to assume these will be limited to 1 per slot type. Again take this with a grain of salt 😉
OK – Lets talk about costs.
Is 100K to 250K worth of fleet credits and 50-100K in dilthium really achievable by most players? I have a hard time saying yes, but with the development costs of a new fleet holding and my fleet being practically empty, I likely will earn enough from building the research base on my own to outfit a slew of alts. But for the ‘average’ player at 2 hours per week – this is well beyond their range to achieve on in-game earnings alone. But it is something they can work towards in a season or two.
The Schematic Drawing is from the fansite: http://www.gilsostartrekschematics.com/fleetchart/yohellfleet/yohellfleet.html
Conversations with the Lootcritter 