Star Trek Online: When New Ships Lose Their Lustre

October 28, 2024 / Roger Edwards

While recently playing the MMORPG, Star Trek Online, I decided to use the “free ship reward” from last year’s Event Campaign V. It gives you a choice between a Premium Tier-6 Starship from an infinity lockbox, 2 x Tier-6 Starship Discount Coupons that you can use in the Z-Store or a bundle of 1,500 Lobi Crystals which will buy you a ship or gear from the Lobi Trader. The fact that I haven’t used this reward for over a year indicates that I’m not exactly short of ships in my inventory. I’ve been flying the Inquiry Battlecruiser for the last two years which I obtained from the Event Campaign IV. But as there’s an appreciable lack of new story content at present in STO, I thought I’d acquire a new ship and spend some time experimenting with a new build. After all, it is the specifics of the build and not the ship that ultimately counts.

I decided to opt for a lockbox ship and chose the Section 31 Command Heavy Battlecruiser on the basis that it looked cool. Yes, I am not especially knowledgeable in the arcane min-maxing associated with STO and tend to make decisions based on superficial factors, rather than data and facts. I decided that I would just do what I did last time I obtained a premium ship. I’d find an appropriate build from the website STO Better and then see if I had all the equipment and traits required. Usually I only have about 60% of the build and then try to find suitable alternatives. Things were no different this time with the new vessel. I opted for a beam build which is viable with a battlecruiser, although a torpedo based build may be a better fit for the statistics of this ship. I managed to cobble together sufficient consoles and traits to focus on Beam Overload.

I think it’s fair to say that I don’t find fine tuning your starship loadout the enthralling end game that so many other players do. I don’t know the relevant game theory and it is clear now that I’m not interested enough to familiarise myself with the nuances of the game’s mechanics. It’s not as if I’ve been left under powered. My new ship still seems to do sustained damage with Beam Overload, which cools down quite quickly. And the new vessel does look cool, which was my main goal. However, I now have a major gap in my end game enjoyment. I’ve dabbled in the past with DPS metres, as they do encourage you to tinker with builds but ultimately it just doesn’t sustain my interest. What I would really like is an expansion with a ton of story content to play through but that is not going to happen anytime soon. Especially with the game transitioning between developers.

I can see now why so many players go all in on multiple alts. Especially those you create during an event where additional benefits are conferred upon new characters. It certainly offers a completionist challenge. Plus more often than not, the stories in STO are well worth playing through multiple times. Therefore, I think this is where I’ll focus my attention in the weeks to come. As for new ships, they’ve lost their lustre as far as I’m concerned. I appreciate that is not the case for a lot of STO players and I am pleased they still have a substantial aspect of the game to provide them pleasure and engagement. But for me, I crave some new narrative content because that has always been the franchises greatest strength. Sadly, I suspect with DECA Games replacing Cryptic, the focus may well shift to new ships, rather than new episodes.