Now that the first of the weekly series of missions has come to an end, we’ve decided to wrap the whole bundle up into a nice tidy package, and tell you how we feel about it from top to bottom — what did they get right, and what did they get wrong?

Before we leap into that review segment however, we have the very latest in news and announcements to bring right atcha, from the minds behind Star Trek Online.  We’ll give you the low-down on the enemy that will appear in the next weekly series, as well as confirm some recent rumors that’ve been floating about.  Then, right before the end, we’ll feature YOUR feedback on how to give players an incentive to join/create Fleets in STO.

NEWS

Series 1 comes to an end.  The Breen Antagonist is defeated.

Series 2 antagonist revealed: The Devidians (concept art)

• “Time’s Arrow” (Find Data’s head, go back and meet Mark Twain)

• Next series kicks off October 16th (that’s 2 weeks off)

NX-01 (Retrofit) will be coming, probably appearing as a T1 on the C-Store (picture)

Rumor confirmation: Gozer will return to the content team in October
(and will hopefully have time for retooling the existing STF missions)

Priority One Podcast – Interview with Daniel Stahl:

• Season 3 (Nov/Dec) to include:
  • UGC Tools (rough/beta, but workable)
  • Ground Combat REDUCTION (smaller enemy groups, smaller away teams)
  • Episode Reply
  • Boff-to-Captain Promotion System
• Post-Season 3 (Early next year)
  • Replayable End-Game Content
  • Revamp of first 10-20 hours of gameplay

From Trekmovie.com:  Star Trek voted #2 among the Top Resurrectable TV Show.

• Voted on by 450 global brand licensing professionals at the Brand Licensing Europe Conference
• (No official response from CBS)

And just because I get asked once a day, here’s dStahl’s answer re: Romulans

For Tribble players: If you want the opportunity to chat with QA Devs, you can type in:
/channel_join tts

Another ASK CRYPTIC is coming.  Submit your questions now!

SERIES ONE REVIEW

The Preservers.  Who they were, and who they became in STO.
https://memory-alpha.org/wiki/Amerind
From “Paradise Syndrom” (TOS, Kirk loses memory)
To “The Chase” (TNG, “Ancient Humanoids” seeded DNA to create life)

The Breen.
Energy Drains from DS9 became Tractor Beams, Energy Siphons, Tyken’s Rift, Polaron Weapons, etc.

Non combat (medical), and puzzles.
Though occasionally clunky/confusing, we both want to see more environmental puzzles included in future missions.

Unique rewards.
The mission rewards for these missions are mostly unlike anything else we’ve previously seen.

The ONLY downside:
In retrospect, might not feel like it was enough content over that period of time.

COMMUNITY FEEDBACK

We asked:  What can Cryptic do to give players incentive to create/join a Fleet?

Common concepts:

1) Fleet Leveling
Each rank would be gated off by progression that could only be completed with large groups.  (FAs, PvP accolades, special unique currency of some sort, etc.)
Offer bonuses that DO NOT give a leg-up in PvP, or are cosmetic only.

2) Fleet Ownership of Property
Starbases, Systems
— Subtopic:  Fleet vs. Fleet territorial PvP
Claim a territory and defend it against incursions from other players.  Use fleet resources to create and man defenses.  The larger the fleet, the better the combat capabilities.
(Interestingly, everyone that brought this up mentioned DEFENDING, never ATTACKING)

3) Fleet Ranking/Ladders
Public rankings that show a collection of Accolades or Levels or something…
A publicly-accessible means of seeing how one Fleet ranks compared to others, on several different metrics.

Of interest, we actually received a couple responses indicating that Fleets are a BAD THING for games.  That they create social cliques, reinforce elitism, and fracture the community.

One alternative suggestion is a series of “Task Groups” similar in function to FaceBook groups that would be open to be joined/left at any time, but each that have their own calendars, announcements, etc.  This open social networking would allow people to form their own social bonds at will, and never prevent anyone from joining whatever group they want to join.