We’re super excited to reveal the brand new Tier 6 Pilot starships! These agile and powerful ships will be released soon and will allow you to slot a Commander Pilot Specialist bridge officer to allow you to take full advantage of everything the Pilot Bridge Officer specialization has to offer.

Availability

Pilot ships will be made available in the C-Store very soon.
These starships have three variants per faction and are available in three ways:

• Individually
• Faction bundles of all three variants
• A Super bundle that includes all three variants for all three factions

Pilot Ship Features

This new type of Tier 6 ship has a number of features that make them very unique. The feature that stands out as truly special for these starships is their Pilot Maneuvers, which allows for some truly fancy flying.
Below is a bullet point list of features for these starships:

• All Factions
  • Pilot Maneuvers
  • Commander Tactical/Pilot Bridge Officer Seat
  • Either a Lieutenant Science/Pilot Bridge Officer Seat or a Lieutenant Engineering/Pilot Bridge Officer seat, depending on the variant
  • Can Equip Dual Cannons
  • All new Starship Traits
  • All new consoles with powerful abilities
• Klingons
  • Cloaking Device
• Romulans
  • Romulan Battle Cloaking Device
  • Singularity Warp Core
    • 40 Base Power for All Sub-Systems
    • Plasma Shockwave
    • Quantum Absorption
    • Warp Shadows
    • Singularity Jump
    • Singularity Overcharge

Pilot Maneuvers Mechanic

Much like how players are able to perform active dodging/rolls on ground, these starships will be able to perform special maneuvers by double tapping in the direction they’d like to perform a special maneuver. These maneuvers can be rebound to different keys, or activated manually from a UI element if you so desire. After activating a Pilot Maneuver you will be briefly immune to damage. After performing such a maneuver you must wait a short time before doing another one. Below is a breakdown of the benefits of each maneuver.

Afterburners (Forward)

By double tapping the W key (by default) you will fly forward in a quick burst of speed covering a good distance. Afterburners can allow you to get out of a dangerous area quickly and grant you a brief period of damage immunity.

Barrel Roll (Left/Right)

You can perform a barrel roll to the left by double tapping the A key (by default) or to the right by double tapping the D key (by default). Barrel Rolls will cause you to travel some distance in the direction chosen and can help you escape hazards (like a Thalaron Burst or Crescent Wave Cannon for example). Like Afterburners, Barrel Rolls also grant you a brief period of immunity to damage.

Retrorockets (Backwards)

You can activate your pilot ship’s retrorockets by double tapping the S key (by default). This will cause your ship to lunge backwards a fair distance allowing you to get behind a pursuing target or to just continue another attack run. Retrorockets also grants you a brief period of damage immunity

Customization

There are many options available to you on how you can activate your Pilot Maneuvers. By default double tapping in a direction with execute a Pilot Maneuver. However, you can also do the following:

• Disable double tap to perform a Pilot Maneuver in Options/Controls
• Disable double tap on your Pilot Maneuver interface
• Activate a Pilot Maneuver directly from your Pilot Maneuver interface
• Under Keybinds you can bind a key that, when pressed, will allow you to perform a Pilot Maneuver with a single directional key press.
  • Example: You can bind shift, so that pressing shift and a direction will allow you to perform a Pilot Maneuver

Pilot Specialist Bridge Officer Seats

All of these ships also include a Commander Tactical/Pilot hybrid specialist bridge officer seat as well as a second Lieutenant rank Pilot hybrid specialist bridge officer seat. The primary profession for this seat varies per Pilot ship variant.

Keep your eyes peeled for a follow up blog for these awesome new ships that will reveal their stats, console abilities and starship traits!

Phil “Gorngonzolla” Zeleski
Lead Systems Designer
Star Trek Online