= 44th State of the Fleet, March 2018 =

[Marcase]

Greetings Fleet.

Behold it has arrived. It’s the first weekend of March, here is your monthly State of the Fleet.

As is our custom we start with welcoming our most recent fellow fleetmembers, this time from the last two months.

Joined January: @bannsidhe (Ralph) from Pennsylvania @captsilva80 (edwin) on CST @afdian (Bryan) on CST @stu999man (Stuart) from the UK @DeadlyChicken47 (Peyton) from Texas @LordAckbar (Jay) from Massachusetts @Loki#3008 (Marianne) from Melbourne, Australia @Norcaldef13 (Rudy) from California (provisional) @Blacken32 (Eric) from Idaho @luckspeare#5527 (Chris), from Utah @Major_Doom (Mike) from Las Vegas   =//=

Joined February: @penguinmage1 (John) on EST @gallifreycaptain#2621 (Pamela) from Maryland @bilrost (Aaron) from Alberta, Canada @worldkiller300 (Ethan) on EST @juliena1 (Juliena) from California @oatmealkid#7202 (KDF) from Michigan (provisional) @rnor6084 (Rob) from Wisconsin @Ixxxtabb (KDF) (Daniel) on PST @firefox2456#7170 (Lucas) on EST @Kromaek (Rolf) from Germany @earthluner (Hill) from British Columbia, Canada @SolarEagle (Harley) from Minnesota @sydors (Casey) from Arkansas @Antimatic (Dave) on EST @Southernman11 (Dennis) on CST

Send out some friend invites, I make it a point to list locationss so you can find a wingmen in your timezone. You can even see all 44th members when you visit the link under About Us/Fleet Officers and scroll midway to Fleet Members.

First, my apologies for not posting a fleet review last February: Since last year I’ve been dealing with an illness in my family that consumed all my time and energy and then some. It’s fair to say that it was the first time I’ve been away from STO for more than a month since 2012 and apparently I’ve picked up some nervous twitches because of that. At least I call my winking at pretty nurses a twitch so my wife won’t notice (spoiler: she did).

The Mighty 44th is thankfully not Marcase’s 44th ( hmm, yet…?) and we are well organized and staffed to continue fleet operations as usual. In fact you should not have noticed anything different due to the stalwart service of the 44th Fleet Admiralty.

Fleet Admiral Sargon, Vice-Admirals Palcioz, Damix, Paradoxical, and the Commodores Akula, Sensei_Krieger and Stompar are all on deck to run, represent and support your fleet brilliantly. Thank you again guys, I will name some future hybrid tribbles after you.

Back in game, I’ve had some questions and it has been a while so I’d like to go over our fleet policies again, just to reintroduce the 44th’s common courtesies and regs that have served us well ever since we were founded way back in 2009.

= Inviting members =

You may have fleet invite priviliges but please avoid random ‘blind’ invites – everyone is welcome to join but every new member has to fill out a proper application form on this forum. Found someone who’s interested ? Sent them here and have them fill out the Join/Application form. It only takes a minute and we need this to keep track of promotions (for fleet store access) and also just so every 44th applicant has read our fleet rules at least once (“don’t be a d*ck, no politics or religious topics please“). I also use the application for a quick background check – we rarely refuse new applicants but we try to leave trouble, drama-queens and spam-bots collect dust at the transport pad. Your application is also used to reinstate your last rank and priviliges when you return after a long afk.

Members who appear on the roster without application will not be promoted and may be removed without notice. Filling out an application takes just a minute and wait for formal approval only takes a few hours at most.

If you do bring in fresh meat-… err, friends or family, please urge them to sign-up with their proper in-game @character name; it’s very confusing keeping track of you guys when you have different tags on the forum, on Discord and the many alt-names in STO. It’s not uncommon getting embarassed discovering Gowron is actually Jane pretending to be Joe in a skirt. Not that we judge of course.

We have and continue to welcome female players and even a few families that joined the 44th which is testament to the maturity and civility of your fleet. Thank you all for keeping standards !

Of course that is probably because we have the option to drop those standards in our not-so-civil area called the Beta Radiation Room on our Discord server where, shall we say, your sanity is best left at the door. Even though politics and religion are also “not done” there, it’s open season on every other topic. It’s a hoot, but shields up when venturing there captains.^^

= The Mighty 44th =

There really is no difference between the 44th Fleet (or “Main”), our 44th Delta Fleet and our KDF 44th Assault Squadron, rather they are all part of the single entity we call the “Mighty 44th“. Most of us have alt toons in all three fleets and bounce between them without restrictions. Heck, if I don’t swap alts every ten minutes I get the Andorian rash.
The extra Delta Fleet was once founded by Sargon and myself during the Delta Rising Expansion (*video) to create more space as our main fleet kept maxing out – and still does today – at the 500 member level. Delta then morphed into a handy “probation” fleet for new members to fullfill their 2 week trial period, afterwhich they had the option to move to Main.
Right now we encourage you to move your dormant alts or least favored Federation / Fed Romulan ones to Delta to free up space in Main (they will ofcourse retain their fleet rank and priviliges). Klingons being Klingons, go directly to the 44th Assault together with their Rom allies and can’t be moved even by a Doomsday Machine*.

44th Main Fleet always has dibs on Fleet holdings to be completed first and has pretty much everything maxed out because of it. Delta Fleet and KDF follow close behind but take their own time as resources/donations permit, and obviously we’re not unnecessarily duplicating resource sinks. Is your Alt in Delta fleet but want something shiny ? No problem as Delta has most stores unlocked and well stocked but your toon can also switch between Delta and Main and back to pick up that particularly shiny Fleet ship without restriction. Just contact a Commodore or above and we’ll set you up no worries.

= Fleet Ranks =

We continue to have no “must attend” meetings – you can choose to join fleet runs or do your own thing, that’s entirely up to you. We actually have quite a few lurking members who don’t interact much but have been with us for years. Reasons vary but often the English language is a barrier or just skittishness interacting online due to some previous bad experience. Sometimes we get them out of their shell but again your playstyle is yours to decide – we welcome you regardless.

STO is an MMO and multiplayer interaction is encouraged but has zero influence on standing, ranking or promotions in the 44th. The same counts for Discord voice/text and Forum posts; these are extra services for you as a player and you can choose to actively join or lurk. However we do encourage you to check this forum for fleet and STO news regularly and post your questions here as well (and do it – we luv talking ships!). Any stuff from Discord worth keeping will also be posted here.

Generally speaking Fleet Promotions are based on active time in the fleet – if you are active (play STO and/or post something on this forum or Discord at least once a week) you will be promoted from Ensign to Lieutenant two weeks after signing-up, and to Commander four weeks after that (we abolished the LT CDR rank). Commander is basically the end rank for the average STO player, offering full fleet priviliges including all store and forum access.

One step up, Captain rank is awarded by your Admiralty Staff to players who are very active in 44th-diplo chat and in-game (call for/join fleet runs, assist other players), and have a good understanding of the game in general. Captains in the 44th Fleet are often veteran players you can turn to if you have questions regarding the game or the fleet, are looking for some good wingmen to tackle a tough Advanced/Elite STF, and are generally considered the back-bone of the Mighty 44th.

Commodores are selected active members who provide “above and beyond” service to our fleet; this may be in-game (slotting fleet projects, keeping track of promotions), but often also behind the scenes (recruiting, supporting our two Armadas), or have an exemplary understanding of the deeper STO mechanics and sharing that with the 44th as a whole.

Vice-Admiral rank is awarded to specific fleet members by the admiralty and who have provided an exceptional service to the fleet; like setting up and running our excellent website, running our twitter account or our private Discord voice/text service and provide sterling service supporting our fleet on the interwebz in front of and behind the curtain. Note that we don’t have and are not planning a Facebook group because folks are often skittish linking their private life to their gaming one (remember the Beta radiation Room…).
As a side note, we dabbled with a PS4 and Xbox presence but that fizzled and flapped. If anyone is still interested in those we may restart something.

The 44th is a bit unique that there are two Fleet Admirals, Sargon and Marcase covering the US and Euro timezones and that golden spot where they overlap.

And in case you’re wondering, unlike Sargon’s, my Fleet Admiral rank was earned with huge amounts of Romulan Ale, Ferengi-inspired bribing and Nausican-style backstabbing, plus many-many distracting Orion girl dancers* that will make your head spin, among other things.

= 44th in-game =

In-game, if you are in a fleet-only run please use Greed over Need for loot drops; this to allow (new) members a shot at getting certain drops or pick loot they really need. This is considered a fleet courtesy and we won’t bite your head off if you do Need (though we might nibble a bit) but try to limit any excessive Ferengi urges.
Obviously if there is one or more non-44th in your team then you can Need all you want.

Help out a fleet-mate – if someone calls for a fleet-run or needs help (re-) playing an episode take a moment to boldy go and assist. We have tons of active players but different timezones sometimes make you feel like being stranded on the planet of Galactic Peace*. When I log on first thing I do is ask if someone needs specific marks or needs a replay. Being a wingman speeds leveling and certainly takes the grind away, plus many of us have dormant alts who may still need a specific mission reward anyway.

Send out friend invites for easy teaming and keeping track of fellow fleeties, especially those in your timezone. This is a game option and not a fleet requirement though. If the constant “RikersBeard@IsAwesomesauce logged on/off“ due to switching alts is annoying you can switch that off without de-friending by untagging friend in your chat configuration tab.

= Channels =

It is highly advised to set up seperate chat tabs to keep track of, and avoid being overwhelmed by, all the in-game text chatter.
Like in most MMOs, Zone-chat is a zoo running amok with more often than not bad advice and wonky trade deals (read: rip offs). Give it a seperate tab or do like most of us do, just switch it off and only follow a few specific channels. trust me you won’t miss it.
The recommended ones are 44th-diplo, Team, Armada/Fleet (quiet back-up), PubEliteSTF, Simulation / KDFSim and various “invite only” DPS 10K-100K / Gold channels.

See these list for some good ones.
https://sto.gamepedia.com/Global_Channel_Directory
https://www.sto-league.com/channels/

= Fleet Holdings, Projects, Contributions =

Another question that often pops up like a Aehallh Worm is fleet holding contributions.
Since we are an active and “rich” fleet we have no minimum contribution requirement, and we don’t really keep track (unless there is an excessive buying spree). Basically you will have to make some donations to fleet projects eventually anyway to earn Fleet credits, but unlike other fleets we will not ask you for a specific amount or regular weekly/monthly contributions.

Remember that you can always look in our two Armadas for extra fleet projects, as we have a few starting fleets we are helping build up their own shiny starbase. This btw is one of the reasons that as a rule we don’t allow multi-fleeting, we prefer to keep scarce resources and provisioning in-house. Also you can use the Armada Tab to cross-donate from 44th Main to 44th Delta and vice-versa.
Our 44th Assault has its own KDF Armada, and although there is often talk (and talk, and talk…) about STO getting One Faction To Rule Them All, Fed and KDF will remain two seperate entities for the foreseeable future.

We have maxed out most of the fleet projects already on 44th Main and pretty much all others on Delta and KDF, with only some (really useless) cosmetic ones left-over. That means that we can only slot a very limited few which obviously will fill rapidly. Your Admiralty works hard to keep track and open projects for you, but if you want a specific one opened don’t hesitate to ask.

= Colony Holding =

Damix has started an excellent post on our Fleet Colony progress *here*, and it is doing quite well progress and resource wise – but we can always use more. When I talk to other fleets most are approaching our level, with the exception of a few who threw some serious real-life $ at it. That never appealed to me: supporting the game with real $ is one thing, unlocking something early just for bragging rights and then moaning “there’s nothing to do” is like throwing the Golden Goose in the Warpcore: the sparks are fun* but you’re left with, well, nothing much else.
As mentioned in Damix’ post the Simulation Channel is still the best way to earn a hangarbay filled with provisions easy and fails are rare. Just a few of us completing one run will stuff our Colony to the brim – switch around to feed our KDF and Delta ones if you can.

= Ships, ships and moah ship (videos) =

We have seen quite a few new ships released recently each with their own strengths and weaknesses. Unfortunately I wasn’t around for an in-depth look, but Timberwolf* is a 44th Armada member and I highly recommend to check out his youtube channel where he offers budget builds and high DPS murder-boats besides providing an overview of the latest ships. Snipey47* is also a well known STO ‘tuber diving under the hood of STO’s damage mechanic.

Not to be outdone, our very own Stompar also posted a good video with solid builds you can fall back on here*.

As always, don’t blindly copy-paste builds but try to understand the underlying mechanic (trust me, it isn’t that hard): just button-mashing may ill-time abilities and can actually work against you, as it too often result just merely scratching a Borg cube’s paintjob (and really pissing them off*).

= 44th Forum =

Hey captain, did you notice those neat ribbons ? You want some too ? Well you can ! And it won’t cost you any latinum bribes either. Started by Paradoxical and implemented by our own miracle worker Palcioz, we’ve gone where no award has gone before and created quite a few you can pick up. For starters just being welcomed in the 44th and the year signing up earns you two. Posting a new topic and/or answering one earns you two more, signing up on Discord adds a shiny blue one. You can earn a Golden Accolade ribbon one by posting a screenshot on this topic, and another one by adding our ship(s) to the 44th’s ships registry – see the full list here – which is just for fun, giving an overview of the current more popular ships flying around in our fleets.

Have an idea for a unique award ? Let us know, and you might even get a unique ribbon for your suggestion.

A weekly “Search for Soolin” will return soon(tm) and we’ll see if we can get some other events restarted as well.

That’s it captains; we may add to this post with some more STO mechanics and info as it comes available (and I’ve read up on stuff as well) as the current in-game calendar is conspicuously empty.

March Fleet Focus: Colony Invasion runs for both Fed and KDF, general STFs.
March 8-12: Research and Development weekend.

Podcast: Priority One – talking STO and other Trek.
Link: Changing your field of view for fun and profit (Reddit)

See you, out there.

Marcase
Commander in Chief of the 44th colony coffee machine.

 

"Boldly bashing Borg to bits since 2012..."

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