History YMMV / StarTrekOnline

** By its conclusion, the Iconian War had become such a DorkAge with episodes such as "Time in a Bottle" (involving the [[ButtMonkey Ferengi]] extensively), "House Pegh", and "Broken Circle" (wherein HollywoodTactics get most of the Alliance fleet killed and the [[spoiler:death of an Iconian]] is accompanied by dialogue that is less epic and more cringe-inducing) that the playerbase was desperate for ANYTHING else to play. The Temporal Cold War that followed is rife with plotholes, stuffed with flat villains with rote motivation, and dripping in [[LargeHam over-the-top melodrama]], but it's actually been reasonably well-received by the playerbase for ''not being the Iconian War''.

* DorkAge: There are a few that are universally panned. The two being:
** Season Four: Crossfire. Season Four took place during the infamous "Great Content Drought", with the only thing being majorly added was a revamp of the ground shooting system and changing up the Borg.
** Expansion Two: ''Delta Rising''. While many players laud the voicework and the storytelling, players found the sudden EXP jump between levels and the harder STFs to be unbearable. This is exacerbated by the fact that, unlike ''Legacy of Romulus'', the ''Delta Rising'' logo was quickly replaced with the ''Iconian War'' logo once Season Ten dropped. The seasons that followed have been at best deeply divisive, with the Iconian War starting off well but becoming mired in various types of stupidity after "Delta Flight" and having an ''extremely'' controversial DeusExMachina ending, and Season Eleven being based entirely on TimeTravel (specifically the Temporal Cold War arc from ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise'').
** By its conclusion, the Iconian War had become such a DorkAge with episodes such as "Time in a Bottle" (involving the [[ButtMonkey Ferengi]] extensively), "House Pegh", and "Broken Circle" (wherein HollywoodTactics get most of the Alliance fleet killed and the [[spoiler:death of an Iconian]] is accompanied by dialogue that is less epic and more cringe-inducing) that the playerbase was desperate for ANYTHING else to play. The Temporal Cold War that followed is rife with plotholes, stuffed with flat villains with rote motivation, and dripping in [[LargeHam over-the-top melodrama]], but it's actually been reasonably well-received by the playerbase for ''not being the Iconian War''.

** The ''Scimitar''-class dreadnought warbird manages to hit ''both'' ends of the TierInducedScrappy scale. A very small percentage ([[SturgeonsLaw call it 10% for the sake of argument]]) of Scimitar jocks can make it a near-indestructible juggernaut. Combined with the performance of [[Film/StarTrekNemesis its canon version]], the ship got a reputation for being absurdly overpowered, and is thus attractive to players who think that just ''owning'' the ship will make them invincible. Hence the FanNickname "Scimitard", for the people who are considered a free kill until proven OP.

** The [[https://sto.fandom.com/wiki/Cnidarian_Defender Cnidarian Defender Ship]] introduced through the Risian Summer Event, or more specifically, the [[https://sto.fandom.com/wiki/Console_-_Universal_-_Cnidarian_Defense Cnidarian Defense console]] that turns it into a stationary turret that not only deals huge damage to any five enemies that gets in range, but also hull heals any five allies in the same range. There ''are'' disadvantages to the Defense form (it's almost non-existent speed and turn rate and going under ten percent health reverts it back to its regular form,) but considering the healing aura also affects ''you'' (and the Space Trait Energy Refrequencer, for example, can convert a percentage of damage dealt into hull health and you will be doing a ''lot'' of damage, easily fifteen to twenty thousand per ship every few seconds,) it's fairly easy to build your Defender to boost hull regeneration and exotic damage. It's more useful for PVE than PVP as human opponents will very quickly target Defenders or just avoid your range, but [[ArtificialStupidity regular enemies will just plow into the field like dummies and very quickly disintegrate unless they're dreadnoughts.]] The Defense Console ''already'' gives you +38 all damage resistance and +28.5 hull restoration to begin with, so even with the cooldown for the ability itself you're likely to survive until it's useable again. On top of all that, the Defender can be used to farm items to sell for Energy Credits simply by parking it in front of a space where enemy ships will warp in with the patrols "Rescure And Search" and "The Ninth Rule," especially the former where Mokai ships will spawn at the end of a mission and be easily taken out by the Defender's field; even better, by destroying the ships so quickly will cause the game to spawn ''more ships than it would ordinarily'', making it easy enough to score hundreds of thousands of credits when you sell all that loot.

** The [[https://sto.fandom.com/wiki/Cnidarian_Defender Cnidarian Defender Ship]] introduced through the Risian Summer Event, or more specifically, the [[https://sto.fandom.com/wiki/Console_-_Universal_-_Cnidarian_Defense Cnidarian Defense console]] that turns it into a stationary turret that not only deals huge damage to any five enemies that gets in range, but also hull heals any five allies in the same range. There ''are'' disadvantages to the Defense form (it's almost non-existent speed and turn rate and going under ten percent health reverts it back to its regular form,) but considering the healing aura also affects ''you'' (and the Space Trait Energy Refrequencer, for example, can convert a percentage of damage dealt into hull health and you will be doing a ''lot'' of damage, easily fifteen to twenty thousand per ship every few seconds,) it's fairly easy to build your Defender to boost hull regeneration and exotic damage. It's more useful for PVE than PVP as human opponents will very quickly target Defenders or just avoid your range, but [[ArtificialStupidity regular enemies will just plow into the field like dummies and very quickly disintegrate unless they're dreadnoughts.]] The Defense Console ''already'' gives you +38 all damage resistance and +28.5 hull restoration to begin with, so even with the cooldown for the ability itself you're likely to survive until it's useable again.

** "Rainbow boats" or some variation thereof for a {{Noob}} mistake of not making your weapon types match up[[labelnote:*]]Tactical consoles that boost a particular energy type provide greater increases than ones that boost a weapon type; and making your weapon types match up makes it more likely you'll be able to score a proc (think StatusEffects [[RecycledInSpace IN SPACE!]]) when attacking.[[/labelnote]], because of the resulting beams being in all colors of the rainbow. As one guy on the forums remarked on one of these who used cannons, "every time he fired it looked like a pack of Skittles exploded."[[note]]Season Eight's Fleet Spire Tactical Consoles have made doing this more viable, but it's still looked down upon by most players for being a newbie mistake.[[/note]] With the addition of several subtypes of weapon, it's possible, and even somewhat desirable, to have a "rainbow boat" that uses a single energy type. Phasers, in particular, come in truly dazzling array of colors and effects.

** A material used in some doff assignments related to Caitians is "Ferasan Nepeta Leaves" (generally taken to be marijuana [-InSpace-]). The ''Nepeta cataria'' plant is more commonly known as "catnip". No wonder the [[CatPeople Caitians]] are interested in them.

** By its conclusion, the Iconian War had become such a DorkAge with episodes such as "Time in a Bottle" (involving the [[ButtMonkey Ferengi]] extensively), [[IdiotPlot "House Pegh"]], and "Broken Circle" (wherein HollywoodTactics get most of the Alliance fleet killed and the [[spoiler:death of an Iconian]] is accompanied by dialogue that is less epic and more cringe-inducing) that the playerbase was desperate for ANYTHING else to play. The Temporal Cold War that followed is rife with plotholes, stuffed with flat villains with rote motivation, and dripping in [[LargeHam over-the-top melodrama]], but it's actually been reasonably well-received by the playerbase for ''not being the Iconian War''.

* IdiotPlot:
** The now-deleted mission "Divide et Impera", due to railroading and a lack of consequences for the player character mass-murdering Romulan civilian doctors. The Foundry mission "[[Recap/StarTrekOnlineFoundryDivideUtRegnes Divide ut Regnes]]" was written as a FixFic.
** "House Pegh". The player sides with black-ops specialist Klingons, on a mission to destroy Omega generators with carefully-planted explosives, with [[spoiler:Kahless]] beaming in as the true leader; simple enough. Then they realize at the end that an [[AGodIAm Iconian]] is present... who decides to face it in "honorable combat", as a means to preferably injure it, even kill if possible. [[spoiler:Kahless]]'s attack is unsuccessful at first, before a [[KlingonScientistsGetNoRespect Klingon scientist]] {{technobabble}}'s down the Iconian's shields to allow him to harm it, which does prove what [[spoiler:Kahless]] desired: they are not invincible. Though the Iconian is injured and [[AnArmAndALeg missing an arm]], it takes advantage of a moment's lull and stabs [[spoiler:Kahless]] in the back - because they have now been fully discovered ''and'' enraged an Iconian, the PC and the black-ops beam out. Not ideal, but even worse, their plan to destroy the generators failed (with it being ambiguous if the explosives went off at all; we never see/hear a command to denotate them). Basically, backlash on the forums was ''intense'', even by Klingon fans.
** "Broken Circle". Protip: A ZergRush against a fortified target generally only works when the attackers have a ''significant'' numerical advantage, because fortification is a force multiplier for the defense (it limits the attackers' ability to attack the defenders). The ''defenders'' have the numerical advantage in this mission. Though the attackers had few options to begin with, you get [[ForegoneConclusion no points for guessing how that turned out.]] And it gets better: InUniverse there was explicitly no operational necessity for the mission in the first place because the Krenim timeship was only weeks from being ready. [[BloodKnight Captain Kagran pretty much just wanted a cool story to tell his hypothetical grandkids.]]
** All of the temporal missions could potentially have been avoided if Daniels just went back a few more weeks in time and stopped [[spoiler:Noye]] from stealing the timeship. "Potentially", of course, assuming that [[spoiler:Noye]] and friends didn't have measures to prevent this in the first place - especially given his temporal resources - but no thought of attempting this in the first place is given. [[note]]Given [[spoiler:Noye]]'s involvement with the Sphere Builders - who were active during ''[[Series/StarTrekEnterprise Enterprise]'', and are made up of a race accidentally wiped out in an Iconian War mission (one of whom was [[spoiler:Noye]]'s wife in the story's present day) - there are major hints that these events are part of a StableTimeLoop origin for the Sphere Builders. So disrupting this event may not have even been possible in the grand scheme of things.[[/note]]

** The [[https://sto.fandom.com/wiki/Replica_Thompson_Submachine_Gun Replica Thompson Submachine Gun]] should be called the "Borg Killer" since even Elite Tactical Drones can't adjust to its physical damage ,allowing you to mow down crowds of Borg in a few seconds of sustained fire just Picard did in ''Film/StarTrekFirstContact''. Granted, it doesn't do as much individual damage as its other physical brethren the Zethram Shotgun or the TR-116B sniper rifle, but it compensates by [[DeathOfAThousandCuts ''hitting the enemies in front of you a lot'']] and can be boosted further by skills and traits like the Commando Specialization that increases damage with aim and also lowers the secondary attack's cooldown. The fact that it was originally available during the First Contact Day event (where a daily grind was all that was required to earn it) and was later moved it to the Picard Bundle in the Zen Store may mean that Cryptic actually is aware of how much a GameBreaker it is.

** The [[https://sto.fandom.com/wiki/Cnidarian_Defender Cnidarian Defender Ship]] introduced through the Risian Summer Event, or more specifically, the [[https://sto.fandom.com/wiki/Console_-_Universal_-_Cnidarian_Defense Cnidarian Defense console]] that turns it into a stationary turret that not only deals huge damage to any five enemies that gets in range, but also hull heals any five allies in the same range. There ''are'' disadvantages to the Defense form (it's almost non-existent speed and turn rate and going under ten percent health reverts it back to its regular form,) but considering the healing aura also affects ''you'' (and the Space Trait Energy Refrequencer, for example, can convert a percentage of damage dealt into hull health and you will be doing a ''lot'' of damage, easily twenty thousand per ship every few seconds,) it's fairly easy to build your Defender to boost hull regeneration and exotic damage. It's more useful for PVE than PVP as human opponents will very quickly target Defenders or just avoid your range, but [[ArtificialStupidity regular enemies will just plow into the field like dummies and very quickly disintegrate unless they're dreadnoughts.]] The Defense Console ''already'' gives you +38 all damage resistance and +28.5 hull restoration to begin with, so even with the cooldown for the ability itself you're likely to survive until it's useable again.

*** Meshweavers are very small ships, also not particularly dangerous, but can generate Tholian Web "walls" between you and them. While the wall is between you, you can't target or fire at the Meshweaver (or Meshweavers, since they ''always'' come in at least pairs). All you can do is navigate around the wall or pour fire into it to destroy it. [[ArtificialStupidity Fortunately, the Weavers will frequently maneuver around their own wall, even though they can fire through it no problem.]]

*** The ''Age of Discovery'' storyline fills out the backstory of USS ''Discovery'''s TooDumbToLive original security chief Ellen Landry and making [[DesignatedVillain Mirror Gabriel Lorca]] a significantly nastier character in retrospect.[[labelnote:spoiler]]Ellen Landry's fiancee, Amna Patel, is killed [[HeroicSacrifice manually detonating an explosive booby trap]] in "Impossibility of Reason", and it's implied her loyalty to Lorca and unbalanced sense of danger is a result of him [[ManipulativeBastard manipulating her while she was in a psychologically fragile state]].[[/labelnote]]

* BetterThanCanon: High-end Foundry missions were often considered to be better than even Cryptic's featured episodes, never mind the average story mission. This despite the LevelEditor not having anywhere near the capabilities of Cryptic's development tools.

** J'ula in the ''Series/StarTrekDiscovery''/''Klingon Civil War'' episodes, to some. Aside from being T'Kuvma's sister (tying her irretrievably to DSC's ContestedPrequel status) she - once transported to the present day - mounts a Klingon-ultranationalist terrorist campaign against TheAlliance that eventually escalates the preexisting divisions in the Klingon Empire into a full-blown CivilWar. But then, regardless of your feelings, the game has all PC characters (including DSC Federation characters, whose commanding officer she murdered in the JustifiedTutorial) come into an EnemyMine situation [[spoiler:when her NumberTwo betrays her and hands her WeaponOfMassDestruction to Chancellor J'mpok]]. In "Knowledge Is Power", you even play as her for the majority of the mission, while she seeks to atone for destroying her brother's greatest accomplishment (as a result of said campaign she caused).

* UnfortunateImplications:
** Behold, the STF "Undine Infiltration" [[http://forum.arcgames.com/startrekonline/discussion/comment/12382731/#Comment_12382731 as a massive civil rights violation]]. At minimum it was pretty tone-deaf of 8472 Counter-Command to beam in in the dead of night and start randomly beaming away local Bajorans; it's not surprising there were anti-government protests.
** The relationship between the Kobali and the Delta Alliance, as well as between Kobali "parents" and their "children", have been compared to DomesticAbuse and [[AbusiveParents parental abuse]], and their method of reproduction to rape: the Kobali have a tendency to send warships to retrieve animatees that remember their past lifetimes and try to return to them. It's further argued that by ([[{{Railroading}} being railroaded into]]) helping them fight the Vaadwaur in this manner, the PlayerCharacter is in direct violation of the Geneva Conventions. [[https://qr.ae/pNy8Iv]]

** "Broken Circle". Protip: A ZergRush against a fortified target generally only works when the attackers have a ''significant'' numerical advantage, because fortification is a force multiplier for the defense (it limits the attackers' ability to attack the defenders). The ''defenders'' have the numerical advantage in this mission. Though the attackers had few options to begin with, you get [[ForegoneConclusion no points for guessing how that turned out.]]

* {{Altitis}}: The game suffers horribly from it - free players get three slots (four, following the Delta Recruitment event) and subscribers/LTS players get 4-5 to start with and can purchase 2 or 4 more up to a maximum of ''[[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters 49]]''. With four factions, three classes and multiple races (''especially'' the catch-all "Alien"), players will want to try to get them all. However, this has caused players to be bitten in the ass as of recently due to the time-gated grinds - players who are in the mind set of GottaCatchEmAll wants to have their characters with ''all'' of the ships, ''all'' of the [=DOFF=]s, as much Dilithium as possible and will get ''really'' pissy because they can't. The advent of ''Delta Rising'' made this harder for many players who had accumulated multiple characters due to a number of reasons, including a lack of usable missions to level up with and the advent of the Specialization trees. After Steven "[=SalamiInferno=]" Ricossa took over as executive producer Cryptic started taking steps to remedy this, including making ships obtained via event grinds available for free across all characters once they'd been unlocked once.

* AlternateCharacterInterpretation: [[AlternateCharacterInterpretation/StarTrekOnline Has its own page now.]]

** The relationship between the Kobali and the Delta Alliance, as well as between Kobali "parents" and their "children", have been compared to DomesticAbuse and [[AbusiveParents parental abuse]], and their method of reproduction to rape: the Kobali have a tendency to send warships to retrieve animatees that remember their past lifetimes and try to return to them. It's further argued that by ([[{{Railroading}} being railroaded into]]) helping them fight the Vaadwaur in this manner, the PlayerCharacter is [[ObligatoryWarCrimeScene in direct violation of the Geneva Conventions]]. [[https://qr.ae/pNy8Iv]]

* BadassDecay:
** DoubleSubverted with the Borg. Initially they were DemonicSpiders, a refreshing contrast to the {{Flanderization}} and BadassDecay they'd received by the time ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' wrapped, but power creep in player starships turned them back into jokes: Until ''Delta Rising'' the average decently built player character would destroy dozens of Borg ships an hour when grinding [=STFs=]. This was subverted ''again'' with the modifications to the PVE difficulty to the point where some of the player base was demanding that Cryptic put ''back'' the Flanderization. And ongoing power creep has pushed players ahead of them again, though too a lesser degree than in the past.

* FriendlyFandoms: Someone on the production team of ''Series/StarTrekPicard'' obviously is a fan of STO, enough to canonize four starship designs from the game by putting them in an episode. Cryptic saluted this by putting the four ship models on sale in the Zen store.

* FriendlyFandom: Someone on the production team of ''Series/StarTrekPicard'' obviously is a fan of STO, enough to canonize four starship designs from the game by putting them in an episode.

** The repetitive dialogue in certain task force missions becomes unbearable during a long grind for reputation progress. (For example, Kagran during "Gateway to Grethor": "Troop transports from the starbase are heading toward the planet!...Troop transports from the starbase are heading toward the planet!...Troop transports from the starbase are heading toward the planet!...")

*** Orb Weavers are basic cruisers, and can generate a full Tholian Web around your ship. It's small enough that, unless you have a ''very'' nimble ship, you ''will'' end up flying against the web, which damages shields and hull. You can destroy parts of it by targeting the "Web Nodes" that hold it together, and if you don't make a hole and escape pretty quickly, it will collapse in on your ship, dealing roughly 80% hull damage. Oh, and as with the Meshweavers, you can't shoot through this web, but the Tholians ''can''.

* GeniusBonus: A material used in some doff assignments related to Caitians is "Ferasan Nepeta Leaves" (generally taken to be marijuana [-InSpace-]). The ''Nepeta cataria'' plant is more commonly known as "catnip". No wonder the [[CatPeople Caitians]] are interested in them.

* GeniusBonus: A material used in some doff assignments related to Caitians is "Ferasan Nepeta Leaves". The Nepeta cataria plant is more commonly known as "catnip". No wonder the [[CatPeople Caitians]] are interested in them.

* JerkWithAHeartOfJerk: Most of the Vorta, as expected. Neman, for instance, comments that it's a waste how the PC has to kill off so many Jem'Hadar, but "you can always grow more..."

* TheWoobie: Keten, [[spoiler:better known as the ''original'' Harry Kim.]] Imagine waking up and finding yourself on another world, no idea how you got there, not knowing that you ''died'' and all you want to do is go home. Even more, he fights to [[spoiler:get back to the ''Voyager'']], despite the fact that 34+ years have passed since that fateful day and not believing anyone who says otherwise. This is pretty much a scared [[spoiler:Ensign]] who just wants to go home and have his life back.

* UglyCute: Several aliens fall into this category.
** The way the Tholians scuttle around is almost adorable. They even squeak when they melee attack you!
** Nanovs, the cuddly, harmless, six-eyed squid-things that act as living radiation scrubbers on New Romulus.

* TheWoobie: Poor Slamek. This guy has been abducted from his colony by the Elachi, turned over to be experimented on by the Tal'Shiar, then, after a short period of freedom, had his ship crashed, been captured and forced to fight in the arena against all sorts of deadly beasts. If that wasn't enough, he's also forced to be a mole against his fellow gladiators. No wonder he seems so utterly whipped in his final scene.

* TheWoobie: Poor Slamek. This guy has been abducted from his colony by the Elachi, turned over to be experimented on by the Tal'Shiar, then, after a short period of freedom, had his ship crashed, been captured and forced to fight in the arena against all sorts of deadly beasts. If that wasn't enough, he's also forced to be a mole against his fellow gladiators. No wonder he seems so utterly whipped in his final scene.