Podcast Feed – http://ctrlalttrek.podbean.com/2010/05/01/ctrl-alt-trek-episode-012-%E2%80%93-death-becomes-us/
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Looking for Audio submissions to start the show. This is Captain so and so of Starship so and so and you’re listening to Ctrl Alt Trek

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CtrlAltTrek – http://twitter.com/Ctrlalttrek
Aprillian – http://twitter.com/Aprillian
Vrishna – http://twitter.com/Vrishna137
Bouvi – http://twitter.com/BlackheartBouvi

Hot Topic

This seems to be a pretty hot topic.  How do you feel about the new death penalty?  Email us at ctrlalttrek@gmail.com.

Here is the new “Injury System” from the 1.1 patch notes.

Injury System
In conjunction with the new Difficulty Settings, we are introducing an injury system that adds added risks to playing on higher difficulties. Depending on the type and severity of the injury sustained, you will notice a decrease in related performance until treated. Federation players will receive a mission that sends you a contact on Earth Space Dock which will explain more about injuries.

Here’s How It Works

• If your captain, your bridge officers, or your ship is defeated, there is a chance they will receive one injury. This occurs at the time you are defeated, regardless of whether or not you respawn or are resuscitated. Injuries cause various de-buffs depending on the type and severity.
• If you receive an injury, the severity of that injury is determined by chance, modified by the existence of any untreated injuries already on that character/ship. For example, the chance of receiving a Major or Critical injury is increased if the character/ship has an untreated injury already.
• Injuries do not occur below level 5 on any difficulty setting and there is a maximum of 50 total injuries each character/ship can sustain at any given time.

Type of Injuries

• Minor – The negative effect of minor injuries is small enough that it would take several minor injuries before most players would notice any difference in performance.
• Major – These injuries feel significant, but the character/ship can continue to function with only slight performance decreases. Sustaining more than one major injury of the same type (which modifies the same stat) will begin to cause noticeable performance impacts.
• Critical – These injuries will cause noticeable performance impacts. A character/ship may still continue on in a mission (and succeed) with more than one critical injury, but each additional critical injury will prove costly to treat and will put the character/ship below the expected potency curve.

How to Treat an Injury

• Visit a medic/engineer in your faction’s major social hub and pay them energy credits to remove the injuries. Use an injury pack to remove the item yourself.
• Regenerators treat personnel injuries – Components treat ship “injuries” (damage)
• Each pack comes in 3 versions that correspond to the severity of the injury.
• Injury packs are not available in replicators, but some packs are available stores.
• There’s a chance of finding some types of injury packs as a reward drop.
• Your medical/engineering staff will automatically treat each Minor Injury 30 minutes after each injury was sustained.

How the difficulty slider affects injuries:

• Normal – No injuries as a result of defeat.
• Advanced – Introduces injuries as a result of defeat.
• Elite – Increased chance of injury as a result of defeat.

From our forums:

billybob476
I like the fact they are implementing this system. I also like the fact that they give you a ‘quick’ way to deal with it (if you want to carry the packs in your inventory) and a ’slow’ way to deal with it (more WoW-style).

Personally I think the death penalty should be the same across the board. The difficulty slider should affect the challenge of defeating the enemy, not the consequences of being defeated yourself. I have a feeling most of us will be running on Advanced or Elite for the greater reward, however it seems that with no death penalty on Normal Crytic is literally giving this game a ‘easy mode’.

Death doesn’t have much of an impact if there’s no reason to bother avoiding it.

Skral
One of my turnoffs to this game was the fact that it had no death penalty. I still don’t understand why the official forum is filled with people that say the game is too easy, they have leveled too fast, and they have nothing to spend their energy credits on. The death penalty attacks all of those problems.

I’ve never even played an MMO that didn’t have some penalty for dying until now. I was happy to hear one was coming to the game, although I think Normal difficulty should have included a minor death penalty. Let only the easier levels remove it completely.

I would like to see our ship’s sickbay used in some capacity to address our death penalty when/if ship interiors ever come along instead of carrying items to remove it.

Jim – Ctrl Alt Trek Officer
I don’t see much of an issue with the death penalty, except for PVP. As I don’t PVP much any way and the death penalty will probable reduce or eliminate what little bit I do.

Bouvi

On the 20th they released a new Engineer report.  http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?p=2577637#post2577637

Here are some of the items I am looking foward too:

Under Investigation
Chat and other UI usability improvements
Ability to set a private instance for Fleet Actions (so Fleets can do Fleet Actions)

Season 1.2
Episode Replay
Bridge Officer Trading
Sitting in Chairs tech

Season 1.3
Dabo MiniGame

Season 2
Player Ship Interiors
Ambient Wildlife Creatures

The new official STO (http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?p=2610782) poll is about which playable faction would you want next?  First I think they need to finish the Klingon side.  After that I voted for Romulan.  One of the options was Borg.  I do not see how you could have a Borg faction period.  The Borg is a hive-mind not full of individuals.  Unless they fundamentally change the Borg I do not see how they could ever be a playable faction.

News

Veteran Rewards

Veteran Rewards are our special thank you to players who’ve invested their time with us. Some rewards available are:

• Free Full Respecs.
• Exclusive Costume Pieces.
• Free Additional Character Slots.

For a full list of Veteran Rewards, check out our Veteran Rewards page.

Free Trial Weekend

Taking a break from Star Trek Online? Have a friend you think would enjoy the game? Take advantage of our periodically free trial weekends, where you can play Star Trek Online completely unrestricted.

Our first free trial weekend, called the Welcome Back Weekend, is available to our former players. Welcome Back Weekend begins Friday, May 7, 2010 at 10:00 a.m. Pacific and ends Monday, May 10, 2010 at 10:00 a.m. Pacific.

For more information, please check out our free trial weekend page.

Refer a Friend

We know you love Star Trek Online. We want to help you bring your friends to the game. With our Refer a Friend program, you can earn rewards for introducing your buddies to the game. You can earn special items, game time, Cryptic Points and more. Visit our Refer a Friend page (coming soon) to learn more.

Star Trek Online Demo

New to Star Trek Online? Considering making a purchase? We’re so sure you’ll love the game, we want to give you the chance to play it for free. Visit our demo page (coming soon) to learn how to create a Cryptic account and begin playing Star Trek Online.

Ship Interiors for season 2.  There is a lot of info. http://forums.startrekonline.com/showpost.php?p=2591305&postcount=84

(all subject to change as they’re still in the process of building this system)

What they’ve agreed on so far
Feds and Klingon players will both get ship interiors
Fed players will get the Fed Ship interior kit (similar to what was seen on Khitomer in tutorial)
Klg players will get the Klingon Ship interior kit (similar to what was seen on B’Vat’s ship)

The default interior will have multiple floors (similar to Khitomer in Tutorial)
The interiors will be instanced and use turbo-lifts (depending on your video processor speed – turbo-lifts are either instant moves or a few seconds – so some players may see a brief loading screen – but you are transfering within the same map which is faster than going from map to map)
Crew members will populate the interior and appear to be performing duties
BOFFs will remain on the bridge – but candidates might be seen elsewhere

There will be 3 floors represented for your ship to start

Floor 1
Bridge and Ready Room

Floor 2
Medical Sickbay
Lounge (like 10-Forward)
Captain’s Quarters
Reception Room (for diplomatic purposes)

Floor 3
Engineering / Engine Room
Engineer’s Office/Science Lab
Transporter room

There are more options they are debating on and is included in the link.

Email

Email #1 from Ronald

I have been thinking of trying Star Trek Online. But have some questions I hope you can help me with.
Does Star Trek Online have s free trial?
Also I have read that you need to play a Federation toon to some level before you can unlock the Klingon player race. Is this true? If so what level do you have to get? Is there a way to start off at level one as a Klingon?

Email #2 from Davy

To the crew:

I am sorry that it has taken me eleven episodes to send you an e-mail, but please know that I have been listening since the first episode. I have worked in radio on and off (currently off) for about twenty years and your show is something that I would have happily run on the air. You have a lot of fun, provide a plethora of information, and are one of the few podcasts to which I regularly listen, the other being The Chronic Rift.

I have been a Star Trek enthusiast since I was five when my father first introduced me toStar Trek; the episode was the “Arena” and the year was 1972. I was hooked. Every dime I got went to purchasing the Star Trek comic produced by Gold Key and I attended my first convention in the mid-seventies, when all the actors from the original series were still attending together. It was around this time that my father bought me the Star Trek books by James Blish and David Allen Foster. I remember my bedroom being set up as the Enterprise bridge and even Star Wars couldn’t deter me from Star Trek.

Over the years, I have collected every Star Trek comic book produced (I recently downloaded them in CBR format to read on my iPad, and had purchased all the novels prior to 2001. I went to college with Mr. John Drew (the host and producer of The Chronic Rift) and Keith R. A. DeCandido. My senior thesis was “Humor in Star Trek” and I used episodes and novels to prove that Star Trek can hold its own against literary masterpieces like those of Shakespeare, Melville, and Hawthorne.

When I first heard about Star Trek Online, last year, I was extremely excited and even purchased a laptop with a lot of power in anticipation of the game. I started playing during open beta and have restarted a couple of times, until I found the perfect alter-ego. His name is Lt. Commander Allen Kahn, of the U.S.S. Amadsuj. I have even created an elaborate, and hopefully original backstory for him which traces his lineage to the only surviving crew-member of the USS Relient and one of two potential genetic donations.

Please keep up the amazing work and I will try to be listening live during the next broadcast.

Live long and prosper.
Davy G (aka Allen K. Kahn)

Email #3 from David

Dear
Aprillian, Vrishna & Bouvi,
I`ve just listned to all of your podcasts back to back & they`re absolutely brilliant.
The enthusiasm that pours out of you guys for STOL is a joy to listen to.  After
listening to the 1st. episode I thought “That`s it, I want to be a part of this.”.
And that felling just grew & grew with each new episode.

I love Star Trek & had a look at the STOL website before the game launched, I
looked at a video or 2, but I wasn`t overly impressed with what I saw & thought, “I
don`t think I`ll bother.”.  That has now changed, cheers guys!  I liked hearing you
talk about the space combat, wheeling & turning & phasers & photon torpedoes, ah,
superb.  Missions, Beaming down, Borg, etc.  I felt as though I were flying through
space.  You really have a genuine like for this game & that really shines through in
your podcasts.

Well, after my shift finished (I listen at work), I drove home and decided to buy it
from Steam.  A few mouse clicks later & I was at the Steam checkout…then a
thought occured to me…”What were the system requirements to run the game?”.
I went back to the Steam store & had a look.  To my dismay I read that my
computer wasn`t up to the task    I needed a dual core CPU & a beefy graphics
card, I have a 3Ghz pentuim 3 & a GForce 7600gt (WoW runs ok).

Not to be put off I hit the ‘Inter tubes’ to find out more, but alas it was all in vain.
This game has been designed to run on a dual core processor (at least)….long sigh
With home improvments & family commitments I won`t be ‘beaming up’ just yet.
A new computer is needed but It`ll have to wait.
In the meantime I`ll get my Star Trek fix from your podcast.

I`m a (that which must not be named) WoW player too & have been an iTunes
subscriber to that other show you guys do!  It`s really great that you were using
WoW as an analogy to describe what it is like to play STOL as it gives me a frame of
reference, keep doing that, please

Well, guys keep up the good work & keep on boldy going where no podcasters have
gone before, I hope to be able to join your Fleet one day in the not too distant future.
See you all in game soon, I hope,

David.

Email #4 from Vern

Hi Ctrl Alt Trek crew

I am into my third month playing and I am still enjoying the game. I still play WoW more, but when I do log into STO I find it hard to leave.

I am writing in to ask if you have any trial keys left to give out. I have a friend who really wants to try it out but they don’t want to buy the game first. As far as I can tell there is no other free trial available. If you could help out I would be very grateful.

I really like the show and if I pay attention to twitter I won’t miss the live stream this time.

Thank you ,

Vern
@Vern74 –STO
Verneesha on Twitter