Surveying Anomalies

The anomaly survey missions that are part of the exploration repeatables are among the most maligned parts of the game. Some folks just don't get why they're there. However, I enjoy them because they are quick and easy and I can just enjoy piloting my ship through a benign region of space. This morning in the Hromi Cluster, I had one mission defeating Klingons on a space station. For whatever reason (that I suck comes to mind), I could not get the last group. Finally after dying quite a few times, my away team and I synced up and we beat the baddies. It was very nice to go the the next anomaly and find that it was a cataloging mission.

There is a ton of precedent for this sort of mission in canon. In Star Trek VI alone, the Excelsior was just finishing up a three-year mission (her first) cataloging gaseous anomalies. And this was one of the Federation Flagships, with the legendary Hikaru Sulu in command. And the Enterprise-A was involved, too. Uhura pointed out that they had special gas sensing equipment aboard that they then used to track General Chang's Bird-of-Prey while it was cloaked.

If anything, the quiet "research" quests are the ones most in keeping with the spirit of Star Trek. Not that I would want to do them for three years straight. But then again, that's a lot of time in the Holodeck.