Zane_Marlowe

Also, the website now hosts the graphics files for our sigs. The sigs are named for each wing as follows: Defense Fleet - Defenseloop.gif CIOPS - CIOPSloop.gif ISS Fleet - ISSloop.gif These can be accessed via the images folder from our site on galcom.net by putting the filename at the end of the directory, i.e., for the defense fleet you'd put the following URL in your sig: http://iss.galcom.net/images/Defenseloop.gif

Alright guys, I've sent you each a PM with your account details. I created them myself. I'll need to iron out the site's emailing functions, but for now you can at least login to the site.

Hey guys, we're back online, go to the ISS website and get registered at iss.galcom.net.

On board sir.

Fantastic Four was the first of the comic superheroes created by Marvel Comics, whose other heroes include Spiderman, Captain America, the Hulk, and Daredevil (among others). The FF debuted in '63 (I think) and is basically kind of like what you'd get if you had the Swiss Family Robinson except as super high tech superheroes. Read more here. Oh yeah, and Jessica Alba as Susan Storm is HOT!

Is there any way we can get a notice of service interruption? We're kind of in the dark when the site's down as to what we should expect and when it might come back up. Recently this was a problem for as much as two weeks, and while I don't expect that kind of interval normally, not having information on the downtime was rather difficult to plan around.

Gamespy's giving it excellent marks if you read the review on their site.

Hey you guys, the site's active, so go get registered on it and we can start working on some of our fleet matters there.

Yeah, I'm at work now, but that was on my list of stuff to do. I wanted to make sure I had the right source for these. BTW, what did you think of the logo placement on the ISS homepage? Also, to keep this on track. I haven't heard from Medievh for some time, so I think I'm going to have to flesh out that outline on my own. I'll post when I've made some progress on it.

Good to hear you got some good time away Ben. I like the Defense Fleet Logo by the way. Level certifications for commanders seemed like a good way to differentiate some kind of competency among fully qualified candidates. I agree with your comment on the medals being for outstanding merit, but what if we put some kind of visual rating like a dot or a bar or something like that into their sig graphic? DennyMala suggested something like that with the avatar, which could work too, but since we create the sig graphics and they're standardized for our fleet, this could be a cool option.

quote:Originally posted by Supreme Cmdr: Good idea. Go do it. Hrm, I waited a few days to respond to this one so I could see if I would magically begin to understand what the veterans here know, but apparently I didn't wait long enough since I have had no subsequent epiphany. Rats. In other Fleet Action news, we're going to do some playtesting next Saturday morning at 10am CST for those who are interested in trying out the missions posted on the official website. See the Fleet Action Rules link on the site for the most up to date information on rules, missions, etc., and hopefully we'll see people out there next Saturday morning. Clear Skies!

Alright, there's a few tweaks necessary, but the site's open for business. You should be able to register there normally (requires valid email) and use the forums. If there are forums that need to be there and aren't, then post here, but I covered them with Jamont so I think we have everything covered adequately. Nick and Ben, I'll PM you your admin accounts shortly, but for now I must rest.

Way to go Remo! When I get the PM, I'll work on finishing the site. As I said, shouldn't take long.

See Zwycky's post about reliability here. Currently we're waiting to see if galcom.net comes back online. Honestly I'd be just as happy reinstalling the system on any reliable site we could get our hands on. This would have been done a while ago except that my account and the iss subdomain at galcom.net are both currently unavailable. We finished our graphics discussion, we've reorganized our fleet, and we've been recruiting effectively I think, so this is really the last thing we need before we're ready to work on our documentation needs (fleet charter perhaps, the training course, etc.). If you want to try the fluxgames site again, we can do that if you'd like to PM me an account to use and create a MySQL database I can access there through some means. Galcom.net would be cool, but I agree with Ben that availability is our priority right now.

Yeah, I posted in the Gammulan forum a little while ago to see if there were signs of life. I basically asked, "you guys going to play MP or be involved in fleet rp or anything like that?" They basically said, "We're here, but no, we don't have any plans like that." And that's about where it ended. Lord David has been lurking in quiet frustration about the failure of his fleet to show its teeth. Jaguar is a regular over at the Politics and Religion forums, but I don't think his ambitions include actual gameplay or RP. I've teased them (good naturedly) in a couple posts about being pacifists, but honestly they don't have any active members besides those two I think. Too bad really, they were supposed to be the scourge of the universe. I could imagine all kinds of super-cool martial organization coming from the Gammulan Empire, but I don't know how the guys over there would accomplish this at present.

Okay, someone close this thread quick before another question gets asked and people get confused again!

Hey Omega, what name did you use in your app to the fleet database? I didn't see your name, but you should use the same name on the forums as you use in the fleet db to help us know who you are and keep your records straight.

I was thinking more about those challenge levels (the objective based missions from the second list). What if we had our recruits join as full commanders and they could have a sort of certification based on the level of challenge they had beaten. So let's take our newest recruit Damier. Let's say Damier begins with ISS (and we could do this for any/all of us really) and we play a MP game where we can watch him accomplish a mission from level 5, let's say capturing five cargo pods. He would then be certified commander level 5. He could then do a level 4 mission, and eventually work his way up the ladder to level 1, which would represent our most experienced and well-trained commanders. This would give us a way to have commanders join as full-fledged members of the fleet, who could improve their skills as they had time and interest, but which would also give us a way to show which commanders had demonstrated superior performance in actual gameplay situations. Not doing these missions wouldn't mean someone didn't have that knowledge or wasn't a good commander, but doing them would mean that they were certified by our fleet as having demonstrated excellence and superior readiness. (It strikes me now that we might use our ideas for medals in conjunction with this mission level certification). What do you guys think?

Here is a rough outline of the course Medievh and I were putting together. Kudos to Medievh for coming up with some excellent course objectives and grouping them into a solid outline of six missions as I'd asked. While other fleets may have their training course more like an actual academy, I propose that we simply make our material available from our website and people can educate themselves appropriately. This means that we're fulfilling the training task at the level the student requires, and we could just let people know that we expected them to have these skills. If someone was appearing to be weak in the essentials, we could just point them to this curriculum online and tell them to read up. This kind of plan keeps our academy's administrative overhead light. Anyways, on to the outline. Training Mission 1 HUD Familiarity *Brief explanation of HUD elements *Entering/Exiting craft *Using the S.O.S *Shields *EMD Jamming *Autopilot *Explanation of Computer Systems (Logistics, Tactical, etc.) Training Mission 2 Navigation *Using Hyperjump *Explanation of TACOPS *Using TACOPS effectively *Basics of Planetfall *Using Shuttles Training Mission 3 Weapons Systems *Selecting Missiles *FATAL system *Using turrets *Setting power levels *Cloaking System Training Mission 4 Space Operations *Relocating your AE *Repairs and Readying FC *Launching and using FC *Docking Basics *Space Escorts Training Mission 5 Ground Operations *Using CALS to Land *Explanation of HUD *The DIE *Giving orders to Marines *Coordinated Attacks Training Mission 6 Advanced Training *Coordinated Invasions *Cloaked Hyperjumps *Trading *Advanced Ground Ops If we required assessment, we could perhaps assign commanders one of the following missions that would be successively more difficult and allow them to successfully challenge themselves on more objective oriented (instead of skill oriented) goals. LEVEL 5 MISSIONS *Escort any friendly GalCOM ship for 30 min *Capture 5 cargo pods *Earn enough money to upgrade your shields and hull *Lead a team of FC into Planetfall LEVEL 4 MISSIONS *Take INTEL photos of ALPHA CENTAURI and one other system *Take an overhead screen of a friendly base *Confiscate a Marauder ship from a base and take a screen *Earn enough money to upgrade shields, hull, and reactor LEVEL 3 MISSIONS *Eliminate 6 Insurgent Craft *Earn enough money to upgrade all upgradeable systems *Assault a planetary base using all resources *Earn 2500 experience w/ no violations LEVEL 2 MISSIONS *Assault a planetary base using only FC *Assault a space station using all resources *Take a screen of each type of enemy ship (Stormcarrier, Aestrom, Garid) *Take screens of various hostile base structures *Establish a certain amount of AI for pilots (To Be Determined) LEVEL 1 MISSIONS *Lead a ground ops assault against a base w/ FC for support only *Destroy one of each enemy ship (To be determined) *Take screens of hostile bases at night Anyways, without committing to this, I thought it would be good to get something started, and this work is properly Medievh's, so thanks again to him for getting the material to this point. So what do you guys think?

WAY TO GO ON THE FLEET MOTTO!!! Who thought that up? Have we been just that cool all this time and I've not known it? One note on the sigs though. Other fleets have been using the MP launch station for their base listing in the sig, I was unaware of whether or not there was anything official for GALCOM fleets about this or whether it was managed on a fleet by fleet basis per fleet leader's preference. Also, regarding the website, I have the site still on my computer and if I can have FTP access I can recreate site on Nick's domain if he can supply me with an account and a database to point to. Let me know what you guys would prefer, but as I've said, we have only a few touches to go before we're top flight in the website department.

/rp Four GALCOM men stood fast in a ring of rifles. The cripped Deathstrike's docking bay shuddered with the echo of the ship's deeper wounds, and two of the GALCOM men adjusted their instruments to take in the full measure of that woe. Shingen arrived. Tense and precious moments followed while the GALCOM officer and the pirate surveyed one another. "Shingen, my name is Zane Marlowe," began the GALCOM officer in command stripes, "Your ship is wrecked, and your reactor will go critical in ninety seconds. Your reinforcements have been sent packing by a non-aligned merc, and you must now decide the fate of your crew. "My proposition is this: we'll beam your crew off this deathtrap and set you down in a non-GALCOM region of your choosing. In exchange, we want information related to recent thefts from GALCOM. Whether or not you did it, we think you know something of value and we're ready to pull your bacon out of the fire here to make sure that knowledge doesn't perish with you. Now if you're wondering what guarantee you have of our promise? None we could prove in the margin of this moment, and certainly none you'd believe beyond doubt, but what I can guarantee is that your odds are better with us than with a million-degree-and-rising reactor." The commander checked his watch, "you have forty seconds to decide Shingen, make them count because we're beaming out of here at T minus five which is the last moment possible to execute the hyperspace jump that will save your life." The newcomers presence had not gone unnoticed by Saratoga's command crew, and within moments of the Vampire Warmonger and Galaxius' entrance to the system, Saratoga's cloak was reestablished. GALCOM's most advanced sensor equipment picked every detail from the surrounding space. Hyperdrive vectors were pre-cached, the jump engines warmed almost sympathetically with the rising temperature of the Deathstrike's critical reactor, and Saratoga's weapons were ready to sing with a fire of their own. Four fighter craft circled the region, dangerously close to the critical distance inside of which a reactor explosion would cause inescapably fatal harm. Galaxius' shuttles stood by for rescue evac, while their mothership licked her wounds after the furious battle with the reinforcing raiders. The whole region held its breath in the last moments before the storm let loose by the Deathstrike's critical reactor. /rp For what it's worth, there is somewhere this is going that's not self-glorifying, so if people will allow, it would be nice not to have a "miracle" turns of fortune that render the picture drawn by the previous descriptions of engagement and damage completely irrelevant to present ship and crew capacities. Also, I SERIOUSLY hope no one decides to post rp with my ship doing anything I haven't described it as having already done.

I've been working on a training course with Medievh. Currently our plan was to have a six mission curriculum, with the first and last missions being assessment missions carried out in MP, and the middle four missions being self-paced and available on our website. Medievh, if you're out there, sound off on your progress since we haven't talked about this for about a week or so and we need to finish this project up. It would be good if you could post the outline we worked out in this thread for others to evaluate. By the way, I mentioned we'd been working on this before in the Fleet Status thread in case anyone was looking.

You know I'm here.

For simplicity's sake, I've reapplied to ISS, and I'll await the appropriate approvals and adjustments to the fleet db before adjusting my sig. Thanks for the kind words, I'm glad to be back onboard. Let me know when my ftp account is available so I can finish the website, we need a couple adjustments before I can finish this up, but it's not going to take long (an evening maybe?). I'll address the remaining development issues in the iss website thread and we can go from there.

References to "Fleet" features on the Fleet Action site have been changed to read "Fleet Action" where appropriate. The Fleet Guide referenced above now reads "Fleet Action Rules" for simplicity and to bring Fleet Action into line with the above guidelines. In the future, it would be nice to have rules referenced in a post or FAQ section somewhere rather than referring to long-established understandings among veterans here.