<~Bizarro_Rekhan> Hello, everyone, and welcome to today's dev chat. With us to answer questions today is Al "Geko" Rivera, STO's lead designer, and Zeke "Continuum" Sparkes, STO's lead content designer.


<~Bizarro_Rekhan> We'll be taking user questions throughout the chat. Please send a PM to Bizarro_Rekhan with your questions. This channel is muted so only the developers can talk, but for general chat and followup questions, please join #talktrek

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Q: <Cpt_Katalena_Valdane> It has been said that when you beam down it is only to a specific area. Can I fly to any of the canon planets, like Trill or Bajor and explore, or can I only do it if I am on a mission?


A:<Cryptic_Continuum> That's a good question. The answer is really a bit of both. There are an awful lot of planets in the game and some of them are tied directly to story lines or missions so you can't always get to them. But we absolutely have planets that you can (and will want to) visit whenever you want. You should definitely expect to be able to walk around on familiar starbases and planets.

Q: <Alien_de_jour> Can you explain a little better how personal shields work? Do they stop everything or only energy weapons? Do they completely stop damage or only reduce it by a certain amount / percentage? And will they ever get so tough that we'll see characters tank repeated phaser hits?

A:<Cryptic_Geko> Personal shields stop most incoming energy damage.  About 10% bleeds through and the rest is absorbed by the shield. However physical attacks, like punched and knives, will penetrate shields more - so they can be more dangerous. Some energy types can bypass low level shields entirely, so if you expect to go up against polaron weapons, you will need better shields. This is more or less how space works too.

Q: <Nasedo> when you beam down to a planet would your ship still be in space or would it disappear?

A:<Cryptic_Continuum> Your ship will clean up, so other players would see it disappear. We want to make sure nothing bad can happen to you when you're actually on another map. ;)

Q: <Loekii> Cryptic_Continuum - Disappear How?   Fade out?  Warp out?

A: <Cryptic_Continuum> We've been trying a number of different things to see which one reads the best Loekii. Honestly I don't think we've picked for certain.
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((  More on forcefields:   ))
A:<Cryptic_Geko> Force Fields are more like walls with HP.  You don't ware a Force Field but you can place one on the ground.
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Q:<Flatfingers> Do kits provide all of the defining capabilities of our characters?

A: <Cryptic_Geko> No, kits are about a third to one half of your characters abilities.  Your weapon is very important responsible for much of your DPS, as are devices (consumables).  You profession also grants you specific activatable skills as well as passive skills that affect all of the above.

Q: <Swea> I'd like to know about bridge officers during away missions and howthere xp is earned. I've read a cpl times that our bridge officers will lvl jus like our character. During away missions where you have other player characters will the bridge officers not used get xp...or will we have to flip flop what BO's we use in order to lvl them up if we're grouped more than soloing. Or are there xp/lvls earned a different way than our main character?

A:<Cryptic_Geko> You will earn skill points for you Bridge Officer.  These skill points are a pool that you can give to any of your Bridge Officers - even if you don't take them on missions.  A Bridge Officer must have a certain amount of skillpoints in order to be promoted.

Q: <Arokh72> In the shows all we saw on the Fed side were essentially 3 types of phaser from a small handheld to a phaser rifle. Will be limited thusly, or shall we have an Elite force type range of weapons?

A:<Cryptic_Geko> There are hundreds of handheld weapons in STO.  From standard issue pistols and rifles, all the way up to exotic anti-proton arcwave heavy assault cannon. There are 6 energy types (Phaser, Disruptor, Plasma, Tetryon, Polaron, and Anti-Proton), each have pistols, rifles and heavy assault.  Each weapon has a different type of alt fire and procs. Starfleet weapons, however, issue only phaser weapons, but there are high end phasers.

Q: <Vuk> How many BO's are availible , is it based on ship size , rank ? and how many can you have max ?

A:<Cryptic_Continuum> The number of Bridge Officers in your roster is based on your current rank. The number of officers you can have active at one time is based on your ship. Bigger and more advanced ships have more seats so more officers can get involved.

Q:<[BOK]Deyvid> In an Away Mission, if one of our BO's is defeated or incapacitated, will we be able to beam them up and beam down a replacement, or will we be one-man short for the rest of that Away Mission?

A:<Cryptic_Geko> No one dies in an MMO.  A defeated Bridge Officer will need to be resuscitated, and then they can rejoin the mission. You are only short the man for the individual encounter, unless you team-wipe, then you have to e-transport back to a re-spawn point. 
   Everyone can use CPR.  CPR is slow, is very hard to use in combat, and comes with a res penalty.  Medics/Doctors have Cortical Stimulators which essentially is a better rez.

Q:<tamgros>: Cryptic_Geko, what if you "the captain" (and all other PCs) dies, do your BOs keep fighting and try to win that encoutner?

A:Cryptic_Geko Yes, your Bridge Officers can keep fighting without you and they can rez you.  You ca, however, choose to respawn at a respawn point if you don't want to wait.

Q:<sdgd> is the mission clear up to the spot you wiped? do you restart the mission from the start? is there checkpoints in each mission and you go back to the last checkpoint?

A:<Cryptic_Continuum> Yes we make sure that the respawn points are clear and safe, or aren't active until they have been cleared out. For longer content there are always several places you can go back to if you wipe, or even if you have to log out and log back in, so you don't have to start from the very beginning again.

Q:<Khannnnnn> Will there be ranged heals in the game, and if so, how will they work?

A:<Cryptic_Geko> Yes, your Bridge Officers can keep fighting without you and they can rez you.  You can, however, choose to respawn at a respawn point if you don't want to wait. There are also melee heal items like a dermal regenerator. At first we tried melee healing only, to be more like the show, but it was just too limiting for healers and it simply was not fun. Only Med Officers can heal.  Anyone can carry consumable heal items.  Engineers can repair shields. This applies to Bridge Officers as well as Players. So you could go on an away mission with only a Tactical, but you will be limited to consumables.
     There are all types of heals. When you heal, you turn to face them.

Q:<Kurzon> What kind of melee weapons will we see on the Fed side if any?

A:<Cryptic_Geko> Fed only uses Martial Arts, but they can pick up and use melee weapons, like a Bat'Leth or a Jem'Hadar Pole Arm. But the Federation is not melee weapon focused.

Q: <Alien_de_jour> Can characters fire while moving? And if so does movement lower your accuracy?

A:<Cryptic_Continuum> Yup, you can move around during most attacks and it doesn't affect your chance to hit.

Q: <Escavlier> Will there be ground based PvP?

A:<Cryptic_Continuum> You bet, we love the fact that the game is focused not just on your ship and space but also on your captain and what happens on the ground. So our PvP designs cover both space and ground combat. (Does anyone else hear Amok Time music right now?)

<~Bizarro_Rekhan> That's all we have time for today, folks. Thanks for coming out! We'll see you next time at our next dev chat.