WMG / Star Trek Online

Player captains are essentially privateers

They don't need to wear uniforms, are responsible for supplying their own equipment, and are not issued direct orders by their superiors. In fact, they aren't even given regular wages, but rather rewarded for carrying out missions. Only NPC captains can be considered enlisted personnel in either Starfleet or the Klingon Defence Forces. Furthermore, because of their semi-official status, they are specially given permission to do things that the ordinary rank-and-file would not be entrusted with, possibly because their respective factions will have some measure of "plausible deniability" in case they are caught.

• The lack of a need to wear uniforms is actually stated by a loading screen to apply to Starfleet in general (one can notice that while NPC Starfleet officers do tend to wear the Sierra or Antares 'modern' uniforms, they aren't consistent in which of the two, nor which of the five different subvariants each).
  • Kinda sorta supported by the TV series, which used the Star Trek: The Next Generation and DS9 uniforms concurrently until the gray-on-black First Contact uniforms were introduced.
  • Jossed by Thomas the Cryptic Cat with regards to the updated Uniform code for 2410. Basically there is a standardized uniform, but since the player character is a high ranking Admiral by end game they're allowed to do what ever they want.

The inclusion of the Ferengi completely transformed Federation society

In the TV shows, after the first few bad experiences, Federation and Ferengi relations gradually improved to the point Quark was allowed to run a bar on Deep Space 9 and Nog even became the first Ferengi to join starfleet. At this point the Federation and Ferengi still seem like polar opposites in terms of how their societies function. Unlike the Ferengi, Federation society had no need for money. Now fast forward to the events of Star Trek Online, Ferengi have become regular members of starfleet and many even ship captains. The Federation now uses several types of currencies and anything can be sold on the exchange from food to starships, including your own officers, to other captains willing to pay the right price. This is certainly a case of Pragmatic Adaptation as money is a practical game mechanic, but consider in-universe implications: in the span of a generation or two after the Ferengi have been introduced, the Federation went from not having a use for money to openly accepting selling people on the exchange market.

Several events depicted in previous Trek shows will occur in-game

2409 is pretty much the perfect time to have a lot of these things happen.

• We'll help Janeway go back in time again to complete the time loop (she's a bit late this time, after hesitating, but she realizes if she doesn't Voyager and the universe are boned.)
  • The fun gameplay bit coming from the fact that the tech she needs is Klingon, and, well, that's just a hair problematic now.
• Worf will die on the floor of the High Council, as per the TNG episode, either in backstory or in a game event.
  • One might assume he is already dead, as he would surely have been one of the most vocal opponents to open hostilities with the Federation. Although he wasn't exactly what you could call friendly in "All Good Things", that probably had more to do with Troi's death and he and Riker's unresolved feelings on the matter. One does look forwards to seeing a Future Bad Ass Alexander though, who is willing to break all sorts of rules, that are in place for very important reasons, for people he cares about. What would that mean for Mom and Pop back on earth? (If they're still alive, that is.)
    • Worf is dead, and has been replaced by an Undine?
    • Actually, in the recent Season 2 content update, the Klingon Episodes feature an elder Worf alive and well as an adviser to house Martok. He appears to be dedicated to preserving house Martok, and does not appear to have been replaced yet. As far as I've seen, thus-far this is his only appearance, and perhaps we may well seen his prophesied death in-game.
    • We do have Alexander kicking ass and pull a Kirk on Rura Penthe.
  • Both Jossed and Defied. Worf is about to get a knife to the back from Torg at the end of "The House Always Wins" but Alexander puts himself in the way, dying instead.
• We'll run into Captain Harry Kim aboard the Rhode Island (the Nova-class is available to players, to boot!)
  • Confirmed. He and the U.S.S. *Rhode Island* are introduced in *Delta Rising*, and serves as an NPC contact for the Kobali Prime battlezone.
• Nog may be a captain by this point.
  • Confirmed. He commands the U.S.S. Chimera as of the Iconian War update, and the player meets him in "Time in a Bottle".
• Jake Sisko's novel Anslem may well be published during or immediately before the game starts.
  • The Tie-in Novel The Needs of the Many confirm Anslem was published a couple of decades earlier.

The tutorial sessions takes place on the holodeck as a Secret Test of Character

All promising officers are given the test. Those that pass are given command.

The Guardian of Forever will be used to show us a ton of events from the shows

There are videos out there already of it showing scenes from TOS and Generations; we'll probably get to help beat Soran or meet Zephram Cochrane.

• It does get used to explain how the Klingons got their foreheads back: you as a player are responsible for it. Way to go.
  • Nooo... You tried to stop it but failed. However you managed to kill the guy who did so and grab the girl he used to do so.

STO will explain exactly why the Romulans seem to have all the same names and whatnot as the Roman civilization on Earth.

Oh, man. If that's not a hint, what is?

• Not having an account, what does that say?
  • Perhaps it's not Romulans that have Roman names, but rather Romans who have Romulan-like names?
• Hello!!!! The Universal Translator! They have Romulan names, when you hear their names said the UT translates them into terms you can understand.

Admiral Quinn is totally a friggin' Undine/8472 infiltrator.

Let's see, he sends you to "escort" that "ambassador" who turns out to be an infiltrator who attempts to murder you (first on the ground, then with a damn Tethys dreadnought), he sends you on another mission where a second Tethys is ripping apart the Klingons, and every time you manage to survive he seems more and more surprised. Suspicious? Nawwwwww...

• Man, first he's infested with neck parasites back in TNG, and now this. When it rains, it fucking pours.
  • The Admiral Quinn in TNG wasn't a Trill - it's a different Admiral Quinn
    • That, or the imposter isn't doing a very good job.
• This is a theory I kept coming back to. Hes gotta be working with someone.
• As of Season Nine, this seems to be jossed! It turned out that head researcher E'genn was an Undine during the invasion of Earth Spacedock.

Jean-Luc Picard's Irumodic Syndrome is going to get cured, and ass kicking will ensue.

One Mission in the Task Force Hippocrates Quest has an NPC scientist who comments on the remarkable progress they've been making towards a cure for Irumodic Syndrome.

Everything is an Undine plot.

This is made by Cryptic, after all. And since they are perfect shape-shifters, it only makes sense that they're everywhere in the higher ranks!

• Actually pretty jossed. It's all an Iconian plot. They riled up the Undine, who riled up the Alpha Quad powers into war to weaken them (and in the Romulan's case, wreck their shit badly (bad enough that some of them WORK for the Iconians). They're doing this to make the galaxy an easier target for them when they come back. (and it is a matter of when...)

The Federation has absurdly high standards for Starfleet.

Starfleet requires officer-training for postings that would be mere enlisted in an ordinary navy, and even then only takes in the very best of the best. This explains why the Federation is strapped enough for manpower that an ensign can be put in command of a ship (the Federation has been doing this for too long to let go of their standards easily), and how a mere ensign can be qualified to be put in command of a ship. This could be because of Starfleet beginning as the best-of-the-best working together in the early days of Coalition/Federation, when the various members still had their own navies as well.

The Dominion will return

Sure, they may have gotten kicked in the teeth at the end of Deep Space Nine, but with this much chaos abounding, you can't really believe they'll stay in their pudding planet for long.

• Partially confirmed. The arc deals with the 2800 ships from the Dominion War whisked into the cornfield by the Prophets. The actual Dominion is staying hands off except to get their fleet back and aren't even returning the Federation's calls. The reason is that Dominion knows the Iconians are coming and Eraun states the Dominion policy is to stay the hell away from them and let the Iconians do what they want. Summon Bigger Fish applies to them as well it seems.
• They return again in the 2017 expansion Victory Is Life, when an attack by the Hur'q forces them to ask for aid from the Alliance.

The reward for completing the Dominion featured series arc will be a Jem'Hadar Bridge Officer

Ketracel White can't just be there for replicator trash, right?

• As of the fourth episode of the arc, released 3/3/2012, confirmed. The mission "Outpost 4029" gives you a Jem'Hadar Bridge Officer as its reward the first time. They can consume Ketracel White and get buffed for ten minutes.
• Arguably enforced as of the 2017 expansion Victory Is Life, which introduces a Dominion faction where the captain and all of the starting bridge officers are Jem'Hadar and are therefore ketracel-dependent. The Jem'Hadar are later cured of their ketracel dependence after the Dominion strikes a deal with the Alliance.

If/when Star Trek returns to television, it will follow the basic plot of STO

It seems likely that the franchise is going to come back to TV sometime in the future, given the popularity of the most recent film. Since there's so much more 'official' involvement in the game then there has been for any Expanded Universe material, could it be possible that the Powers That Be are using Star Trek Online as a testing ground for new TV series ideas? That would be awesome.

B'Vat went on a long-term mission at some point.

As in The Emissary. It would explain the Fridge Logic in him being old enough to have been around in Kirk's days and still being so spry in 2409 - he was in cryo-sleep for a goodly portion of the time in between, and so isn't actually 170 years old in terms of biological age!.

• Actually Deep Space Nine reveals that Klingons can live to be around 200 years old before dying of old age (not that many get that far...)
  • No 'actually' about it. Kor and the others were old by DS9 — clearly less able than in their glory days, especially Kor by his death. B'Vat was active around Kor's TOS days, and is still active showing no real signs of age-related decay 34 years after 2375. Klingons can get old, but B'Vat's still oddly healthy for a Klingon that old.

2013 will be a 'Year without Seasons'

The devs have been unwilling to call the May update Season 8, saying that it is too big for that. Recent datamining have also revealed evidence of a playable Romulan faction incoming. This theory is that this faction will come this year... but not in the May update, which will merely lay the foundations for it while adding other stuff as well. Instead, what would have been Season 9 will also be a 'too big to be a Season' update, and that update will bring in the Romulans as a playable faction.

• Jossed: May got a Romulan faction, and November had the introduction of Season 8: "The Sphere".

Admiral T'Nae in the main timeline is the same person as the T'Nae in Temporal Ambassador

Due to an apparant oversight by the timeship, the only person removed from the Enterprise-C at the end is the player, not T'Nae, Yar or who knows what other alternate timeline crewmembers were aboard. Sela's backstory establishes that crewmembers aboard the Enterprise were taking prisoner, therefore T'Nae could have been one, and could have escaped back to Federation space and joined Starfleet. This would account for how much of a General Ripper she is toward the Romulans. The real question is what happened to the main timeline T'Nae.

• T'Nae was stuck on the Romulan prison world, which caused numerous temporal anomalies on and around the planet. The finale of Yesterday's War sees her retrieved and re-integrated. However, existing in two places at once may have influenced her behavior.

J'mpok is an Undine infiltrator

Wouldn't be the first time the Klingons' efforts at counterintelligence against alien infiltration failed so thoroughly. Reference the changeling who replaced Martok in 2372, despite the various blood tests. Also gives an alternate explanation for him being bound and determined to throw the whole Empire at the Federation: Undine!J'mpok is doing his part to weaken the KDF so that the Undine have an easier time taking on the AQ/BQ superpowers.

Sub-WMG: Ambassador Worf becomes Chancellor of the Klingon Empire after J'mpok is unmasked

The Player Character can't be the Big Good; they're busy playing The Hero. Worf is popular, has strong ties with the Federation (even though he cut official ties, he still has many friends), he's badass enough to scare off challengers, and he's a good guy.

• Not to mention that the KDF player character needn't be a Klingon. Even in 2410 it's unlikely that the Empire would accept a non-Klingon chancellor.

The Player Character is an Insane Admiral

There is a theory among players that one's character is precisely this, being a mass-murderer by the sheer number of enemy npc ships destroyed throughout a player's career, especially at Vice Admiral rank. The death toll a player can be personally responsible for (while being standard fare for a MMO game) is quite hideous if viewed from a purely canon perspective. Neither Kirk, nor Picard or Sisko, or even Janeway ever directly killed so many sentient beings as a player can.

• As a counter, it seems more likely that, in most cases, the PC is simply destroying the ships, and most of the crews are able to evac. Save for either A) beings that can in no way be talked down, B) Dangerous fanatics a la Kahn, who would sooner go down with their ship, or C) a few unfortunate incidents, then the actual body count is likely comparatively low. Most probably on par with 2009 Kirk.

There will be a future storyline involving a *Federation* civil war

It could serve as something of a parallel to the Year of Klingon story, except that Klingon civil wars are a dime a dozen, while the closest we ever got to a Federation civil war was the DS9 two-parter "Homefront/Paradise Lost". An extended Federation civil war, with the enemy in control of Earth for an extended time, would be a major Wham Episode.

Spoiler Stuff.

The Iconians weren't bombed for being bastards.

• They were a standard Precursor Race but then got nuked halfway into oblivion. 200'000 years later, they're still a little sore.
• Alternatively, 200'000 years is a long time for things to change and people to get over things. An imperialistic Iconian government has arisen to power in the interim, and now they are getting involved in the galaxy for their own reasons. They're just using a tech advantage garnered from 200'000 years of space-faring history.
• Jossed, information from the records of the Dewan people and the New Romulus History chips revealed that they were a slave using race who simply walked through a gateway and let their slaves get killed instead of them when there was a revolt.
• Partially confirmed via the Preservers on Lae'nas. While details are sketchy and unlikely to get much clearer (the Iconians are obviously biased and probably not willing to talk anyway, the various entities with a loose enough connection to spacetime that they could tell tend towards the cryptic, and the Preservers get killed by Iconian for the individual and then for the entire Archive with the rest of the Preservers blown up by Iconian dreadnought before they can elaborate), apparently the Iconians were different, 'brighter' before the war that ended with Iconia's bombardment, and said war supposedly began in part due to jealousy and fear of the Iconians and their gifts (in other words, the implication is that first war against the Iconians wasn't entirely the Iconians' fault).
  • Now basically entirely confirmed. They were bombed for being arrogant if mostly peaceful and artistic, and having a principle similar to the Prime Directive, based on what was seen on Iconia itself 200,000 years ago.

The Iconians haven't really come back. It's all a plot by the Tal Shiar, who have access to Iconian science and technology.

Notice that we have never directly seen or interacted with an Iconian in the game and neither have any of the NPCs, including people that should have. The only hints that the Iconians control the Tal Shiar come from people like Obisek, leader of the Reman resistance, who have no firsthand, direct knowledge.

The "Iconians" also captured Empress Sela, a known enemy of the Tal Shiar who attempted to assassinate the head of the order...a kidnapping done with Romulan ships and equipment. Why is it necessary to assume an alien force made the Tal Shiar capture someone who is already their enemy?

In addition, in the "Countdown" comics, it was established the Romulans are hungry for revenge after the supernova, and their modus operandi for this revenge is to reverse-engineer captured technology from more advanced alien races, like the Borg technology to create Nero's ship, the Narada.

The Iconians as malevolent ancient conquerors contradicts what we've learned about them from the episodes, which presented them as a scientifically advanced culture destroyed by less advanced races who feared them for their science. The TV episodes featuring the Iconians like "Contagion" strongly hinted that they were never conquerors. Zero evidence is presented for the view they were warlike, as, Picard himself pointed out, no Iconian weapons were ever discovered: the only known Iconian "weapon" is a probe that disrupts computers, though even that, disrupting computers, might be an accident without malevolent intent.

Picard speculated that the Iconians were not malevolent or warlike, but were feared and misunderstood by less technologically advanced races. If they really were aggressive conquerors, would less advanced races have really destroyed their homeworld?

• On the other hand, having your planet blow'd up and basically being kicked off out of your homes wont leave you very happy. 200K years definitely won't numb that kind of pain. Plus even though the TNG episode says they probably weren't conquerors it actually does still leave it ambiguous as we have no idea what actually happened. As you stated no Iconian weapons were discovered. Just because I can walk down a street in New York City and not see a nuclear missile doesn't mean the US doesn't have any. "Contagion" and later "To the Death" never give any evidence about the Iconians as a people just showing what people would do with their tech. "Power Corrupts."

• Basically jossed as of Sphere of Influence. More 'servitor races' to the Iconians are showing up, and the technologies involved are becoming increasingly more impressive. Considering every indication is that you weren't supposed to show up on the subspace station and read the records there, would the Tal Shiar really have gone to the effort of making fake Iconian reports on a scattering of worlds complete with live apparently life-sized images of the worlds in question, including Iconia itself?
  • And with "Surface Tensions", pretty much completely Jossed. An Iconian appears in person and vaporizes some Klingons.

The Iconians built the Doomsday Machines.

To the Death in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine established that they built structures with Neutronium and STO shows them using Anti-proton weaponry exclusively. Which is exactly what the Doomsday Machine is.

The Iconians and the Preservers are members of the same race.

One faction dedicated to preserving sentient life, and another dedicated to conquering/destroying it. The unusual appearance of the Iconians seen in artwork might simply be full body suits they wear to look intimidating.

• I don't know about this. I don't think a humanoid could fit into that shape. And we've seen them in person now, so it's not exaggeration.
  • An alternative is that the Iconians and the Preservers were members of the same race, but that the Iconian faction ended up going a high-transhumanist route, ultimately turning into the shape we now know them as. After all, Star Trek does tend to be rather sceptical about significant transhumanism.
• Jossed by the Iconian War arc. Per the Preservers' own words, the Iconians are another of their created species.

Tholians are Iconians.

Or at least the higher-ranking Tholians are a genetically engineered sub-race of Iconians. Get to level 3 of the New Romulus reputation system and play the mission it gives you. Watch the video of the Tholian report to their headquarters, and compare what you see to this. See the similarity?

• Seems to be Jossed. We see an Iconian during "Surface Tensions". It's a similar design, but they're more of a black color with blue/green highlights now. No more red crystal.

The Voth are going to be a Spanner in the Works for the Iconians.

One of the things that make the Iconians so dangerous is that they're so technologically advanced, being hundreds of thousands of years old. Well, what about the Voth? They're millions of years old, being sentient dinosaurs. While they might never have endeavoured to have a greater impact on the galaxy, and dogma has restricted their advancement, but they should still have a few goodies lying around that could potentially make the Iconians' lives a bit more difficult should they every start something serious with them.

• Jossed. The dinosaurs with frakking laser beams waste all their time and resources trying to kill mammals and then very anticlimactically get blown away by the Undine.
  • On the other hand, while they lost their hold on the sphere, they are still around and show up from time to time in the Delta Quadrant arc.

The defeat of the Iconians is going to involve, in some way, time travel.

We now have several sources telling us that for all their power, the Iconians are unable to handle time travel. Starfleet, on the other hand, is within five centuries (probably closer to four, since it seems to have become rather routine by Captain Braxton's career in the 29th century) of developing into a Timefleet with temporal functions as a routine part of their operations, and the entire premise of the Delta Recruit promotion is information-gathering in the past with the help of information from the very near future. This doesn't necessarily mean that the Iconian defeat will involve altering the past, but temporal shenanigans of some sort seems likely.

• Given that the Krenim are now allies and working on the temporal superweapon from the Voyager episode "Year of Hell" this is almost a certainty.
• Kinda confirmed. the victory did involve time travel, but it wasn't exactly an Iconian defeat so much as most of the Iconians going 'oh shit, we've been trying to kill the people responsible for saving us when Iconia fell! Look, just let us hole up on Iconia for a couple of millennia and let us think about what we've done, okay?'.

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