First thanks for any and all advice...

I'm returning to STO, haven't played since before the ground combat revamp due to some family issues but was flipping through the net and noticed that now the feds can get a carrier and that interest me, I've always been a major fan of carrier type games and the fact that this is ST just makes it better. I have a lvl 49 Liberated Borg Engineering Capt in a cruiser right now and have went through the forums and got up to speed on some things, and would like some suggestions on the following points please.

1. Skill set up that will specifically benefit use of the carrier - I'll throw in that I love the new approach to skills.
2. Bridge officers that will be of the most use. My current set up, and play style, is for PVE survivability, lots of heals but takes a while to kill stuff. I have zero exp with most science skills other than the "teams" to heal my shields.
3. Is there a point any more to having 2 versions of the same skill on your bar? The timers seem to overlap now apparently.
4. On the carrier, once you have the type of fighters you want do you have to pay for replacements?
5. What is the recommend type of fighter to use if you want them to be a major factor in your DPS?
6. What is the preferred type of weapons now, I assume beams with the slow turn rate but maybe turrets, and early on my all anti-proton set up was good but with all the changes now I'm not so sure. note - all my anti-proton gear is in cannons, i was flying a escort back then for dailies. May change back to it if it would be faster getting to 50.
7. Duty officers, i signed on, saw the quests, turned them in and have them in my inventory, started what missions I could with them but there are a lot of missions that say I dont have the correct officer, how do we get more/better ones?
8. There appears to have been several episodes go by that have unique gear/bridge officers as possible rewards, was any of it what I will refer to as "Have to have" gear?
9. I found and ran a half dozen or so space STF's last night, are they the best/easiest way to gear up a ship now based solely from PVE? Would the same apply to ground gear?
10. There are several new quests in my log listed as dailies, and apparently the rewards is all in delithium a new type of currency apparently, where can i see whats available with it and how does it compare to the STF rewards?
11. If anyone reading this has used the new carrier what is your impressions and what is your console set up? If its all mk12 stuff what would you use in its place in my situation?
12. I've had a lifetime membership since beta and have seen references to some veteran rewards, how do I find out what they are and claim them?
13. Obviously I'm anxious to get into this carrier and need to get to 50 asap, what is the quickest way to do so taking into mind my need for gear now? Dailies? STF? quests?
14. There is now a option on my log in screen besides the test server called redshirt, what is this?
15. I'm looking for a family orientated laid back fleet that can understand that my real life obligations have to come first, that occasionally I want to just group with my wife and kids, who also occasionally play now, and are willing to answer questions or help but not carry me.

Again thanks for any and all advice I'm really hoping that STO is now everything I wanted it to be out of beta, and from the forums it sure seems to be a lot closer and much more polished.

edit - looking for fleet suggestion.

1. You can check out this page Caitian Atrox Builds. Its a list of builds that players have made with my skill planner for the Carrier.

2. Honestly, you'll need to experiment with different skills to see what you like best. I will say that for away teams you'll want at least 1 Engineer with fabrication abilities.

3. Sometimes its useful. They are on a shared cooldown though. For example, I use cannons on my escort so I want Cannon Rapid Fire to be used as much as possible. I have a duplicate of that ability so that I can always use it more often. Instead of waiting for the full 30 second cooldown, I just have to wait for a 15 second cooldown.

4. I don't believe so. I've never used a carrier but I'm 99% sure that fighters are not consumed so you don't need to keep buying them.

5. Can't help you here sorry.

6. Cannons won't work on a carrier as far as I know. They are primarily only for escorts. So you'll need to use beams. You can have a complete beam boat, meaning no projectiles. As far as energy type, anti-proton is good. Each type has a different benefit so you'll need to figure out which you like best. You can read more about energy types in my weapon guide.

7. For starters you can read my duty officer guide for more info. To answer your question, visit Starfleet academy and talk to the Personnel Officer in the small building by the water (i forget what number the building is). The Personnel Officer has recruitment assignments so you can get more DOffs. You can also buy DOff packs from the C-Store or buy individual DOffs on the Exchange.

8. Nothing is really "have to have". I would say the Jem'Hadar set from the 2800 series is useful. Right now those missions are included in the Cardassian story arc.

9. The equipment you can get from the STF vendors on DS9 are the best against the Borg. They aren't necessarily the best in the game, however they aren't the worst either. On one of my characters I have a whole bunch of gear from the STF vendors and its perfectly fine in all kinds of PvE. As for easiest to get, hmm maybe crafting is easier lol

10. Right below your minimap is a button for the Dilithium Store. The items here are a tad bit stronger than STF gear, but not by much. It really doesn't matter which you get.

11. Can't help you here, sorry.

12. Google is your best friend :p http://www.startrekonline.com/veteran_rewards

13. Do whatever missions you haven't done yet. Do your STFs, do your dailies. It really won't take you a long time to get to 50, you're already at 49.

14. http://forums.startrekonline.com/sho...d.php?t=271633

15. Then join the STO Academy fleet! Send me a message if you are interested.

These answers are not super-in-depth, but I have tried to at least answer them.


1. Have you ever played a KDF captain with the Vo'Quv? If so, you may already have an idea of the kind of builds that mesh well with this carrier. That said, briefly -- as I feel there are others who have explored in more depth where spending 6 points is better than 9, etc. -- take note of the science boff slots and the ability to emphasize them. With the Atrox layout, skills like TSS, HE, GW, Tyken's Rift, Science Team, Eng. Team, EPtS, and so forth will be strong, so keep that in mind when spending points. As an engineer, your build for the cruiser you have may still be applicable in many ways, though if you haven't spent much in the science areas it is probably worth re-considering it.


2. Surivability is still great for the carrier, but yes definitely explore science officers. Look into Transfer Shield Strength, Hazard Emitters, Tractor Beams and/or Tractor Beam Repulsors, Gravity Well, Tyken's Rift, and Science Team. For PvE, anyway. You may want Polarize Hull if for some reason you think your carrier will be getting close enough to cubes/gates or the occasional sphere to warrant wanting out of tractors.


3. Think of it as two cooldowns -- the one for the skill you've just used having to recharge and the one for all skills that share a system. The latter is typically short enough that you can rotate two of the same skill. A common example is Emergency Power to Shields. By the time the first one fades, you can cast the second one to keep it up indefinitely. In fact, you can usually keep two emergency powers up fairly constantly (a good example may be a cruiser keeping EPtS and EPtW up) by keeping on top of recharges/cooldowns. TSS and HE also can be carried in pairs to better assist teammates/yourself. Some doffs can cut the recharge further.


4. No. They don't have a limited number of charges or anything like that. The hangars you equip are like consoles/weapons in that they won't need replaced (unless you are upgrading or swapping which ones you are using).


5. Typically the advanced fighters serve this role well, but the Atrox has a lot of options. Consider the Danube runabouts for their tractor beams to annoy/hold targets or other runabouts for their increased hull over fighters. There are some starting points here. Generally craft with torpedoes and some tactical skills will "strike" harder than those with just some beams or a special ability, but sometimes the debuffs are totally worth it! Consider mixing as well and having two different hangars set up.


6. Beams and turrets, yeah. However for PvE the Borg are nice enough to fly in predictable paths or without too much evasion to make a forward arc viable (dbb, cannons, torps). You may be doing this anyway to fire off gravity well or the like (though you can easily turn the ship when needed otherwise). If you stick with beams and consider the tetryons like it comes with (though upgrade these, of course, as they are terribly low quality), look into the Power Siphon skill to help with the shield drain. This may also boost polarons.


7. Go to the Academy on earth and talk to the various NPCs to recruit more. You can also trade, like, 5 of one quality to get 1 of a better quality if you want. Lastly you can purchase packs in the Cstore, but that's dumb.

Also, as you travel to different sectors, different missions will be available. And after an amount of time the ones in the current sector will update/change.


8. Some of it is. I realize I am a f2p player and wasn't playing under the previous system, but long story short you'll want to take a look at the STF rewards. Roxxy has the Borg gear (under "general" when you talk to her for merchandise) set pieces, though you'll want to make sure to run the mission "Assimilated" in the Undine/Borg missions to get the console (do this on every ship; it's a great console). You can also get the MACO and Omega pieces as a Starfleet officer. You will likely want to set up with the MACO shield at least and then fill the rest of the slots with Borg pieces for the carrier. Don't ignore the potential of the MACO deflector, though.

You can also get MX X, XI, and XII weapons through STF drops, though all of these carry a [Borg] modifier that you may not want for general PvE/PvP.


9. Yes


10. There's a dilithium shop that you can access from the dilithium button under the mini-map in the UI. It's a great way to get ship consoles if you don't want to spend the EC on the exchange / have dilithium to spend. It's also where you get the advanced hangars, which are not tradeable among players. So save your dilithium for your fighters and shuttles, etc. first.

The STF rewards are the best/easiest place for shields/engines/deflectors and weapons for PvE.


11. For my eng. character, I so far have played around with 6 beams, Neutronium Alloy and an EPS console for engineering (though I dump the EPS for more armor often, as I don't need to boost for swapping energy levels too much on the engineer) | a Field Generator or two, shield emitter array, and the Borg console for science | two appropriate energy consoles for the beams I am running.

A more healing-focused build may dump weapon power/boost to use more universal consoles (i.e. ones from Cstore ships) instead of tac consoles, but *shrug*.


12. As I understand it, open the Cstore and look under the unlocks section (last section in its menu). I believe veteran rewards are there just like unlocks from some of the retail packages.


13. I would run STFs to get the rewards so you can equip the ship right away. However, I am pretty sure STFs don't net you XP. Look out for the Mirror event, as that's a nice XP boost, and replay any mission that either you liked or that has a reward you might want (as rewards scale to your level).


14. Redshirt is for Season 6 testing.


15. I suspect there may be plenty of fleets for that here in STO and wish you well. I myself cannot speak from experience, as most of my characters are in a joke fleet made with some friends. I PuG all the time and have yet to find a "home".

I will also add that Dilithium can be exchanged for C-Points on the Dilithium Exchange, which you can access from the dropdown off your minimap console.

Aside from the Personnel Officer next to Lt. Ferra at Starfleet Academy, there are also three other Personnel Officers scattered throughout the grounds that will let you get Duty Officers of a specific species: Vulcan, Andorian, and Tellarite. (Wish there were more of them for the other Fed races...).

Some Duty Officer assignments reward you with more Duty Officers or allow you to exchange Prisoners or Refugees for a Duty Officer. Colonial Assignment Chains, when completed, will reward you with Blue quality Duty Officers and let you do a repeatable assignment for a chance at a Purple quality Duty Officer.

The Beta Ursae and Zeta Andromeda sector blocks have some of the best Duty Officer assignments in the game. Basically tooling around in Bajoran/Cardassian space and visiting their exploration clusters is a good way to advance in the DO system.

I can relate to your situation as a family man. I am a casual player with a family myself. You can check out the Federation Reborn fleet if you like... you can visit our fleet forum at http://z15.invisionfree.com/Federati...ex.php?act=idx