Inter-Galactic News

Issue 49, July 1999

Anything for inclusion for future issues of the IGN should be sent direct to me at the following address:
Graham Orford, 2 Horseshoe End, Newbury, Berkshire, RG14 7XE.

Otherwise you can include your articles with your BSE turn cards making sure that they are clearly marked FOR THE ATTENTION OF THE IGN EDITOR.

For a quicker turn-around, and perhaps even a response you can contact me at the following Email address: ign@gorford.screaming.net (yes that's right folks I've changed ISP but the demon account will still be in use for a while longer) or if you want to publicise something straight away to a number of BSE players with Email access you could leave a message on the BSE forum:
uk-bse@pvv.ntnu.no

To subscribe to the BSE Forum, send a message to uk-bse-request@pvv.unit.no with the following text in the body of the message (NOT the header): subscribe

Outer-Comm.

To: All Players
From: Emperor Sarek, The Falconian Empire (#70)

We are in need of new players, to help us strengthen our Empire, in regards to everything. Then who are we. This question have we asked ourselves for the last two years, before we invented the Jump Engines, we thought that our race was the only race in the Galaxy, but with the invention of the Jump Engines two years ago, we encountered a large race of humans and other forms of aliens. Since this first encounter, have we been trying to find out, who we really are, but we have found that its not as simple as we had thought. We are an alien race of avians and we do share traits with birds of Earth, but unlike birds, then do we have a pair of arms, just like Humans have and wings to get us around.
Our Government form is based on a Caste system, the FCN Emperor represent the entire race, where each House only represent varies sub-races of birds, like Eagle, Raven and Vulture, to name a few. These Houses along with the Emperor discuss problems and negotiate with aliens, so to gain access to systems or to help our affiliation members to get what they need. Each House specialise in a single area, so to better help out the Empire, House Falcon is the Production force, House Eagle is the Merchant Force, House Raven is the Military Force and House Vulture is the Naval Force. and together do they try to make our affiliation stronger and safe. (You can actually view us the same way as the Minbari of the Babylon5 series, except that we don't have all the best tech <g>)
What can we then offer you and you us? Unlike most affiliations, then do we not want a lot of loners to join our affiliation, we work for the best of the affiliation, but this does not mean that you cant do anything for yourself, but we will provide you with ships, equipment and further helps for free, in case of new ships or if you need colony equipment for free as well, why is this you say? Because in return, you may produce something in your colony, that you don't need, so you can give this for free to another Falconian player, or you can give some of the stellars you make from trading to some of the FCN politicals, so they can use the stellars to help out the Empire, there is no trading among FCN members. Besides this co-operation part, then will the politicals also provide missions, so that you can try out different parts of the game, so to try out most things or you can request missions from the politicals, who do need help, for varies things, to help out the Empire. (This will be in the same ways as Fallout2 and Role-playing Games)
Our abilities are a more strange part, because unlike most affiliations, then do we have a small number of bad abilities, but with them a lot of good abilities, the most important of these abilities, we have good abilities and we have a few bad ones, to compensate for those we got. I will not come into our abilities here, anyone who joins, will off course be told of how our abilities work and function, but the most important thing to remember is, our race are the carriers of the Alien Plague, which will effect other races badly, you will be told, how to work around them, if you join us. There is many sides to our affiliation and I can assure you, that you will not be wasting your time in the FCN and if you want to know about our abilities, then just write or email me about it and if you want to join, then do the same, before you try to, because we have a restricted access, so the GM needs our acceptance of you to let you join. Reason for this restriction, is to avoid anyone joining us to hurt another affiliation or us, by giving someone else the Alien plague, that we have.

To: All From: Emperor Sarek, The Falconian Empire

Two RIP warships attacked last week a AFT Merchant ship within the Acropolis system, currently it is not know why this attack has happened and contact with the RIP is being done. (If the RIP have any politicals, then please contact me) Since the RIP is allowed the same things within the systems of Acropolis and Storm as any other affiliation is, this am I a bit surprised to hear about such an attack, members of the RIP, you should know that such actions will only mean that you will be denied access to our systems and we will actively be hunting your ships. So too compensate for your attack, we will demand the same of you as we would any other affiliation, and that means a stellar or goods amount, based on EEM ship prices, to go to the AFT and a 10% fine based on this amount to us, any RIP politicals can choose to ignore this, but it will mean that the RIP is no longer welcome into FCN space, which may or may not bother you, I leave this upto you. Any RIP members, can pay to this and if the Payment is done, then will the RIP be allowed back into our systems.

...NEWS...NEWS...NEWS...NEWS...NEWS...NEWS...NEWS...NEWS...

In a surprise development, Cathedral Central announced today that the Sect Leader, the long serving Ludovicus de Fortis, has disappeared. A leaked memo indicates that staff reported him missing mid morning, prior to an official engagement. According to Brotherhood sources, the missing Sect Leader vanished without trace. A headquarters weapons locker was later found to be have been emptied of ammunition. New appointments will doubtless ensure shortly.

...NEWS...NEWS...NEWS...NEWS...NEWS...NEWS...NEWS...NEWS...

To: All
From: Stephan Jaroschek, DTR

So here's that other email I announced earlier. It deals with some general issues in BSE and again this is in part in reply to Ted Pratt's IGN article and some rantings that I was going to write for some time. There's a number of things to be covered here in no particular order.
Ted said that BSE had recently deteriorated into a wargame. I strongly disagree! I know of a large number of plots and scenarios that cover wildly different areas. Some of these things are completely useless to know. To give a few examples, I did a 3000 points research project that revealed what had happened to the original inhabitants of the Venice system, and to know how they all died has absolutely no commercial value. Another DTR player did a number of special actions to find that one particular planet once did possess another moon and even get pretty accurate mass assessments and again find out what happened to that moon, commercial value = nil. The problem seems to be that few people do thought-through special actions. According to Mica many plots are lost because players cannot be bothered to follow them. This is certainly not true for the DTR (again according to Mica) but outside the DTR and two or three other affs people appear to be content to do surface investigations or install ship specials with special actions. Fine, but don't say there is nothing to discover in BSE. You are just not looking hard enough.
As for BSE being a wargame, the new posting/LOM rules have certainly removed the GM-enforced restrictions on combat and made the game far more realistic. It has also removed the need to "play the rules" as it used to be in the past in order to get a decent fight. Today, Nicc Newton and his Rolling Thunder could cause havoc in imperial space, and rightly so - you only deserve to have that what you can defend (to a certain degree). But this overall increase in the possibility of combat occurring also leads to increased political efforts to place oneself in a good and stable position. Blazing guns have become an option now but never will be the best option in diplomacy. On the other side nobody can afford to be on bad terms with everybody else or he will be crushed. I feel this has added to the political dimension of the game. BSE has not changed into a wargame, it was merely enhanced to include elements of a wargame in my opinion.
As Ted has correctly pointed out postal players are at risk to miss a lot in this game. Almost all ongoing discussions and even some official announcements never make it to IGN or SSS; instead they are issued on the forum. Of course lengthy discussions have no place in IGN but I think a lot goes through the forum that should have gone to IGN instead, or at least as well. (Like my DPB article concerning Operation Opportunity - I plainly forgot to mention it was supposed to go into IGN and now it's too late for announcements). I used to play in Quest Game 6 before I joined BSE (as did Thomas and Silvio) and one thing I particularly liked about Quest was that a lot of role-playing occurred. The monthly newsletter appeared regularly and it contained short stories as well as something that is completely missing in BSE: Personal IC communiqués from one character to another or (those we have from time to time) to the general public.
In BSE the players appear to be slightly less creative in this respect, and what is worse is that the UK-BSE forum takes up most of the stuff and it never goes to IGN. This problem is not easy to solve. It would probably best if Graham would place selected forum articles into IGN to make sure everybody has access to the information and opinions circulating here. Perhaps somebody would volunteer as IGN reporter and produce a short summary of the UK-BSE articles for IGN monthly (Graham?). (I would prefer to oversee somebody else being the IGN reporter or it could become biased reporting if only one pair of hands had sole input the article, but I am in favour of the idea [ed]). IGN would then be divided into four parts, two IC and two OOC sections: IC messages, IC market reports, OOC short stories (they can be written IC but only messages can really be IC), and OOC forum summary. I would like to see more messages and short stories here!
Another thing that I loved in Quest but that did not really have an impact in BSE are rumours. Sometimes they are a lot like IC messages in IGN would be but at other times cleverly written rumours can add a lot to the atmosphere of the game. They also are a good way for the GM to insert information into the game - if I was BSE GM I would have issued the jump routes and system numbers for Arachnid and Titan as rumours instead of announcing them in SSS. There are rumours in BSE and some of them are good but what I would like to see is more stuff like that. In Quest KJC have given out free rumour cards to submit rumours, which helped a lot. In BSE, rumours are a special action and thus cost RL money to insert, which goes a long way to keep them unattractive.
Finally, trade. The restructuring of GM markets has made stellars much rarer than in the past, and I think this has added to the trade aspect of the game. But one aspect has completely been removed: Smuggling. You may or may not have read the proposals I wrote during the "future of BSE" debate, and I still think they were better than what Mica actually did later on. As this is basically nothing new I will just give a short summary: Five of the six Interstellar Freighters known to exists belong to the EEM. This means the EEM is the only affiliation that can maintain regular trade relations with the inner empire. Due to this fact the EEM should be able to pay premium prices for all sort of raw materials (ores, drugs, alien pets) and offer finished goods (farms, mines, factories, complex modules) at cheap prices in return. If the EEM really were to sell important finished goods at very cheap prices there is the danger that large affiliations with large freighters would benefit over proportionally from this; on the other hand especially the smaller affiliations and IND's rely on GM markets for a steady supply of certain goods. This is easily solved if only a single item can be bought per transaction. Buying large numbers becomes a pain for large freighters but small affiliations who only require small numbers of the items are much less affected. Suggestion is for EEM colonies in Yank to sell factories 1@3000, mines and farms 2 @ 1500 and complex modules 10@300. Furthermore, certain items are more valuable the farther a colony is away from the place where the ore/substance is produced.
This way traders could make a stellar simply by travelling long distances and the AFT Free Trader would be far more valuable. If the EEM (or another GM run affiliation) were to buy drugs at high prices (>50 Stellars/MU, depending on the exact substance, perhaps 200/MU for Kinshi) it would be an incentive for people to start smuggling again, and for the IMP to hunt down the smugglers. A GM bounty for each smuggler ship destroyed (similar to RIP, but you must prove that the ship was carrying drugs) would make smuggling a rewarding but dangerous task. It would also make ship types such as the Courier and the Pioneer far more interesting. Perhaps the IMP would have to become active as a police force against their own corporations. If the multiple affiliation suggestion is implemented into the game it would be possible to reintroduce the SSL affiliation and get the Courier class production back on line? Just a few general thoughts. Hoping for some feedback.

* Official AFT Announcement *

Following statements of concern by members of the Falconian Empire over apparently contradictory information on the status of Solo, the following statement has been prepared after discussion within the AFT Council.

'In the Solo system (121), every affiliation may apply its own laws within the boundaries of its own ships, colonies, ground parties and outposts. No laws currently apply to the system in general, but the Association of Free Traders (AFT) reserves the right to apply any laws it deems necessary to ensure the safety of AFT assets.'

Please note that each affiliation's laws apply ONLY within the confines of their own positions. Audrey Firesong, AFT Information Master (2308), Secretary of the AFT Council

To: All
From: Blair Watt (CIA PD)

This is in response to Ted Pratt's (FET PD) article in issue #47 of IGN. I will only be dealing with his comments about the CIA as the other affs can state their own cases. The original article has been included for reference [internet ed: this is held in quotes].

Quote'
CONFEDERATE INTELLIGENCE AGENCY:
Set up to be the eyes and ears of the CNF. Some people say that the CIA are the Darkfold equivalent of the FET. I don't agree. FET are a Mega-Corp out to make money, the CIA are a political organisation who aid the CNF in trying to take over the Imperial Throne.'

I think this similarity is used as both affs work in extremely 'grey' areas. On the surface both affs do have some cosmetic similarities but that's all they are - cosmetic. I totally agree with Ted's definition of the two affs different agendas. Our job is to help the CNF put Samuel on the Imperial Throne. If we embark on money making ventures then its merely a means to that end. We will do whatever it takes.

Quote'
With their ability to place agents into colonies without having to actually go to the colony makes these people very dangerous indeed. I can't help wondering why their agents haven't destroyed more IMP assets than they currently have. Used properly this ability could cause havoc with IMP production.'

While you may be wondering about this, all I can say is to ask the IMP colony governors. We run agents routinely but as we mostly limit our activities to IMPerial colonies nobody hears much about it (and the IMP ain't telling). There are also real life constraints on the effectiveness of agents. Yes we can try and blow stuff up in a colony (and frequently do) but its not as effective as Ted seems to imply.
The damage caused is not huge considering it takes 20TU to accomplish and the fact that its random items that get destroyed/damaged limits its usefulness. If you want to be really effective then you have to start thinking about special actions and this is damn expensive and also more prone to complete failure. The limit to also hiring only 1 agent per week at a colony is also another severely limiting factor if your target has an insane security crackdown level (as many IMP colonies do). Entire turns can be wasted this way. If anyone wants to disagree with this argument then lets hear it.

Quote'
Use of the cloaking ability can help get CNF or their own ground forces (special covert forces) onto a planet to attack IMP colonies.'

Again we do make good use of this ability. The fact that we used cloaked ships and ground forces to destroy 150,000MU of IMPerial Outposts and RTS links last year (Operation Freebie) heralded the introduction of Outpost Security Modules. How may other affs have recently had such an effect on the game? That's only one example of the operations we constantly run.

Quote'
The CIA should not be running large warships, that's the CNF's job.'

I have to disagree here. In the past the CNF have suffered several membership crisis and both CIA and BHD have had to fend for themselves. Also it comes down to real money again. The number of ships available is limited to the cash players can afford to spend. By running a modest fleet of large ships we can defend our own assets without having to rely on CNF players being willing to help (though they normally do) and in return we can bolster the overall Confederate naval strength. Its a case of spreading the cost of warships evenly throughout the affiliation. I run a Battleship or two myself but mostly they sit around and do nothing. I expect to have to run them about 5-6 times a year at the most. Every aff should have some ability to defend itself so a modest number of warships, which will probably be based on the number of players in an affiliation, should be expected. Its the proportion of the ships that will differ from aff to aff (i.e. CIA player with 5 ships may have 1 Battleship, 1 Cargo ship and 3 Runners while a CNF player with 5 ships may have 4 Battleships and 1 Cargo ship).

Quote'
No, they should use Runners and the like to land ground parties (see above) to take out enemy outposts, conducting guerrilla warfare whilst the CNF conduct the more conventional sort of war.'

I feel that the CIA do this very successfully (see comments about Operation Freebie above). We have had some stunning success' and the fact that you don't know what we are up to is testament to our success as well.

I feel that the CIA are currently being played exactly to profile and will happily refute anyone who thinks they can prove me wrong on this.

Priority Markets

S.O.	Colony	Sys.	S.S.	Item	Buying	Selling	Price
CLN	CLN Constantinopolis (1265)	25	839	Fissionables		2781	10
				Pulac Crystals	2000		20
CLN	KAS Black Pig (4912)	35	1834	Life Supports	30000		35
				Structural Units	30000		40
CLN	CLN Skypoint (1824)	38	3032	Slug Juice		2000	40
CLN	CLN Sabeltand (1412)	97	2349	Chemicals		1000	30
				Fibrillium	300		300
CLN	CLN Gomorrah (3170)	98	1555	Fissionables	1209		20
				Pulac Crystals	5000		30
CLN	IND High Star (1971)	103	1841	Condensed Metals	4000		12
				Metals/Non-Metals	30000		2
CLN	CLN Lunar Eclipse (4805)	138	2239	Chic Clothing		7000	9
				Structural Units	3000		22
CNF	CIA Serpent's Hold (4341)	4	251	Chemicals	10000		100
				Mines		80	3000
CNF	IND Weregild (2332)	4	2349	Hive Eggs	100		200
				Mines	10		3000
CNF	CIA Shadowland (4748)	4	2349	Colonists	1500		15
CNF	CIA Langley (2301)	17	1636	Fissionables		10000	5
				Untooled Factories		10	5000
CNF	IND Thorn (140)	17	2258	Ambrosia		500	50
CNF	CIA Armoury (179)	17	2456	Waste	2000		30
				Luxury Foodstuffs	6000		8
CNF	BHD Osgiliath (1440)	17	3047	Fissionables		9500	40
CNF	BHD Opacus Custos (3012)	18	2352	Indigon	100		500
				Mines	56		4000
CNF	CIA Entropy (488)	24	2342	Colonists	2000		10
CNF	AFT Return (4313)	41	1850	Heaven Herb		10000	15
FCN	FCN Dark Sun City (586)	162	1148	Luxury Foodstuffs		19300	4
IMP	FET Tortuga (4734)	1	349	Colonists		10000	7
IMP	GTT HQ (467)	1	1440	Colonists		9944	1
				Pulac Crystals		10000	6
IMP	EEM Hypso (4802)	1	1939	Ambrosia	500		50
				Luxury Goods	1000		5
IMP	FET New Kyoto (4297)	1	1939	Luxury Goods		10000	4
IMP	FET Serendipity (3379)	132	357	Euphoria		8000	40
				Medical Supplies		8000	40
IMP	FET Dragonnest (227)	147	2832	Colonists	10000		20
IMP	IND Freedom City (2653)	149	2150	LBCM	1000		600
				Photon Guns	1000@200	1934@360
IMP	GTT Outcasts (1821)	150	1034	Artworks		10000	2
IMP	AFT Eclypse (1124)	150	2232	Photon Guns		719	180
IMP	GTT Xanadu (4810)	158	1146	Ambrosia		800	250
IMP	IMP Sevastopol (4997)	159	2438	Medical Supplies		7324	50
IMP	IMP Leeward (4871)	159	2438	Clothing		4000	5
IMP	FET Port Royal (1571)	160	740	Luxury Foodstuffs		4000	45
IMP	CLN Outreach (1758)	160	740	Pulac Crystals	500		40
IMP	GTT Bannockburn (3411)	160	740	Colonists		30000	5
				Luxury Foodstuffs		30000	5
IMP	DEN Aslan (1665)	163	2856	Stargate Key 163		2	30000
				Teleporters		4	25000
IMP	FET Falconhaven (4806)	165	2259	Colonists	10000		10
				Luxury Goods		1000	20
IMP	GTT Liberty (3240)	165	2936	Korondite	625		80
				Xbureaucrat		80	500
IMP	IND Amity (1831)	166	1745	Metals/Non-Metals		6180	5
IMP	FET New Hope (951)	166	1745	Strion		7527	160
IMP	Heartbreak Ridge (2963)	172	1642	Condensed Metals		500	35
				Metals/Non-Metals		1000	5
IMP	AFT Amythest (282)	173	532	Life Supports		90	20
IMP	IMP Cezta (2625)	173	532	Fissionables		1996	20
IMP	GTT New Christiania (4707)	173	532	Maintenance-Bots	2		10000
				Veterans	10		1000
IMP	GTT Thermopylae (1152)	178	1742	Teleporters	3		26000
				Alien Pets		1500	3
KAS	CIA Sin City (209)	146	631	Veterans	70		500
KAS	SQM Windhooks (2071)	146	1947	Luxury Foodstuffs		5000	4
KAS	EEM Balmoral (4100)	146	2857	Condensed Metals	1000		6
				Untooled Factories	10@8000	5@10000
KAS	CNF Sarajevo (3874)	146	2857	Celesium	100		30
				Crew		100	40
KAS	KAS Rubis (4063)	146	2951	Chemicals	19666		100
				Jacium	9170		300
KAS	GTT New Atlantis (2069)	146	2951	Processed Thorlium	494		150
				Super Conductors		100	180
KAS	AFT New Aurora (4428)	146	2951	Food		1194	3
KAS	FET Alliance Station (604)	146	2951	Jac/Thor Alloy	100		50
KAS	DEN Minotaur (1322)	146	2951	Stargate Key 121		10	30000
				Teleporters		4	25000
KAS	DTR Babylon (2350)	146	2951	Small Arms	1770@10	4122@12
				Veterans	70		400
KAS	DOM Mycenae Sound (3114)	146	2951	Jacium	250		325
KAS	KAS Azreals Peak (789)	171	1433	Life Supports	30000		25
				Structural Units	30000		50
KAS	CIA Atlantis (3315)	171	1433	Colonists	19950		10
				Condensed Metals	5000		15

Space Academy XXII

This months new arrivals to BSE are as follows:

Ship Name	Ship Number	Address
Hula Girl	3535	Alex Vincent, 1 Cranesbill Place, Conniburrow Stantonbury, Milton Keynes, MK14 7DE
Rincarnation	4567	Colin Combes, 56 Holmes Lane, Rustington, Littlehampton, W Sussex, BN16 2PU
Gallileo	3323	John Masson, 118 Maldive Road, Popley, Basingstoke, Hampshire, RG24 9AU.
Fabricati Diem	3298	Andy Berney, 19 Bracken Way, Knutsford, Cheshire, WA16 9BU.
Iscariot	3140	William Spriggs, 7 Mildmay Close, Stratford-Upon-Avon, Warks, CV37 9FR.
Ether Princess	4774	M. S. Durham, 22 Hampton View, Bath, Avon, BA1 6JL.
Wild Rover	201	Chris Lancaster, Marais 15, 2400 Le Locle, Switzerland.
Forlorn Hope	833	Peter Cooke, 3 Norbury Avenue, Marple, Stockport, Cheshire, SK6 6NB.
Caliber II	984	Rory Baxter, 4 Elmslack Lane, Carnforth, LA5 0RX.
Glorious Gumball	2723	Dan Reed, 30 Richmond Road, St. George, Bristol, Avon, BS5 8EJ.
Voodoo Monolith	1030	Scott Crawford, 38 Trevanna Way, Wrexham, LL13 8RR.
Fallen Angel	2064	David Midwood, 131 Rosedale Grove, Hull, N Humberside, HU5 5DA.
The Carol-Anne	320	Dean Syme, 16 Ilkley Road, Riddlesden Keighley, W Yorks, BD20 5PS.

...Late News... Late News... Late News... Late News... Late News...

28/199 DESASTROUS ACCIDENT ON PASSENGER TRANSPORT

Cyprus - Probably the greatest tragedy so far in DTR space faring occurred this week when DTR Frigate Viper suffered a breakdown of their life support systems in orbit over Cyprus. The ship was on regular passenger duty and was carrying almost a thousand colonists and forty crew when the life support system failed. 922 colonists and 38 crew died of suffocation. Investigations revealed that the ship had only installed life support capacity for sixty lifeforms although it was supposed to carry more than a thousand which lead to a random collapse of vital life support functions throughout the ship. The reason why insufficient life supports were mounted remains unclear to this date; it may have been an oversight during the last maintenance or starport overhaul of the ship. The ship's commanding officer, Ensign Anaconda, claims that he had not been informed about any problems with the life supports and believed to have sufficient capacity to fulfil his orders of shipping more than a thousand lifeforms. The crewman responsible for supervising the life support systems, a Kastorian immigrate by the name of Jast, cannot be asked as he died at his post. Rumours of sabotage could not be substantiated. In fact some believe in an underlying plot here because the Viper, although transporting colonists, was registered with the DTR Stellar Armada and not with the DTR Merchant Navy or the DTR Explorer Corps. One possible explanation for this is that Ensign Anaconda is due for promotion to Lieutenant in week 35 and was supposed to take command of a Nebulon class attack cruiser in service with the DTR Stellar Armada soon.
The Magistracy of the Detinus Republic is now reviewing the incident to see if the CO is to be tried for manslaughter, negligence or any other legal offence. Regardless of the outcome our thoughts and mournings are with the families of the victims of this terrible accident.
- DPB, Babylon

...Late News... Late News... Late News... Late News... Late News...