When you first embark on your new career as a Krellan commander, you may wonder why the universe is so quiet. There’s barely any fighting, and when you begin, it’s just you and your lone Battlecruiser. What a lot of people don’t realize is that Star Fleet II has an ingenious ranking system that gives you more complexity as you rise through the ranks while also adding to the danger and complexity of the sectors you’ll be exploring and fighting in.

This guide will strive to succinctly explain what lies ahead in your career as a Krellan Commander, and why this is truly one of the finest space games ever made.

Please note: As I write this I'm on the penultimate mission of the game, so I've not seen the game's toughest challenge as of yet, but I'm close.

When you begin, you hold the rank of Altern, the lowest rank in the game. In this rank, many of your missions will involve exploring new worlds, sending down landing parties, establishing bases and some light combat with unarmed ships such as freighters and starliners. This rank is to ease you into controlling your ship itself and getting comfortable with the controls.

Escorts are a literal game-changer, and they’ll stick with you until your final mission in the game. Escorts are an amazingly flexible tool, and can be given orders either as a group or individually. Say you want to capture a starliner but take out its frigate escort. You could set two escorts to disable, and slave them to your target, and the other two to free fire (i.e. destroy mode) and target anything EXCEPT your target, so they’d focus on the frigate. The missions here will help you get used to controlling your battle fleet in light combat situations, with the strongest enemy ship you’re likely to meet being the UGA Light Cruiser.

This is when combat begins to get really serious, as now you’ll begin encountering the pride of the UGA fleet, the Invincible-class heavy cruiser. Missions can involve seeking out these enemies and destroying or capturing them, as well as dealing directly with starbases. You’ll also become more heavy handed with planets here.

Achieving the rank of Commander allows you direct control of invasions. Invasions are almost an entirely separate ground-based strategy game tied to your spaceship game. It’s so good and detailed they spun it off into a separate game called Star Legions a few years after this came out. Here you’ll start with invasions of lower-technologically advanced planets, so you’ll have an easier time learning how to control your shock troops and warriors as they take over entire enemy cities and planets. Invasions might seem a bit daunting at first, but once you get into a rhythm with them, you’ll find yourself masterfully conducting them as you would an orchestra.

As a Prefect, you can now give orders to other Krellan ships in the same system as you. This allows you to give them specific orders if you need to, which can be great help in fleet battles, especially against enemy starbases. You’ll also find higher-level technology planets here that are a bit tougher to invade -- especially with planetary and city-based shields -- but are also a more fun challenge as well.

As a Subadmiral, you’re finally given control over all Krellan ships in your entire sector. Yes, all of them. You can give ships a variety of commands, from attack to withdrawal to rendezvous to escort. You’ll need this flexibility too as you’ll be tasked with invading even tougher planets and destroying multiple starbases in a single mission. This is where the full and true depth of this game really comes into focus, as being in full command gives you a wide array of options and tools to deal with pretty much anything the UGA throws at you, if you use them right. As a Sub-Admiral your orders are tactical in nature: capture or eliminate X number of HCs, eliminate X number starbases, capture X number planets, etc.

As an Admiral, you again have full control over the entirety of forces in your sector, but as you’ve been moving deeper into UGA space, your enemies are also getting tougher and more numerous. These missions prepare you for what is the game’s final act: taking out the UGA 5th Fleet Regional Headquarters, which is sort of like a super starbase. It even took the game's creator and developer multiple attempts to take out this mighty fortress.

At Admiral rank, your missions are all strategic, involving all the UGA forces. The missions are much grander in scope, such as destroy all UGA ships, or neutralize all inhabited planets. This is also where you first encounter the dreaded colonies of the UGA. Unlike allied planets, colonies are colonized by the humans of the UGA directly, and have formidable defenses, such as a minefield and orbital fortresses.

Therefore the challenge in dealing with the game at the Admiral level is even greater than Subadmiral, and you'll need all your training and all the skills you've acquired to be successful.

While Star Fleet II’s depth might not be apparent at first -- as screenshots don’t really do it justice -- we hope that this article gives you an idea of the amazing depth and detail found in the game. The game is truly a marvel, and if you stick with it, you’ll be given one of the most satisfying gaming experiences you could ever hope to achieve.

If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to ask in the comments below or the forums. Thanks for reading!