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Well, STO is an MMO, so by definition it does have some multiplayer elements. That said, the multiplayer aspect of the game is not quite as well-developed or integral to the gaming experience as what you would see in other MMOs.
The only traditional PvE group content STO offers is TFOs, or Task Force Operations. These are akin to Flashpoints in SWTOR or Dungeons in ESO/WOW. they're 5-man group content (either space or ground-based) with difficulty levels ranging between Normal, Advanced, and Elite. I should note, however, that not all TFOs are created equal as they vary in mechanical difficulty quite significantly. While some are nothing more than shoot-em-up style missions where you hold off waves of enemies, others have very steep learning curves and require coordinated groups in order to complete them. There are also a TON of them in STO, close to or exceeding 100 if I'm not mistaken, so there's great variety if that's what you're looking for.
Aside from these, there's also Battlezones, which are either ground or space areas where multiple players can work together to capture objectives and, when enough objectives are captured, enter a final "boss" phase of sorts. Battlezones are much more casual than TFOs as players don’t need to queue for them and can enter or leave at any time with no penalties. Most Battlezones also have a difficulty scaling mechanic to them as well, meaning that when multiple players attempt to capture the same objective, enemies become more powerful and spawn in greater numbers.
PvP is still kind of a thing in STO, but it's not even close to what it is with other MMOs. I've been playing this game for nearly 6 years and in all that time PvP has never been popular outside of small groups of extremely dedicated players. Cryptic tried to breathe new life into PvP a couple of years ago, introducing new maps and even creating a whole new Reputation faction to go with it, but it did little to boost the PvP player base.
However, if you're more interested in the social aspect of MMOs, then you're in luck! STO does offer Fleets and Armadas, which are similar to Guilds and Clans in other MMOs. STO is fortunate to have quite a few very active and fun Fleets that frequently run events and giveaways for the community, and many are eager to help new players learn the ropes! Armadas are a group of Fleets that have joined together in order to pool in-game resources and/or expand their social networks. Being part of a Fleet also allows access to a whole host of great high-end equipment and ships, which is another plus!
All in all, STO is definitely a much more casual-friendly MMO than many others out there. For starters, it easily has the most friendly and accessible Free-to-Play system of them all, with no in-game gear or content being restricted. The most you'll miss out on for not being a Subscriber is a handful of ships and some cosmetic items. Another thing that I personally love about STO (though appreciation of this can vary based on personal tastes) is how consistent the endgame meta has been. It is extremely rare for a massive balance patch to be pushed to the live servers, unlike most MMOs where every major update includes significant changes to a ton of things. I love the fact that characters I'd fully leveled and geared up 4+ years ago are still completely viable; it lets me feel as though I can take my time and that my in-game progress/investments don't lose value or become obsolete every update.
Anyways, I hope this (rather lengthy) write-up helps you out, even if it's just a little bit! Cheers!
EDIT: typos and phrasing
just some points to augment this fantastically informative comment:
while there are over 100 TFOs, and enough players that you can always jump into one, i would say the gameplay variety is actually pretty limited. Most of them are just shoot-em-up with practically no strategy or teamwork required. There are certainly exceptions, though.
As a result, when you encounter a TFO that does require tactics and teamwork, your partners may flail around like they've never flown a starship or fired a phaser before, because they're expecting it to be a faceroll like most other TFOs. (many players use the "join random" button to join a completely random TFO, because the rewards are higher this way).
In my opinion, STO might seem like a pretty mediocre "MMO" if the "multiplayer" aspect is the most important thing to you, but it's a uniquely wonderful MMO if Star Trek and storylines and flying awesome ships and building awesome crews are important to you. Personally, I treat STO as a single-player game with an auction house, and i love it. (after 10 years of hardcore WoW raiding, i'm possibly permanently burnt out on teaming up meaningfully long-term with other people, and the obligations, pressure, and drama involved -- STO's casual-friendly approach is what keeps me comfortable and free from WoW PTSD flashbacks).
As with any MMO, your experience will vary widely depending on the quality and demeanor of the Fleet you join (like a Guild in WoW). My fleet is stone cold dead, save for a monthly email from the Fleet Admiral admonishing us for not donating more (he and i are the only two people who ever log on, and i have donated over a million credits worth of holdings in the 3 months i've been there, haha). honestly, i am 100% fine with that. i'm a weirdo hermit and i'm only in it the fleet for the various in-game benefits. so i'm getting what i want out of the situation.
Very well written guide, only one thing I should expand on
The most you'll miss out on for not being a Subscriber is a handful of ships and some cosmetic items.
The only "subscription" left is lifetime subscriber, which is basically a bundle of the old subscription perks and a monthly 500 zen stipend.
If we read this as not paying real money, I mean technically you can grind dilithium to zen, and buy anything on the zen store.... But there are things that are not realistic for most people going the full f2p route (legendary bundles come to mind)
Again, I'm probably nitpicking here, but if we are talking about spending in this game with a new player, I figured we should be more precise.
And never forget the most important rule of spending in STO: Only a sucker pays full price.
The others have mentioned TFOs and Fleets, but there is one more multiplayer aspect that I find super fun: Story mode co-operative play.
Granted, some story mode missions are single player only, but most of them can be tackled with up to 4 other buddies.
And not just story mode, shorter missions known as Patrols can also be tackled co-operatively.
Finished a full party playthrough of the Fed storyline not long ago. I think there were 6 missions that we had to do solo in the process.
I'm glad you brought this up, because it's the real key of where STO shines. Running through story missions with a friend (or 4) means leveling is even easier and you can focus more on enjoying the story and less on "shoot I'm not geared and I keep dying" times.
Plus it's easier to get through painful missions (like the Vault) when you have at least one friend backing you up.
Endgame queues, called Task Force Operations, are 5-man missions, to grind for currency to purchase reputations and reputation gear. Longest queues are 15ish minutes, but many last less than 2 minutes due to the players' damage output steamrolling any threats. There are a few open-world zones where players aren't instanced and can work in groups but generally don't (again the objectives aren't tough enough to require teamwork). Technically there's a PVP scene but its very, very small. And there are fleets (guilds) and chat functionality. Its more a single-player game with online functionality than a real MMO world.
After the tutorial you can do any story with people if you find them and pretty much all the rest of the active content outside of the story is have to be multiplayer. Queues and battlezones and adventure zones.
Well, STO is an MMO, so by definition it does have some multiplayer elements. That said, the multiplayer aspect of the game is not quite as well-developed or integral to the gaming experience as what you would see in other MMOs.
The only traditional PvE group content STO offers is TFOs, or Task Force Operations. These are akin to Flashpoints in SWTOR or Dungeons in ESO/WOW. they're 5-man group content (either space or ground-based) with difficulty levels ranging between Normal, Advanced, and Elite. I should note, however, that not all TFOs are created equal as they vary in mechanical difficulty quite significantly. While some are nothing more than shoot-em-up style missions where you hold off waves of enemies, others have very steep learning curves and require coordinated groups in order to complete them. There are also a TON of them in STO, close to or exceeding 100 if I'm not mistaken, so there's great variety if that's what you're looking for.
Aside from these, there's also Battlezones, which are either ground or space areas where multiple players can work together to capture objectives and, when enough objectives are captured, enter a final "boss" phase of sorts. Battlezones are much more casual than TFOs as players don’t need to queue for them and can enter or leave at any time with no penalties. Most Battlezones also have a difficulty scaling mechanic to them as well, meaning that when multiple players attempt to capture the same objective, enemies become more powerful and spawn in greater numbers.
PvP is still kind of a thing in STO, but it's not even close to what it is with other MMOs. I've been playing this game for nearly 6 years and in all that time PvP has never been popular outside of small groups of extremely dedicated players. Cryptic tried to breathe new life into PvP a couple of years ago, introducing new maps and even creating a whole new Reputation faction to go with it, but it did little to boost the PvP player base.
However, if you're more interested in the social aspect of MMOs, then you're in luck! STO does offer Fleets and Armadas, which are similar to Guilds and Clans in other MMOs. STO is fortunate to have quite a few very active and fun Fleets that frequently run events and giveaways for the community, and many are eager to help new players learn the ropes! Armadas are a group of Fleets that have joined together in order to pool in-game resources and/or expand their social networks. Being part of a Fleet also allows access to a whole host of great high-end equipment and ships, which is another plus!
All in all, STO is definitely a much more casual-friendly MMO than many others out there. For starters, it easily has the most friendly and accessible Free-to-Play system of them all, with no in-game gear or content being restricted. The most you'll miss out on for not being a Subscriber is a handful of ships and some cosmetic items. Another thing that I personally love about STO (though appreciation of this can vary based on personal tastes) is how consistent the endgame meta has been. It is extremely rare for a massive balance patch to be pushed to the live servers, unlike most MMOs where every major update includes significant changes to a ton of things. I love the fact that characters I'd fully leveled and geared up 4+ years ago are still completely viable; it lets me feel as though I can take my time and that my in-game progress/investments don't lose value or become obsolete every update.
Anyways, I hope this (rather lengthy) write-up helps you out, even if it's just a little bit! Cheers!
EDIT: typos and phrasing
just some points to augment this fantastically informative comment:
while there are over 100 TFOs, and enough players that you can always jump into one, i would say the gameplay variety is actually pretty limited. Most of them are just shoot-em-up with practically no strategy or teamwork required. There are certainly exceptions, though.
As a result, when you encounter a TFO that does require tactics and teamwork, your partners may flail around like they've never flown a starship or fired a phaser before, because they're expecting it to be a faceroll like most other TFOs. (many players use the "join random" button to join a completely random TFO, because the rewards are higher this way).
In my opinion, STO might seem like a pretty mediocre "MMO" if the "multiplayer" aspect is the most important thing to you, but it's a uniquely wonderful MMO if Star Trek and storylines and flying awesome ships and building awesome crews are important to you. Personally, I treat STO as a single-player game with an auction house, and i love it. (after 10 years of hardcore WoW raiding, i'm possibly permanently burnt out on teaming up meaningfully long-term with other people, and the obligations, pressure, and drama involved -- STO's casual-friendly approach is what keeps me comfortable and free from WoW PTSD flashbacks).
As with any MMO, your experience will vary widely depending on the quality and demeanor of the Fleet you join (like a Guild in WoW). My fleet is stone cold dead, save for a monthly email from the Fleet Admiral admonishing us for not donating more (he and i are the only two people who ever log on, and i have donated over a million credits worth of holdings in the 3 months i've been there, haha). honestly, i am 100% fine with that. i'm a weirdo hermit and i'm only in it the fleet for the various in-game benefits. so i'm getting what i want out of the situation.
Very well written guide, only one thing I should expand on
The only "subscription" left is lifetime subscriber, which is basically a bundle of the old subscription perks and a monthly 500 zen stipend.
If we read this as not paying real money, I mean technically you can grind dilithium to zen, and buy anything on the zen store.... But there are things that are not realistic for most people going the full f2p route (legendary bundles come to mind)
Again, I'm probably nitpicking here, but if we are talking about spending in this game with a new player, I figured we should be more precise.
And never forget the most important rule of spending in STO: Only a sucker pays full price.
This is a fantastic reply, cheers!
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The others have mentioned TFOs and Fleets, but there is one more multiplayer aspect that I find super fun: Story mode co-operative play.
Granted, some story mode missions are single player only, but most of them can be tackled with up to 4 other buddies.
And not just story mode, shorter missions known as Patrols can also be tackled co-operatively.
Finished a full party playthrough of the Fed storyline not long ago. I think there were 6 missions that we had to do solo in the process.
I'm glad you brought this up, because it's the real key of where STO shines. Running through story missions with a friend (or 4) means leveling is even easier and you can focus more on enjoying the story and less on "shoot I'm not geared and I keep dying" times.
Plus it's easier to get through painful missions (like the Vault) when you have at least one friend backing you up.
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If i have no friend that play the game, is there in-game matchmaking to allow me to do this co-op content with random people?
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Endgame queues, called Task Force Operations, are 5-man missions, to grind for currency to purchase reputations and reputation gear. Longest queues are 15ish minutes, but many last less than 2 minutes due to the players' damage output steamrolling any threats. There are a few open-world zones where players aren't instanced and can work in groups but generally don't (again the objectives aren't tough enough to require teamwork). Technically there's a PVP scene but its very, very small. And there are fleets (guilds) and chat functionality. Its more a single-player game with online functionality than a real MMO world.
After the tutorial you can do any story with people if you find them and pretty much all the rest of the active content outside of the story is have to be multiplayer. Queues and battlezones and adventure zones.
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