Mission

There are several types of Missions in Star Trek Online; Episodic Missions focusing on the main story, found missions acquired in sector space and queued missions. The latter two focus on either ground or space combat, but episodic tend to make use of both.

Episodic Missions
Episodic missions are those which form part of the main storyline of Star Trek Online which are acquired through the Mission Journal. Missions are grouped in arcs focusing on particular stories, such as the Klingon War or The Delta Quadrant. There are however missions within those arcs that do not tie directly into the overarching story. The mission arcs were previously referred to as Episodes, however the term "Feature Episode" is now prevalent for an new individual mission.

Episodes and missions follow a very similar structure to most other MMORPGs. They are received from a non-player character (NPC), added to your assignments, and then carried out by the player. The player then contacts the original NPC that gave the mission (optimally via the "Hail Starfleet" button) to receive their reward(s). Some content objectives are automatically given to the player upon entering a certain area, such as Starbase 24, or engaging an enemy signal content in sector space. Total mission length tends to be between 15 minutes to an hour.

Rewards for completing episodes and missions are typically Experience Points and expertise. Some missions also award Energy Credits as well as Dilithium. Sometimes they give the player extra rewards, which includes (but is not limited to): a new bridge officer, a piece of armor or a new starship item like a Deflector Array or Cannon. These rewards are reduced on replay (Note: not all missions are replayable).

The Galaxy at Large
In addition to the story missions on the episode tab, further narrative missions are available as side content. These are usually found under the "Available" tab with other kinds of missions. The Spectres, Lost Dominion & Cold War arcs are all former episodes that were removed from the mission journal to streamline it. Wasteland and the Kobali Crisis are also considered side content and relate to adventure zone stories that were previously listed as episodes (although Wasteland is still an official episode for Romulan players).

Featured Episodes

 * Main article: Feature episode

In August 2010 the concept of a "Feature Episode" was introduced whereby a specific arc, starting with Breen Invasion, would be available for a short time with special rewards. There were four of these Feature Episodes composed of 4 to 5 missions each. In 2012 they were added to the main episode run with normal missions, but special rewards were available on them during re-run events.

Starting in 2013, the name of "Featured Episode" begun to be associated with a specific, single story mission released as an event. This started with during the 3 Year Anniversary Event. Unlike regular episodes, when these missions are released they are available to players of nearly all levels. They also have special rewards which are staged to encourage replaying at least once a week for about three to four weeks. After that, the Featured Episode joins the regular mission lineup.

Remastered missions
Missions are occasionally remastered to improve their quality to match the latest releases. This is in particular focused on updated the content that was rushed out for the initial launch of Star Trek Online.

Some of the first missions to be revamped were those in the early Klingon War arc, starting with in February 2011. Examples of additions at this stage included cutscenes, accolades and extra sequences that there was no time to address during the initial production. Some unique rewards, such as the Azura Personal Comm Code, were also added at this stage and mechanics pioneered in the early feature episodes were added.

Legacy of Romulus in 2013 launched the Romulan Republic faction and gave new early content to the Klingon Defense Force faction. The quality of these, and of the new Featured episodes, prompted Cryptic to revisit the Starfleet tutorial at the end of 2013 to match its quality to their latest work. In early 2014 they continued this by improving most of the missions of the Klingon War arc, including added a lot of extra voice over to episodes.

Given the amount of work involved in rebuilding the missions, when Cryptic moved to revamp the Romulan Mystery arc they opted to focus on a smaller number of higher quality episodes; in the Romulan case, replacing 14 missions with 4, though producing a far tighter narrative and high quality cutscenes. Borg Advance arc likewise merged the previous Borg Collective and Undine Advance arcs into one story. The Cardassian Struggle was revamped in 2015 to not only streamline its story but ensure the whole arc was cross-faction (whereas before many missions were Starfleet-only).

Minor updates to missions have continued, notably concerning the addition of new characters. For example, with the introduction of Geordi La Forge, Julian Bashir and Nog, their characters were added into earlier episodes in place of previous one-time original characters.

In Season 15, the Klingon War arc was revisited once more. This time as the Gamma Quadrant arc showcased advanced new graphics. Many of the episodes were improved with these new cutscenes, and generally tightened up by cutting extraneous sections. Other missions were removed for a more comprehensive overhaul, to be returned at a later date.

The Year of Klingon in 2020 is seeing the remastering of KDF faction content including the tutorial and Empire arc with new cutscenes, voiceover and gameplay.

Endeavor Assignments

 * Main: Endeavor System

The Endeavor System is a limited-time challenge based reward system for endgame players (Level 60) in Star Trek Online. Every two to three days (Resets on Monday, Wednesday, Friday) at 9AM Pacific Time, a new task emerges ranging from completing R&D tasks or story missions. Upon completion, a small amount of Expertise and Skill Points are awarded along with an [Endeavor Prize Pack].

Found Missions
Found Missions are missions which are not acquired from a Mission giver; instead, they are typically acquired by interacting with an object in the environment, which then begins the mission and assigns objectives.

Patrol Missions

 * Main article: Patrol.

Patrols are a type of Found Mission which can be acquired by approaching a System in Sector Space. If a patrol is available for that system, an option to enter the system and begin the patrol will appear.

Deep Space Encounters
Deep Space Encounters are a type of Found Mission which can be found in Sector Space. They appear as a red swirling vortex in sector space; the player acquires the mission by flying to the vortex and entering the encounter.

Diplomacy Missions
Diplomacy Missions are a type of Found Mission characterized by a lack of combat; instead, they involve solving problems peacefully, and award Diplomatic CXP upon completion.

Open Missions
Open Missions are frequently found in Adventure Zones. It is not necessary to contact a Mission giver or interact with an object to acquire an Open Mission; they operate on a timer and become available at regular intervals. All nearby players may participate in and complete Open Missions.

Battlezones
Battlezones, such as the Gon'Cra System or the Badlands Battlezone feature open missions that escalate towards a zone-wide completion objective.

Adventure Zones
Similar to Battlezones in that anyone can participate, areas such as Nukara Prime or New Romulus feature content where captains are able to work towards zone-specific objectives without an escalation event similar to battlezones. However, zone-wide alerts may occur for additional awards.

Task Force Operations
Task Force Operations (TFO) are multiplayer, queued player versus environment missions available from the TFO screen. They can be ground or space missions with teams between 5 and 20. While usually they have a team of players against NPC forces, some missions involve two groups of players competing against each other in challenges.

Red Alerts
Red Alerts are a type of 5-player Space Queue which can be found in Sector Space. When a Red Alert is available, a "Red Alert: Distress Call" button will appear. The player acquires the mission by clicking the button and entering the encounter, or by accessing them through the PvE Queue Window.

PvP Missions
PvP Missions are player versus player missions acquired through the PvP Queue on maps with players directly competing against each other in combat.