You’d think porting over trademark ships and recreating races would be enough to give Star Trek Online the flavor it needs to be authentic to fans, but developers plan to ramp up the content and atmosphere even more in Season 4 for a more immersive experience.

“The next step forward is continuing to make the game more “Star Trek.” This includes more story, more locations and factions from the universe, and generally more elements that allow the game to feel like the shows. There are a ton of features on our backlog to get to, but in general, the motto is ‘More Like Trek,’” said Cryptic Studios in its December Ask Cryptic newsletter.

With the impending arrival of Season 3 features like the Foundry content generation system and Episode replay system, Cryptic acknowledged that the framework needed to expand the game world is there.

Aside from additional content from TV episodes and lore, Season 4 and beyond should also bring gameplay improvements. “For Season 4, we want to introduce “Crew” as an important gameplay element of your ship. We would like to see departments within your ship have leaders, such as “Chief Engineer,” as well as a staff of individuals who when assigned to “Engineering” provide a specific bonus.”

Fans though would have to wait a lot more before they can get the full experience of seeing crew members roaming around the ship interior. Ground combat is also expected to get a major overhaul after two Seasons of only minor fixes.

“In Season 4 we will be releasing a major update to ground combat, which will help PvP, so that is something on the books to start with. For additional PvP support, we are looking into ways to incorporate PvP into upcoming story updates. There is also a chance we may release an additional PvP map in Season 4, but my estimate is that it will be sometime between Season 5-6 where we will start to see some major PvP features hit Holodeck.”

Season 5 could even activate Sol System maps, which Cryptic Studios confirmd as being in the pipeline, and which fans have long been clamoring for since the game launched.

This month, Mr. Stahl dedicated his September Ask Cryptic post to answering queries about Feature Episodes, including the planning that went into these weekly missions and what’s in store for upcoming updates.

First off, Mr. Stahl clarified that no skipping will be allowed–all five to six Feature Episodes that make up each story-arc Series should be played in succession. Which wouldn’t be so bad because several new accolades await captains who finish the mission objectives, he said.

The current running Series revolves around the Breen invasion of the Deferi, a peaceful race that calls out to both Federation and Klingon camps for help. Two Feature Episodes have already been released, with three more scheduled for every Saturday this month.

“The inspiration was that Star Trek could present episodic content in the same format as the television series did. When we launched the game, many of the primary missions in the game were presented as Episodes with multiple acts. This all came from our desire to have the missions feel like Trek,” Mr. Stahl said.

Feature Episodes are also the tools in which the developers will expand the Star Trek Online lore. “Each series will give us a chance to focus on a specific species or faction storyline within the game so that we can go back and tell the stories of whatever happened to [this species or faction]?”

Having had a taste of the Undine, nothing would excite us more than a Series focused on the Borg nemesis. There’s also the hush-hush Special Series Reward to look forward to, which should be all sorts of mind-blowing given the patience it takes to complete the month-long Feature Episodes.

If not, I’m sure DStahl and his team will get heavy fire. And no amount of defensive maneuvering will save them.

Star Trek Online is giving full promotional back-up to its newest free expansion “Season Two: Ancient Enemies” to encourage more captains to sign up  and explore the brand-new content on offer.

The Star Trek Online client can now be purchased for a low $19.99 through online retailers like Steam, GameStop, D2D and Stardock, and will provide access to both Federation and Klingon play for newbies to the Final Frontier.

A special Welcome Back Weekend is also underway starting last Aug. 4 until Aug.9 to woo back inactive captains who have stopped logging in to their accounts. For several days, these MIA pilots can log on to the game, patch up Season 2, and return to their galactic adventures without the need to re-sub.

Of course, once the Welcome Back Weekend is over, players will need to pay the full sub amount to continue logging in. There’s a good chance of this happening with all the additional episodes and ships in Season 2.

Not only has the level cap been raised from 45 to 51, Federation and Klingon pilots alike will gain access to new Tier 5 ships plus ranks.

Story-wise, Klingons get eight additional Episodes and will have to defend their capital city against a historical nemesis, the Fek’ihri. Add to this mayhem the continuing struggle against the Undine, Borg and other alien races and you have a recipe for diplomatic disaster just waiting to explode. It’s up to you to work it all out and, as a reward, you might just earn special ranks and loot for handling First Contact missions with ambassadorial grace.

Star Trek Online players lost some and gained some this week as they mourned the stepping down of executive producer Craig Zinkievich while celebrating the Fourth of July sale at the C-Store.

Mr. Zinkievich called it quits after serving two and half years on Star Trek Online as executive producer. He said in a statement posted at the website that he wished to “take a break” from his gaming duties at Cryptic Studios after a seven-year tenure. His role as STO grand captain will be taken up by “production superstar” Daniel Stahl, whom he recommends quite enthusiastically:

“With Dan in the Captain’s chair, I’m confident that this team will be true to Star Trek’s vision and continue to expand STO to its fullest potential,” Mr. Zinkievich said but it was the Kirk photo anecdote that sealed the deal.

Mr. Stahl will probably oversee the final development touches on Season 2, and browse through the questions Cryptic has been soliciting since last week via the official forums.

The mood has lightened a bit though recently with the Fourth of July weekend sale at the C-Store. Ship variants will enjoy a 20% discount starting July 2 to July 6. This includes the super new and drool-worthy Dreadnought Galaxy seen in the Next Generation series finale episode. Its pop culture legacy aside, the Dreadnought Galaxy boasts of a Spinal Phaser Lance and a cloaking device, and the distinction of being the only Federation cruiser that can equip dual cannons.

How’s that for blasting away your glumness?

Ground combat in Star Trek Online is like fine wine—it gets better and more complex with time. At the beginning ranks, it’s a simple shoot-em-up but turns fast into a sprawling tactical battle as you and your bridge officers attempt to expose, exploit and flank enemies into submission.

Two new videos uploaded at the official STO website gives a short tutorial on these three concepts that can spell the difference between mission success and eating phaser fire.

Expose and Exploit
Exposing enemies through special weapon abilities (and enhanced by traits) makes them more vulnerable to damage. Triggering an Expose phase is a great way to bring down foes quick and easy.

How does this happen? Well, Exposed opponents are susceptible to Exploit attacks, which deal far more damage than normal attacks—powerful enough to kill with one hit. The increased damage multiplier from Exposing enemies is a great incentive to equip you and your officers with Expose-enabling weapons. It’s also advisable to choose Expose weapons that inflict a short stun effect to keep them in place for the ensuing Exploit barrage.

Remember to keep a strong balance of Exploit and Expose weapons. Some Trekkies leave the task of Exposing enemies to their officers and wield dual Exploit weapons instead to finish the job.

Flanking
Another unique aspect to ground combat is the lack of multi-sided shields, which we know are standard fare for all starships. This is where attacking enemies from a flanked position—from the side, behind or below—becomes a major consideration. As opposed to engaging enemies head on, spread out your ground force so enemies are forced to take extra damage from your flank attacks. Some even crawl the ground while shooting to stack some bonus firepower.

The videos make a great visual presentation of these concepts at work, so be sure to check them out along with the dozen other tutorial videos uploaded on the website.

Players went all-out with their questions on the Klingon faction, showing major interest in their future game play mechanics. Among the queries answered in the latest Ask Cryptic blog post are the functionalities of Klingon Houses and Carriers.

On the Klingon Houses, the developer said these will “function like Federation Fleets so all advancement and benefits are handled by players themselves” but failed to mention what exactly these perks are. While on the Klingon Carriers, it was pointed out that the Vo’Quv carrier will have two fighter bays. Each bay can hold a wing of custom fighters ranging from blasters to disablers, which will make the Carrier more adaptable to a variety of space encounters. The Vo’Quv itself will have capable weapons so taking out the fighters will not mean an automatic lose for the Klingon Carrier, and will make it strong fleet support vessel for the Empire.