What do you do with those extra DOffs which are locked and unsellable? If you can't find a mission to 'use them up' like "Execute Changeling Spy" you are pretty much stuck with either maintaining them on your roster or dismissing them.
But what about educating them so they become more valuable?
I'd like to see a Service School DOff Mission made available for white and green DOffs so they can be upgraded, and thus made more useful, and Continuing Education Correspondence Courses made available so that Blue, Purple, and Lavender DOffs can be upgraded as well.
To qualify for such an assignment the DOff must be bound to your character. Appropriate fees must be paid, and possibly the use of commodities or consumables could be a part of such missions. Another possibility is to have appropriate gear such as weapons or consoles required, so that a 'Security' DOff may require a Personal Weapon to attend his class, while a 'Technician' DOff may require access to a console he can dissect as part of his education, with the rarity of the advancement setting the rarity of the device. (If you want to upgrade from a Rare DOff to a Very Rare DOff you must allow him to use up a suitable Very Rare item in his training.)
Not only could this generate a Dilithium Sink, it could create a demand for items which would otherwise be sold for EC. Exchange prices would go up a little, perhaps, at first, but I can't count the number of good items I routinely discard because they don't sell for more than the discard price on the Exchange anyway. I doubt this would have any long-term effect on Exchange prices, but it might encourage more players to seek out bargains there.
Hypothetical Example:
Garok the Ferengi Quartermaster is an Uncommon quality DOff which is bound to the character's roster.
The player examines his mission options on his 'Home Base', (Starfleet Academy, Klingon Academy, or Romulan Command,) and discovers he has an opportunity to send a DOff to an Operations Service School.
The player assigns Garok to this school and, because he is a Quartermaster, the Service School requires he be provided with a Rare Personal Equipment item such as Personal Armor or Personal Shield to aid in his studies. The Mark Number of the item could also be a penalty or bonus to his success, with items lower than his captain's Rank generating a penalty while items with a mark number above his captain's rank offer a bonus. Let us assume Garok's captain is level 50, and therefore the item must be a Blue Mk XI item to allow Garok to train without penalty or bonus.
Now Garok must spend 100 hours in school, learning the ins and outs of the duties of the Quartermaster. At the end of that time he must pass a final examination which determines his eligibility for an upgrade in Rarity. It is possible he fails, and a Critical Failure could indicate cheating, (Unscrupulous trait,) which could result in his expulsion from Service, while an ordinary Failure, (Unruly trait,) would send him back to his command without an upgrade in Rarity. A Success, (Logical trait,) would indicate he has passed the course and is rewarded with an upgrade to Rarity, while a Critical Success, (Eidetic Memory trait,) would indicate he has exceeded all expectations and is awarded an additional random trait as well as a boost in Rarity.
The previous example presumes Starfleet alignment. Romulan Service Schools may not penalize Unscrupulous trait DOffs, while Klingon Service Schools would actively reward Aggressive trait DOffs.
Now, some might argue that such a system could make DOffs sold on the Exchange less valuable. I counter that players, able to potentially improve the DOffs they buy, might consider purchasing more DOffs to fill out their roster knowing that the best DOff they can afford now can be trained to be even better later on.
I think the idea could be tweaked in several ways to accommodate any misgivings the Developers or Players may have, including, but not limited to, a Dilithium price equal to or higher than that paid to Reassign Underperforming Officers. The idea is to allow a player to fine-tune his roster, rather than simply buy his way to Orange quality DOffs, so this Service School/Correspondence Course mission would be Very Rare. Over the lifetime of a typical Captain's career, only a dozen or so DOffs would have the opportunity to be upgraded this way. Few DOffs would have the opportunity to upgrade this way more than once or twice.
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Let's say you have a common Flight Deck DOff and you just bought a new Carrier. When you look on the Exchange you discover Flight Deck DOffs are more expensive than your EC cap, but you really want that Flight Deck DOff improved.
Under the current system you can continue to trade and hope you eventually get a better FDO DOff, at 1000 dill per try. Under my proposed system you could train him the next time you get an Operations Service School DOff Mission.
Also, under the current system, the only way to get better than Purple (Very Rare) DOffs is via placed mission rewards. My proposal would allow Purple DOffs to be trained to Lavender rarity or eventually even Amber.