Wednesday 29 April 2020

La Sirena comes to Star Trek Online, plus other new game ships

Got lots of starshipy updates from Star Trek Online today, including a chance to pick a future design, some remasters of classics, and I think the first ship from Picard to join the game. Continue below to check them out:

First up, from Picard we have La Sirena, which they're calling a Heavy Raider. The ship will be one of many available as a possible bonus upon opening a Research and Development Pack or a Duty Officer Pack purchased between May 7th and May 11th.


Here's how STO describe the ship:
The La Sirena Heavy Raider was originally intended to serve as a transport frigate, but it has been meticulously maintained and heavily modified to be as capable as any operating Starfleet vessel. It has been classified as a Raider, but trades some of that class's trademark mobility for increased flexibility and durability.

This starship features a Commander Tactical/Pilot Bridge Officer seat and a Lieutenant Commander/Intel Bridge Officer seat.

Pilot ships are highly agile craft designed to perform advanced maneuvers that can give them a deadly edge in combat. Your starship can perform a sudden maneuver in each horizontal direction: Forward, Backward, Left or Right. Executing each maneuver will rapidly reposition your starship while granting very brief damage immunity, but costs all available thruster fuel which takes several seconds to recover.

STO's Thomas Marrone has confirmed (on Twitter) that you can change the colour of the pattern, so you could have some real fun customising this already distinctive design. He also notes they've adjusted the scale a bit:
The STO version is not the same exact type of ship as the original La Sirena. It's significantly bigger, about 30-40 meters longer, so that it can be considered a "capital ship" in STO. You'll notice we scaled the window down to illustrate this.
The ship comes with some new abilities. The Fundamental Field Replicator mimics the holographic fleet sequence from the final episode:
Most modern starships come equipped with an enormous array of holographic projectors, and all can be designed to work with this piece of technology. When activated, the neuro-cotamic interface allows your starship to project several independent holographic copies of the La Sirena into nearby space that will aid in combat scenarios for up to 30 seconds, assaulting nearby foes from multiple directions simultaneously. In addition, while this console's effects persist, all of your Bridge Officer Abilities will recharge much more rapidly.

The Coordinated Hull Piercer seems to have been created entirely anew:
This weapon system is integrated into a ship's external holoprojectors, and has independent targeting and communications systems designed to work with similar systems aboard allied ships. The resulting beam is capable of firing coalesced kinetic energy on enemy vessels, and can allow nearby allied vessels to coordinate fire for additional impact damage. This weapon has a good chance of knocking one or more of an enemy's subsystems offline with each hit, whether from itself or from an ally's coordinated attack.

You can get full details of both the La Sirena, and how you can get it and several other ships, on the STO blog.


Next up a new Ferengi design, the Quark class. This is another ship that you could win, this time when you get an Infinity Lock Box. Obviously this is a variant of the classic Ferengi Marauder:


Here's how STO describe it:
The Lobi Crystal Consortium (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Quark Enterprises) is proud to announce the arrival of the pinnacle of luxury and performance – the Quark-class Marauder. Built with the generosity and care a Ferengi would want to receive, this starship provides the utmost in comfort and security to all who travel within it. Trek through the stars with comfort and ease that would make even the Grand Nagus envious!

Along with the latest technology, the Quark Marauder is also fully stocked with a Dabo Table and onboard access to the Bank and Exchange. The ship even comes with your own freelance Ferengi Trade contact who can offer you Trade assignments for your Duty Officers.


The ships abilities also mirror those of the classic Marauder, with the ability to extend out parts of the ship in "Battle Module 4000", and fire an EMP Burst or Swarm Missiles:
"Home is where the heart is, but the stars are made of latinum." To get you there safely, the Quark Marauder comes standard with a Battle Module 4000. The ultimate in military hardware, the Battle Module 4000 ensures your Quark Marauder is fully equipped to protect all your investments.

Like the D'Kora, the Quark Marauder is a tough ship on its own, but the Battle Module 4000 lets it show its teeth – and we all know that "the bigger the smile, the sharper the knife." The Battle Module 4000 enables your ship to fire an EMP Burst, which will drain the power from pursuing enemy ships. But that's not all! When fully engaged, the Battle Module 4000 will transform your ship, opening several ports and conduits and improving your weapons and engines. The EMP Burst will be disabled in this mode, but a Swarm Missile System is revealed. Lastly, the Battle Module 4000 provides a passive boost to Critical Hit Chance and Accuracy.


You can see full stats for this ship in another STO blog.

Alongside the Quark class, STO have also updated their model for the classic D'Kora class. Tobias Richter made the new model, and STO's Thomas Marrone shared these images on Twitter:





Also recently updated, as part of the ongoing efforts to get many ships in STO looking more screen accurate, is the Akira class. You can see in comparison images here the updates; the main things I notice are that the new version (on the right) seems less glossy, and the glowing parts less garishly glowing:



STO is offering a bundle with the Akira and it's variants (the Alita, Armitage, and Thunderchild classes), but if you already have an Akira you should be able to update to this new look already. Full details on the STO blog, and addition images via Thomas Marrone's Twitter and ArtStation, that latter which is also where this cool rotatable 3D model comes from:










Also via Thomas Marrone on ArtStation, here's a interactive model of the recently released Ross class variant of the Galaxy class. You can see plenty of stills of this on ArtStation too.



Finally, a chance to pick a new ship to join the STO fleet. They are currently running a vote to choose the next Summer Event ship, which will be a Risian science ship. Four members of the STO team who do not normally do ship design sketched out ideas, which were then refined by Hector Ortiz to give the four possible options to pick from. You can vote on the STO blog (ends soon), and see how each of the four designs were worked up in YouTube videos here, here, here, and here. Personally I think number two is the coolest.





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