**>> SPYNET BULLETIN **>> EARTHDATE 92.06.21 **>> AN H-by-A SERVICE **>> Compiled by Hazed plus a team of specialist newsdroids **>> your news and gossip and get paid good groats! **>> FIGHTING SCHOOL The Practice Session of the Fighting School was held this afternoon - in fact, it has just finished as we type (talk about hot off the presses!). For the event, Bella arranged automatic re-insurance on death, and Hazed gave out groats for people to buy superships and repair after fighting. At first, Hazed foolishly attempted to organise the event, acting as a target and promising not to fire back at newbods. She found it extremely hard to keep her fingers off her tl trigger! After about 5 minutes of anarchy she gave up and let people get on with it. Which they did! It was very hard to keep track of what was going on, there were so many mayday messages being generated... and the SpyNet Report showed so many deaths it wrapped around several times. Krell was probably the most violent of the fighters. She killed at least six, including Hazed (but only because Hazed let her!). Crafty Rezrov used the time to his advantage... when he got bored of killing and maiming his friends, he started teleporting about, checking teleportation addresses - safe in the knowledge that if he ended up somewhere deadly it wouldn't matter! Others went after all the high-paying mobiles, getting as much reward money as they could without risk. Things are back to normal now (what is normality, we hear you ask?) so death does have some meaning. The Fighting School was great fun and we will do it again some time in the future. **>> GENIE HOT SUMMER DAYS Addicted Fed players will no doubt be ecstatic to know that, for a limited period, GEnie is lowering its price for day-time use. From June 15 to September 7, GEnie's prime time hourly connect charge is being reduced from $18.00 per hour to $12.50 per hour (in Canada, the reduction is from $25.00 per hour to $16.00 per hour). So if you want to play Fed during the day, it won't cost you quite as much as before. Note: GEnie*Basic pricing is NOT applicable during prime time hours. Reduced prime time rates are in effect in the United States and Canada only, and apply at speeds up to 2400 bps. For more information about the Hot Summer Days promotion, type EVENTS at any main GEnie menu. **>> FLEE HAS FLED Our Illustrious Leader has a long history of deliberately ruining H-by-A's jokes. Every time we issue a new edition of The Idiot's Guide, she scours it, word-by-word, line-by-line, searching for the places where we make sarcastic comments about her strange ideas. Often these comments were the result of hours of painstaking research and drinking on the part of Hazed and Cryptosporidium. And what does Bella do when she finds an example of our shining wit? Does she admire it, chortling with glee at our cleverness? Does she send us a message applauding our excellence? Does she show it to all her friends? No, she removes the relevant feature from the game, thus rendering our joke obsolete. This time, her target is the command. This command has always been completely useless - it dates back to the days when ship versus ship fighting was going to be far more elaborate, involving high-tech stuff like grappling with tractor beams. Fighting as it exists today was going to be a minor part of combat, called pot-shots. It was put in first, because it was the easy bit, and proved so successful that Bella decided to junk the more extensive ideas. (We think she was too lazy (or incompetent) to do the more complicated parts of the coding, but we'd never say that to her face.) So now it's farewell, command, and goodbye to another of our cracking jokes. She only does it to annoy, because she knows it teases! **>> UNTRUE! Last week we reported that Bochiman had taken out a contract on another player, offering large sums for their dead-deadness, and in response a load of very rich people were after his blood. It really shouldn't come as any surprise that Bochiman has virulently denied that he ever did such a thing! The fact that we received the story from three independent sources means either that there is at least some truth to the story (no smoke without fire), or there is a massive conspiracy of all the other players against Bochiman. We leave you to decide which it is. **>> LEARNING TO TELEPORT Anyone perusing the SpyNet Report over the last few days will have noticed that Rezrov's name appeared in the "Deaths" column with alarming frequency. He's been randomly punching teleport buttons in an attempt to pin-point all the useful locations in the Galaxy, and keeps porting into deadly places. On one occasion he died ten times in as many minutes! Hazed informs us that she had a complete list of Sol teleport addresses, and is willing to take bribes, so long as they are large ones. **>> BARKING MAD We've received the following communication from Niun: "Ever wonder where all those poor people in the Smith and Jones Memorial Ward in the hospital on earth got their injuries? I'm the only one in the game that carries a sword....(exits laughing madly)" Yes, well, keep taking the tablets Niun! **>> NAME THAT PLANET! What should The Vile Cryptosporidium's non-existent planet be called? You've been sending in your ideas, and there are some good ones this week. Krell thinks it should be named Void, because it is non-existent. Jewel has suggested either The Porcelain Goddess or The Porcelain Throne. Nice ideas, but unfortunately a planet name has to be just one word. Hawkwood's idea is Slimewood, which we feel is very appropriate, if a little distasteful. Even more appropriate is this week's best suggestion, from Spongybugman (good grief, with a name like that, it's no wonder he thinks on the same wavelength as Crypto!). His idea is Effluvium. Short and sweet. Well, perhaps not "sweet"... Keep sending in your suggestions, we'll run this for a few more weeks, and then The Vile One himself will award a measley groat or two to the best idea. **>> PROMOTIONS NEWS There's been an influx of new players recently, and they've started climbing the ranks. Over the last few days there have been a lot of new Traders and Adventurers. Most excellent! Talas, Spongybugman and Marvin have all become Adventurers. Well done, all of you. Kimos, Sylvain and Looney all made it to Trader - Looney says he zoomed through the ranks from GroundHog to Trader is just over a day. Plantking has solved the fiendish JP puzzle and will shortly be attempting to scale the dizzy heights of the even more unpleasant GM puzzle. Don't forget to send us details of your promotion, and we will mention you in the news. **>>CONTACTS The following information will appear at the end of every News Bulletin, so you don't have to read it if you already know it. In the event of a problem or question, you can: * talk to Hazed or Bella in the game * leave a message in the game log * a message to Hazed or Bella * send mail with the Federation Feedback option from the main menu You can order a copy of the unexpurgated printed Idiot's Guide to Federation by typing ORDER at any GEnie menu. Cost - a mere $12.95. (New edition will be available shortly!) Federation has several category in the new MPGames RT. To get there, type M1045,1 from any menu prompt and SET category 13 (for information, instructions, questions and answers) or 14 (for general chat and discussions). The Federation Leader in the bulletin board is Krell (Mail ID: K.HILLYER). There are also private categories for Explorers, run by Krell, and for the Conclave run by Oddball (Mail ID: D.STALZLE). The MPGames RT also has a Federation library in the files area, Library 5. Library 18 holds the Federation News Archives. **>> BULLETIN ENDS