CT/Pounce's Guide to STO Character Building v1.0

Introduction
Now that I've level capped, I'll try to write some of the lessons I learned down for others to learn from.

Before you read this you should understand the basics and some advanced concepts of Star Trek Online. If you don't understand any of the following list, look it up somewhere or spend some more time playing.

Bridge officers, abilities, skills, traits, power settings, cannons, arrays, torpedos, mines, consoles, officer promotions.

Disclaimers
I'll try to cover everything I can but I'm sure I'll miss stuff. If you see a gross error or something missing, let me know and I'll do what I can to update this guide.

I've only taken one character to the level cap and he's an engineer. So I'm honestly not yet familiar with the other classes yet. That doesn't mean you can't use the advice here, it just means be aware that I don't know much about Tactical or Science player abilities.

I'm a PvPer. So I almost always will build characters to play in a PvP environment. Unfortunately, it takes a long time to get in a match as a Federation so I don't have a lot of first hand experience so I'm relying on my little experience and a lot of information from other players.

I'm a min/maxer. This goes hand-in-hand with the previous disclaimer. If the benefit outweighs the cost, I will do it. So that means squeezing out as much power as I can out of limited resources, which in this case are skill points and bridge officers.

Star Trek Online is a space combat MMO. Yes, there's some ground combat. But I'd say 75% of your time will be spent in space.

This is a rather detailed guide. I'm fairly thorough when it comes to planning characters (for me it's almost as much fun designing as it is playing them). It might be difficult to digest in one sitting (it was hard to write in one sitting). But I suppose it's doable.

Terms, References, Etc
Tier # - A character's rank Lieutenant (Tier 1), Lt Commander (Tier 2), Commander (Tier 3), Captain (Tier 4), Rear Admiral (Tier 5)
Ship Chart - http://suricatasblog.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/stoshiptierchartv19.png
Planner - http://quutar.110mb.com/stoplanner/STOPlanner.html
BOffs - Bridge Officers
BOff Abilities - http://stowiki.org/wiki/Bridge_officer_abilities

Three Starting Points (But Really Only One)
There are three points you can start out when building a character:

1) Concept
2) Tier 5 Ship
3) Role (Tank/Damage/Control)

But those are all illusory choices, it really boils down to what ship (or ships) you plan on using at the Tier 5 level (Rear Admiral). Remember, we're min/maxing so we really don't build for leveling up, we build for the endgame. Every step in between is to get us one step closer to our ideal goal.

If you're building a concept character, you can stop reading. Honestly, this info may provide helpful hints but just go with your concept (unless you're like me with a concept and a need to power game).

If you already know what ship you want skip the next section.

Choosing the Right Ship for You
You know what role you want to play but you don't know what ship to aim for. Rank these three roles in order from most important to least important.

a) Tank
b) Damage
c) Control

1) Tank, Damage, Control - Assault Cruiser
2) Tank, Control, Damage - Star Cruiser
3) Damage, Tank, Control - Fleet Escort
4) Damage, Control, Tank - Advanced Escort
5) Control, Damage, Tank - Recon Science Vessel
6) Control, Tank, Damage - Deep Space Science

Generalizations About Ships
Escorts are your typical glass cannon. They can dish out the best damage in the game. But they're not so good at taking it. They move fast and can turn on a dime which you'll need to escape mobs of Borg.

Cruisers are team players. They tank, they dish a bit of damage and they can heal themselves or others. They're huge and slow and make turns like semis. Built correctly you can sit in the middle of a war and you won't come close to dying but don't expect to kill much either.

Science vessels are control freaks. They lockdown enemies, heal allies and can find anything anywhere. They're average speed and average strength.

Are We There Yet?
Yes and no. Honestly, what ship you plan on being in is the single most important choice you make. It literally determine everything else you do with your character including weapons, shields, engines, deflectors, consoles and bridge officers. That's just to reinforce the point that ship selection is the biggest choice you'll make.

Now that you've made the most important choice in your STO gameplay, here's a tidbit to relax you a bit, you can have up to 8 ships! So don't feel to confined to a single ship but you'll need to have a main focus. So if you're like me, you can switch ships and almost completely change your role in a team. You'll have to swing by Spacedock (or DS9) to do so.

Bridge Officers
Now that we got the big decision out of the way, now we have to get the most time consuming decision out of the way. Bridge Officers (aka Boffs) directly impact your gameplay in so many ways. In space (at Tier 5), you'll have access to 12 space abilities from boffs plus your 8 abilities. That's 20 abilities without dealing with weapons and shield adjustments. Bridge officer abilities cover the full spectrum. Just like all MMOs, abilities can be broken down into two categories (buff or debuff) and a target (self, friend or foe).

Check the ship chart. Figure out what bridge officer slots are available to you on your ship and what rank they are. Class and rank determine what abilities they can use. Go check the Bridge Officer Abilities on STOWiki and figure out which abilities sound appealing.

Now, I'm going to list some of the best skills in the game and what class they belong to and some notes.

Tactical Abilities
Beam Array: Overload - Good for Cruisers or Science Ships. Drains all your weapon power.
Torpedo: High Yield - Doubles, Triples or Quadruples a single torpedo.
Attack Pattern: Beta - Must have.
Cannon: Rapid Fire - Must have for escorts.
Attack Pattern: Omega - Breaks holds. Turn rate buff.

Engineering Abilities
Emergency Power to - Boosts power to a system for a bit.
Engineering Team - Must have. Heals hull damage.
Extend Shields - Must have for tanks. Gives a nearby targeted ally extra shields.
Reverse Shield Polarity - Must for shield tanks. Turn shield damage into shield healing.

Science Abilities
Hazard Emitters - Must for tanks and healers. Heals hull damage over time.
Jam Sensors - Solid. Stops target from targeting you.
Polarize Hull - Breaks tractor beams. Add hull damage resistance.
Science Team - Must have. Removes science debuffs and heals shields.
Feedback Pulse - Really good. Reflects damage from beam arrays.
Scramble Sensors - Confuses foes. Area of Effect.
Viral Matrix - Must have. Locks down single target.

So now you have to pick what abilities and what rank you want where. This will take a long time to figure out. Mixing and matching is difficult. But I won't go into specific builds. If you want help planning your boff abilities, make a post and I'll help you work it out.

Here's a sample for an Advanced Escort built for damage and some survival.
Class - Rank - Ens - Lt - LCdr - Cdr
Tac - Cdr - HYI - HYII - APBII - APOIII
Tac - LCdr - HYI - CRFI - CRFII
Eng - Lt - EngTeamI - RSPI
Sci - Lt - PolarizeI - SciTeamII
Sci - Lt - SciTeamI

And one for an Assault Cruiser built for tanking and some damage.
Class - Rank - Ens - Lt - LCdr - Cdr
Tac - Lt - HYI - APBI
Tac - Ens - BAOI
Eng - Cdr - EngTeamI - RSPI - RSPII - ExtShieldIII
Eng - LCdr - EPtShieldsI - EngTeamII - AuxToStructIII
Sci - Lt - SciTeamI - HazEmitII

Your Character
So you've picked your ship, you've planned out your boffs, but you haven't done anything with your own character yet! We're finally to this step. First up, pick a class.

Tactical officers will add damage to whatever ship they're in.

Engineers will add some tanking ability to any ship they command.

Science officers will add some control and debuffs to the ship they choose.

Selecting a class isn't nearly as important a a ship and boffs. But it's still a fairly weighty decision. So choose carefully. Remember you don't have to match the class's strengths to the ship's strengths. Pounce is an engineer but while leveling up I was primarily in Escorts with a short detour into the Tier 4 science vessel. At Tier 5, I own an Advanced Escort, an Assault Cruiser and a Recon Science Vessel. So just because you're a Science Officer doesn't mean you have to pilot the ugly Olympic class in Tier 3. Or if you're a Tactical you don't have to pilot that pancake in the Tier 4.

Now you need to pick a race. Races obviously deal a lot with looks. But the important part to min/maxing is related to the traits. The best traits are space based (since you're in space!). Specifically, from best to worst, Warp Theorist, Efficient, Astrophysicist, and Techie.

Weapons
Weapons are the next important choice. But they're also influenced by your ship choice.
Escorts - Cannons, Turrets, Torpedos. Keep your nose pointed at your target and blow them up.
Cruisers - Beams, Dual Beams, Torpedos. You'll be moving slowly, so you need to maximize your attack arcs.
Science - Beams, Dual Beams, Torpedos. When you do damage, you want it to be worthwhile.

Now you'll need to select some weapon types. I recommend one energy weapon type and one projectile weapon type. This helps you focus your skill points and equipment to maximize damage.

Energy Weapons
All energy weapon types do the same damage. They just have different secondary effects.
Phasers - Chance of disabling a power system.
Disruptors - Chance for hull resistance debuff (non-stacking)
Plasma - Chance for DoT
Tetryon - Chance of dealing damage to all shields.
Polaron - Chance to reduce power systems.
Antiproton - Chance to ignore shields.

I recommend phasers or disruptors. Least amount of skill points needed to maximize damage. If you want to go with exotic types, goo with Tetryon.

Projectile Weapons
Photon - Good damage all around.
Quantum - High damage to hull. Low to shields.
Plasma - Can be destroyed. Chance for hull DoT.
Transphasic - Low damage. Better at going through shields.
Chroniton - Slows enemy.
Tricobalt - Can be destroyed. Chance to disable.

Skills
First, read this post (http://theenginescannaetakeit.wordpress.com/articles-3/skills-the-numbers/). It talks about skill point efficiency. It's a must read for any min/maxer (and honestly anyone who cares about building characters).

Here's a summary of the important stuff:
For Tier 1 and Tier 2 skills go up to level 7 in the skill.
Tier 3 is the best bang for the buck (when going to max).
Tier 5 you can only max one skill and get another to level 7.
Choose a single weapon damage type for energy and projectile weapons (Phr,Dis,Pla,Tet,Pol,AP).
Choose a single weapon equipment for energy and projectile weapons. (Cannon/Beams, Mines/Torps).
Maxing T1 and T2 skills to squeeze the last little drop. But only if you must (or have nothing else to spend it on, which is highly doubtful).
Focus on space skills.

Each ability is affected by three skills. A T1 skill, a T2 skill and a T3/T4/T5 skill. T1 skills affect the most abilities but provide the smallest bonus (+18). T3/T4/T5 skills affect the fewest abilities but provide more than half the bonus possible (+52). Figure out which skills will affect your most important Boff and character abilities.

Warp Core Training gives a small bonus to all power levels.
Starship System Efficiency skills are only useful on low power settings (25-50).
Starship System Performance skills are useful at any power setting (25-100).

Pick your two Admiral skills. I recommend you max your ship skill and pick something else you find useful (like Weapon Performance) and put 7 levels in that.
Now pick your weapon skills and max them.
Max Starship Command and the T2 ship captain skill related to your T5 captain skill.
Max Warp Core Training.
Now spend all your T1 skill points.

Use the character planner linked above.

In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. But, in practice, there is.
So, you've read this entire thing and you're ready to build a character! That's great. But before you do, go play the game. Honestly, you'll learn what works best for you by playing not by reading. Plus, you'll understand this wall of text a million times better. Trust me. I read lots and lots while I was making my way to Adm5. But it didn't all come into focus until I was finally there. So go play. Come back and apply these suggestions later (unless you're weird like me and enjoy building characters as much as playing them). You'll get a free respec with Season 1 anyways.

Version History
1.0 - First post