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1* Rifts have formed over whether it's a credible addition to the ''Franchise/StarTrek'' universe, or simply a flash in the pan and not long for this world. Rifts have formed within the game as vocal Klingon players clamour for content, among other issues. Basically it's the same as any other MMO.
2** Interesting, retroactively, STO is gaining legitimacy in this regard. When it launched it was DarkerAndEdgier than the Literature/StarTrekNovelVerse. 4 years later and the STO Timeline is suddenly LighterAndSofter than the novel verse simply because in those 4 years several novels were released that featured the deaths of several popular characters, destroyed a few popular pairings and blew up Deep Space 9. While STO got Denise Crosby as Sela (who was one of the KilledOffForReal Novel-verse characters, though players are starting to wish she'd die in-game, too) and Tasha Yar, made Kira the Kai, kept [=DS9=] and lots of publicity push from CBS, even including STO in [[http://www.idwpublishing.com/startrek/timelines.php official timelines for their comics with IDW.]] The base is breaking further as a result.
3** A lot of the conflict over if this game is credible for actually ''being'' a ''Star Trek'' game worthy of the title is due to the game's heavy combat stance. Many players don't like it ''at all'', get frustrated every time a new conflict starts up and hate the fact that their characters are openly and willingly spilling blood left and right in a sick and twisted version of GunboatDiplomacy that involves actually ''using'' those Gunboats. These players run on the idea that ''Star Trek'' is about exploration, diplomacy and following the OpeningNarration of "to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life forms and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man/one has gone before". They accuse Cryptic of never watching ''Star Trek'' or just focusing on the ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' episodes involving the Dominion War. However, other players point out that all [=MMOs=] run on conflict of some sort - player-made or developer-made. They believe that, yes, ''Star Trek'' was about trying to follow the OpeningNarration, but it was just backdrops for the conflicts of the day. They also believe that if they just focused on things like diplomacy, the game would get stale very fast. Some of them tend to run with the idea that Q postulated in the final episode of ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'', that it's not about charting stars, but to expand one's horizons and boundaries.
4*** While still combat heavy, the revisions to the game have also moderated it a bit. There's a bit more conversation, scanning, and diplomacy around the setting now with Duty Officers doing other sorts of missions than blowing up things or shooting them. This has changed opinions of some fans, though not all of them since you'll still kill more individuals than the Doomsday Machine by the end of it.
5* The Lockboxes and their related Shop Items, the Master Keys. It's basically a lottery, where you receive random loot whenever you open a box, ranging from awesome rewards (Cardassian Galor or Ferengi Marauder Starships) to near useless Junk. Most people seem to consider it a blatant rip-off, while others scramble for the shops to purchase Master Keys by the crapload. Discussion over that matter can turn very heated in short time.
6* This has somewhat cooled off after the Third Anniversary, as many of the assets made for the Lockboxes were used in the (awesome) anniversary mission "Temporal Ambassador". When the concept that the lockbox stuff could be used as team assets that could also be sold, many people shut up about the lockboxes.
7* The Foundry has its own massive debate regarding story-driven missions versus missions designed solely to raise funds. A little backstory to this one: the Foundry mission creator has a behavior for {{Non Player Character}}s called 'timid creature'. An NPC set with this flag can be attacked and killed, but won't fight back. Missions started appearing in (and eventually dominated) the list of top-rated and popular missions simply because they were seven space maps with 25 battleships each that ''sat there'' while you destroyed them. A small group of detail-oriented Foundry authors noticed both the overabundance of these missions as well as the number of them dominating the top-rated list and cried 'exploit' at players taking advantage of them. Cryptic patched the game so that Timid Creature [=NPC=]s start to fight back when attacked, pissing the 'sit and shoot' mission fans off beyond belief. The threads on the STO forums are slowly leveling out to mostly level-headed discussion with the occasional name-calling and snarky responses thrown in, but Jesus ran three laps around the church it got out of hand for a while.
8** This came back with the release of Season 9.5 and the removal of Exploration Clusters. Cryptic realized that many players can create new areas from whole cloth and told players that they can easily make new worlds of their own to replace the lost Clusters. This infuriated the Cluster players as they felt that the Foundry was unsuited that sort of thing, that all Cryptic had to do was just fix the Genesis Engine that generated the random worlds and that if players were being asked to make these new worlds, then ''they'' should be getting paid for doing Cryptic's work (their words). While this has calmed down since then, there are a bunch of players on the forums who will constantly complain about this over and ''over''...
9* Note: None of the above is anything that Cryptic hasn't already dealt with before. Most of the team on this worked on ''VideoGame/CityOfHeroes'' before the split between Cryptic and Paragon Studios. And let me tell you the BrokenBase on ''City of Heroes'' was much worse.
10* Recently, Cryptic released a modified version of the "Crystalline Catastrophe" PVE match titled "Crystalline Cataclysm". Suddenly, you got another set of base splitting with one side raging because of the chance to be surrounded by [[MirrorUniverse the Terran Empire]] and the other saying they enjoy the challenge and that players should ignore them.
11* The Federation ''Avenger''-class Battle Cruiser is considered horribly ugly or quite cool-looking with little to no middle ground.[[labelnote:*]]It's a boxy, blocky riff on Starfleet's typical flying spoon design, which one commenter said managed to look "exactly like a Starfleet ship and nothing like a Starfleet ship ''at the same time''".[[/labelnote]] And then there's the GCS diehards who wish Cryptic had given its boff layout and stats to the ''Galaxy''-X. Surprisingly, the ''Mogh''-class, its KDF MovesetClone, got a near-uniformly positive reception (though this is at least partly because the KDF has so few goodies to begin with).
12* The Reputation grinding, to the point where players began demanding that Cryptic revert the lower grind numbers on the test servers because they didn't want to grind for what they felt was things too high to obtain.
13* As mentioned below, the Exploration Cruiser Refit line (the ''Galaxy''-class). Either it's an effective tank that's meant to be tough to kill and be able to help heal your teammates or that it should be a monster that murders everything on sight and Cryptic should feel bad for not making it this way. The latter group love to point out that power creep has so thoroughly outpaced the {{Non Player Character}}s that tanks and healboats ''don't have a role anymore'': Even the flimsiest tacscort can usually handle what the AI throws at them, so if you aren't contributing to DPS you're just slowing everyone down.
14** This has spilled over into the reworked ''Galaxy-X''-class that was recently released. Opponents of the revisioned ship call it still useless as the Spinal Phaser Lance still misses its shots and that, even with the extra Tactical console, it's worthless DPS wise because it doesn't have a Lt. Commander Bridge Officer slot. Proponents, though, cite that the Antimatter Spread/Saucer Separation console power set grants the ship better turning, giving Dual Cannons a better shake, which increases even more once the Saucer ''does'' come off[[note]]The ''Galaxy'' series has a base turn rate of 6. The console power set grants it (at maximum) +2 turn, putting it at Support Cruiser/Heavy Cruiser level. Separating the Saucer grants you +10 for a grand total of a base turn rate of 18.[[/note]], that the Spinal Phaser Lance ''does'' work, especially if the targets aren't ''fast'' and that there's more to the ships than DPS.
15* PVP is a major Base Breaker for this game. Many of the naysayers have various of reasons for hating it: the imbalance of the fights as most of them end up being [=PuGs=] vs Pre-mades, the belief that the only way you win is if you have Fleet/Lobi/Lockbox ships outfitted with Mk XII/Fleet gear, thus selling into the idea that STO is actually Pay-2-Win, that any attempt to sell PVP to others is doomed to failure, etc. This was driven home when a Guest Blog written by a prominent player on PVP was put up and 3/4ths of the replies outright attacked it using those reasons.
16** This has gotten worse with a recent patch that put PVP-related dilithium-granting missions on the same 20-hour cooldown as other missions. Some see it as a needed thing, trying to cut down on rampant bot farming. The others, especially PVP players, see it as a nerf to force them to spend more money on the game than just using dilithium.
17* Whether or not [[Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries TOS]]-era ships should get Tier 5 refits, something CBS has vetoed. Proponents essentially point to RuleOfCool. Opponents point to the fact that the game is set in 2409, which makes the ''Constitution''-class over 150 years old, and that just because the also-century-plus-old ''Excelsior''-class is already at T5 doesn't mean it ''should'' be. Adding fuel to the fire is the fact that the T2 cruiser apparently doesn't get a T5 refit, unlike its escort and science vessel counterparts, because it has a Connie Refit skin. This one got to the point where the forum moderators actually put a moratorium on further threads about it. (Cue ObviousRulePatch when T6 ships were announced and {{Rules Lawyer}}s decided there was no rule against asking for a ''T6'' Connie.)
18** As of the Kelvin lockbox, there is a T6 connie available, though only the one from the Kelvin Timeline. This has resolved the above debate not at all.
19** And now the T6 TOS ships have been added in as lockbox prizes. Though they require either spending real money and more than a little luck, or spending '''insane''' amounts of in-game money.
20** Whether or not the Federation should have Cloaking Devices or be allowed to use Cloaking Devices. Proponents point out that the canon reasoning, the Treaty of Algeron, doesn't really work with the Romulan Republic as it was made for the Romulan Star Empire, thus they should be free to use them again. As well, the ''Defiant'', ''Galaxy''-X and ''Avenger'' can use it, so all other ships should. Opponents point out that the Federation is supposed to be good guys, thus not sneaking around (Roddenberry's original reason why the Federation hasn't developed cloaking, despite stealing a Romulan cloaking device in TOS and an entire Klingon Bird-Of-Prey in the films). As well, the ''Defiant'' and ''Galaxy''-X were special cases and the Avenger was designed to use Cloaking as an optional function, not a main one. And then we have the folks who TakeAThirdOption and just want the cloak on the particular Starfleet ships that already possess it to be a built-in power rather than having to use a console slot. Finally, there's the argument that ''somebody'' has to be the side that can't cloak, or PVP matches would devolve to waiting for somebody to get bored and decloak ''just to get something to happen''.\
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22It doesn't help that the game itself can't seem to make its mind up, given two seemingly contradictory bits of exposition. ''[[InGameNovel The Path to 2409]]'', [[http://sto.gamepedia.com/Accolade/Lore#Volume_16 Volume 16]] notes that there was a big kerfuffle with the RSE's [[TheRemnant Remnant]] in 2395 over another Starfleet cloaking experiment, ending with the President of the Federation banning them by executive order in the interest of peace. Then the flavor text for the ''Defiant''/''Galaxy'' X/''Avenger'' cloaking console goes and states that it's an exception to the treaty. The Tier 6 intel ships with integrated cloak just made things worse, even though the Klingon and Romulan versions got battle cloak and enhanced battle cloak respectively.
23* Season 8's use of the Voth as the MonsterOfTheWeek, with their ground {{mooks}} including bioengineered [[MemeticMutation dinosaurs with freaking laser beams on their heads]]. Part of the fanbase thought it was ridiculous, illogical from a story standpoint, and/or non-''Franchise/StarTrek'', the other pointed out dozens of other equally ridiculous things from the franchise. Boils down to whether or not you find fighting laser-spewing dinosaurs [[RuleOfCool sufficiently cool]].
24* The game's PowerCreep is easily this. While many do agree that there is a horrible case of this, it's the idea of it should be followed or not that divides players. Some players feel that it should, that the only way to achieve ultimate "deeps" is to have the best of the best - Tier 6 ships with Epic Mk XIV gear. These players also feel that this is the reason why the PVE queues were so low. Others have pointed out that you don't really need that many, that even the gear you pick up from missions is more than enough to bridge the gap and be helpful to others. The feelings on inadequacy isn't helped by the videos shown off by a group of players who call themselves the "Wizards of STO", who show off some of their runs with DPS numbers as high as 100k.
25* Some feel this way about [[spoiler: the Iconians showing up at the end of the "Surface Tension"]]. Some felt it was about time we saw them, others felt that [[spoiler: with the Iconians advanced technologies they should have just kicked a bomb through the gate and killed everyone right then and there.]]
26* ''STO'' under Atari and the Subscription model vs. ''STO'' under PWE and the Free-2-Play model. It's not uncommon to see players argue between the game's first three years or the second three years to be the better of the two. Players who prefer the old model point out that, despite the massive financial problems the game had, the game had a ton of missions to go through, Cryptic didn't try to remove everything in sight, there were no lockboxes in sight and Cryptic wasn't trying to nickle and dime everything in sight. going so far as to say that it was better when it wasn't trying to be "a Korean MMO". Players who prefer the new model point out that, under it, the game has flourished much more than before, the missions no longer look like time sponges and, despite the hardships gone through with ''Delta Rising'' and other moments, it's a much more better game as well as point out that the days of subscription-based games post-''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'' are long gone and this game would have been taken with it. Players who prefer the old accuse the other side of just being players who never played the game before then while players who prefer the new accuse the other side of wearing rose-tinted glasses.
27* It's not uncommon that, whenever the Bonus Dilithium Event rolls around or a new Dil sink is created in-game, there is a major call for the Refining cap (8000 for F2P players, 8500 for those in a fleet or subscribers/lifers, 9000 for subscribers/lifers in a fleet) to be either raised or removed completely. The players who want it changed point out that they can't actively use their Dil until they have it fully refined and with so many items out there that require it, the cap is majorly cumbersome. The players who don't point out that removing it will cause the Dil/Zen exchange rates to spiral out of control as those with the money and the dilithium would easily control the market, making it hard, if not impossible, for casual players to use it. Those who want the change are either ignorant of the implications or just don't see how that's a bad thing.
28* The swimsuit issue involving the Risa Summer Event for 2014. Cryptic designed a bunch of swimsuits for men and women, but restricted them to ''only'' Risa. Players who want the swimsuits everywhere point out that Cryptic allows people to not only run around in other era uniforms, but also formal wear and other odds and ends. Also, [[{{Stripperiffic}} Orions and Mirror Universe uniforms]]. Players who don't point out that this would give incentive to [=ERPers=] and many people do ''not'' want that. When a bug accidentally allowed players ''to'' go elsewhere with swimsuits, supporters called Cryptic "liars" for "going back on their word".
29** 2015 gave us the Targ H.O.G. Hoverboard kerfluffle. The Hoverboard, as stated on the news blogs, was supposed to be more maneuverable yet slower to accelerate and decelerate. However, a bug made it ''faster'' than it should be and was fixed a week later. While many are happy this was fixed because it made the hoverboard race unwinnable against someone with them, others are angry ''because'' it was fixed, as they felt that this was advertised and was nerfed.
30* ''Delta Rising'' as a whole, easily making it a ContestedSequel. A lot of the bile and anger towards ''Delta Rising'' is mostly towards the PVE queues as they had been revamped into three difficulty settings. However, thanks to a bug along with overcompensating on HP and shield totals, once easy and (admittedly) boring runs through the former Elite (now Advanced) queues lead to fights taking ''ages'' if not outright impossible to beat without high DPS machines and even ''then''... This is also coupled with the fact that they toned down the Dilithium rewards so that just beating the matches only netted you half of the old amounts and beating a match with optionals netted you the old totals. This has greatly divided the player base as one group demands that Cryptic drop everything and reset everything to the way it was ''right this minute'', with their big argument being that they're going to drive away their casual player base (without actually knowing ''how'' the casual player base is feeling), while the other group finds the challenge exciting and are telling the other players to "git gud".
31* The "Tau Dewa Patrol" fix has ''really'' divided players. When players found out that mobs were not scaling to levels, players took advantage of it to rapidly gain levels and gather all of the Specialization Points. When Cryptic discovered what was going on, they shut down Tau Dewa, fixed the problem and punished the players who were actively gaming the system by taking away their EXP and Points, though, in the process players who have apparently gotten their points fairly were hit in the process. Players affected by this have been insulted and angered over this, calling Cryptic every name in the book, claiming that what they were doing ''wasn't'' an exploit and that Cryptic was just butthurt that players found a way to power grind the levels instead of sticking them in the Delta Quadrant. Players who were either not affected or affected but realized they were wrong are more angry at the angry players because they feel they're being entitled for their actions. Things got worse when EP Stephen D'Angelo finally stepped in and explained what was going on. While many were placated by this and just called D'Angelo to look things over to make things better, others called his explanation "bullshit" and still hung on to the idea that they were not in the wrong. The online counterattack was so severe that Cryptic backpedaled and gave everybody's points back.
32* The Kobali Cruiser introduced for the fifth anniversary has an odd one that isn't a tier related reason - many people love the look of the ship and can handle the layout of the ship. They just don't like the fact that it was made by the Kobali. For one reason, see DesignatedHero above (another reason cited is that it's the anniversary ship -- previous anniversaries have had faction-specific ships).
33* The February 26, 2015 patch that, among other things, gave Dil bonuses in missions, increased XP gains and set Tau Dewa's patrols to the same tune as the Delta Quadrant's and the expense of placing a lockout on effectively grinding a certain patrol mission. The point of contention is that some players feel that they shouldn't be [[{{Railroading}} Railroaded]] into doing all of the patrols and if they want to park their keister in Argala and grind there, then they will, gosh darn it! There was also the fact that mission replays gave out less Dil than they did during first play, with many players believing that they should still gain the same number of Dil no matter what
34** This expanded into a later patch that normalized Dil bonuses in Patrols. Some felt that the bonuses they got before was just TOO good and are fine with the changes and others feel that Cryptic was going back on their word in saying that they were giving players the amount of dil according to how long you played there.
35* Removing anything '''''period'''''. Missions, PVE missions, PVP missions, holiday spaceships, ''anything'' - retire anything and the players will go ''berserk''. While accepted at first, the removal of the original Romulan Mystery missions set off a chain of rage-worthy roars from the fandom. Cryptic's official stance is that the missions were not up to standards and they want to promote exclusivity with the event ships, but players are horribly divided by it. There's one side who thinks the entire thing is just a load of BS and Cryptic is shouting "MUH METRICS!" and another side who thinks that they're in the right to remove them with a third side being a compromise - get rid of them from the main game, but give us a way to enjoy them later.
36** On that subject, exclusivity period. The central idea of Cryptic's exclusivity stance is that they want certain items to be rare, that only certain people can obtain them during a certain period. This is essentially true for non-Prime, non-Starfleet/KDF/Romulan items and ships. A good chunk of the player base hates this, claiming that it sets a bad precedent for the company by essentially hogtying players into playing how Cryptic wants and not how players want to play. There are constant calls for items unlocked by events such as Crystalline Cataclysm to be account unlocked instead of per-character and constant plans to restore the Holiday and Anniversary ships via paying them through Dilithium. Other players accuse these players of essentially complaining about the fact that they missed the items and are deluded into trying to obtain them. While they're either okay with Cryptic's stance, pretty "meh" about it, or don't really like but see Cryptic's stance, they're not okay with the plans many players take up.
37* The revelation of the Jem'Hadar Strike Ship. This infuriated players with its arrival as it made them feel that their T5-U Jem'Hadar Attack Ship was now permanently obsolete by its existence, that it was a slap to the face for the players who paid out of their nose to get the JHAS in the first place and the assumption that this was false advertising because they said the JHAS would be made T6 and they created this instead. When the stats came out, the divide was a little more clearer, between the players who felt cheated by this ship's existence and the players who are just rolling their eyes and mentioning that this what happened when the JHAS came out. Then, there's the people who just want to know if the JHSS unlocks the JHAS pets.
38** The main crux of the rage stems from a post made during the last promotional giveaway involving the JHAS stating that the ship would made to have "T6 Capabilities" during the time before ''Delta Rising''. This lead to many players believing (perhaps erroneously) that they would make the JHAS an actual T6 ship and not turn it into a T5-U, which is what happened. The anger was not subdued by [=SalamiInferno=] clarifying that the JHAS was indeed meant to be T5-U only, that the post was written before T5-U was announced and that they would modify the original post. In a repeat of the Fleet Patrol Escort Refit incident, players are still demanding that their JHAS be instantly transformed into JHSS.\
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40This came back with the arrival of the Elachi Sheshar Dreadnaught. The original ship was given an Intel-based seating, but when the ship promo came back, they had given it a Command-based variant as well. Many players saw this as "bad marketing", stating that Cryptic needs to keep the players in the loop with these things. Other players found it made them dread the return of the Jem'Hadar Strike Ship, as they knew there'd be one coming up that brought in Pilot abilities. And a third group just shrugged their shoulders and went "meh" because Command powers suck.
41* The Delta Recruitment event is being seen as this. While many players are plotting to create new characters to get Cryptic to notice the other races (and give the KDF and Romulans more neat ships), many other players are brushing it off, proclaiming that the game is ''still'' too alt unfriendly, that Cryptic shouldn't make an event that only caters to new characters (though it's obvious this is also meant to draw in new players, plus that the event gives bonuses to ''other'' characters you have) and that it's nothing more than Cryptic trying to regain players after the "obvious" failure of ''Delta Rising''. There is also a third group who is only creating these characters just so they can get the special perks and that, once the event is over, they're either going to be deleted or become nothing more than Contraband mules.
42* The usage of voice actors and, even more, the usage of ''Star Trek'' alumni. While the usage of voice actors to give many of these characters life, especially returning characters, many players feel that it's a waste and the time and money put into them should just go back into making the game and fixing bugs. This got worse when "Uneasy Allies" was released and the revelation that Cryptic became SAG-certified became known, coming as it did at the cost of at least two preexisting [=VOs'=] jobs (Gabriel Wolf, playing Gaius Selan, and Jon St. John, who played Chancellor J'mpok). There's also complaints of Cryptic marginalizing the PlayerCharacter in the mission writing in favor of their celebrity VA of the week.
43* When it was discovered that Cryptic was modifying a set of [=DOFF=] assignments to match their XP rewards better (or so claimed), namely the 12-to-15.9-hour set, players got into an uproar over it, with two major camps forming over this - the working as intended group and the group that says the system is horribly off-balance. The point of contention comes from a set of notes from the [=DOFF=] system creator "Heretic" when it was set to go live, stating that this was meant to be another way to level up your character without playing missions. Some say that how it was was always meant to be like this, that there was supposed to be a set that was better than the rest and that's how you leveled up. Others point out that, as it stands, it is incredibly unbalanced and point out that the 20+ hour missions give way less than the rest below them. This was finally mitigated with the revelation of the Admirality System.\
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45This wasn't helped at all by "Borticus" and [="CaptainGeko"=]'s responses. "Borticus" attempted to explain through simplistic terms how things were (specifically going "10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 40, 3, 2, 1") and saying that they were modifying the odd one out. The first camp suggested instead of modifying the odd one out, they instead make all of them odd ones out. [="CaptainGeko"=] did something similar and when players tried to explain, "Geko" blocked them from Tumblr.
46* The idea of "playing smart". In recent months, Cryptic has gone out of its way to invalidate certain ways to earn bonus currency due to players using certain LoopholeAbuse to gain more or, even more, trying to obtain new "shinies" without doing the event. Some of these including holding on to Event Reputation (like Mirror Incursions and Crystalline Cataclysm) or normal Reputation (like Battle Group Omega or New Romulus) to gain extra Dilithium or having Alts run holiday events so that they can just get the next new ship next year and not bothering to play in the event. Many players have taken offense to that, stating that this was how Cryptic set it up and that they're just butthurt that their "precious metrics" are being hurt. Others point out that, yes, this was how Cryptic set things up, but they didn't expect a bunch of freeloaders taking advantage of it.
47* The death of [[spoiler:Kahless]] in "House Pegh". While everyone agrees that [[spoiler:gloating to a wounded yet still alive Iconian]] wasn't the best idea in the bunch, the fandom is divided on his fate. Was his death fitting for a Klingon, to go out in a blaze of glory in battle (the interpretation of some of the TNG Klingon fans), or was it a senseless death capping off an equally senseless mission (more or less everyone else)?
48** Subsequently there were calls by some primarily-KDF players for an FE to retrieve [[spoiler:theSword of Kahless, which was left where the emperor dropped it when he was killed]], while other players called it a useless trinket and the proposed mission a pointless errand (the argument went something like, starships and troops, not silly vanity exercises, win battles), as well as invoking SoldierVsWarrior: They pointed to Starfleet ''not'' acting like AxCrazy {{Glory Hound}}s in the preceding mission "Delta Flight" ''and actually achieving their mission objective'', and therefore called for the Klingons in their entirety to be banned from any future mission-planning.
49* The expansion on ship color schemes. Many players are quite excited for the expansions, especially for dreary ships like those with the Klingons and the Romulans, giving them something bright and cheerful to make them stand out. Others are calling them an eyesore and using the "immersion-ruining" card.
50* Tier Six ships have been a point of contention between players since they were first mentioned and has gotten worse, especially in the Tier Five vs. Tier Six war. Do Tier Six ships make Tier Five ships obsolete or are Tier Five ships still just as good as before? Was Tier Five-Upgraded a mistake or a needed stopgap to stop the complaints? Should Tier Five ships be upgraded to Tier Six instead or no? Are we paying for the same ship at Tier Six or are we paying for a new ship that uses the old ship's skin? It's actually quite common for a player to ask if buying (insert name of Tier Five ship) is still worth it, fearing it will be superseded by a Tier Six later on in life.
51* The changes to Warp Cores to remove the mod [=[W->S]=] from non-Epic level items. As going Epic gave players a second of that mod, many players sought to obtain them as that meant that, with two of them, They would have 40% of their Weapon power going into shields... until they found out the mods weren't working together and only one was. When Cryptic changed it so the lower levels got [=[A->S]=] instead and made the other one an Epic-only mod, camps formed once again: you have the players who are angry because they felt that Cryptic was too incompetent to fix it so they can have their uber powers again, the players who point out that ''they still had their mod'' and it was still just as good and the players who just rolled their eyes because they used other Cores.
52* The mission "Broken Circle" seems to have torn open a lot of rage-inducing moments. There are two that seemed to be the main focus:
53** The mission itself. While everyone agrees about Captain Kagran's [[ZergRush plan]] being [[HollywoodTactics the worst thing ever]], it's [[spoiler:M'Tara's death]] that seems to rile up people. Is it Cryptic hamfisting it along so they can just get the Iconian plot done and over with or is it a case of players being unable to read between the lines and realize something else going on?
54** The forced use of the [[spoiler:Temporal Warship]] and its implications. Many players are just outright convinced its ultimate target are the Iconians and thus means genocide, something that would fly against the face of everything the Federation stands for, causing the players to take sides in an OOC GenocideDilemma. Some players are convinced that the Iconians are not the targets, but something else, such as the Herald Sphere. Others are convinced that the season will end here with the weapon being used as a ResetButton ''a la'' the "Year of Hell" two-parter ([[spoiler:which is what ended up happening in "Butterfly", although it [[GoneHorriblyWrong went horribly wrong]] and was changed to a CloseEnoughTimeline by the end, where things were left pretty much as they were before.]])\
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56A lot of the arguments over using the weapon seem to stem from the idea that the Federation wouldn't stoop that low, that there are other ways to stop the war without resorting to genocide. This is despite the fact that the Iconians are beyond being appeased by diplomacy (their first appearance [[spoiler:killed the Klingon High Council]]), that they won't stop until we're either dead or on bended knee and we're really losing. Other arguments state that Starfleet ''is'' willing to bring about genocide if it means saving everyone else and mention General Order 24, Starfleet's orders to infect the liberated Borg Hugh with a virus to take down the rest of the Collective and the morphogenic virus that ravaged the Founders (though the last one was Section 31).
57* A player discovered that the Embassy Plasma Infused Threat-Scaling Science Consoles had been heavily altered, "Borticus" revealed that the console was bugged due to the fact that the device only applied Critical Hits on the Tactical Skill Beam: Fire at Will and, unable to devote too much time on it at the moment, they removed the Critical Hit and nerfed the damage slightly. This riled up many players: there are many who are angry that Cryptic went this route, calling them incompetent for not actually ''fixing'' the console and considered them "useless" now and called for the usual demands of compensation (as many players used the weekend prior to its discovery to upgrade it due to the Upgrade Weekend Event) and declarations of "wallets closed". There are others who are actually quite understanding, feeling that the console was indeed bugged and that it was only chosen because it padded attack damage. There are also some who are in this category, but just wish they didn't nerf the damage and, instead, boosted the base damage.
58* The revelation of Season 11, a divide that is clearly seen between the FandomRivalry of the Reddit forums and the main forums. The Reddit forums are clearly excited with many of the naysayers either just cautiously optimistic or just shrugging their shoulders. The main forums, on the other hand, are downright furious - they're angry that the Iconian War is being completed in one season, that the Iconian War wasn't a massive raging war machine that destroyed the face of the STO Universe, automatically deriding the idea of exploration as another bug-ridden, haphazardly tossed together device and all and all just taking a humongous dump on the entire thing, woe to those who defend it. Even those that ''do'' stick to defending Season 11 tend to do it from the negative perspective that the Iconian War [[AudienceAlienatingEra was handled poorly enough]] that it wouldn't really be salvageable by another season, so it's a ''good'' thing it's cut short.
59* During one weekend, PWE sent out e-mails to inactive players, enticing them to return with a free T6 Galaxy and enough XP to get them to Level 60. Cue player rage. You have some players going "Where's MY e-mail?!", some players convinced that STO is going down the crapper (for the millionth time), some who are trying to explain that this is actually quite standard for MMO games and shouldn't be taken as anything serious and a few who want Cryptic to reward them for suffering through lag. It didn't help that several players received codes for ''VideoGame/{{Neverwinter}}'' by mistake instead and PWE refused to give them the correct ones.
60** This returned on July 19th, 2016, when Cryptic sent out random e-mails to players giving away a rare T6 ship, a Ferengi Nagus Marauder, along with a bunch of actual physical swag. While there were players who were insanely jealous of those who got the ship, there were players who were insanely incensed at the fact that ''they'' were passed up, that Cryptic should have ''told'' people this was happening and that, because ''they'' spent X amount of money, they should get them, too. This got worse when a news article revealed the confusion from players and PWE essentially gave a non-answer and even more so when some players discovered that they got the ship unknowingly. The major problem with this is that many people believe that the criteria for getting the ship was the amount of money spent with the (actually quite reasonable) reason being that the ship was gold, it was Ferengi (a race known for their insane greed) and it was given away for their "continued support", which many players thought was through actual cash donations via buying things. Other players, however, have just rolled their eyes at this, feeling that they're blowing things way out of proportion and that the ship isn't that impressive anyway.
61* Ultimately, the Iconian War storyline is has essentially broken the fanbase over how it worked. The general consensus is that "Blood of the Ancients" and "Delta Flight" were really good and that "Midnight" hit it out of the ballpark (despite criticism of the time travel plot and a significant minority arguing that "Midnight"'s [[UnfortunateImplications morality was screwed up]]), while "House Pegh" was derided by almost the entire fanbase. However, everything else seems to be different with different people: either it had the right amount of story and immersion to keep things going or that Cryptic should have made it into a real war. Much of the controversy surrounds the annual summer vacation event that ran [[GameplayAndStorySegregation in spite of the war story arc that was ongoing at the time]].
62* The ''Galaxy''-X ship has always messed with players. Many feel that it's a wonderful ship but, design wise, it shouldn't have all the nooks and crannies that it does, especially the third nacelle. While the recent remodeling gave us the Galaxy Beta look, which removes the bars on the nacelles, the wings on the pylons and the cannons beside the bridge, many players want the third nacelle gone. Other players have stated that if you want to fly a Galaxy-X without the third nacelle, just go fly the normal Galaxy. And then there's the subset of fans wondering why, if you ''want'' a three-nacelled Starfleet Dreadnought, it ''has'' to be based on the ''Galaxy''-class, when Dreadnoughts with three nacelles date back to the Original Series' ''Starfleet Technical Manual'' and ''Literature/FortunesOfWar''.
63* The day after Season 11 launched, "Borticus" ended up apologizing to those in the [=RedditChat=] chatroom for blowing up at them when a few players complained that the new queues paid far less marks than they should, angry that the players were focusing on the rewards and numerical gains instead of actually having fun. The response to this was heavily mixed - there were many players who were sympathetic to "Borticus"' plight and agreed that there are a few who are too focused on rewards to sit down and say that what they were doing was fun. However, there were a number who were less sympathetic, perhaps going into antagonistic, when they turned down his apology, stating that it was ''he'' who was out of touch with the player base and that if he wanted to make the players happy, then he should do something to fix it (i.e: stop with the reputations, kill the grind, stop removing everything, etc.).
64* The Herald ships being made playable has been very mixed. Once more, players don't like the idea of villain ships, especially the big bads of the first 10 seasons of ''STO'', playable. This is made even more notable due to the appearance of the Vonph Dreadnought, which is ''insanely huge'', with many players thinking that its appearance was the reason why the PVE queue "The Breach" was removed.
65* The fixing bugs vs. creating content debate. It is highly common to see players, tired of certain bugs, demand that Cryptic just devote an entire season to nothing but bug fixes, that they don't need to constantly make new missions, reputations and all of that. This also extends to events or giveaways with players saying that if certain players cannot participate in said events or giveaways because of problems (for example, a number of free giveaways were done during a point where the Mac version of the game wouldn't function just right), then no one should until those people can be brought back in. Some do point out that Cryptic did attempt a season for bug fixes - Season 8 - but people demanded more things to do and it got scuttled.
66* The entire "Design Starfleet's first Carrier" thing has been a major mixed bag since the winning design, the Omega type, was chosen. While many were upset that their choice wasn't the winner, there is a vocal few who are calling the entire thing a major sham, claiming that the Omega type only won because it resembled the long-since-abandoned ''Jupiter''-class (which was one of two ships players wanted in-game for the longest time) and claims of vote rigging with many watching the message board voting without taking into account both Facebook and Twitter voting.
67* The revelation that the ''Defiant'' ships will have its three-piece console/weapon set modified to grant it Battle Cloak when all three are together. There are some who are very happy that it's happening and some who just see this as a waste, mostly from the DPS side of things. There are also a number of KDF/RR players who are angry that the Federation side has ''another'' power that they have, which they feel ultimately make them obsolete.
68* The mission "Time and Tide" got a bit of a mixed reception when it was released. The main gripe is that it's not only a time travel story, it's about the Temporal Cold War, a storyline many ''Trek'' fans hate because of how it bogged down ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise''. Others find it interesting and hope to see if Cryptic can make it a better story. The other gripe is [[spoiler:Noye's FaceHeelTurn and [[LoveMakesYouEvil the reasons why]].]] Some find it sympathetic and understandable and some think it's stupid.
69* The upcoming Skill Revamp, the second since the game started. It's either a sorely needed balance pass in a game where a player could just sneeze and blow up hundreds of Borg or its a slap in the face for players who have fine-tuned their game style to the old way and punishes players for playing "smart" (again). The main bulk of the worry is that it forces players to essentially take up a certain build and stick with it, especially since respecs are quite cost prohibitive (at 500 Z a respec).
70** A week after the changes went live, respecs were dropped to 300 Z a respec. This broke the base ''again'' leading to two more sides; one group of players who feel that Skill Respecs should be dropped to 100 Z, be a Dil Sink, an EC Sink or even free as they feel that paying money for a Skill Respec is such an archaic gameplay style that hurts Cryptic in the long run and proves that they'll never become anything more than a niche game and another group of players who are actually okay with this as they don't respec every time the tide turns and points out that Cryptic has to pay for the license ''somehow''.
71* The transformation of popular queues into three-week events that offer character-bound items. It's not uncommon to hear players whimper and whine about how they have alts in excess of 15, 20 and even full cap and that there's no way they can get the special items to them all. It's also not at all uncommon to hear players complain that they can only focus on a handful of characters or to up and RageQuit. The major problem with this is that, outside of the Crystalline Cataclysm event, they're all 10-20 minute runs that seem to punish players for running in guns blazing and blowing away your opponents like they were nothing. Thus, they're angry that it's long, requires some basic strategy and tries to discourage hitting things really hard at times. The usual response from players towards those who are complaining? Usually a variation of "Why do you have so many in the first place?"
72* The revelation of Expansion 3, ''Agents of Yesterday'' has split the fandom again. While there are many who are excited for the expansion, complete with TOS-inspired ships and storyline, there are others who feel very quite differently. There are many who are just "meh" about it, essentially citing that they don't really give two flips about the TOS era, even if ''Agents of Yesterday'' is a celebration of the franchise's fiftieth anniversary. There are also players who downright hate the expansion because they feel that, because of its heavy Federation usage, it's essentially a big middle finger to Klingon-based and Romulan-based players who couldn't give two flips about the Federation. There are also those who hate the expansion because they feel that the TOS "class" should have been filled in by the Cardassians/Dominion.
73** The revelation that the AlternateContinuity universe that began with ''Film/StarTrek2009'' would play a part in the expansion. There are fans who are excited about this, as this means there's the huge possibility that the often talked about but always denied "Endgame ''Constitution''-class ship" would appear in the form of the Reboot ''Enterprise'' or even the equally-popular USS ''Vengeance'', there are those who really don't care or just interested to see what Cryptic does, and you have the people who are angry that this is happening, either out of the "I hate [=JJTrek=]!" mentality that has been around since the movie came out or using the "MUH IMMERSHUN" card.
74*** This got even worse when the Kelvin Lockbox was revealed, with a separate faction getting a certain ship and the U.S.S. ''Vengeance'' being locked to Feds despite being a Lobi ship. The largest complaints basically boiled down to the fact that Cryptic didn't put these ships into the C-Store at all, once again crying "money grab". Those opposing those complaints essentially say that this is probably another CBS mandate and that if you thought it was going into the C-Store, you've been dreaming.
75* The fact that the game is being released on the Platform/XBoxOne and Platform/PlayStation4. One of the biggest gripes that are angering players is the fact that the servers for the PC, [=XBOne=] and [=PS4=] are being separated, meaning that if a player wanted to jump from PC to a console, vice versa or even console to console, they would have to start over from scratch. There are two groups to this argument - those who want Cross-Platforming (allowing players to bounce their accounts from one version to the next) and those who don't. Those who do want Cross-Platforming claim that, without Cross-Platforming, the console versions are doomed to fail as they won't have the more advanced players boosting their numbers and helping new players out. They also claim that the excuse of "Microsoft doesn't allow Cross-Platforming" doesn't matter anymore because they're relaxing them, pointing out to ''VideoGame/{{Neverwinter}}'' getting a [=PS4=] version. Those that oppose this claim that this is nothing more than fear-mongering. They point out that the major hurdle for Cross-Platforming is the update schedule (the PC version updates weekly with emergency patches; the console version has to go through a tedious process that puts them at a monthly schedule) as well as the fact that Cross-Platforming would kill the console versions faster than any other excuse. They also claim that the console versions were never for the PC players, but for whole new players.
76* The Cooldown change to the "Turn in Contraband" [=DOFFing=] mission to be 4-hours to 20-hours has really angered players. A lot of this has to do because the Klingon and the Klingon-aligned Romulans have their version of the mission to grant them 2000 Dilithium per successful mission. Many players are already accusing Cryptic of "nerfing for nerf's sake" and considering it a major slap in the face for the KDF players who are already suffering from a lack of faction-related content. Another group points out that this is majorly a case of WhyFandomCantHaveNiceThings as there are players who create KDF characters for the express purpose of Contraband delivery and ''especially'' towards those who are able to bot to get massive dil earnings and essentially point towards the exceedingly high Dilithium Exchange dil-to-Zen numbers (when ''Agents of Yesterday'' launched, it was as high as ''490:1'', 10 away from the hard cap of 500) and this is one step towards bringing the numbers back down to normal. Those who don't believe this accuse Cryptic of being lazy and that all they need to do is just add in more things to spend dilithium on. The other side has countered with the fact that things like that can't be made instantly. They also warn to not give away exploits like this or run the risk of the same thing happening again, as everyone's eyeing the Admirality system warily.
77** A week or so later, Cryptic began adding items into the perpetually ignored Dilithium Store, including old 1 and 2 Lobi Consumables and four highly requested costume pieces - the ''Enterprise''-era MACO uniforms, and the ''Wrath of Khan''-era Captain's Vest, Scotty's Vest and Excursion Jacket. This threw players into a tizzy when the vaunted costumes were revealed to be costing 1 million Dil+ as well as only being Character-bound upon being bought. Some players have tried to explain that this is for the players who have a ton of Dil from trading it off of the exchange, though those players have been shouted down, especially on the Reddit subforums, as these vaunted costumes and items should be made ''lower'' so everyone can get them, once again citing "Exclusivity".
78* The reveal of special T6 TOS Constitutions, Klingon D7 Battlecruisers and Romulan T'liss Warbirds as R&D prizes. A good number of players are downright furious, if not for the fact that they're claiming that Cryptic lied about never bringing about an endgame Connie into the game, then for the fact that the ships isn't inside the C-Store and once again claiming that Cryptic is becoming corrupt with their "money-grabbing" schemes. The other players are just rolling their eyes at this, telling them that if they thought that the ships would be C-Store bound, then they are delusional as hell. As well as the well-known fact that it was CBS who had long stood in the way of "endgame-capable" Original Series ships, and however Cryptic managed get around that decision, making the ships ''very'' rare was almost certainly part of it.
79* On the 50th Anniversary of ''Star Trek'', some players flipped out over what was perceived to be a lack of celebration towards the anniversary, feeling that Cryptic should have done something ''big'' for it. These fans accused Cryptic of essentially forgetting the anniversary was that day, especially when they gave away the 23rd Century Bundle Pack so late in the day instead of the usual time and that it should have been so much more. Some players, however, accuse these complainers of being greedy and selfish, that Cryptic had already released ''Agents of Yesterday'', brought in the Kelvin Timeline Lockbox, offered the T6 Light Cruisers/Warbirds and ported the game to next gen systems specifically for this anniversary and that anything more is essentially token.
80* In late October 2016, the Red Alerts for the Borg and the Tholians are modified to become queues instead of the hopping in and starting up automatically kind. A lot of players absolutely hate this because of a number of reasons, namely that they prefer to hop in, fly around and kill everything in sight and that they're losing the big EXP bonus that came with those Red Alerts. With them because queues, they claim that they'll just die out because they aren't "worth it". Other players, however, point out that the changes actually make the Tholians and Borg tougher and that, under the original system, players actually lost out on the EXP bonuses because some bonehead wants to "roflstomp" with their souped up ship for shits and giggles.
81* Many people were very excited over the Phoenix Prize Box, which rewarded players with emotes, weapons, and even ships retired by Cryptic due to its reasonable price and being able to give players a chance to obtain things that players were unable to get. However, there are a select few who are upset over this due to the fact that Cryptic made the boxes character bound, the tokens account bound, and essentially made it so that all the unlockables weren't unlockables for all on the account.
82* The long-awaited Space balance pass has arrived and many are split over two of the biggest changes. The first is the continued nerfing of the Embassy Consoles, which kills their damage output by 50% more. The other is the lowering of power to the Plasmonic Leech. Many have expressed disappointment in such a nerfing, though many point out that Plasma Damage isn't all there is to the Consoles and the MACO/Adapted Honor Guard shields can now work alongside the Leech.
83* The retirement of the Gateway program. Many are upset over its retirement, mostly because it had the chance to be useful and Cryptic let it languish and be ignored. They feel that, had Cryptic paid more attention to it, it would have been better. Others, however, feel that its retirement is probably a good thing, especially seeing as how ''Neverwinter'' had one and it caused massive exploits. A lot of the annoyance, however, is the claiming of "lack of interest" when many players had an interest in it.
84* Season 13 seems to be the long awaited "PVP update" with a Reputation focusing on such a thing and it has greatly agitated players. The main problem is the fact that many of the new queues seem to focus on getting players to work together to complete a goal. Many players have essentially said "no" because they don't want to play with other people -- they just want to fly around and shoot at ships that won't blow them up in the blink of an eye. At the very least, players are either claiming they will ignore the Reputation that goes along with it or play other queues that allow them to obtain the marks needed for the Reputation so they don't go near said queues. Others are excited to participate in this because PVP-type elements have been long neglected and they can't wait to see what they can do.
85* Everything after ''Age of Discovery''. While some players enjoy it or have no real attachment to it, there are players who just absolutely ''hate'' it. Their big hatred to it is due to the fact that they're using the Kurtzman-era ''Trek'' series (''Discovery'', ''Picard'' and ''Lower Decks''), all of which are humongous Broken Bases themselves due to fans' ideas of what ''Star Trek'' is.
86* The Klingon Civil War for finally having J'mpok's CharacterRerailment into being the BigBad rather than his HeelFaceTurn with the Iconian Arc. Many were eager for him to be the baddie he was initially set up to be. Unfortunately, the resolution of the arc annoyed some as he was only a villain for a few missions before being unceremoniously killed by J'Ula. Many players wanted to be the one to finally do J'mpok in.
87* The player character being declared an outlaw didn't make much sense unless you were a Klingon and only lasted for a mission. Whether you liked it or not, most players felt it was underdeveloped and could have been handled better.
88* J'Ula's HeelFaceTurn caused many players to react in disgust while others thought it helped change her from being a one-dimensional FlatCharacter into a more developed antagonist. Still, others felt she was fine as a Klingon TheRemnant of a more violent evil time and didn't ''need'' to be more developed.
89* Having L'Rell resurrected from the dead and return to be Chancellor of the Klingon Empire proved to be a less popular decision with the Klingon player base than the idea Martok would return to being Chancellor. Not only was she from the controversial Discovery series but it was questionable she was that ''great'' of a Chancellor to begin with since she took over with a doomsday weapon. Some players felt a Online original character, Worf, or even the player themselves would have been better.
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