Zane_Marlowe

I think I can make it for a little while. That's about 1pm CST I think, so I should be okay. Krasus, Rip, what about you guys?

I saw it, I enjoyed it, it wasn't a piece of art, but it was entertaining. The Good: Excellent images of angels / demons / heaven / hell, Rachel Weisz, spooky coolness, Keanu Reeves, The Bad: Too talky without actually being able to resolve the plot into a tight form, not enough images of angels / demons / heaven / hell, Keanu Reeves. 6/10 How's that?

Should we initiate a roll call and purge the inactive roster again?

I've just approved Cadet Hare Kumaichi to ISS fleet. Cadet Kumaichi, report in and tell us something about yourself.

quote:Originally posted by Remo Williams: Sure if they actual had an academy back then that would be the thing to do, but since they didn't actual provide training probably not. Cheers on the trivia check, this one's on me!

Thanks, what's the standard title I should use for my sig? I've seen Nick use Vice-Fleet Leader, I've seen Fleet XO, and I've seen just simple Fleet Leader. If I had a choice, I kind of tend to prefer the latter since the seniority is generally understood and it saves confusion for those wondering what the difference actually is. That said, Ben's clearly the front man, so I'll let him decide what he'd like to me to use.

quote:Originally posted by Remo Williams: If you want to be with the people that started it all though there is only one choice. You mean you want him to go bug Tac or you want him to join Orion? On a more serious note my new friends, each fleet has a variety of personalities, activities, and (for lack of a better term) style. Since we don't allow fleet transfers once you get into the fleets, then take your time and do a little research. Go check out how active members are in the prospective fleets, and what kinds of things they do. Read some of the fleet forums for the fleets you might be interested in. Even check out old RP thread postings to get a sense of each fleet's "flavor." Then, hopefully, when you sign up somewhere it'll be a good fit for you. Clear skies.

I of course abstain from that vote, but I wanted to say thanks to Nick for leading the way while he was here. I've been reading a lot of backstory lately from the forums, you'll be missed man.

So Deephack, can you meet us this weekend for a little fleet exercise?

Glad to meet you Deephack, what have you already done with respect to applying? If you haven't already, put an application into the Fleet Database, and then go register on the ISS main website. Take a moment and read some of the material in our fleet reference, and confirm your interest in your wing assignment. Then, when you've got a minute, come tell us a little bit about you and your ship. Glad to have you onboard!

That is so...SO messed up... and funny! RP Marlowe goes to seek absolution for his soul /RP

I was convinced when I saw Equilibrium. It wasn't the greatest flick, but I give it points for having some cool concepts, and showing us that Bale has some serious whoopass in him. Watch it and wait for the "Not without incident" line. That was when I knew he'd rule if he ever took up the cape and cowl, and that was before casting rumors connected his name to the new movie. I can't wait.

Drat it all, I'm kind of jammed up. I may not be able to show this week. Let me do this though in case I'm not here. I'll make a time with Omega and (hopefully) Rip, and we'll setup a practice over here some time this week. I'm still having a hard time figuring out when we're meeting, but it appears to be about 40 minutes from now or so. If I can make it I may be a little late.

Hey Ben, When I have a few minutes, I wanted to send you a more thorough history I've been drafting that includes the beginnings of not just ISS, but that tells the story of how the fleets first formed, and brings ISS history into larger context with the rest of the overall history.

Can you say where it is that you see that penalty? I'm not sure I remember reading anything like that, but if it's true I'd be interested to know, because I'm not aware that ISS is doing that.

I'm actually going to be out of town, sorry gents. It's only a weekend trip though, so I'll be good again later. Really fries me that I won't get to work with you guys on the new bandwidth patch tomorrow though.

Commanders cleared to Level 3 need to read this. Also, our wing profiles are online now, so remember to use a URL in your wing designation on your sig (as I have below). If you can't read the forum post, then you're either not cleared for level 3 access or you're not logged in.

Now I'm not sure about you...but I'm beginning to get the impression that SC liked that trailer. Just a hunch on my part, but I'm gonna say it's more likely than not

Well, I think you're right to say that we can't compare the effects, but I wasn't trying to do that. I was just saying that one of the things the new show was doing well was the effects. Consider that if the new show had poor effects then we'd all be hearing about how much the new show sucked because of that, without people necessarily drawing comparisons to the old show's effects. Faux Militarism is just my term for the failure of people to represent any kind of military authenticity. When I look at the Trek series, the characters appear, speak, and act nothing like anyone I've ever known in uniform. They spend more time breaking orders than following them, and rarely do they seem like they're professionally trained in the appropriate use of force. Star Trek (in general) is written with a Vietnam-era perspective on the military, but if I go on from here, I'll end up ranting about liberal construals of the military, so I'll just stop there. Suffice it to say it rings hollow, and that's what I mean by Faux militarism. I'll plead ignorance on Starbuck since I don't remember the original enough to know what Starbuck's character was really like. I do remember he was a ladies man, a hotshot pilot, and the more hotheaded irresponsible one. Except for the ladies man part, isn't that kind of present in the new character?

I have to say, I thought the original was good, I think the new one is good. They're different shows. There's an entirely different thread here about the death of sci-fi, and together with this thread it's getting me to wonder if it isn't sci-fi fans that killed it. The story of Battlestar Galactica is about a fleet of colonial ships trying to escape the clutches of robots intent on destroying them, and placing their hope in the saving power of their ancestral homeworld. That idea is present in the original and intact in the new, but how it's executed is subtly different. Regarding Starbuck, when the original series aired, we didn't have women figher pilots, and the culture wouldn't "believe" the tough kick-ass leading lady. Since then we've had all kinds, from Tomb Raider to Resident Evil, to Shirow's Appleseed, etc. (Not an exhaustive list, but just off the top of my head.) Starbuck makes sense given these trends, although it's certainly not the original. Is the character intersting? I'll say it certainly reflects a more recent trend that wasn't present in the original series. Is that good or bad? Depends on how much you loved the original series I suppose. One thing I DO like about the new series is that people seem to have real problems and personal conflicts, and that the show doesn't have a faux-militarism (ala Star Trek). When I watched this series, I believed that I was seeing future soldiers, and for those two reasons at least I'm going to be interested in continuing to watch.

Welcome back Nick! We've been busy while you were away, winning fleet matches, working up the website, and getting our latest player, Krasus (forum name Omega) up to speed. Can you imagine what might happen if we have FIVE active MP players? We could actually accomplish missions in paired battlegroups, have intra-fleet matches, work up team tactics (which we did a little bit this last practice). Anyway, welcome back!

You missed a good practice today Rip, I got a couple GREAT new tricks from our fearless leader.

quote:Originally posted by Ben Zwycky: What's happened to the logos? I can't see them.The sig logos? I have no problem seeing them, are you referring to something else?

Now I still didn't see you respond to the reference to Babylon 5, which fought its way through five seasons and won a Hugo (or two?) for its storytelling. I put an exception to it for it's being television, but if the point is about sci-fi as adapted to a visual medium, I think B5 was most suited to television given the expansive nature of the story. That said, I also cited those examples of recent sci-fi movies as sci-fi movies, not as their parent sources that are clearly older. If you're looking for original ideas in sci-fi, and you're looking for them to appear on film first, then I'd have to think about it. To Scrivener's remarks about studios, I think the main "problem" if there is one is that people don't go to the movies for high aesthetic pleasure or to experience art; they go for entertainment and spectacle. One studio exec said that they do the I, Robot's to pay for the riskier films they know they'll lose money on. Also, remember that by 2010 there WON'T be affordable CGI for those indie filmmakers if you don't have big budget CGI-fests that sustain the SFX market and innovate new technologies so that the existing ones drop in price. Some of that is just hardware and software, but remember that some of the "big budget" is building tools that other people can then use cheaply. I don't think Sci-Fi is dead, but I do think we see science differently than we did 50 years ago, so Sci-Fi has accordingly lost some of its luster since we no longer think of science as a panacea from which we will have all and only good things. We exchanged Utopias for Dystopias, especially the nuclear variety, in the latter half of the 20th century (even after WWI if you want to go that far back), and who wants to spend all their time looking forward to that?

All four of us are on the GALCOM.Net team registry, and I've been working a little with Omega to get him up to speed. He's got a good rig and is coming along quickly. I've still got to bump him up to L2, but he's absorbing ISS' tactical philosophy quickly and already knows what he needs to know about maneuvering and fighting his ship. When are we practicing next?