[xonak]

Greetings, comrades-in-arms.
I have a few questions that I can't seem to find answers for on any of the wikis or forums ... at least not that have been answered post-2015. I figured I'd post a few of them here, and perhaps some other folks also have questions that they have hesitated to ask for fear of seeming too noob and this could get the ball rolling.

In no particular order:

1) Bridge Officer (BOFF) Traits:

a - Do the Space traits apply only if the officer is assigned to a station?
b - Is there any way to search the exchange for specific traits?
c - Are any of the C-Store BOFFs totally worth it?
d - If traits do not apply if not at a station, and there are never more than 5 stations, why would one have more than five officers?

II) Ships and Their Parts:

z - What are fleet ship modules? I don't appear to have any. They seem rather expensive.
y - Assuming the expensive way is the only way to get those modules, my follow-up is .. are the modules the only way to get fleet ships?
x - If the answer to the above two questions are "yes" and "yes' my third question is: Yikes! ouch!
w - Do you keep an admiralty ship even if you decommission the "real" one?

I probably have a zillion more but I believe in starting slow to sort of rope people into something and THEN springing the deluge on them.

Thank you in advance for your efficiency and logic.

[Michael]

Even after playing this for years, taking a break for a bit and coming back, I felt like a n00b so don't worry about asking questions. We're here for ya!

BOffs:
a - I'd imagine would ony be active if you have them in a station, but someone else may have a better answer
b - For boffs or your character? I don't believe you can change your boffs traits though.
c - I rarely buy anything with Zen (someone else likely has a better answer)
d - Some like to have different boffs for differnt ship builds. Mb they have some they only use in space and some only for ground.

Ships:
z - Used to get Fleet high end ships, select fleet ships when at a ship vendor (might as well take a look while visiting the UFP starbase hehe)
y - It is faster if you have the ECs to just buy em off the exchange or Z-store, but you can also get them for each T6 rep you achieve.
x - LoL
w - Oh YES! I'm not a fan of hanging onto stuff in-game (or in real life for that matter) that's not needed. In fact, there are plenty of ships you gain while doing admiralty missions. Some stay with you and some have a limited amount of time/usage b4 they disappear, but I believe you'll always keep ships that you once owned within the admiralty system.

[xonak]

Thanks this is very helpful. With regard to traits, I was thinking if I'm searching the exchange for a new BOFF and wanted to find one with a specific trait, if there was a way to search for that, but after trying a few things, I see that, no, there is not.

[aceman67]

You can't change traits on your BOFFS, unfortunately, but when searching for them on the exchange you can see what their traits are when the tool-tip for that BOFF is visible from a mouse-over. It's actually uncommon for a BOFF to have a space trait, and rare for them to have more than one.

If you're really going for the min-max route, the following BOFFs are the most desirable.

Male Rare (blue) Romulan Tactical officer from the Romulan Embassy for Superior Romulan Operative. Romulan Captains can get BOFFs with this trait for all their BOFFs through regular gameplay.

Hierarchy Science Officer for Pirate Trait, a mission reward.

Nausicaan Diplomatic Reward Pirate Trait BOFFs (Reward for completing Diplomacy DOFF mission chains). KDF Aligned characters can obtain this trait normally as this trait always appears on Nausicaan BOFFs.

Jem'Hadar Vanguard BOFFs (Zen-Store purchase) for the Engineered Soldier (Space). They come fully trained in all specializations and make great replacements for starting BOFFS. They also make good Ground Mission BOFFs.

[Sul-Matuul]

BOFF and DOFF searching on the exchange is abysmal in this game so it’s not easy to find what you want trait wise.
The best option is to go by tooltip info when viewing them. But generally certain species only have specific traits; that makes it a bit easier to narrow down. For DOFF traits you’re best to try and find the name of the duty officer and search for that, most traits are linked to specify names officers do fairly easy to find once you know how.

If there is anything special that you want in terms of BOFF traits them just drop a list here. We have a lot in the fleet banking system you can freely make use of and many members will have spares sitting in rosters unused who they’ll maybe donate to help you out. No use spending resources when the fleet can help you out; that’s what we’re all here for.

[Taku]

1) Bridge Officer (BOFF) Traits:

a - Do the Space traits apply only if the officer is assigned to a station?
b - Is there any way to search the exchange for specific traits?
c - Are any of the C-Store BOFFs totally worth it?
d - If traits do not apply if not at a station, and there are never more than 5 stations, why would one have more than five officers?

a - Yes.
b - No, but you might want to look here for more information about BOff traits.
c - I have never bought one. If you can get Very Rare BOffs, you're pretty well set.
d - Personally, I use them for various things. I have 18 BOff slots. I have a rotating Space crew of 9 (3 of each), I have 4 BOffs that are the Away Team only, and I have a couple that are only for storage of items that I might want to swap out. (Going to kill Borgs? Grab the Borg gun from a storage BOff. Need to keep food out of the inventory? Drop them onto a storage BOff. That sort of thing.) Separating BOffs into Space and Ground cuts the training costs. Every skill you give a BOff increases the cost of that BOff's next skill. So if you keep Space skills to Space BOffs and Ground Skills to Ground BOffs, you can cut your training costs considerably. Also, Space BOffs can be used for storage as well. They don't need armor or weapons or items. But that's just me.

II) Ships and Their Parts:

z - What are fleet ship modules? I don't appear to have any. They seem rather expensive.
y - Assuming the expensive way is the only way to get those modules, my follow-up is .. are the modules the only way to get fleet ships?
x - If the answer to the above two questions are "yes" and "yes' my third question is: Yikes! ouch!
w - Do you keep an admiralty ship even if you decommission the "real" one?

z - Fleet Ship Modules (FSMs) are used to buy Fleet ships. Typically 4 or 5 are needed to buy a Fleet ship. UNLESS you have the C-Store version of the ship. If you have the C-Store version, then the cost for the Fleet ship drops to one FSM.
y - Yes. Fleet ships are bound to the character that buys them and cannot be traded. You can earn 14 character-bound FSMs by completing all of the Reputations to Level 6. Should take about... The rest of the year(?). Or you can buy unbound FSMs from the Exchange or the C-Store.
x - Yeah. Buy the C-Store versions. It's easier that way.
w - Yes you do! Admiralty cards stay with you after you Dismiss a ship. This is true for free ships, C-Store ships, Spacedock ships, Lobi Store ships, Event ships, and Lockbox ships. All ships. Provided you take them out of their boxes. They have to enter your Roster to be counted in your Admiralty list. I can't tell you how many ships I have bought, taken out of the box and then dismissed. Just to get the Admiralty card. But I can tell you I have 93 Admiralty cards.

Thank you in advance for your efficiency and logic.

You're welcome.

[rsciw]

d - If traits do not apply if not at a station, and there are never more than 5 stations, why would one have more than five officers?[/INDENT]

All has been answered quite well already, but I figure I go in on this point a little more.

As previously mentioned by others, you can have Boffs set up purely for space, others for ground only. Then also you may want to have some form of RP going on, so a Nausicaan, a potato (Hierarchy guy), Orion, Borg etc. would look weird on a Romulan ship. As such you can place those in the stations you want, but in the Doff screen is a section where you can apply Boffs to certain positions as in First Officer, Chief Engineer, etc. This way when you get a mission window popping up with your boffs, it's those boffs appearing, not those assigned to the ship stations.

Also of course useful to have multiple depending on the ship you fly. If e.g. you're flying a Romulan ship, having Boffs with SRO trait is useful. But when you switch to a non-Romulan ship, you can switch to other boffs with traits more useful to that ship.

[Taku]

Just know that assigning different BOffs to those jobs in the Department Heads DOff screen do not change the DOff missions.

Also, check this if you want a list of "Special BOffs".

[Sylveria]

The only dumb question is the one that isn't asked. Many thanks and kudos to those who responded with helpful advice.

I even learned a thing or two from the responses and I've been playing this game for many years now- no one knows "everything" but collective knowledge is priceless. Another one of the many things I absolutely love about this Fleet.

As to C-Store Ships and Fleet Modules- in my own experience, I've found that first buying the C-Store versions is more valuable only because Fleet Ships are bound to the character that uses the module for the purchase of the ships- so if you ever want an "alt" to use the same vessel, you'll have to rebuy the same amount of modules all over again unless you own the C-Store version as well. This can save you a TON of cash in the future as C-Store ships are Account bound, not just Character bound.

Fleet Ship Modules offer a great upgrade potential to some ships- but some ships are already considered "Fleet Grade" (which is why they don't have a "Fleet" version available) and another point to be made is if you're not interested in having "alt" characters, buying Fleet versions outright may be more beneficial if you're not interested in the unique consoles (or traits) each C-Store ship comes with, etc.

[xonak]

All these answers have been excellent and you all are terrific. I want to particularly mention how incredibly useful this information is:

a -Separating BOffs into Space and Ground cuts the training costs. Every skill you give a BOff increases the cost of that BOff's next skill. So if you keep Space skills to Space BOffs and Ground Skills to Ground BOffs, you can cut your training costs considerably. Also, Space BOffs can be used for storage as well. They don't need armor or weapons or items. But that's just me.

This is the kind of thing players of huge games like this often never figure out or notice. The increase in cost to train when training, eg, ground skills on a BOFF you keep around for Space is just --- well if I knew the emoji for a Star Trek chef's kiss, I'd use it. Thanks!!

- - - Updated - - -

If there is anything special that you want in terms of BOFF traits them just drop a list here. We have a lot in the fleet banking system you can freely make use of and many members will have spares sitting in rosters unused who they’ll maybe donate to help you out. No use spending resources when the fleet can help you out; that’s what we’re all here for.

Actually, I've been searching high and low for a female Vulcan science officer with Efficient trait. To make a long story short, my wife sort of plays over my shoulder/back-seat Captains the good ship Xonak and we make the First Officer basically her avatar in the game. She wants a Vulcan science officer, and I'd like another space trait. I wouldn't hate a nice superior like Creativity, while she is interested in being as, forgive me, "Vulcany" as possible. So telepathy, nerve pinch, etc. But mainly I've just had a heck of time finding one that meets the three criteria of "female, science, efficient".

Her current avatar (Vulcan female, common quality) has logical, nerve pinch, peak health, physical strength. So not really hitting the right notes.

If this seems peculiarly specific, I can only tell you to go and be married for 21 years and then you'll understand.

Thanks!

[aceman67]

Unfortunately, Vulcans can't have the Efficient trait.

Kentari and Lukari always have that trait, and Letheans, Liberated Borg, and Saureans can possibly have it. That's it...

https://sto.gamepedia.com/Trait:_Efficient/boff

[xonak]

Unfortunately, Vulcans can't have the Efficient trait.

Kentari and Lukari always have that trait, and Letheans, Liberated Borg, and Saureans can possibly have it. That's it...

https://sto.gamepedia.com/Trait:_Efficient/boff

I see. I was going from this page: https://sto.gamepedia.com/Bridge_Officer_traits
.. which lists it as an option, if I read it correctly.

[aceman67]

That's because the only Vulcan BOFF that you can get with that Trait is the special Vulcan Science/Intelligence officer from the Delta Rising Operations bundle, a 15,000 Zen purchase.

https://sto.gamepedia.com/Vulcan_Sci...icer_Candidate

And that BOFF is always Male.

[Sul-Matuul]

Is it possible to get that trait on alien boffs? That way you could make her look Vulcan and have the trait as well.

[xonak]

And that BOFF is always Male.

Aha! Thanks!! Basically no space trait for the Vulcans. That's fine, I can make her even more Vulcan and make the Mrs. happy. But that was a pretty good idea about the Alien too, hadn't thought of that.

This does raise another dumb question that probably has an easy answer, but ... Fleet Bank?