So, when the STF Starts, say 'HI'. Easy enough and everyone who has their screen on knows your there and they won't have a problem with you. It's a common practice among the experianced and shows courtesy to the other players.

QFT I routinely complete all optional mission objectives with many cruisers in groups. A little less in PUGS but close to 100% in Fleet groups with all cruisers.

BTW isn't communication a major reason why Fleet groups are so succesful compared to pugs? Yeah sure we've got good equipment , but we usually run on TS and it's just much easier to use a good voice system. Because of the fast and easy communication we can afford to get lazy and even a bit stupid and complete the optionals pretty easily.

Now if only STO would get a good voice system...

It's an interesting point, I noticed this about STO first time I played it a while ago.

There may be several reasons for it, but I think maybe it's at least partly a psychological matter, to do with the nature of spaceships, that makes it feel a bit weird to chat in local.

What I mean is, a shout in local makes sense in a game where you're yomping around on foot, or warm bodies in close proximity.

But it seems a bit weird for a spaceship to "shout" at a another spaceship.

Maybe if there was a "comms channel" that just opened up (and became chat focus automatically when you enter the instance, and lost focus when you leave the instance - optionally turn-offable feature of course) when you entered one of these public instances?

I think because of this psychological problem, and lack of a solution to it such as the above, what's happened with STO is that no culture developed around talking in public instances right from the start, so it's become a "tradition" - people don't see anybody chatting, so they don't chat.

I guess its because most people who do the STF's think of it more of a job and something you have to close your eyes and chew trough to get to the juicy bit of loot. I wonder how many people actually do the STF's because its fun ....

Personally i preferred the old STF's.

i use 3 different weapon types, i used to have a disruptor bank but changed that out for 3x tets, 3x AP and 2x phaser for my tac/cruiser beamboat build, a rainbow cruiser xD. it is still very deadly none the less and if someone wants something of me to the insulting thick end of stupidity, thats their problem.

i always keep my chat window open incase there is a reasonable group of people that come to STF. i want the old STFs back, i have NEVER been a fan of this cut in half stf run, if the issue with the probe destruction and warping to donatra's location on KA was fixed instead, i would happily take it over this datachip grind thats going on now and the non communication.

It's easier for some people to explain what to do over the voice chat than text chat but really... are you implying that your fleet members all have some kind of memory disorder that prevents them from remembering what to do and only through your voice chat system are you able to guide them to an easy victory?

Honestly I'm betting your voice chat is mostly idle chatter... something I would find distracting. If everyone has done the mission several times then there's no point in using voice chat, it's simply a distraction.

I'd much rather run with guys who don't need to be told what to do than a group of players who enjoy babbling to each other while playing the game.

You die, you wait 10 seconds, you respawn. That's the DP. Add in some repairs that take a second to complete to remove a death debuff, maybe.

People will just say F it. And zerg. No tactics, no strategy, just DPS as much as you can until they're dead. No need to say 'hai'.

This is the point. With good communication and teamwork, there is no dying in elite STFs.

What? No, no - dude, screw talking to each other. Who cares if people die. I never get a reply back in /team and now I know why. All strategies point to "zerg it"; forget communication and teamwork. Low dps, afk's, spread out - these are the things that hold back a team of 5, nothing else, really.

Also a very big reason why people don't talk. With the UI designed the way it is, and the fact that we have to manuver the ship in a 3-D volume, we can't really stop to respond to every single chat, not when there are regeneration probes out there healing the larger Borg ships.

Truely all weapons on all ships need autofire, and about 90% of the abilities as well.