Raising The Level Cap

Captains! Star Trek Online’s upcoming expansion Delta Rising is coming this way, bringing you tons of new content and features. The first will be raising the level cap from level 50 to level 60. This will be the first level cap increase in over 4 years. Let’s take a closer look at what this means for you!

From levels 1 through 50, you have earned Skill Points throughout the game, via playing Mission Content, Queued Events, and other methods like our Duty Officer System.
As you have leveled up, you’ve spent Skill Points in your captains Skill Tree until you max out at level 50. After the level cap increase goes live, you will continue to level by earning and spending Skill Points earned throughout the new content that will premier with Delta Rising. What will change is that these will only be used to track your progress as you approach the new level cap of 60. You will no longer be using these points in the basic skill tree.
Instead, for every level between 50 and 60, you will earn one Specialization Point that can be spent in the new Specialization Trees. Specialization Trees will be the main way you will develop your character past level 50, and they will open up new ground and space abilities as you progress.
We will describe all the new features and abilities you’ll be able to find in these Specialization Trees in an upcoming blog, so stay tuned.



Another important change to the leveling system will come after reaching level 60. You will continue to earn Skill Points as if you are still leveling up, and each time you reach enough points to level up to what would be the next rank, you will earn an additional Specialization Point. This will give players the ability to continue earning points until you max out your Specialization Trees.
In the current game, once you reach max level, Skill Points are converted into Expertise, but with Delta Rising Skill Points will continue to be useful indefinitely.

This change will reduce the amount of Expertise earned at max level, and we have planned accordingly to address this. We are adding additional Expertise rewards to the game in order to keep the earning rate similar to what players experience today at level 50.

One of the joys of getting ahead is earning a new title for your rank. Federation and Romulan characters will advance from Admiral to Fleet Admiral. KDF characters will rise through the ranks to become a General and later a Dahar Master.

Along with the titles listed above, there are some other great rewards for captains as they level from 50 to 60.
These range from Duty Officer packs to increased rank in existing abilities. Check out some of the rewards you’ll be receiving as you level:

Level 51 - Gain a small pack of Duty Officers
Level 52 - Upgrade your Fleet Support ability from rank II to rank III
Level 54 - Upgrade your captain class ability Strike Team, Engineering Proficiency, or Scientific Aptitude from rank II to rank III
Level 55 - Gain a Bridge Officer Candidate
Level 57 - Upgrade your captain class ability Tactical Fleet, Engineering Fleet, or Science Fleet from rank II to rank III
Level 60 - Gain an additional Captain Trait slot





These are merely some of the changes coming in Delta Rising. The level cap increase is meant to be a simple solution to rank progression and yet the resulting change to the end game play will be very noticeable. It is still around 2 months until Delta Rising will go live, so please remember that all of the details here are subject to change as we work to finalize our improvements. We’re still fine tuning the numbers, and we look forward to getting feedback from our players once you have had the chance to try the new game play on our Tribble test shard in the near future.

There is so much to share about Delta Rising, and we are working hard to bring you everything you want to know about the expansion and more in our developer blogs that will be published over the coming weeks.

Thank you again for your continued support and participation in our Tribble testing phase as we lead into X2: Delta Rising, and we look forward to playing with you in-game during the next 2 months as we release more of the exciting updates coming to Star Trek Online.

Al “Captain Geko” Rivera
Lead Designer
Star Trek Online

Can't wait.

I know right