Bridge officer

A Bridge Officer (or "BOff") in Star Trek Online is a commissioned member of the player's bridge crew. Bridge Officers are available to the player in both ground and space play. Players can view their current Bridge Officers by opening their status screens (defaulted to the U key on your keyboard). A Captain may maintain no more than 54 Bridge Officers.

Traits

Tellarite BOff trait window — Trait menu of a **Common** Tellarite BOff

Bridge Officers have four traits which can currently not be changed. Like player character traits, most of these grant benefits for the individual officer in ground combat, while few also buff the entire away team or give a bonus in space combat. Most BOff races have between one and up to four required traits, i.e., traits a specific race will always have.

In contrast to player character traits, Bridge Officer traits come in three different potencies, which are determined by the BOff's rarity:

Rarity	Traits
Common	2x Basic 2x Standard
Uncommon	1x Basic 3x Standard
Rare	1x Basic 2x Standard 1x Superior
Very Rare	2x Standard 2x Superior

While "Basic" traits grant 50% of a bonus, the "Standard" and "Superior" potencies grant 100% and 150%, respectively.

Development

Promotions

A Bridge Officer's rank determines her/his number of skills, i.e., BOff abilities, in ground and space combat. While an Ensign (lowest rank) BOff has one, a Commander (highest rank) BOff has four abilities. Bridge Officers are promoted by clicking the Career Options button at the bottom of an officer's status page and selecting the "Promote" option; a dialogue box will be opened with details of the promotion.

Skills and training

Training

See additional article: List of Training Manuals craftable by captain

Bridge Officers can be trained in new skills, i.e., clickable abilities. To do so, a player requires a Training Manual for the desired skill, as well as the amount of Expertise points required for training. Training an officer in a skill consumes the Training Manual in the process.

There are several methods of acquiring Training Manuals:

Bridge Officer Trainers sell lower-level Training Manuals.
Training Manuals may be traded or acquired from other players via the Exchange.
Higher-level, career-specific manuals may be crafted through the Officer Training School of the Research and Development system. To unlock manuals for crafting, the player must spend Skill Points in particular skills.
Bridge Officer Candidates can be converted into a training manual for a single ability.

Specializations

Bridge Officers can be trained into a Specialization. This requires a special type of Manual called a Specialization Qualification. When a Specialization Qualification is used to train a Bridge Officer in a new Specialization, the Bridge Officer learns four new space and four new ground abilities in that specialization.

Abilities

See main article: Bridge officer ability

Acquisition

Candidates

Bridge Officer Candidates are primarily available from a requisition officer, such as Elsa Mora at Earth Spacedock or V'Qlar in First City. New candidates may be purchased using Dilithium, and once acquired, are available to to be commissioned. A player may maintain no more than twelve (12) uncommissioned candidates.

Faction-specific bridge officer candidates are also rewarded for some tutorial and early storyline missions and later obtained periodically as the player levels up (every 10 levels after level 15). Additionally, some unique, very rare cross-faction candidates are also rewarded from specific higher-level missions in the game.

Bridge Officer Candidates serve two purposes: they can either become a full member of the player's bridge crew, or they can be used to train a commissioned Bridge Officer in one of their skills.

Direct trade

Special Bridge Officers cannot be traded this way.

Players must be within 5 feet (ground) or 5 km (space) of another player character to trade.
- A player opens the trade dialog by targeting the other player, right-clicking on their portrait, and selecting "Trade").
By opening the character status window, players can drag a Bridge Officer Candidate into the trade window.

Exchange

Bridge Officer Candidates can be sold on the exchange for Energy credits.

Via mail

Candidates can be sent through the mail to other characters (on a players account) or other players. This can only be done at a mail console that allows adding items to a message.
- Go to a mail terminal
- Compose a new message
- Open the Character Status window
  - Switch to the Assignments tab
- Drag the candidate to an open item slot in the mail window

Assignments rewarding Bridge Officers

See also: Assignments rewarding bridge officers

There are also Recruitment duty officer assignments which reward Bridge Officers of various races, (excluding C-Store or special officers) such as Ferengi, Alien, Trill, Saurian, Bolian, Klingon, Gorn, Andorian, Human, Orion, Lethean... etc.
Note: Some assignments are faction specific and may require higher Commendation ranks.

Special Bridge Officers

See also: Special bridge officer

There are a number of unique Bridge Officers which are obtained through other means, such as C-Store purchase or mission rewards.

Commissioning Officers

When a Bridge Officer Candidate becomes part of your crew, they are Commissioned Officers. You must have an empty Bridge Officer slots to commission an officer. Additional slots are earned as the player increases in rank, and additional slots can also be purchased in the C-Store.

Bridge Officer Candidates are commissioned by right-clicking on the candidate and selecting "Commission."

At the time of commissioning, the player will obtain a one-time opportunity to edit the officer's name, and to change their clothing and appearance without visiting a tailor.

Once a candidate is commissioned, players can promote them to a higher rank, which enables their higher space and ground abilities. Players can only promote an officer to a rank below themselves; therefore, Bridge Officers cannot be promoted until the player reaches the rank of Lieutenant Commander.

Customization

Players can customize a Bridge Officer's appearance by visiting a Tailor. Bridge Officers can be renamed at any time through your character window. Some Special Bridge Officers cannot be customized or renamed.

Using bridge officers

Status Window Stations — The "Stations" tab of the Status Window

Choose your away team — The prompt to select members of the Away Team before beaming down

Space

For space combat, bridge officers can be assigned to specific stations on the player's ship. In most cases, each bridge station requires a specific career and rank. Only Bridge Officers of the correct career can be assigned to a career-specific bridge station; any Bridge Officer may be assigned to a Universal station. Bridge officers will only be able to use their abilities corresponding to the rank of the station, even if they have been promoted and trained to a higher rank.

Ground

Members of a player's bridge crew can be assigned to the standard Away Team for ground missions and ground combat through the "Stations" tab of the Status Window. Players are also given the option of selecting members of an Away Team before beaming down to a ground map. If a player is playing a mission with other players, members of the Away Team are replaced with the other players; any remaining open positions will be filled with members of the players' Bridge Officers.

In ground combat, captains have direct control over their bridge officer's movement. The column with the team status on the far left allows players direct control over their AI-controlled characters. The player may set waypoints on the ground in order to send bridge officers to a specific location. The player may also set the attack "stance" of their individual bridge officers. Lastly, players have direct control over bridge officer abilities. By default, bridge officers will use their abilities on their own. However, players may choose to disable automatic use of an ability by right clicking on said ability, setting the ability to a disabled state (red background).