I been checking websites and the forums and the limited online help files but have had no luck. I thought science officers (or was it science ships) had the ability to target an enemy's susbsytems during space combat? I have not seen any option for this in the HUD displays.

Is this a high-level skill or such? I am only a level 3 lieu science officer.

Once you are in your first real science ship (i.e. tier 2 at lt com) you will have the option. Hit P and bring up your powers list, and you should see "target weapon subsystem", "target auxiliary system" etc

You can also see the buttons for it below your weapons banks in the UI, and they're clickable from there.


Just tap the power and the next phaser shot will hit them with the attack

Yeah ... powers aren't put on your hotbar automatically any more so you have to manually drag them off the Powers display (P key).

I really wish they would go back to the old way and automatically put them on your display otherwise I forget sometimes that I get a new power now and then.

You shouldn't have to put them on the powerbar - they also appear below the power settings, as I recall.

Thank you for the quick replies all.

They are still put on the hot bar automatically. Unfortunately they are not always put on a hot bar that you have active. If you open up your hot bar to show all three rows of bars you will find them.

Weird as I run with all three hotbars up all the time (for ship mode)

Wonder if I have a setting set somewhere that disables this. Course now I am so used to checking the P screen as I level, it's not a big deal ... but hmmmm .... :p

Just to clarify, because it seems nobody actually said it in this thread - and the OP wasn't sure about it in his post.

Targeting subsystems is a Science Ship thing. Not a science officer thing.

I said it, though I may not have been totally clear with it hehe

To reiterate, yes, it's available on sci ships only, and you get the targeting subsystems deal regardless of your captain class.

You can be tactical, engie or science, and still see the option to target subsystems.


This is important to keep in mind, because there ARE BO skills that allow you to target subsystems, and they work differently than the innate ship given ones do.

Right. If you check the info, what Science ships actually get is:

Beam: Target Shields I, Beam: Target Weapons I, etc.

Tactical officers can get Beam: Target Shields II, Beam: Target Weapons II, etc, as normal Lieutenant-grade skills.

Hypothetically, the Science ship versions are 'Ensign'-grade versions of those Tac officer powers. Except ensign-grade versions of the Beam: Target powers don't actually exist as trainable BO skills.

This means the Tactical officer Lieutenant skills are better than the Science ship equivs. They're grade II, not grade I. But of course Science ships get theirs for free.