Issue #31
Monday, August 22nd, 2005Quiet Throughout the Universe
After an extraordinaryly quiet week, a Tribune reporter went ballistic on fellow reporters; wounding three before laughing hysterically and running through a nearby door. Unfortunately, the hallway hadn’t been fully repaired yet after last week’s attacks and the poor deluded individual found himself hurled into space. Witnesses to the episode had noticed the employee becoming extremely jumpy lately. After the busy weeks of action involving Red Cell & Co, and QI, the reporter just didn’t know what to do with himself when no real action was happening. The station psychologist hypothesizes that the individual wanted action so badly that he was willing to create some himself. So with that, he overpowered an unsuspecting guard, wrestled away a weapon, and began firing. Fortunately, no innocents were killed.
[Editor: Mandatory psychology sessions are being held for all employees on the reporters’ floor. Any who miss these sessions will be hunted down, shot, and killed… errr, will be asked to take vacation (and will be docked accordingly]
Blocking the Dragons
Well, after a short hiatus, Ultimate seems to be back in action. His return was marked by the building of several military outposts blocking the dragon dens in Essaa and Lalande. Unlike Gorath’s outpost blocking the den, Ultimate had started with a toll of 5k credits to get in and out of the dragon dens. PurplePanzer of FTS decided that MO’s charging tolls in Fed space were against policy and destroyed the Essaa outpost. Ultimate was not exactly pleased with this action and has implied that FTS will pay for the actions of PurplePanzer.
As to the outpost in Lalande, the public has begun taking general bets as to how long the outpost will last. Much the same was said of Gorath’s outpost before Gorath ran himself into the sun. Gorath’s outpost was never taken down. It will be interesting to see whether or not Ulti’s outpost will run the same game.
Letters to the Editor:
Dear Editor:
I’d like to express my absolute disgust over the new taxation feature introduced into the alliance. I’m a member of a large alliance where I’ve been able to skirt by having to pay alliance dues just by laying low and private message requests to pay dues. (Huh – I wonder what THIS button does….oops, I accidentally deleted a message…) I do just enough for the alliance to keep me from getting booted while still getting protection from pirates and have been making a TON of money. However, the credits are mine! Now, alliances come along and begin TAXING me? I mean, seriously, without owning a starbase, how am I supposed to sneak through not paying taxes?
I guess I’ll have to start purchasing large amounts of droids and storing them to hide my assets. I mean SERIOUSLY, you’re making me go through entirely too much work in order to evade paying dues. You can take your taxes and shove them out the airlock for all I care.
Well – I’m off to purchase some droids. And your taxes STINK!!
[Editor: Note that the Tribune had absolutely nothing to do with the introduction or implementation of alliance taxes]
Trans-Dimensional Exploration (by Kirkus Maximus)
Scientists working in a top secret research station located deep in the winding corridors of the neutral zone have developed a prototype trans-dimensional gate to a realm known only as “realspace.” As the ethereal portal finally stabilized, an expeditionary force was mustered from the station’s high-tech defensive force. Knowing that this will be a perilous and ultra-high risk mission, the stations directors created a “crack” team from the station’s roster. The leader of the team was Gus Kavenstrom, who was well known as the station’s practical joker after leaving the head of a dead space maggot in the director’s bed. Also recruited was Tony Dexter, who was reported to have continually missed the washroom’s urine eliminator and Janice Smith, the telephone sanitizer.
Once the ships were prepped and ready, the small task force made the jump into realspace. Once across, they cut the engines. But much to their surprise, the ships continued to move. Thinking quickly, they turned on the braking thrusters. Cleary, this place has a completely different set of physical laws. Everyone knows that if you turn off the engines in Pardus-space, you stop moving. The confusion barely settled when one of the fighters spontaneously exploded, heavily damaging the rest of the fleet. Apparently the positron armor collapsed under the strain of hydrogen atoms. Who would have guessed that in this realm, matter would react with antimatter? The confusion only compounded when the first astronomical readings came in. The astrophysicists were aghast to see that the planets circled stars instead of floating in the middle of nowhere! They were even more shocked to see that vital resources such as asteroid, nebula and energy fields were quite rare. No development could be possible in such a barren environment. Truly disappointed in the results of the excursion, they turned back to the gate only to find a native spacecraft. Purely out of reflex, one of the fighters fired a volley from the dreaded viral gland. Much to pilot’s surprise, the craft was unaffected. The viral gland did nothing against the inanimate, un-living metal of the spacecraft. In Pardus-space, even the most robust and durable ship would at the VERY LEAST contract a terrible case of the sniffles. Now in a panic, the few remaining ships made top speed for the gate. They barely noticed that the lower mass ships accelerated faster then the heavier ships. Later analysis would prove to give one of the first realspace equations Force= mass*acceleration.
Finally, the task force warped back to Pardus-space. Reporting their measly findings to the station director, the survivors of the excursion applied for some badly needed R&R. Janice, however, was badly needed to counter a terrible outbreak caused by poor telephone hygiene in her absence.
Resume Posting Service
Former Starbase Operations director looking for new position. Experience includes:
- Handling operations in small to medium size starbases including but not limited to supervising logistics, security, maintenance, and expansion
- Large scale station disaster management
- Large scale fleet tactics against local space creatures
- Large scale search and rescue operations
- Large scale triage management
- Large scale body removal management
- Large scale legal management control
- Minimal understanding of space creature psychology
Ideal location would be a small starbase in a remote part of the universe. Please send notice of interest via the Tribune.
The Duel (by Tightwad)
Recently all of Pardus gathered to witness the epic duel between Dipstick, of Quinto Imperio; and Hastur, of Technocracy.
The reasons for the duel are multiple, and complex. Parts of it go months back to a disagreement between the pilots involved. Recently this disagreement was bolstered by what Dipstick referred to as a “backstabbing” by Technocracy.
Regardless of the reasons, a duel was arraigned as the best way to settle the disputes. The rules were simple; No repairs, No surrender, No raids. Fight to the death, last man flying wins.
As the moment approached, the crowd anticipated a good match. The pilots were in the same type of ship, with complementing weapons. Dipstick entered the battle having a slight advantage in using EM weapons VS. Organic Armor, giving him a 25% bonus in damage. Hastur had the advantage of firing 11 shots per round VS only 8 for Dipstick.
Skills were said to be close as well. Only 3.75 skill difference average. Bets were discussed over how many attacks it would take for the unfortunate pilot to meet his fate.
After much waiting and anticipating, the battle commenced. Hastur was chosen to attack first, and so he did. After 20 combat rounds, the maximum allowed by Interplanetary Law in a single combat cycle, it was plain to see that even the bravery of Dipstick may not prevail over the superior skills of Hastur.
With ship mass out of the way, and armor/hull strength being the same, this was truly an even match-up. In those first 20 rounds, Hastur showed that he could hit about 20% more accurately than Dipstick. In addition, Dipstick seemed to have a weapons malfunction that prevent 1 of his guns from hitting at all!
After the initial 20 rounds, it was Dipsticks turn to become the attacker. He also led with the maximum 20 round battle, and by the end it was plain to see he was outmatched. Only 25 of his original 135 armor points remain, while Hastur was still in fairly good shape. Dipstick, being true to his agreement, allowed Hastur to finish him in another 10 rounds. Good thing someone suggested checking Escape Pods, Dipstick had just replaced his due to a malfunction prior to the Duel.
Dipstick was a gallant loser, and admitted defeat to all who were listening. He has expressed his intentions to sell his fighter for a Trade Ship. We all wish him well in future endeavors, and hope to see more pilots who are Men/Women of their words.
For those interested in the battle stats, here they are:
Hastur hit 9.04% of his shots. He fired a total of 542 shots in 50 rounds of combat. One gun hit an amazing 12.24% of it’s shots.
Dipstick hit 6.89% of hit shots. He fired 392 shots in 49 Combat rounds. He was unfortunate enough to have one gun only hit 2% of it’s shots. His weapons were quite damaged, but didn’t seem adversely affected for it.
PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT
The time is coming. It’s coming soon. Pathetic weaklings around the universe fail to hear the call for strength. Fail to hear the call that life isn’t worth giving up for another day of ‘security’. The time will come in the not too distant future when they will no longer have that choice. Live life to the fullest or die.
Be prepared citizens – be prepared. That time is closing in.