I do have one free trait respect. I don't know if it's an old-character thing or if every character gets one.
What exactly is new about the trait system other than being able to respec?
Racial traits don't take up any of your slots anymore (i.e. Vulcans actually always have all their racials. LIke the famous nerve pinch).
The new system basically just lets you actually pick your traits with more flexibility, and the ability to respec them if you don't like them. It makes Aliens less metagamingly OP by being able to select a bunch of traits, and races get to use all their special traits now instead of having to use valuable trait slots on them.
Ok, what I remember, you used to get 4 traits. 2 were racial (you can't change them) and 2 were custom-selected on creation (or 3/1... I don't remember if Bite was optional on my Gorn, I'm pretty sure it was). If you chose alien, you could choose all 4 traits. You never gained any new traits.
But now, you have the same 4 traits, except one is basically "Your race name" and is fixed (and a more specific, instead of something like "Leadership" that anyone can choose), you still get 3 extra traits. Choosing "alien" gives you 1 extra trait and no "racial", so basically, 4 traits, same as before.
The only difference I can see is that you gain more traits as you level, up to 9 at level 50. And respec, which AFAIK wasn't even an option before. Well, and they removed some traits and added others it seems (if you had one of those you basically now got your slots back without paying for a respec).
I'm not sure what is worse in the system now. Did I miss something?
EDIT: also, I can't find the fleet.