Guest Blog: Epohh Tagging
By PWE_BranFlakes @ January 8, 2013 at 12:00pm
By Mimey
Overview
So, you've just arrived on Mol'Rihan, or "New Romulus in your language," as D’Tan said when you first arrived, seeking to help out the Romulans with their new colony. As you walk around, beginning to explore, you might see these small, furry creatures of various colors running to and fro. These are indigenous creatures of the planet, which the Romulans call the 'Epohhs', which is their word for 'pet'.
As you continue, you might make your way south, over a large suspension bridge that has been built over the Atlai, where you will come across a large, green pasture called the Epohh Fields. There are several Romulan scientists here who are studying these small, passive creatures and would like your help. If you’ve already visited this section and accessed the transport console, you’ll be able to transport directly there.
From this point onwards, if you are having any trouble getting around the fields or finding Toreth, etc., please feel free to use a zoomed-in map that may be found here.
To begin your Epohh tagging journey towards receiving hundreds of Romulan Marks, find the head scientist, Toreth (she's in front of a tent, dressed in white and is holding a PADD), within the camp. Talk to her because she has a mission for you named, "Isha Forest Epohh Collection." This little mission is what is going to get you on the road to getting Epohhs, and can be done daily (it has a 20 hour cooldown timer).
Because of that, there's a lot to mention here!
Epohh tagging is much more of a minigame than a true mission. The game itself is simple: just run around in one of several areas and tag Epohhs. Based on how many you tag, you will gain 'Active Epohh Tags,' and a few Romulan Marks as your reward. The best reward is 4 tags and is earned by tagging at least 30 Epohhs during the mission.
Teaming up with at least one other person can help immensely as each team member’s tags counts towards the group’s total, making it much easier to get the minimum of 30 needed for the maximum reward. A full team of 5 would only need each person to tag 6 Epohhs to earn the maximum reward.
Epohh tagging is a mission of speed. Abilities or items that can speed up your movement will help you move around quickly. For example, if you are a Tactical officer, try using the Motion Accelerator kit ability, or put on your frosted boots from this year’s winter event.
Tips from a Tagging Expert
Using your mouse to tag Epohhs may take a couple seconds longer over using your interact key, since you have to move your mouse around to click on the Epohh when you are near it. Using your interact keybind ("F", or another key if you have changed it) may help you tag faster since you can focus on tagging and moving on, rather than switching between your mouse and keyboard.
Try to avoid running around too much. If you run out of Epohhs in your starting area, look around, but keep yourself focused on the closest Epohh. You only have 90 seconds to tag the Epohhs, so you can't be running around or standing idle for too long.
Epohhs are small and some blend in very well with the ground – your biggest asset will in fact be the interact box that pops up when you are in range of tagging an Epohh. Looking for them can be difficult, especially small ones. It's also worth noting that if you lower your visual setting, much of the grass, shrubs, and so on will disappear off the ground, making it easier to spot Epohhs.
Next Steps
Once the timer is up, talk to Toreth and turn in your Epohh tags to finish the mission. Based on how many Epohhs you or your team tagged, she'll reward you with a number of tags you can keep. Once you earn four tags from her, you are ready to move on.
NOTE: If you are having trouble getting a group together for tagging, there's a chat channel to help! Just type in 'channel_join Epohh Tag' (without the quotes) in your chat box and you’ll join it. I'd like to mention that it's not my chat channel, but it could help you find a team if you don't have anyone to team up with. If players in that channel have already finished tagging, try asking in ‘Zone’ chat. Most will respond to "LFT Fed (or KDF) Epohh Tagging" or something similar.
So, now that you have your tags, let's do something with them! Go ahead and talk to Toreth, as she has a Duty Officer (DOFF) assignment for you.
Now, for this DOFF assignment, you will see it that it requires science Duty Officers and lists out specific specializations and traits that will increase the success and critical success (crit) chances of its completion. It has a guaranteed success rate that will reward 1 Epohh research, and a critical success will reward 3 Epohh research. DOFF attributes that can increase your crit chance are include slotting officers of higher rarity (very rare/purple) and officers with the Efficient and Logical traits.
Next, once you start this assignment, all you have to do is wait. I will mention that all DOFF assignments related to Epohhs take exactly 24 hours to complete, but once they are done, you can (if applicable) start them again without waiting on a cooldown.
When the assignment has completed the next day, collect the reward, and don't forget to participate in tagging again. Repeat that process until you have collected 5 Epohh research in total. Once you have, talk to Toreth again and choose to open up her 'Store'.
Your First Epohh
Now, pretty much the bulk of the 'work' is done at this point. In the store, you can choose one of 4 Epohh pups to buy: River, Forest, Mountain, or Ruin. The only difference between them is color, and what they can evolve to. If you're just tagging for the Romulan Marks, choose anything; if you’re looking to raise a pup to become your new non-combat pet, go ahead and pick what you want the most.
It's worth noting that ALL Epohhs, research and tags are bound to you the moment you get them.
Now that you have your new Epohh pup, it’s time to say goodbye to it already and talk to the other Romulans standing around camp. There are five in particular, each specializing in a different type of Epohh: River, Forest, Mountain, Ruin, and Evolved.
Speak to the Romulan who focuses on your Epohh type and choose the Epohh pup DOFF assignment. It will require the Epohh pup and a couple of DOFFs to start. Again, if you don't care about the type of Epohh you will raise in the end, don't worry about what DOFFs you send on the assignment at this point.
Epohh raising goes as such: pup to moppet, moppet to adult, adult to elder. Thus, it takes 3 days to fully raise an Epohh. If you should crit a raising mission, the base breed (such as River) will decide what kind of evolved Epohh it will become.
A River will become a Purple
A Mountain will become a Black
A Forest will become a Yellow
A Ruins will become a White
Collecting Your Reward
At this point, you have a final choice to make: keep the Epohh as a pet or turn it in for Romulan Marks. An elder Epohh (whether it's evolved or not) will reward you with 400 Romulan Marks upon turning it into Toreth. But don’t worry; she will find a great home for it. You can also turn in research, mopets, and adults for a smaller amount of Romulan Marks, but I recommend you fully evolve yours to an elder if you’re going to be turning it in for a reward. If you decide to keep the Epohh as a pet, you can turn it in at a later time or have it follow you on your journey for years to come.
On a final note, I'd just like to say I really enjoyed making the original guide. I might've written it, but I have to also give proper credit to others who've helped me with things I couldn't have done on my own: Idrona who provided the map above, Darkstarkirian who gave the info about the total number of pets you could get from this, Starkaos who figured out all the exact evolutions of the Epohhs, everyone who helped me figure out the evolution thing, and anybody else I might've forgotten.
Thank you all for reading; I greatly enjoyed making this guest blog and hope to see you tagging in-game sometime!
-Mimey
kittieshaufer @ Jan 19th, 2013 2:30PM
I pretty much only play once a month for five minutes. The game has gotten so boring. And I'm sorry, but this isn't enough to make me up my play time. I'll check it out, maybe play the mini-game once. But to be perfectly honest, I really don't expect much any more. A bone here or there to appease the fan bois and fan gurls, but I haven't seen anything of real substance in over a year now.
petaluma1 @ Jan 15th, 2013 10:03AM
What do we do with our Winter Wounderland Epohhs? and I can't see a Star Fleet RA runnig around collecting these things. Why can't we have DOFFs do these missions. Can't wait for Space Citizen MMO to come out. I'm a lifer but this is really starting to get really boreing. Save it for the new joins!
valutzu @ Jan 13th, 2013 5:47AM
I appreciate your article, don't get me wrong, but missions like this one is what made me quit playing the game and look for other ones online. Seems ridiculous for me as a starfleet admiral to chase rabbits around... I invested time and money in the game but this was the last straw. I wish you all good luck and all the best.
draconis1982 @ Jan 11th, 2013 6:31AM
This is for a comment left on the first page of this Blog. Just because like the other person said you can afford a lifetime membership with STO others dont have the time to play al the time. I dont intent to sound rude or put-offish but grow up.
fayemaeryne10006
yuh true my comment beebeeeep
lordmanzelot @ Jan 10th, 2013 1:59PM
aww cute
sabremeister1 @ Jan 10th, 2013 10:06AM
Since there's an event sequence that allows us to get 400 Romulan Marks in one go, is there going to be one that'll allow us to get 400 Omega Marks in one go?
butlertollrules @ Jan 10th, 2013 8:30AM
Thank you for a great little guide.
poochie420a @ Jan 9th, 2013 7:03PM
people like me, the ones that play this game a lot, the ones that religiously log in to it everyday, we are the ones keeping this game alive. And I am a paying customer. God bless you sir.
velqua @ Jan 9th, 2013 10:04AM
Very helpful guide. :) It would have been nice to mention the Winter Event Epohh, but then again, the Winter Event is ending. Thank you for the info. :)
tpalelena @ Jan 9th, 2013 8:29AM
This is a nice guild, tanks for posting it. It thought me which evolveds come from which norma epoh.
captainaramda @ Jan 9th, 2013 4:14AM
So many of you claim that you can earn major amounts of Romulan Marks, Fleet Marks, Omega Marks in a single day. That works only for those who are on here 24/7 with nothing else in Real Life to keep you busy. So many of us work or go to school full time so we don't have the time that you apparently do. Guides like this are invaluable. Think of it this way, someone who has been playing this game stopped playing to offer you guidance. You don't need the guidance? Good for you. You don't offer guidance? Then your knowledge is wasted on yourself. I greatly appreciate the time that people are capable of putting in. I wish I could do the same, but I don't. But I'm ever so grateful for those that choose to share their knowledge as a way of giving back to the community. Self-centered people who are so absorbed with themselves will lead very lonely lives.
crashdragon @ Jan 9th, 2013 4:01AM
Next guest blog : Federation Death Sports - Klingon Hugging.
questerius @ Jan 9th, 2013 3:36AM
The only reason why i would raise a Romulan Rabbit is to sell them to Klingon chefs. Targ meat and such can become boring so why not add variation by adding Epoch Steak.
starfish1701 @ Jan 8th, 2013 10:43PM
Thanks for this. There is so much to do on New Romulus, I didn't realise that Epohhs were a viable source of Romulan Marks. Trouble is, they are so cute, if I raise one, I might not want to let it go!
poochie420a @ Jan 8th, 2013 7:58PM
I dont get the point of this really. Not the tagging but the fact that this article is here, isnt this old news? I mean its like they think we arent checking this stuff out as soon as humanly possible. Yea its great an all but why are we talking about this?? How abotu the fact that and yes here it comes (bug), that the required duty officer to research the epohh tags is not the best choice in fact jsut abotu any OTHER science doff purple will give you 20 80 vs the 16 84 that the research lab doff does even with efficient trait. no biggy really but cmon lets put things up here that people may be actually interested in more of a way that just a cute fascination. what is the next move for this game?
clannmac
Because not everyone started playing when some of us did - like two folks in my fleet who just hit high enough level to go to New Romulus and do these missions yesterday. In geeking out, one was asking this very question today - now they have a post they can come to to explain things to them if the rest of us in the fleet aren't around.
perfectself82
Why is it that these posts are always coming from people with 420 or w33d or some other stupid drug reference in their names?
captainaramda
Just because you can afford to be on STO 24/7 does NOT mean the rest of us can. What's more is the fact that STO is adding new players all the time while players are starting new toons to begin missions. Topics such as this are invaluable. I applaud them for taking so much of their playing time to offer guidance to others who may not be as fortunate.
snoge00f @ Jan 8th, 2013 7:35PM
Nice article. :) Keep it up.
sean2448 @ Jan 8th, 2013 7:04PM
it is trying to help speed up romulan reputation pvp test is coming
branmakmorrn @ Jan 8th, 2013 6:26PM
Wake me up at first sign of any KDF-exclusive stuff. Oh, that isn't like this, I mean real gameplay. Grind is so 2007. Evolve the genre, people.
tribbleorlfl @ Jan 8th, 2013 5:30PM
I wonder why evolved eppoh's don't yield more rom marks than the standard variety. The special winter ones do, as the scarcity and relative difficulty in obtaining increases their value.
darkstarkirian @ Jan 8th, 2013 4:09PM
Well thnx for the minor kudos mimey, you did a great job on this. QWould still like some Pet storage space thou because of all the pets that were introduced with S7 and Winter Wonderland.
gradstudent1 @ Jan 8th, 2013 4:01PM
Good work, Mimey! You have so many talents--PvP coach and Epohh tagging expert! I guess we're lucky to have you on board!!!!
claransa @ Jan 8th, 2013 2:09PM
I remember turning in my first epohh for 400 romulan marks!! Hello winter event!! Tier IV done and progressing towards tier V in less than a month!! Now we just need to introduce the Deferi to epohhs
fewzz @ Jan 8th, 2013 1:39PM
A Tagging expert, looooooooooool
khamseenair @ Jan 8th, 2013 1:26PM
Nice guest blog. Didn't know about the channel, that will come in handy and may help reduce the amount of "Epohh tag team" chat in Zone once more people know about it. Thanks.
stingrea2012 @ Jan 8th, 2013 1:25PM
I remember it took me about a week to get my first Epohh. I was careful to pick the Mountain Epohh to match my outfit color (because I'm a girl and we accessorise like that). Ironically enough, while raising my Epohh, it mutated into the black and red version which completely clashed with my outfit. During the winter event I was lucky enough (and I count myself lucky) to get a hold of a Snow Epohh which didn't mutate while raising it. So now I have a plain white Epohh for my white snow outfit. I guess I'll probably end up selling the black and red one for the marks.
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