**>> SPYNET BULLETIN **>> EARTHDATE 93.04.11 **>> AN H-by-A SERVICE **>> Compiled by Hazed plus a team of specialist newsdroids **>> your news and gossip and get paid good groats! **>> HAPPY EASTER! As is now traditional, the Easter Bunny visited Fed Data Space over the holiday weekend, with a basket full of easter eggs, groats and free Fed time. During Friday and Saturday, he played various games with Fedders, giving away groats as the whim took him. While enjoying a friendly game of hide-n-seek, the Bunny hid in the lobby on Titan - that's the room with three doors that lead to certain death. Noe was lucky enough to find the bunny, but in the excitement she overshot and walked straight through one of those doors! On Sunday, Harvey organised the prize events. First there was a novices treasure hunt, open to Commanders, Captains and Adventurers. Zuflex was the winner, and he gets a free day's play in Fed, on the day of his choice. This was followed by an open treasure hunt, in which any players could take part. The game was divided into three rounds, each round eliminating players until there was an overall winner. Around 10 people entered the treasure hunt. The Easterbunny asked them to search for an item of electrical or technical equipment, and the first four players to return would go through to the next round. There are 7 items of this nature in the Solar System, so the players had plenty to choose from. Maxwell got back first, followed shortly thereafter by Riccardo. There was a long wait before Occy came back with a suitable object, and an even longer one for the fourth, Vaxhacker! These four went on to the next round. The four contestants were asked to bring the bunny a jewel or item of jewelry, with the first two going through to the final. There are three items, one of which is in a very inaccesible place, and one which can only be obtained by people of high intelligence - as Riccardo found to his cost! Once again, Maxwell was back first, followed shortly thereafter by Occy. A tense final between Occy and Maxwell had the two contestants searching the Solar System for the diamond, which the bunny had hidden somewhere. The waiting crowd in Chez Diesel placed bets on the outcome, while the Easter Bunny gave cryptic clues to narrow down the search. Finally, Occy found the hiding place on the surface of the moon, and won the contest! His prize was a free weekend in Fed. The last prize contest was an Easter Bonnet competition. Contestants were asked to buy a set of clothes, and paint their spaceships, in a suitably festive fashion. Harvey then judged their efforts. Honorable mentions must go to Mojo, for his ship description, short and to the point: It's a giant, man-eating Easter Egg! To Bochiman for his clothes: You see a bonnet with visions of the Easterbunny chasing OXCART around CD's as Krell, Freya, and Hazed shout out advice on how to do it correctly! To Tellurian for his lethal-looking ship: Looking like a giant rabbit out of Monty Python, the Fangerdash has nasty big TEEEEEEEETH! And to Famemonger for his very sexy outfit, that got the bunny quite excited! Hot bunny suit, with pink frilly ears, and deep clevage showing, combined with a solid milk choclate tail cut high up the thigh. Expressions of extreme disgust to both Tellurian and Krell for their bad taste in wearing rabbit fur! Harvey was not amused. However, the winner was someone who had matched their clothes and their ship to provide a very effective ensemble: Ryan! He won a free day's play in Fed. His clothes and ship were: You see a giant pink bunny carrying a basket full of multicoloured eggs. He seems to be clucking. He gives you an egg and hops off. You see a giant chocolate egg. In the control booth is a small white rabbit with a basket of eggs. It seems to be clucking at you. Congratulations to eveyone who won! Sadly, the bunny's visits to Fed were marred by a small element of hooligans, who insisted on trying to thrust him into a stewpot whenever he showed his face in Chez Diesel. The poor rabbit was quite, quite traumatised by this treatment. And the affrontery of having an event called KILL THE WABBIT really made him feel very unloved. Hordes of ravenous Fedders chasing him around the Solar System, waving sharp knives and packets of herbs and spices, shooting him over and over again... next year, he says, he is going to send him cousin Roger! **>> ARENA SPACE! Last week we told you about Bella's plans for enhancing the fighting aspect of smuggling by putting in a special Arena Space where real fights with customs ships would take place. Arena space is now in! 69 locations of space, in a 3-dimensional layout, especially for fighting. You can visit Arena Space by using the Interstellar Link to . Arena Space is the home of StarBase1, a roving deathstar rumoured to be Bella's naval base. You can't land on the base, but you can visit it by teleporting or travelling to it - or, of course, by dying in Arena Space! The Spynet Review reports that twelve people have already died in Arena Space. The area is not at all dangerous in itself (unless you try to beat up StarBase1) but Glurg has claimed the space as his own, and enjoys giving people tours of the base, whether they like it or not! Science fiction fans will feel particularly at home on StarBase1, and should definitely visit the Rama Bar. **>> DEMOCRACY IN ACTION! Early last week, the Conclave was abolished and replaced by the Senate. The command now lists the members of the Senate (all the Dukes and Senators) and tells you how many have been on the game in the last ten days. Now if you wish to have a decision upheld you need to convince half of the active members to vote for you. When Bella first put in the new version of the game which contained this code, she was a little shocked to find that the game put EVERY player into the Senate! This rather extreme example of democracy in action was not caused by any political upheaval but simply because she'd ommitted a curly bracket from the code. Of such little things are revolutions born! Once she put this right, she realised that for some reason the Easter Bunny was counted as a member of the Senate, but she decided to leave him there for the duration of the easter frolics. **>> NEW FOR DUKES AND SENATORS At last, anyone building a naval base or any of its equipment can draw commodities from wherever they wish, even if the base is on a planet. The command is . If you leave off the planet, the build will default to the planet where the base is situated. Each of your three projects can draw inputs from a different planet. If you do draw inputs from a planet other than the one housing the base, or if the base is orbital, you will have to pay an extra 15% for the goods you import - shipping charges being what they are. You can now start building all the facilities for your base. Despite what we reported last week, none of the items requires any money, but some of them take a very long time so will have to be left for weekends. Don't forget that if a project isn't completed by the time the game is reset, you lose it! Fed wouldn't be the wonderful place it is now if Bella was perfect. When she put in the last few items you could build, of course she spelled personnel wrong, leaving out one of the Ns. It has been fixed now, you will be relieved to know. Senators can now get their sweaty hands on the filthy lucre in their slush funds, using the obvious command: . puts money into the slush fund. **>> RESCHEDULED RTC The Fed RTC which should have been held today has been rescheduled to next Sunday, to avoid a clash with the easter bunny festivities. That's 3.00 eastern on Sunday April 18, in the MPGames conference area. **>> GANGSTER'S MOLL Last week we reported that Freya has given up earning a living. We can now reveal how she can still afford to drink and throw lavish parties in Chez Diesel, despite having no visible source of income. A secret under-cover investigative droid followed her for several days, and despite her attempts to throw off any trackers, it managed to obtain secret film of her in an intimate clinch with one of Fed Data Space's shadier characters. We are shocked to say that she has become the Godfather's Mistress! We advise all players to be very, very polite to her from now on. **>> GOSSIP AND STUFF Not that we wish to speculate at all about who wears the pants in this marriage, but we've noticed that whenever Glurg does something to upset someone (which, let's face it, is pretty often) they don't shout at Glurg: they run to Jade and whinge at her! We have heard rumours that their marriage is not going swingingly. In fact, it's possible that Jade is getting bored with Glurg. Well, let's face it, would you stay with anyone who called you "snoogie-woogie buns" on an open commlink? Glurg seems determined to kill at least one person of each rank. Although only a lowly Explorer, he has disposed of a Baron (Zippo) and a Duke (Occy). He has his sights set on blowing Senator Hazed away, but for some reason she won't fight. We wonder why? Having decided that anyone entering Arena Space was fair game, Glurg was chasing around after some poor innocent, his TLs blazing, when he got the message: "Your ship is due for an overhaul". Good timing, or what? Mojo has got married! Yes, it's true, Mojo and Swifty were joined in unholy matrimony on Dunnottar recently. Jade officiated. The mind boggles. Particularly as they are both male, and neither of them realised till long after the ceremony! Noe has officialised her divorce from Joyrider, who probably gets the prize for being Fed's most absent husband! She's now looking around for a replacement. Tellurian is keen to offer himself as a candidate, but she prefers to keep her options open for the time being. Hans is becoming a loan shark. He'll lend money to Commanders, Captains and Adventurers, for what he says are good rates of interest. Good for who, we ask? **>> PLANETS AND DUCHIES There's been hardly any change at all to the status of the duchies. Starbase1 is a new Independent world, but since it's extremely difficult to get to the planet it's not much good for trading. Oxcart's planet Jinx is now a leisure world. Early next week, Glurg's planet should be linked to the game. We've built a special "bad taste" droid to go and explore it. Akiko's planet is also rumoured to be ready to go in. Apparently there is unrest in the Duchy of Zippy, as Occy's minions have started a panic about what will happen to them once Occy gets promoted to Senator. We can reassure them that their planets will not self-destruct with the shock; they will simply become Independent worlds, and can then join another duchy if they wish. Unless they are worried that after being allied to Occy, no-one else will want them... **>> SPYNET REVIEW Congratulations to everyone who was promoted during the week. The new Captains are Pepe, Famemonger, Gordarkar, Mazer, Emmi, Sarajane, Abimelech, Thalek, Snakeplissken, Ni and Reverend. Famemonger and Snakeplissken (boy, that's a tough name to type!) went on to become Adventurers; Phiz and Gordarker also gained this rank. Famemonger was later admitted to the Trader's Guild, as were Flamin and Riccardo. Victor, Tellurian and - guess who - Famemonger were all promoted to Merchant. Tellurian and Victor became CEOs of Pentacle Inc and Syntec Inc, respectively. Famemonger obviously decided not to bother with a company straight away! Tellurian became a JourneyPerson. Akiko and Valtras solved the fiendish GM puzzle. Akiko went right on to become an Explorer. Oxcart advanced his planet, and is now a Baron! There were just two deaths during the week: Kurgen and Jammur. RIP, guys. **>> BULLETIN ENDS