I'm quite new to level 65 and so far the Hydra is the only thing in the game I've spent real money on, and I'm very glad i did! Not only is it a really good ship, but it's fun as hell, especially with pilot specialisation. Zipping around the map and using MVAM is so fun

Thanks for keeping up on STO, I play it here and there, have since 2012, and im glad to see someone still covering it.

The Lexington is the best first purchase I thought I'd make: It is. And I barely have anything top end going for it. I don't even have remotely ideal ship traits as the account is only a month old, and it just PERFORMS. And sometimes it flies like an escort, which is wild to me.

I've been using the Hydra as my daily driver since it launched as well. I run a DEWSci build with 3 anomalies, SIA, and SS3 plus 4 other SIA detonators. Very little survives 15 SIA procs, and SS3 mops up what little does easily. It's also nice because as long as you're not running elites, you can run a single build and do literally everything else in the game without swapping (and elites too but it'll be a struggle.) The rest of my build and why: - 3pc Restoration Reinforcements set: lowers cooldowns, increases power levels, the blast module deletes torps and fighters in a 180 degree cone, the support platform provides good shield healing on maps where you need to sit still, and the torp platform follows you and just pukes out torps constantly (which deal mediocre damage but it fires a LOT of them) - 2pc Chronitron Integrated set: AoE healing + tractor beam immunity without eating a boff slot for polarize hull, also good for pushing mines away, mainly for Tour the Galaxy though - Gamma Warp Core: for Tour the Galaxy mostly - KHG Engines + Shield: The hands down best 2-piece core component combo in the game and I will fight anyone who says otherwise. The only reason to use ANY other 2pc is if you have zero torps on the entire ship, and even then alternatives aren't much better. - Fleet Channeling Deflector: for crit, obviously - Hypercharged Field Projector: doesn't use any weapon power to fire, is excellent torpedo point defense - 1x Kelvin Torp: self explanatory - 4x Sensor-Linked Disruptors: because SS3 lowers rate of fire, which in turn halves proc chance. Sensor-linked aren't a massive buff but they're always on, better than a proc that will almost never fire. I'm using Beam Arrays because I'm lazy, but of course you can slot DHCs. The Hydra can easily turn enough for them. - 2pc House Matrok set: the console for this is the second best quest reward console in the game, second only to the Chronometric Capacitor, but I'm tired of Polaron. - 2pc Omega Cutting Beam set: because the cutting beam is simply underrated. Yes, it doesn't benefit from firing modes. No, it doesn't matter. DPS is 20% higher than ANY Omni after shields are down, which SIA and the other weapons melt instantly. - Hull-Image Refractors: The best single console in the game. I'll fight anyone over this too. +20% Cat2 damage plus doubling your survivability plus battle cloak plus a 100% hull heal all on one console. I refuse to fly any ship without this, even ships that already have battle cloak. Fortunately I have 5 of them :) - 1x Disruptor Locator, 1x Protomatter Infuser: self explanatory - 1x EPG Particle Field Exciter: self explanatory - SIA, Vanguard Specialists, Time to Kill, Synthetic Good Fortune, She's a Predator, and tbh idr the other trait. Those are the important ones, heh. - SS3, Torp Spread 3, Ionic Turbulence 1, Intel Team 1, Aux2Shields 3, AP Lambda 1, Reinforcements Squad 1, GW1, Subspace Vortex 1, Photonic Officer 1, Transfer Shields 1, Hazard Emitters 1. Pretty sure I'm forgetting something but those are the main ones. I am usually able to redeploy the anomalies every 24 seconds, which means 20 seconds of uptime and 4 seconds of downtime. SS3 never goes down for more than 1 second. Also worth noting, the Hydra is unique among ships with Cmdr Tac Intel because you can use AP Lambda instead of eating the Tac Lt slot for AP Delta or Beta, which allows the third anomaly. No other Cmdr Tac Intel has Pilot slots. Anyhow, loving the Hydra. I still love the Adamant too but it's worth sacrificing the battle cloak and 10% She's a Predator damage for everything the Hydra offers. As for pure Sci ships, my personal favorite is still the Fleet Nova Scout Ship, because the 33% raider flanking can apply to sci abilities. That automatically gives Scout ships a boost that no other Sci ship type has. Of course the Dranuur works fine too, but I find the Pilot maneuvers do help with survivability if you save them for then you're about to take a big hit. It's also 4/2 so it's an excellent SciTorp platform. Throw 4 Kelvin torps on it with the new Terran Eagle console and it's insane. EDIT: One thing about shields, if you do decide to build for them, the Voth Power Subscore is a must. That plus EPtS3 gives you around +55% shield hardness. Counterintuitively, you want a Covariant shield for best results, not a Resilient shield. The capacity is far more important than anything else, because the largest issue you'll have trying (emphasis on "trying") to make a "shield tank" is drains, especially when fighting Borg. EPtS3 will negate them once they drop to 50%, but when you're up against drains, that basically means 50% is your functional shield capacity. Thus, more capacity trumps everything else. Anyhow, you can't just stop at the Voth Power Subcore + EPtS3, you need more hardness, but those 2 are the main sources for it. My T'Laru has around 89% total shield hardness, and those shields simply never drop, but it has 2 wings of Elite Drone Ships that are drawing most fire anyway.

We need a list for best ships for each build type like DEW sci and torps imo, and also the hydra is prob the best z-store ship

Great list. I have similar picks for my top 5 z store ships currently. The only ones I would replace from your list are the Eternal and the Norway. I have found that even though the Sutherland is not a full temporal ship, it is actually more suitable for epg/torp builds. As engineering is the most useless boff seating for epg. There are exceptions of course, but for a pure epg build, I pick the fleet Sutherland/Magellan over the Eternal using the engineering seating for my temporal abilities. As for the Norway, I don't have this ship, and I passed on it, as I am not a torp guy, and the lt. intel seating limits it. I would pick the Adamant over this particular ship. The Adamant is basically the Vengeance class ship if it were a raider. If I were going for mere fire power from an energy weapon build, the Fleet Intel Soyuz frigate is a monster as well. Using Surgical Strikes or CSV. Also it has incredible flexibility as it is almost set up like a raider. Still the Norway is a pretty ship, and I might just get it one day.

I used the Valdres throughout the last few arcs of the story, and I used it as a torp boat. Concentrate Firepower works well enough by itself. I'm not very competitive l, so I wasn't trying to cause crazy numbers of damahe

Very good your video, thank you. I noticed that when using the Starship Switch in a social zone, the loadout of any ship gets messed up. This problem has been happening to me for a long time.

I'm don't often purchase ships, I kinda wanna make sure I'll really like it. I saved up last year and got the 10th anni set and I loved it, also got the romulan legendary set which I loved for my Romulan, my first ship was the Lexington and loved it, also got the vanguard ship for my Jem'hadar and loved it too. I got the Hydra last week anf I really love it despite it claiming to have the immolating phaser lance and it does not, but far as any kinda energy weapon set up it runs pretty well with my Mirror Warship I got in the event last year. Enjoy it very much.

nice list, i am stil using the kelvin timeline intel dreadnaught, it is a very good ship aswell!

thanks for the advice

Awesome list. Oddly enough...my favorite store ships are the T6 Multi Mission Explorer, T6 Alita Heavy Strke Escort, amd the T6 Avenger skin Arbiter. Besides those, i still fly both Kelvin cruisers and the Astika the most. Unless I'm on my Klingon...then it's D4X all the time. My favorite canon boat.

Excellent choices, I agree. 😀

"Number One" first uttered by Captain Christopher Pike, the throw away captain that NBC did not like, nor his female first officer or his Vulcan Science Officer, everything and most ship staff was changed except for Mr. Spock, which Gene Roddenbury refused to change. Interesting irony, Spock was the predecessor to all the alien life forms that have since been born into the show, had NBC not ask for a new pilot with a new cast and story line there would be no Uhura, Sulu, Bones, Kirk and eventually Chekov. The first officer became Nurse Chapel, Majel Barrett (later Majel Barrett Roddenbury), also voice of the computer through TNG, other voiceovers in the animations and Deanna Troi mother Lwaxana Troi. She was a very good friend. We were close, especially after Gene passed away. So many personal stories to share about them all, some day maybe. Thanks for your work, it is always appreciated. 👍🏽

Nice video and great info.

Good list. And I agree with your view on ships-for-traits. I have max. 6 trait slots, what would I need 30 great traits for? Personally, I prefer the Fleet Oberth over the Eternal. It dishes out an amazing amount of damage (focused on Spore Infused Anomalies) for such a small ship.

Great video as usual. Is there a Klingon near-equivalent to the Hydra?

Could you do a pilot focused build maybe? I'd like to try see if I might like to play that way but I'm not build savvy. Plus, I don't know much about the Pilot rework.

Legendary Mirror Galaxy Dreadnought. The bundle gives you excellent ground weapons and excellent t6 that can be a torp or beam boat, sackes with you, built in phaser experimental weapon, custom outfit, aggony weapons which aren't the best but still top 5, x token and a dog. 🐕 Its a great deal. And you get a BO trait which is nice and 3 meh consoles. But their good early game. Saucer separation is excellent until you get an emergency pilot boff. Plus you get to roll around like admiral Riker in "All Good Things". Best ship except you really need to to run aux to bat 1 x1 and PO 1 x1 otherwise perfect.

Are the Khopesh or Romulan pilot warbirds any good? Haven't played in a while but had those with cannon scatter volley build

Good list. I really like that you broke down which ships are Fleet Quality out of the box versus the ones that need a FSM to get. But it's me, so please pardon my follow-up observations. Science carriers, especially those with some Intel seating, make for excellent Unconventional Systems boats. Since you don't need any drain/debuffs to mule a Deteriorating SecDef, you can go all in on Control abilities. In fact, I am going to be so bold as to suggest that Intel/ Science Carries are probably your best Uncon boats. Slap those clicky consoles on and observe the explosions. Tanks are easy to make, but (and this is probably my own prejudice) still require a lot of Threat generation and survivability, even for support tanks. That's not cheap. Finally, I would like to reiterate that you can't go wrong with Ba'ul DBB and Surgical Strikes. With the Ba'ul Lobi set doubling your extra targets and that automatic SS crit magic, yum. The Hydra is the perfect boat for that.

@50:20: CF was changed. Pets and players now have separate procs. See recent patch notes.

Hay there I recently got the voyager j and was wondering what would be a good build I've never done a science build any advice would be appreciated

I just came back to the game after a several year break. I run the temporal science vessel. What’s a good upgrade for this ship? I love it but I want a ship with similar capabilities for EPG builds.

thank you very much!

I went online last week for the first time in 5 years. Id been making a T6 Terran T6 into an assimilated build. Id collected the Kelvin Phasers for my hopeful drop of a Kelvin Dred. I may as well of stopped playing last week because im hooked again. Ive beat alcohol and this....this is worse. I need my Kelvin Dreadnought now ive completed ISS Resistance. I must say using them with Dominno and Beam Overload packs a punch. I also need help as this is very much an addiction.

It’s been a while that I’ve been on sto my favorite ship to use was the Galaxy Dreadnought fleet T6X. Is that still doing good in the game?

Whats the best ship for science schangians like gravity wells, rifts, ect. Best in game regardless of lockbox, lobi, or zen

I'm considering getting a Valdres - out of curiosity, how is the Mjolnir experimental weapon? Not a deal maker or breaker for me, just like to get as full a picture as I can.

35:42 You slot that consile for the CAT2 bonus it gives.

I am currently doing the red alerts which can offer a t6 token for a c store ship i believe I am not sure if it would let me buy any of these or it is a limited choice.

I know some people don't like it but I want the excelsior 2 so badly. But my luck is so bad I never get the infinity t6 ship box. Really sucks for me

nice and clear, already thinking about the Lexington. Btw, is the trait A good day to die still bugged ? haven't seen any dmg increase when I use Go down fighting skill

Unless you can get the terren ody to turn fast or something that gives cannons more firing arc, any cannon build would suck

The interface bugs in this game are legendary.

Honestly, CSW on the Hydra has the biggest damage potential, while SS makes it a superior single target damage dealer. Don't really need any other firing modes, as long as you have the extender traits for both.

Looks like is one of those that you can do the saucer seperation with that one

How do I know what all items are used on the build? All anyone gives on KZfaq is the visual and I don’t know how to obtain the pieces, weapons, consoles, etc.

I have only one question. Why do people put rear beam arrays on the forward slots when there are higher damage arrays for those slots? This confuses me.

In RTFO's I see people all the time, flying science ships and never using anything that triggers their secondary deflector. They might as well be flying sci carriers at that point.

I Second all 5 ships for feds, but what would your none fed ships be ?

How does that first ship do in the Ker'rat battle?

Just wish they would update old zstore ships...Really love my guardian cruiser for the looks, but since it was first store ship back in days it's really outdated.

was wondering where you have been

Will they be addressing the issue we are having with loadout and the "InvaildEntityName" Bug going on?

I feel like they're going to nerf the Hydra trait. I think the Lexington is my favorite. The Clarke is good, too. If you use Centaur pylons it gives it an odd Connie look. My latest ship is the Vengeance. I'm a bit late to the party on that, but it's fun.

What beams you running on the 31:30 lexington?

I brought a ship but can’t find where to unlock it in the game

Damn it Stu! Now I want the Hydra. I may have to stop watching your vids. LOL

Valdres, is a Norwegian location name :D - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valdres

With 4 out of 5 mismatches on the list it is safe to say we have an entirely different preference in ships.

Which ship is that the bridge of that you are standing in?

This game launched in February 2010, and it still has bugs that were reported back in beta.

I am coming back to the game after like 10 years of not playing, I am not sure if I want to invest money yet. Is there a fast way to get a Zstore ship that doesn't suck.

Wish I could play the game 😢

i have never liked the auto loadout switching that they put into the game more than once its screwed me over when i had everything set perfectly.

This is an only Federation faction ship video, unlike the title suggests, "BEST 5 zStore Ships in Star Trek Online 2023".

I fly the eternal idk why some people think it's not that good for c store

Lexington would of been better if the weapon parts were their own part

No eagle?

I think the Lexington would look and be even cooler instead of a sensor pod or whatever it's supposed to be it could also be docking ports for another ship like a defiant 😁 but I know nothing like that would ever happen..

Aw first one have not tried it but I'm already if the Concel can be equipped to the constitution then ok smash

What list is this? How is there not even the Legendary Defiant?!

Second hmmm interesting smash

I mean it's no Defiant...

Dreadnoughts and beam are my bread and butter, you have tempted me on a hydra beam now... this game makes my wallet hurt.

Third ok yes Big time cus it's a ship from star trek legecy smash

You will do better replacing the STD torp for a wide-angle quantum and then adding the wide-angle dual bank from the STD rep for the set bonus.

Fourth Tirrin I like the normal not podded but I'll say pass

Hi, I'm from Colombia, can someone with a good heart please donate me some weapons for my ship, since when I try to earn money to buy boxes that help me increase the rank of weapons, but they cost 4500 or something, the boxes for ,improve weapons and since I don't have a good weapon because I'm poor so I have no way to buy items that cost real money so I'm always patrolling and they kill me I don't have a good shield please from the heart someone who can donate me what I no longer use Thank you, of course, use a translator for this because everything is in English.

I only bought 1ship never again

Fifth ok alsom but more constitution class but pass