Star Trek Online at Ten Ton Hammer

Warp Drives are humming with anticipation all over the galaxy as Star Trek Online continues to build towards engagement. With closed beta in full speed ahead mode, more details continue to emerge from Cryptic Studios about this highly anticipated title. This week we were fortunate enough to sit down and discuss the abilities system with Steve Nix, Combat System Designer and Craig Zinkievich, Executive Producer.

How do abilities work in STO? Does your race play a factor in your characters overall capabilities? Does STO finally succeed at breaking the traditional MMOG pigeon-holing of class roles? The answers to all these questions, and many more, await you in this look at the most fundamental aspect of combat, player abilities.

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Ten Ton Hammer: Can you explain a brief overview of abilities and how they work?

Steve: They have a variety of different modifiers that will affect the player’s capabilities such as skills that you improve by spending earned points.  These skills modify abilities which are discreet clickable “powers” if you will.

Ten Ton Hammer:  How do you gain these points? Is it through experience or as you level?

Steve:  As you go through the game completing missions and fighting off enemies you will earn points, as well as gaining reputation with Starfleet which can be spent on progressing your career as a Captain and earning a higher commission for your starship as well as gaining more bridge officers for your crew and so on.

Ten Ton Hammer: Is this a progressive tree based system?

STO characters are more complex than traditional MMOGs

Steve: You have a career choice. Our characters are a bit more complex than the average MMOG in that you as a player are playing your own Captain but then you are also responsible for your Bridge Officers as well as your crew on your entire starship.  This means that any given moment that you are playing, you are improving all those assets.  You have a personal career choice as a Captain, which can be Tactical, Engineer or Science. As you develop your character and acquire bridge officers they will also be either Tactical officer, Engineering officers and Science officers that you are developing.

Ten Ton Hammer: Do these career paths affect both space and ground combat?

Steve: Yes they do, on the ground your personal career choice is more apparent since you are playing as the individual. For instance if I am playing as a tactical officer I will have certain abilities that I get just for being a Tactical Officer that I can use on the ground. I also have my away team that is a composition of my bridge officers that I use or other players to round out the group, but my own discreet performance is largely affected by my career choice. Now in space you are more representing you as the captain on your ship and so your own abilities that you can use are more focused on the bridge officers that you have assigned to duty stations on your bridge as well as the ship class you are currently captaining be it a tactical escort, a cruiser which is more of a engineering ship or science vessels.  So in space now it’s more of a composition of all your officers and what abilities you have trained them in.

Ten Ton Hammer: When you send the away team “away,” is any portion of that team AI controlled?

Steve:  When you beam down, if you are in group with any other players, they will beam down with you as part of the away team. You can have up to five people in your away team, any slots that are not filled by a player will be taken up a by an AI bridge officer, and that can come from your bridge officers or any other player you are grouped withes officers.  When you beam down by yourself you will choose four officers to beam down with you, now this is very interesting because as your developing your bridge officers you can specialize them if you will and you can have certain ground officers you’ve trained and certain starship bridge officers that you have trained up, or you can just balance each one and have your own sort of Scotty and Spock and Bones that you take each time.

Ten Ton Hammer: So are there always five party members when you beam down, whether it is you and four UI controlled characters or five players?

Steve: That is correct, it’s true for all episodes, but there are some instances where you beam down  as just the captain.