Agents of Yesterday

The 50th anniversary of Star Trek is here, and I couldn’t be more excited to announce our contribution to the celebration: Agents of Yesterday, the third full expansion to Star Trek Online!

Agents of Yesterday will allow players to create a new captain in Star Trek: The Original Series era and will set them on an adventure featuring classic story lines, locations, celebrities, and era-appropriate starships. In 2270, the year following the third season of the original series, the player will adventure with Walter Koenig, reprising his role of Chekov, and Chris Doohan, filling in for his father as Scotty. There is a new threat to the security of the Federation, and they are invading with hopes of overwhelming the past to destroy our future.

In addition to the ability to create a brand new Star Trek: The Original Series Starfleet captain, we will be introducing a new episode arc for players of every faction, the Temporal Initiative Resistance Reputation, a Temporal Operative Primary Specialization along with brand new Bridge Officer powers. Players who create their captains during the first six weeks of launch will also be able to participate in the new Temporal Agent Recruitment system for bonus personal and account-wide rewards, a new iteration of the popular Delta Recruitment system that released a year ago. This release is packed with content to keep you engaged in the classic Star Trek: The Original Series era - and beyond.

There isn’t a better way to continue to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Star Trek: The Original Series than by creating a Starfleet captain and engaging in some amazing adventures in that classic period.

This is only the first of many blog posts with detailed information on everything that’s shipping with Agents of Yesterday, so stay tuned and I’ll see you in game!

Stephen Ricossa
Executive Producer
Star Trek Online

i DON'T KNOW HOW I FEEL ABOUT THIS.

I DO! I'M EXCITED!!!

I'll be able to bust out my Connie I bought ages ago again. Though I may fly around in my NX and name it the U.S.S. Canon and really annoy TOS purists. I wonder if this means we'll get TOS uniforms unlocked for everyone. And if the connie interior will be made available? If not, I may be tempted to buy the TOS bundle. Not the one with this expansion, the existing one.

I'm pretty amped for this! Sounds exciting. I already have a bunch of TOS items unlocked, so it will be neat to finally put them to use!


And finally I will have an appropriate ship to put this in!

Welcome back to where it all began! In honor of the 50th anniversary of Star Trek, I’m proud to announce the third full expansion to Star Trek Online - Agents of Yesterday. Players can create brand new captains in the Original Series era and begin their own journey in command of their very own 2270 era starship. Throughout this expansion players will visit familiar places, see familiar faces, and show the quadrant what a rough and tumble captain from the greatest generation of Starfleet can do. Any captain knows that they need to be fully prepared for anything they come across, and to that end I’m excited to announce the Temporal Special Agent Pack and the Temporal Agent Starter Pack! These packs will ensure that any TOS era captain has the tools, personnel, and the starships to give you the edge you’ll need against the unknown.

Captains that choose the Temporal Special Agent Pack will be able to command five (5) TOS era starships that can be used while leveling your captain from ensign to admiral, as well as six (6) brand new T6 ships they can be used once they’re an admiral and beyond. The five (5) TOS era ships will give captains an extra boost of capability while leveling, and the remaining six (6) feature not only exciting stats but the new Temporal Bridge Officer seat. These are the only ships that have access to the brand new temporally themed bridge officer powers at a Commander level, and they will also come standard with the new temporal gameplay mechanic that will add depth to gameplay and reward situational awareness. The combination of these bridge officer powers and the temporal ship mechanic provide a level of versatility in combat that any captain strives for while in command.



In addition to these amazing new ships, we’ll be including six (6) TOS era themed outfits, three (3) unique captain titles, and three (3) high-end upgrade kits. Captains will also have six (6) Temporal Operative Specialization Qualifications made available to them to ensure their experience, and crew, are as primed as possible.

Alternatively, captains that choose the Temporal Agent Starter Pack will have access to one (1) starting ship and one (1) T6 ship with full access to the temporal bridge officers and temporal ship mechanic. They will also have access to one (1) TOS era themed uniform and one (1) exclusive title. All of these items are included when purchasing the Temporal Special Agent Pack as well.

The Agents of Yesterday: Temporal Special Agent Pack, and Agents of Yesterday: Temporal Agent Starter Pack are both outstanding offerings, and will give captains all the tools they need to make their travels a success for themselves and their allies.

Stephen Ricossa
Executive Producer
Star Trek Online

SQUEEEEE

Star Trek Online is proud to announce the arrival of Walter Koenig in the game! He’ll be taking Pavel Chekov into a new frontier, joining forces with Captains as they strive to keep the galactic timeline safe and secure.

Things have changed in our timeline for Chekov since the incident onboard the Enterprise-B and the loss of Captain Kirk. He’s been promoted to Captain, and has joined the ranks of the temporal agents, where he’ll play a key role in several missions.

As someone who grew up in the ‘80s watching TOS weekday afternoons on syndicated TV; I always found Chekov to be young, inquisitive, and humorous. He reminded me of Davy Jones from The Monkees, another show I watched then. Years later, I learned that a resemblance to Jones played a big role in the casting of Walter Koenig as Chekov!

Indeed, Gene Roddenberry wanted the character of Chekov to appeal to the younger members of their audience – and he certainly did. His hairstyle and look was definitely akin to what you would see amongst young people during the late sixties. But his appeal went beyond good looks. Chekov became a staple of the show – he was an amiable young man from Russia whose good intentions sometimes landed him in some trouble.



Chekov’s youthful appearance and full hair were challenging because finding a “resting face” was difficult. We poured over references from the various appearences he had made in TOS, as well as the movies of the Wrath of Khan era (TWOK). In the TOS series, we often found him smiling or joking around. In the TWOK movies, he had more of a serious tone (especially when under the control of Khan himself).
We didn’t want to make him too happy nor too intense. We settled on a resting face of slight concern and readiness. This would help convey the attitude we wanted him to show while interacting in our game.



One of the things we knew going in was that we would see Chekov as a young ensign as well as an older captain. To this end, we made sure to create his face in stages – so that adding slight age lines was easier. In games, much like film – adding age to a character can be a tricky situation. We didn’t want to make an entirely new head, but add to the existing younger face we had already made. Furthermore, we kept the age-specific features to a minimum because it’s often very easy to go overboard with them – resulting in a less-than-ideal look for the character. We certainly want our characters as great-looking as they were on the show!

Chekov remains one of our most prominent icons in the TOS experience. We had a lot of fun making him!
Known for his analytical skill as well as his iconic charm; we hope players will appreciate his addition to the vast and amazing universe of Star Trek Online.

Montgomery Scott (“Scotty”), played by James Doohan, is one of the most recognizable characters in all of science fiction. His very name brings images of a highly skilled, lovable, and often concerned technician. Even people who don’t know Star Trek know the phrase “Beam me up, Scotty.”

As chief engineer of the USS Enterprise, Mr. Scott was often one of the biggest factors behind the Enterprise escaping serious damage or destruction multiple times. He is his captain’s miracle worker, and he is often the archetype by which Hollywood models their “tech-savvy,” but down-to-earth characters after.



Chris Doohan lends his voice to Star Trek Online in the role his father made famous. From his days as a lieutenant commander on the Enterprise to his future as a captain, Scotty will play a big role in the fight for the timeline.

Scotty’s no stranger to the game. When we last saw him on Drozana Station in 2265, he joined forces with captains to save the station from the alien threat of the Devidians.

Several of us grew up watching TOS in the 80’s while it was in syndication. Scotty was one of the regular crew appearing whenever his expertise was needed to fix some problem on the Enterprise. We liked it when he was a member of an away team. His colorful sayings were one of the stand-out features of an already skilled cast. Without Scotty, Star Trek would not be as iconic as it is today.

Before any artwork was ever done, screenshots of Scotty were taken from TOS episodes, as well as the various movies he appeared in. This took quite a lot of time, because Scotty appears in almost every episode of TOS! But, after a few days, we had several large files filled with screenshots.



Next, we needed to find the best, and most appropriate images of the character. Since we were sculpting an image of him in ZBrush, we needed appropriate images of his face. For instance, Scotty has appeared in several types of costumes throughout the years. We certainly love the beige uniform he wore very early on, but we wanted to use his “typical” red uniform instead.

We then searched for images of what is called a “resting” face –an expression in which his face is mostly neutral in appearance. Unlike faces with a significant expression, the neutral face allows us to get the likeness down without permanently putting a scared, angry, or concerned look on the character. (Although there have been certain villain characters in which a permanent, angry expression is very appropriate!)

ZBrush is an amazing program used by many character artists in the game industry. It allows us to sculpt organic forms that would otherwise be very difficult to do in any other program. In our experience, most character artists use ZBrush to get their final look. In our case, we used both ZBrush as well as Cryptic’s Character Editor to make Scotty.



In ZBrush, we only sculpted the parts that we needed – in this case, the cheeks, the jowls, the eye shape, the nose shape, and the lip shapes. The size of the head, shape of the head, the forehead, etc. – all of those were done using the Character Editor. The Character Editor is so versatile that parts made for other characters can often be used for new characters. By combining the shapes we got from ZBrush and the shapes we got from the Character Editor, we created the likeness we wanted.

We were very happy to work on Scotty - it was an honor to make such an iconic character. We really feel his addition to our vast game will help bring home that TOS experience to our players. We certainly got that nostalgic feeling when we were creating him!

Ships are all fine and good. But I'm gonna be in my connie the entire time.

And I'm glad they've got Doohan's son in. This expansion is gonna be suh-weet!

A conflict on Cestus III led to the legendary duel between Captain James. T. Kirk and a Gorn captain. After Kirk showed mercy towards his defeated enemy, both captains were returned to their respective ships alive and well. The planet which hosted their conflict, Edren IV, is a mineralogist’s dream. While tensions remain high, the Gorn and the Federation have agreed to explore and use this miraculous world’s resources jointly. Edren IV sees peace… for now.

“In the Shadow Of Cestus” takes 23rd century Starfleet officers to the iconic desert landscape seen in the Original Series episode “Arena”. This is the first episode available to temporal agents after the tutorial’s conclusion. Creating a temporal agent will unlock special benefits for that character. Prior to the launch of our latest expansion Agents of Yesterday, Gold and Lifetime players will have access to this mission on Tribble. Once Agents of Yesterday launches, it will be available to all players.

You can easily access this mission by creating a new “TOS Starfleet” character from the character creation screen. Look for future updates on new missions as the launch day approaches, and we’ll see you in-game for the release of Agents of Yesterday!

A science survey vessel has gone missing near the Murasaki-312 nebula. Starfleet Command believes it may have crash landed on Taurus II, the same planet that cost the lives of two Starfleet officers several years ago. As first officer of a Pioneer-class starship, you will be leading a landing party to the surface of the planet to discover the fate of the survivors.

“The Taurean Affair” is the tutorial for our new Temporal faction, beginning an adventure that will span the length of time from the Original Series all the way to the 28th century. This will be a brand new experience available to new and returning players. Creating a temporal agent will unlock special benefits for that character. Prior to the launch of our latest expansion Agents of Yesterday, Gold and Lifetime players will have access to this mission on Tribble. Once Agents of Yesterday launches, it will be available to all players.

You can easily access this mission by creating a new “TOS Starfleet” character from the character creation screen. Look for future updates on new missions as the launch day approaches, and we’ll see you in-game for the release of Agents of Yesterday!

Im gonna spend alot of time in this expansion!

We are excited to announce a complete overhaul of our existing “All Lock Box Drop” Event, with the introduction of a new method of obtaining prizes from retired Lock Boxes: The Infinity Lock Box

Beginning with the upcoming event, players will no longer find old lock boxes being rewarded by missions and defeating enemies, but will instead be occasionally rewarded with Infinity Lock Boxes. These boxes, just like all previous lock boxes, require a Master Key to open. However, the contents will include prizes from nearly all retired boxes in a single, massive prize table!

In order to help ensure that this massive number of prizes doesn’t place your desired prize too far out of reach, we are introducing an element of choice into the Infinity Lock Box. Most prize entries will reward the key-user with an Infinity Prize Pack for whichever prize entry they won. Infinity Prize Packs are bound to the person that won them, but offer an unrestricted choice as to which item they wish to have won. Once that choice is made, the item(s) rewarded will be unbound, and can be freely traded/sold/gifted to other players.

EXAMPLE:
You may win an item named “Infinity Prize Pack: T6 Starship” which will be bound to the character that won it. Upon using/activating this package, you will be presented with a choice that includes all previously offered T6 Starships: Benthan Assault Cruiser, Vaadwaur Manasa Assault Escort, Krenim Imperium Warship, etc.

Choosing any of those entries will reward you with a packed-up version of the chosen ship, which can then be kept and opened for yourself, or freely traded/sold/gifted to other players.

The Infinity Lock Box will only be available for a limited time! However, each time it returns it will be updated with additional prizes from more recently-retired Lock Boxes, offering even greater variety and choice of prizes to be won.

The table below shows which prize entries will grant choices via an Infinity Prize Pack, and which will reward random (non-bound) prizes directly into your inventory.

PRIZE ENTRY

TYPE

EXAMPLE PRIZES

T6 Ultra-Rare Ship

Infinity Prize Pack

Vonph Herald Dreadnought Carrier [T6]

T6 Ship

Infinity Prize Pack

Krenim Imperium Warship [T6]

T5 Ship

Infinity Prize Pack

Tal Shiar Adapted Destroyer [T5]

T5 Secondary Ship

Infinity Prize Pack

Mirror Universe ships, Kazon Raider

Consoles

Infinity Prize Pack

Plasmonic Leech, Vaadwaur Constriction Anchor

Space Trait

Infinity Prize Pack

Precise, Anchored, Fluidic Cocoon

Ground Trait

Infinity Prize Pack

Pack Leader, Molt, Photonic Armor Protocol

Bridge Officer Training Manual

Infinity Prize Pack

Kemocite-laced Weaponry, Subspace Vortex

Kit Module

Infinity Prize Pack

Vaadwaur Anchor Drone, Deadly Intent, Gravimetric Traps (***)

Weapon Pack

Infinity Prize Pack

Phased Tetryon, Coalition Disruptors

Duty Officers

RANDOM

Tholian Warfare Specialists, Temporal Duty Officers

X-Large Boosts

RANDOM

Extra-Special VIP Dilithium Claims, 150 Fleet Mark Bonus Pools

Duty Officer Assignments

RANDOM

Temporal Beacon, Holonovel Fragment

Large Boosts

RANDOM

VIP Dilithium Claims, 100 Fleet Mark Bonus Pools

Kit Frames

RANDOM

Xindi Experimental Kit Frames, Fluidic Kit Frames

Crafting Packs & Duty Officer Packs

RANDOM

Gamma Quadrant Duty Officers, R&D Booster Packs

*** Infinity Prize Pack: Kit Module only offers a choice of Profession (Eng, Sci, Tac or Universal). The Kit Module rewarded is still randomized, within the chosen profession



The Infinity Lock Box Event will first appear on June 28nd and run up until the release of the Agents of Yesterday expansion.

Q&A

Q: Will existing Lock Boxes be updated? Can they still be obtained?
A: No. The contents of existing retired Lock Boxes will not be updated to reflect these changes, and we will no longer allow retired Lock Boxes to be acquired in-game.

Q: When new prizes are added, will existing Infinity Prize Packs be updated?
A: Yes. But they are only updated once when each Infinity Event begins anew. Prizes offered within the Infinity Lock Box will also not include the most recently retired Lock Box – addition of those prizes will be delayed for some time.

Love the new video!!

Looks an excellent idea that, though of course it depends on what the probabilities for everything actually are. But anything that makes the game simpler is a good idea in my opinion, it's got ridiculous.

The fight for the future – and the past – is heating up! Prepare to boldly go when no-one has gone before!

Federation agents from the 31st century are conducting covert operations to find new recruits. They’ve gone back to the 23rd century, in the early days of Starfleet, to find likely candidates.

When the new Agents of Yesterday expansion launches on July 6th, you’ll be able to make new captains from the Original Series time period – but they won’t stay in the 23rd century forever! For a limited time, these captains can become special temporal agents, recruited to track down and disable probes seeded throughout the timeline by the Na’kuhl and their allies.

Temporal Agents will play through all of the usual story missions, but in many of them they’ll uncover probes left by the Na’kuhl to gather intel or drop off equipment for enemy operatives. By completing puzzles, Temporal Agent captains can unlock those probes and disable them – and get great rewards in the process. In some cases, the interference of the Na’kuhl may result in new enemies or revelation of new secrets in these missions!

In addition to hunting down temporal probes, Temporal Agents will be able to use their special Temporal Transponder item to claim rewards for completing other tasks, such as finishing story arcs, gaining Reputations, completing Duty Officer commendations, finishing Admiralty campaigns, and learning Specialization skills. Unlocking these rewards will also earn rewards for other characters on your account, in addition to providing your Temporal Agent with new traits, gear, and bonus marks.

For the first six weeks of the Temporal Agent release, there will also be shard-wide tasks to which Temporal Agents can contribute in order to unlock rewards for the entire server. During this time, Temporal Agents will also add small amounts of Dilithium Ore as a bonus reward for enemies defeated, given out to their entire team.

Temporal Agent Rewards

The rewards for playing a new temporal recruit are many – and the tasks are those that many captains will complete as they play through the story arcs. Long-term dedication is also rewarded with new bonuses.

Find Temporal Probes: Finding and disabling Na’kuhl temporal probes in various missions will award your Temporal Agent with a small box of Marks of your choice. Finding half of the temporal probes will additionally award you with the new Trait: Rapid Support, which reduces the cooldown time of your Engineering, Science, and Tactical Fleet Captain ability. Finding all of the probes will unlock an Improved version of the Rapid Support Trait.

Reach Rank of Admiral: At each new rank you’ll gain a package of gear to enhance your space weapons, space equipment, space consoles, or ground equipment – your choice.

Specializations: Earn Specialization Points and spend them on skills in Specialization Trees – complete full trees to earn more credit. You’ll earn experience boosts and special Temporal Agent Tech Upgrades, and upon completion of three full Specialization trees, you’ll earn additional Tech Upgrades and all of your Improved Specialization Traits will be increased to Superior versions – giving you better abilities from Command Frequency (Command spec), Predictive Algorithms (Intel spec), Pedal to the Metal (Pilot spec), and Linear Progression (Temporal Operative spec) for all captains on your account!

Research & Development: Reaching level 1 in any R&D school grants you five R&D Duty Officers as well as a Rare Aegis Duty Officer. Reaching level 5 in any R&D school grants you a one-time boost of any school to level 10.

Play through Story Arcs: You’ll gain packages of Fleet Marks, Dilithium, and Energy Credits for playing through each Story Arc, including everything through the Breen arc, as well as the Delta Quadrant arc, the Future Proof arc, and the new Yesterday’s War arc. Finishing half of the Story Arcs unlocks the new Trait: Critical Systems, which grants a bonus to critical hit and critical severity for a short time after using any Emergency Power ability. Completing all of the Story Arcs grants an Improved version of this Trait for all characters on your account!

Admiralty: As you complete tiers of various Admiralty campaigns you’ll gain bonus one-time ship cards and pass tokens. Reaching level 3 in three Admiralty campaigns will give you a bonus that permanently gives you extra experience earned from completion of Admiralty assignments for all captains on your account!

Reputations: Persevere in gaining Reputations and you’ll gain bonus Energy Credits, Dilithium vouchers for use in Reputation Stores, and bonus Marks so that you can purchase the special gear offered by Reputations. When you reach rank 5 in all nine current reputations – Task Force Omega, Temporal Defense Initiative, Nukara Strikeforce, New Romulus, Dyson Joint Command, 8472 Counter-Command, Delta Alliance, Iconian Resistance, and Terran Task Force – your Reputation projects will be updated so that any project that awards special gear will now replace Mk XII very rare gear with Mk XIII ultra-rare gear instead!

Duty Officer Commendations: Work toward reaching rank 4 commendations in every category of Duty Officer commendations. You’ll receive assortments of Temporal Investigator Duty Officers of increasing rarity, and when you reach rank 4 in six commendation categories you’ll receive a unique Temporal Investigator Duty Officer of Epic quality for all captains on your account!

Fleet: Join a fleet after level 30 and get a package of Fleet Marks and Fleet Dilithium Vouchers.

Well agents of yesterday dropped...well yesterday and I made myself a 23 century character. So far it is really amazing I had a fan boy head explosion when I was able to chat with the entire (fully voiced) Enterprise bridge crew (minus Kirk). All the sound effects are period correct and even the loading screen has been changed to give it more of a 23rd century flair.

Nice I can't wait .

It was pretty impressive. I am working my new 23rd up the chain, and the temporal items in the classic missions are interesting. If you see W'yrd on drop me a line (I need to get him in the fleet..."

My regular Fed character is being offered a time-travel-related mission called "The Core of the Matter", looks as if there are others to follow it. Does it make no difference which character you complete this on, or should I wait and do it on a 23rd-century character for special bonuses or something? (I don't usually do missions more than once, so it'd be one or the other.)

So far im actually kind of dissapointed with my 23 century playthroguh, sad to say.

Sorry to hear that.
Does anyone know the answer about "The Core of the Matter" etc.?

I enjoyed the 23 century play through although I felt it was entirely too short.

Spoiler! :

I am noticing some glitches like the audio calls me a "delta recruit" which I found extremely funny.