Patch 32 is here. There’s a new officer this month, a new ship, new ship skins, some new research, new missions, a new away team assignment slot, and yes, an awful lot of mining.
New Officer – William T. Riker
So we’ve had Riker without the beard for a while, now we’ve got the Riker we wanted – bearded Riker. You can read my full profile of this new hostile/armada officer here. You’ll get Riker shards in events, auction events, event store, and other ways.
Along with Riker, we’ve got Riker-based storyline missions for players level 32+, focusing on Bajoran resistance to the Cardassians that you’ll unlock through the free Battle pass. AND for players 40+, there are three additional missions focusing on the TNG storyline.
New Ship and New Research
We’ve got a brand new ship, an Isogen miner, the Meridian, that you can read all about here. And this unlocking this ship will get you a new refinery that’ll you’ll use in four new research nodes.
And one cool bonus to the Iso-resin refinery that players in smaller alliances could find very exciting – it will give out a small amount of Territory Capture particles in addition to the Iso-resin. So if your alliance doesn’t have a territory, or is missing one particle, now you’ll have a chance to get them.
New G4 Miner Ships Refits
This month, we’ve got our first miner refits. Each of them gives you a secondary material mining bonus. The Hydra refit gives it a bonus when mining Ore. The Vorta Vor Refit gives you a bonus when mining Crystal, and the B’Chor Refit gives you a bonus when mining Gas. The rub is that they’re all G4 ships, so most players won’t have them. The lack of corresponding G3 mining skins is noticeable here. Fourth dimensionally, they’ll be great. Something to shoot for down the road.
Aesthetically, they’re okay. Adding the red to the Hydra and pink to the B’Chor is interesting, but I really like the lighted things on the sides of the Vorta Vor. They kinda look like the cylinders on a six-shooter.
At the present moment, the only way to acquire these Refits will be through in-app purchases. In the future, they may be available through other means (events or event store,) but for right now, it’s a fixed-price purchase.
There are two ways of looking at this. One, you’ll need to spend money if you want to get them, but on the other hand, with items that are only available in auctions, you can spend money and still not get them.
Mining Officers Available
So this month, you’ll have a 2x chance of getting mining officers in ultra recruit packs, and for the first time, you’ll have a chance to get DuPont in those chests. In addition, Isogen mining officers Makinen and Airiam will have officer shards available for in-app purchases.
Bonus Away Team Assignment Slot
For this month, you’ll be getting something free. And free is good. You’ll be getting one new Away Team Assignment slot that will be just for Iso-resin assignments, and it will give TNG officers with critical success. But make sure to keep this one going all the time, as it goes away at the end of the month.
Events This Month
As with everything, these are subject to change, but the events will include things like Cosmic Cleanup, the Si Vis Pacem event, and Jellyfish Brawl. There is a research event, so you’ll want to hold off on completing any research your working on until that event drops.
Plus, with the Olympics being this month, there are events in the works for that.
I’m hoping to release an article with more specifics on all the new events sometime in the next few days.
Lastly…
I just wanted to thank everyone for their patience and support over the past few months. It’s been an exhausting time, as in addition to work, I’ve been coaching both my kid’s Little League teams, and while it’s been really really rewarding, it has been a bit draining, and I’ve fallen behind on my articles and emails.
I’ve got a backlog of articles that I’m hoping to get caught up on, and I’ll be doing mailbag articles because I have gotten a lot of great questions in my inbox that I’ll start turning around in the next few days and weeks.