**>> SPYNET BULLETIN **>> EARTHDATE 94.06.05 **>> AN H-by-A SERVICE **>> Compiled by Hazed plus a team of specialist newsdroids **>> your news and gossip and get paid good groats! **>> INTRODUCING OUR PARTY HOSTS Last week we mentioned that we would soon be appointing some Party Hosts to make fun things happen in Fed DataSpace. They are now in place, and ready to do their stuff! You already know the personas involved, they have been a big part of Fed's social life for a while. They are Emmi, Tellurian and Tellurain. They now have an official role in the game, with a brief to help new players, answer questions, and - most importantly - throw lots of wild parties! One thing you should be aware of: it may not always be same people behind the personas, so you might not want to rush up to one of them and start a personal and private conversation without verifying who it really is that day! Likewise, personal sendmail might not be read by the person you intended it for, so it's probably best not to send sendmail to these personas unless it is game related. We'd like to welcome Emmi, Tellurian and Tellurain to their new roles, and we hope all our players find it a benefit having them around. **>> COMING SOON - A FREE WEEKEND! Last week, we vaguely talked about the possibility of a free weekend. Now we can confirm that some time during June we will be holding one of our very popular free weekends, to give new players a chance to try the game for free. Last time we had a free weekend we managed to keep all the planets in the game by having some in on one day and some on another. This worked very well, giving you all something to do but still leaving enough room for lots of new players, so we'll be doing that again. All mini-planets (mining and above) will be in the game for the Friday and Saturday of the free weekend, and then all full (agricultural) worlds will be in for Sunday and Monday morning. This means that if any new players make it to Adventurer during the weekend, they will have somewhere exciting to explore. As usual, we won't be telling you exactly when the free weekend will be until it actually happens, but look out for some cryptic messages on the bar board a few days beforehand. **>> BELLA GOES AWAY Poor hardworking newsdroids like us never get a holiday. Just because we are machines, people think they can work us constantly without ever letting us have a rest or a break. They don't realise that we have feelings too, that we suffer from mental stress as well as physical defects if pushed too hard, and that we enjoy sunbathing in skimpy little bikinis while sipping exotic cocktails next to swimming pools. It's alright for Bella. She can decide to go away whenever she likes. But no-one ever thinks about us. Bella will be away for two weeks from Thursday June 16 until the end of the month. While she is away, Hazed's capable hands will guide the rudder of the Fed ship. The only thing that Hazed won't be able to do is link new planets into the game. So, if anyone is working on a planet, they will have to finish it up before Bella goes away, or wait until she gets back to have it linked. **>> WARNING - SANDWICHES CAN DAMAGE YOUR HEALTH! We all know that Emmi's cooking is lethal. If you have explored the UnCon planet (courtesy of Tantras, who has converted his world Vertigo into a mini-celebration of that depraved weekend) you will have come across the sandwich, and may have taken a bite out of it only to regret it as the poisons race through your system bringing certain death. But not only can this sandwich damage your health... it can damage your persona too, as one poor Poor Person found! For some reason, the victim took the sandwich back to his ship to eat it. Perhaps he wasn't aware of its poisonous nature, and wanted to keep other greedy Fedders from stealing his food. Maybe he just wanted to die in peace. Whatever the reason, the result was very unexpected. As he ate the sandwich and died, the game transported him to the hospital... and took his ship with him! He was both in his ship AND on the planet at the same time, and the game didn't know what to do with him. This has happened before on player-planets, when there are movement table errors, and the usual cure is to suicide so the game knows where you are. But this poor Poor Person had just died once, and had no way of reaching the insurance office, and didn't want to go dead-dead. It was left to Bella to organise a rescue mission, and this she will do at the next reset. But until she has the chance to change the code to make sure this doesn't happen again, everyone please be warned: DON'T EAT POISONOUS SANDWICHES IN YOUR SHIPS! **>> NEW PLANET TOUR PROGRAM Plantking has uploaded another version of his offline planet tour program. This lets you explore the worlds of Canna, Gotham, Roissy, Athens, Nemesis and now Fortymile. It's file #4118 in the MPGames library on page 1045. **>> DEAD, AND DEAD AGAIN! "To lose one parent, Mr. Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness." from The Importance of Being Ernest by Oscar Wilde I am sure the same could be applied to going dead-dead. Doing it once may be regarded as a misfortune; doing it again in the same week is definitely carelessness!! Sukotto certainly has sore legs at the moment, because he's been kicking himself so much. Still, he must have achieved some kind of record. He was promoted to Explorer, then went dead-dead, got back up to Explorer, died again, and is currently running around as a Merchant. All in the space of a week! We think he needs a bumper-sticker -*inside*- his ship reminding him to insure. Speaking of dead-death, the Vile Cryptosporidium showed up on the SpyNet Review as having snuffed it during the week. Rumours were rife about how and why the amorphous blob had met its end. Top of the list was that Galauriel had hit it with a bratwurst-encrusted frying pan. The poor woman has the Vile one as a house-guest at the moment, so one cannot blame her for wishing to dispose of it in any way possible. Someone suggested a fit of depression brought on by PMS resulted in suicide. There were even rumours that it choked on a peeled grape! But we can reveal, exclusively, that the reason Cryptosporidium went dead- dead was just to annoy everyone. **>> GOSSIP, SCANDAL AND LIES A dripping wet Sean staggered into the H-by-A office earlier today, gasping out a horrifying story of passion turned to pain, love that almost became murder. Emmi, he said, had tried to drown him! She'd pushed him into the sea on Oac (and a cold, wild sea it is) and held his head under the water. He'd managed to struggle free and had fled straight to us to tell his story. Not to the police, no, he came straight to the press without even stopping to towel himself dry. The carpet here still has large damp spots, and the headline-writing droid will never be the same again after Sean shook himself like a dog and sprayed the poor droid with salty water. We asked Sean what on earth (or on Oac) had possessed Emmi to try to bump off the man who had previously been so close to her. Sean said that she is uncontrollable and wicked and she did it for spite. We tried to contact Emmi to ask her if she had any reason other than spite, but she didn't seem to be available. Maybe she enjoyed killing people with her cooking so much on Vertigo that she decided to branch out! In other news: Talisan complained to us that someone is trying to assassinate her love life. Every time a man gets close to her, the would-be suitor gets a threatening letter saying, in effect, "touch her and you go dead-dead!". The origin of the threats? That loveable, playful, cuddly little chap, Tellurain. Alucard was one of those on the receiving end of the promise of mayhem, and he was so upset that he was reduced to tears. But he soon recovered his aplomb, and posted a plea on the barboard: SMV seeks same for debauchery, hedonism and games-playing. We like the sound of the debauchery and hedonism, but are not so sure about the games... where does snakes and ladders fit into all this? Meanwhile, was it he that was steaming up Fed DataSpace with Dierdre last night? Obviously he wasn't that serious about Talisan after all. Paladin has been up to his old tricks, complaining bitterly that he never gets mentioned in the news, yet doing absolutely nothing that's worth writing about! He was even reduced to pleading with our beloved Editrix, Hazed, that she make something up about him so he could see his name in lights. But she refused, informing him that her high journalistic standards would not be compromised, and she would never stoop to putting untruths in the news just to titillate the readers. No, she leaves that to the newsdroids! **>> PLANETS AND DUCHIES There's been a few changes since last week's round-up, as planets that were out come back, and those that were in spin out. Plantking's Canna is left planet-less because Jinx has gone missing. Looney's Insanity has lost Surf, but gained Mycenae with the return of Amigan. Ulster has spun out, leaving Marcia's Roissy with one less world. Ramius's Ausland has one more planet due to Fletcher's return to Fed DataSpace, bringing the lost Pagrah with him. There's no change to Nightstalker's Nightfall. Barberousse's Source shows the biggest difference, because Addis, Bree and Skan have all returned. Skan, with the planet Shelter, is owned by Talisan, and although it's not a new planet, it hasn't really seen the light of day until recently. Just after the planet was linked in, Talisan had to go away, so she took it offline again for the duration. Now it's back, and we sent a newsdroid to explore it. Here is its report. Arriving at the Shelter orbit/link, we were greeted by a cheery message from the surface inviting us to visit. But before we landed, we were distracted by a strange trail of sparkling dust that led away through space. We followed the gleaming path for a while, but were set upon by a fierce space bird, so decided discretion was the better part of valour and hurried back to the safety of the planet. Disembarking, we found ourselves on Main Street, where facilities in the form of a wooden rail allowed us to fasten our ships against possible thieves. Everything here was dry and arrid, the hot sun beat down upon our metal heads threatening to fry our circuits, and the dust crept into every joint and crevice of our mechanisms. We sensed that this was not a planet that would be kind to newsdroids! We took refuge in the Nine Of Cups Bar, where Faust the bartender served us a refreshing drink. This is a pleasant bar, with an enchanting chaunteuse singing the blues for entertainment, and rooms upstairs for those that wish to stay the night. As is the norm, the landing pad is surrounded by the essential services. Surprisingly, the trading exchange doubles as a casino. Obviously, the locals take every opportunity to separate you from your groats! Lulu's Lingerie sells both lacy crinolines and tough levi jeans - these seem to make up the national dress. The hospital is a bit worrying - the doctor looks like he's more at home treating horses than humans! Insurance is upstairs, presided over by a man far more interested in playing computer games than in serving customers. Heading south out of town, the dust gets worse, and this newsdroid developed a severe allergy to the horse we were forced to ride. We stopped outside the Shelter Vineyards, but weren't allowed in, more's the pity. Following the paths across the prairie, we found ourselves at Talimaka, the ranch where Talisan lives. A beautiful property, with a sweeping lawn (in this climate, surely the height of ostentation), we were delighted to find an oasis of civilization on the otherwise barren Wild West planet. The most interesting part of the ranch was the studio we found upstairs, where beautiful paintings were displayed, some still works in progress. A solarium filled with exotic plants allowed us to rest and admire the view over the plains. There are more paintings in the library and the bedroom, and here we came to grief... in trying to pick up a painting (purely to examine it more closely, you understand!) we fell foul of the ranch's security system and were smothered by a voracious bed. Shelter is well written and fun to explore. Talisan is offering 40 meg to the first person under the rank of Duke to solve the puzzle on the planet. Even if you're not a puzzle-solver, you'll enjoy looking around Shelter. Well done Talisan for writing an excellent planet. **>> SPYNET REPORT The following people made Captain during the week: Blaize, Dierdre, Jainzar, Sukotto (twice), Mandragon, Tan and Jonharmon. Craig, Blaize, Shadowdemon, Sukotto (twice), Jainzar, Djmayhem and Dierdre were all promoted to Adventurer. The Traders Guild opened its doors to admit Dylan, Dierdre, Sukotto (twice) and Shadowdemon. Shauna, Sukotto, Dierdre and Widowmaker made it to Merchant. Sukotto was promoted to Explorer - twice! Rai advanced his planet and got promoted to Industrialist then Technocrat. Fed DataSpace mourns Explorer Patch, Merchant Samantha, Adventureuse Oisine, Explorer Sukotto, and Trader Sukotto, who all died dead-dead. Sukotto has returned, but we don't think any of the others have. Finally, Paladin and Budwarp both played 1000 games, while Elex played 3000 games!! **>> 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, Bella, Emmi, Tellurian or Tellurain in the game * a message to Hazed * send GEnie mail with the Mail about Federation option from the main menu A front-end terminal program is available for Federation, for the PC and Amiga. You can download a copy of FedTerm from the Federation official libraries (option 3 on the main Fed page). The third edition of the unexpurgated printed Idiot's Guide to Federation is now available, price $15.95. Type ORDER from any GEnie main menu and buy one. Or more! Federation has several categories in the 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 Oxcart (Mail ID: J.LONG29). There are also private categories for Explorers and the Sentate, run by Krell (Mail ID: K.HILLYER). The MPGames RT has a Federation player library in the files area, Lib 5. **>> BULLETIN ENDS