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Well as you might notice, this report is mostly about the outcome of 2 related competitions. But don't fear, the next round of the ViB is right around the corner AND we got 3 more running and starting competitions for you to join in on. On with the report!

1.
Second Flying Round of the Vanguard interactive Competition has ended in a surprice victory for.... The Vanguard;).
MAJ Strahd won an IS-SW for the HS (28) 8209 and LCM Johann Glorick a IS-BW for coming in second with (21) 7748. LCM Johann Glorick also won a IS-SR for sending in the best mission report (which is at the end of this report as the next chapter in the story). Johann Glorick's mission report was complete, recognizable to anyone who has flown the mission, well written and exciting. I'm re-reading Zahn's Thrawn trilogy at the moment - and Johann's story was far better! LCM Argos Staneth got the IS-BR for coming in second. Argos mission report was adventurous, complete and funny too, I especially appreciate how he placed himself in his roster-designated craft/squadron rather then the player-craft and still made the mission recognizable. For their tremendous help in creating, debugging and testing the XWA mission for the ViBcompetition and their continued support for the next missions (which are in process). CM Blair Vallyn and MAJ Prophet have been rewarded Merit medals.

Pilot scores:
MAJ Strahd (28) 7884+325=8209
LCM Johann Glorick (21) 7323+425=7748 [echo]
LCM Da'Ger (19) 6245+325=6570 [echo]
LCM Staneth (16) 5158+325=5483 [wasp]
MAJ Prophet (14) 4465+0=4465 [wasp]
(VA mBind (39) 4241+0=4241*)
CM Blair Vallyn (18) 3782+375=4157 [echo]
CM Bevel Leeson (11) 3386+0=3386 [mantis]
LT Spawn (9) 1621+275=1896 [echo]
CM Ekim (12) 1082+325=1407 [scorpion]
LT Kuja (0) 461+325=786 [mantis]
LT Xanthos (0) 0+0=0 [scorpion]

And to gve you an idea  on how the Competition around TC-XWA#1 could turn out: here are some stats on the Squadrons:
(mission to fiction kill factor: 63/148=0,425675675675675675675675675675676)
ECHOSQD: 9+8+4+7=28 Kills
WASPSQD: 7+6=13 Kills
MANTISSQD: 5 Kills
PYTHONSQD: 0 (CMDR on leave at start)
HORNETSQD: 0 (opened in last week)
SCORPIONSQ: 5 Kills
FLAGSTAFF: 12(+16=28)* Kills

2.
The Vanguard newspaper with more details on the ViB battle will be out tonight for ASF Staff and Vanguard Crew too. The connected competition for articles has been won by LCM Glorick as well, for his article on Imp storm. Glorick's article on Imperial storm, including graphics was the most complete and suitable of all those published. Very nice work Johann!LCM Da'Ger won the IS-BR for his article on the Vanguard Officer's Mess. Da'Gers article for the newspaper was funny and very suitable for the newspaper. Great writing there as well! (and now go clean that mess up;) ) All entries should be receiving a LoA too, the moment this edittion appears in the next EH Newsletter. The paper ofcourse has a lot more, even an interview with one of the pilots who flew at the battle over the plumbing station.

Connected to this we are starting a new competition, just like the last one, for the next edittion of "the Vanguard":
Starting Date: 14/08/2001
Ending Date: 10/09/2001
Parties Involved: All crew members of the ISD Vanguard
Site: http://www.gimmie.tudelft.nl/homes/blok10b/ender/vanguard/vib/news/
Contact Names: VA Ender mBind, CM Bevel Leeson (a.c.w.t.zwegers@bk.tudelft.nl, skinner@matavnet.hu)
Info: "Crew members are encouraged to write articles for the Vanguard Newspaper. Best articles get rewarded an IS-SR, runner up IS-BR.
Articles can be anything, from Interviews, horoscopes, cartoons to short sports articles about your squad winning the bowling contest. Graphics like Adds or
Photographs of "News Events" are fine too ofcourse - Anything that makes a newspaper a newspaper.
Participants are to keep in mind that this is a FICTIONAL, Black and White tabloid sized newspaper based in the Star Wars Universe. Also, text fills these pages up
pretty fast. Your articles don't need to be very long, check the earlier editions for examples. Participants are allowed to enter articles as many times as they want.
Articles will be judged by the COM and the Chief Editor. All usable articles will be used in the paper. (though with large participation we might keep some on file for
next issues.) Mail all articles to CM Leeson (Chief Editor), cc VA mBind"

3.
I'd like to announce that LCM Glorick of Echo is Commodore's Protector July 2001. 15 battles, 2 missions, 3 IWATS Courses and 12 LoCs in just the last month alone make LCM Johann Glorick very well qualified. But besides that he's been very active on other fronts as well, making sites and uniforms and participating (and as you'll have noticed often winning) in all competitions. This Super Active and still very nice and modest pilot is just what I was looking for in my Personal Bodyguard of this month. Congrats!

You can view the Hall of Fame of Vanguard COM's Protectors at http://www.gimmie.tudelft.nl/homes/blok10b/ender/vanguard/com/comprotector.html

4.
The #Vanguard Officer's Mess crew has been re-inforced by our new bot, TC-14 who'll gladly serve you anything from a Cola to sexy Ensigns;) Thank you very much, CM Leeson for geting the bot running. If you want to know more about our Officer's Mess AND our bot, I suggest you check out our Channel's pages. You can reach it via our site. Here you can not only review our Code of Conduct, but also the pricelist of the drinks and snacks, post funny quotes or logs of chats and rad through the data of our Bar Personel.

5.
Major Strahd has a new wing comp and it is starting today, it involves flying TC-XWA #1. You will all have till aug 31st. IS-SW for top scoree and IS-BW for runner up. Also, there will be a fiction comp on this mission as well. Please send all pilot files to Strahdf for he will be using the BSF form to get scores. Also, there are squadron nicks and mottos at stake. The best averaging squadron gets to name the lowest scoring one. The command staff (Strahd, Ender and Cyric) will count as a group as well. If we (the command staff) get a better average than the entire wing...we get to rename your mottos and nicks, just to make things interesting :)
(and since Strahd won the ViB flying....)
 
6.
To test the submission form and database for the upcoming Vanguard Combat Night, we'll be having an impromptu MP competition in #Vanguard from the end of the TC meeting till tomorrow morning. No LoCs to be won, or IS-wing-things, but for helping us test our php, the pilot who enters the most wins will be rewarded an PC, the runner up a ISM. This is not really for your flying efforts, but more for your help ofcourse, but regular rules will be in effect. Please fly as much as you can - and report anything that's unclear or buggy to me or CM Leeson.
 

Fleet News:

General TC News:
- "Why isnt the TAC doing ...." The TAC's Network connection is being annoying. All your emails ARE being read, but until my connection is stabilized i will be at a diminished capacity. Needless to say, Network Administration have a nice stack of complaints in their email boxes, and i hope to have this sorted ASAP.
- Fleet Commander's Note: Without the need to name a replacement and since SOD has not served a useful function in a couple of years, the Fleet Commander (GA Ronin) herein dissolves the Position from the Command Staff.
- Admiral Slade, Security Officer - Recommendation for Fleet Admiral - (Last rank promotion: 2/8/01 [6 months]) - Slade has served the fleet in a large variety of ways, since his last promotion, he has helped out with the Newsletter graphics and, after every month, even after leaving the position of CA:XO, he has volunteered to make our wonderful newsletter covers. After taking over in the Fringe, which was one of our deadest single-digit-membership subgroups in the club, him and DCGM Kadath rebuilt the foundation that allowed it to grow into success it is today. Kadath was awarded the GOE, but Slade has never been properly awarded for all his work. In the Security Office, he quickly took care of the large backlog of pending cases within his first few days and created the "Imperial Security Bureau" which has quietly proven their usefulness since its creation.
- Admiral Keiran Idanian, Reconnaissance Officer - Recommendation for Fleet Admiral - (Last rank promotion: 5/8/00 [1 year, 3 months]) - For someone in a stereotyped "do-nothing" position, he has managed to do a lot. He has made several efforts (sometimes successful ones) to get the EH recognized by outside [official] groups and interviews with people who create the Star Wars universe. He has helped organize competitions against other clubs for the COO, assisted with the EH Newsletter, and diligently reports in every week (moreso than most other COs) with painstakingly long details of status updates and SW news tidbits. The range of duties doesn't give much for Recon Office personnel to do, but Keiran has been creative in finding ways to keep busy.
- Vice Admiral Figaro, Infiltrator Wing Commander - Recommendation for Admiral - (Last rank promotion: 5/26/01 [2 1/2 months]) - In the amount of time he has served as IWCOM, he has proven himself to be promoted beyond his "probationary" rank of Vice Admiral to become a full Admiral. I've found him to be an active, helpful, and a capable command officer (who better had given something nice to his IWSE for the lovely webpage of theirs). :)
- Fleet Admiral Stalker5, Supreme Director - Recommendation for the Grand Order of the Empire - With all the work Stalker5 has done for the Emperor's Hammer, he hasn't received anything in terms of medals. I can't begin to stress how useful he has been in keeping things within the EH peaceful...because confidentiality rules prohibit me from doing so. :P Regardless, the fleet will have to take my word that this is an award well deserved.

Other Information:

Meetings.
- Fleet-wide meeting on IRC-Undernet channel #emperor's_hammer (every Saturday at 5PM GMT)
- TIE Corps meeting on IRC-Undernet channel #tiecorps (It's every Sunday at 9PM GMT)
- Don't forget our own IRC-Undernet channel #Vanguard it's a fun place to be after all:)
Additional for if you do not know what IRC is: IRC stands for Internet Relay Chat and it's a protocol specially for chatting. Easiest way to get on IRC is to go to http://www.mirc.com and download mIRC free. The Emperor's Hammer is based on the Undernet servers, but if you need any more help setting up, don't hesitate to call in help from either your squad mates or me.

Messageboards.
- Emperor's Hammer Message Board - http://www.tiecorps.org/ehmb.asp
- TIE Corps Message Board – http://www.tiecorps.org/mb
- Aggressor Strike Force Message Board - http://www.tiecorps.org/mb/view.asp?b=21&v=0&s=0
- ISD Vanguard/Wing XV Message Board - http://tiecorps.org/mb/view.asp?b=38&v=0

Vanguard interactive Battle:

ViB Prologue XVI:
by: LCM Johann Glorick, Echo 3-1

 The cockpit seal closed as the tech outside gave LCM Johann Glorick a thumbs up, he was ready to launch. Glorick went over a mental pre-flight, there was no time to do it for real; the Platform was already under attack, and those supplies were desperately needed. Once he saw that his fighter was clear, he hit the power switch, and gunned the engines. There was a slight pulling sensation as he passed through the MagCon field, and then there was nothing; he was in space with only himself to worry about.

Glorick punched the switch for IFF on, and targeted the nearest green blip on his sensors. This particular target was a A-wing, about 4 Klicks out, firing on T/D Wasp 2. Glorick couldn't stand a rebel firing on an Imperial ship (even if it was a Wasp), and he transferred all his beam weapon energy into his engine, only siphoning off the slightest bit to go to his laser recharge. During this time Glorick could not think about the circumstances that got him into this mess. He had always hated the leaks that were forming in his room, in which he had to use his spare boots to stop the "water" from spilling all over the place; maybe that was the reason why he had volunteered to go out in LT Kessap's craft, "Hoss," for the mission. In his mind, anyone that would stop a repair operation like this deserves to become "a new star in the night sky."

As Glorick rocketed away from the Vanguard, at speeds his ship was never designed to go, he could just make out the silhouette of the A-wing that was his prey. The two ships were closing rapidly; Glorick flipped his Comm. over to the Wasp's frequency, and shouted, "Wasp 2, break towards coordinates 125, 268.do you copy?"

The only response Glorick got, was a double-click over the Comm., he then began to see the TIE Defender whip around towards the coordinates he had been given. This would bring the TIE Defender just under where Glorick's own ship would be in just a second. Wasp 2 passed under Glorick with lightning speed, and he could see the A-Wing right on his tail. Glorick pounced on his target. He lowered his engines to 1/3 power, and whipped around, and behind the A-wing, then coming back to full throttle, he linked all four of his lasers, and began pumping his target full of quad burst energy. Before the A-Wing was slagged, it managed to veer away to Glorick's starboard side.  Glorick began the simple maneuver to come around the A-wing for the killing shot, and then immediately hit 1/3 again, a pulled a corkscrew climbing for all he was worth.

Before Glorick had been able to fire the final shot on the doomed A-Wing, the rebel's wing-mate had began firing. The only reason Glorick was still alive today was because the wing-mate was obviously green. He had fired too far ahead of Glorick, giving him the warning he needed to avert his own death. At that point Glorick had a moment of vision. He could see the A-wing as a fireball. He pursued that vision with all his might, he quickly targeted the A-wing that had just attacked him and flipped his weapons system over to concussion missiles. Glorick heard a piece of a rebel message as he was locking on   (3 take those bloody squints off our tails) He then dropped his targeting reticule over the fleeing A-wing and waited for the tone. He fired a singe missile and watched it track its target. Switching his weapons back to cannons, he fired a dingle quad burst, to make sure the Missile would slag its target. The obviously bright green rebel pilot tried to pull a hard turn the port, but the missile caught up with him, and in a glorious explosion, turned into an expanding gas cloud.

After seeing what little damage a quad burst could really do to the enemy, Glorick began to miss his own TIE Experimental Mark 1. That ships Mini-Turbolaser had more then enough power, the entire ship would buckle each time the weapon fired, but this ship was a nice change, it had been a long time since he had been able to use missiles. As Glorick was reminiscing, he had come around behind the first A-wing he had targeted; he lined up the shot and was about to fire when he had to avert his ship again. The A-Wing had exploded and the form of another ship had rocketed up just meters in front of Glorick. He quickly came around to target the ship and stopped himself just short of firing a shot into an ally. The ship was the TIE Defender he had saved earlier. Glorick flipped the Comm. back the Wasp's frequency, and said, "Leave to a Wasp to almost get himself killed by an Ally." The TIE Defender only performed a quick snap roll, and raced away to his next target. Glorick thought to himself, "Leave it to a Wasp to be so arrogant."

He then allowed himself a chuckle as he remember Wasp's new motto. Though he did not have much time to think about it, the next thing he new his hull began to blink, and he threw his ship up onto the port Solar-array, and dove. The green light above his targeting reticule told him all he needed to about his attacker. While he had been searching for another target, he had come within range of the FRG EchoHawk's guns. Glorick took a quick look at his starboard solar-array and noticed that the lower half had been reduced to slag. This infuriated Glorick, and he again, linked his lasers and charged towards his aggressor. His CMD showed that the torpedoe barrage launched by T/B Echo II had already weakened the EchoHawk; the hull was down to 53 percent, and the shields were gone. As Glorick raced towards the ship at blazing speeds, he dropped the reticule over the Engine pods, and began to fire. The quad burst tore through the already damaged hull plating and drilled right into the power core of the ship; once it had been hit, there was little time for Glorick, he had to quickly turn around and try to outrun the explosion that had once been the rebel FRG EchoHawk.

Glorick wiped the sweat off his brow, had he not turned when he had, he would have become just another fatality on the quartermaster's list. Glorick quickly calmed himself, and looked at the overall situation via the sensors. Most of the A/Ws had been destroyed by now, those that hadn't launched were stuck on the EchoHawk when it blew. There were two other groups of fighters out there that were causing the most damage, a group of "wishbones" were targeting the Vanguard, but obviously did not have the firepower to breach the shields, let alone the hull. The other group was X-Wing Crimson; Glorick quickly pulled one of these fighters onto his CMD and noticed its target, Echo 1-1. That wouldn't stand although Glorick wanted Vallyn's job, he certainly didn't want his Commander to die, just so he could get it; besides, if Vallyn were destroyed they would come after Glorick next.

Glorick threw the throttle back into full thrust and began heading for the nearest X-wing, a mere 3 klicks away. At 2.5 klicks Glorick noticed that the XW had began firing on Vallyn, Glorick thought, "Time to give you something else to worry about!" He then changed his targeting mode to Concussion Missiles, and began locking onto the "troglodyte." The reticule went red almost immediately, and Glorick fired. The missile flew towards it's target and sent it spinning as the missile was diffused by chaff. Glorick switched back into Quads and fired 4 quick burst into the XW. X-wing Crimson 7, saw his shields disappear with the first two bursts, and then burned as the last two tore his ship to shreds. By this time Vallyn had managed to subdue Crimson 8 by the Grace of the Emperor. Wasp 2 had managed to take out Crimson  (quite an accomplishment) and the two Echo fighters paired up as wingmen and took on the next set of incoming X-wings. Glorick spoke into the Comm., "You take Crimson 11, I'll take 12, leave the scraps for the T/A Python." Vallyn sent back a double click, and they both move side-by-side towards their targets.

The first of the X-wings, Crimson 11, came in on a head to head, Glorick new better to accept such a challenge, and fired a quick shot at max range. A single bolt hit the XW which caused its pilot to flinch, and send his fighter down and out. The extra speed from the Beam Weapon allowed Glorick to snap around and behind the XW and fire several quads into his rear shields. The XW didn't stand a chance and was slagged after the third hit. Vallyn had subdued his target in a similar manner; only there were a few more scorch marks on his hull then before. The three Python fighters had managed to take out the last Crimson with a triple slash maneuver, which left only the remnant of Stealth squadron to take. Then-there was another voice over the Comm.   (NightWolf here to finish the job for you guys). The squadron had begun hyping in groups of 3, and they appeared in perfect position to get wamped on; their hyper-vector made their entry point right where the last of the Crimson had met their fate. Glorick and Vallyn began pouncing on the new fighters, and with the help of both Python and the remaining Wasp fighters, managed to destroy all the new XWs in record time. By this time the Vanguard had managed to take out all of the Y-wings using her own guns and the area was finally secure. The Luggage had just finished entering the Vanguards Hanger Bay, and all fighters were ordered to return the Hanger without delay.

As Glorick waited for final clearance to enter the MagCon field, he tensed with the thought about the lecture that Strahd and Kessap were going to give him when he got back. Neither of them would be happy that the upper half of the Starboard Solar-Array was not longer a there. When Glorick was finally able to pilot his starfighter back to rest on the racks, he saw the ugly face that his Mechanic made when he saw the damage. Glorick could only ask the chief to do the best he could and await his grim future.

IMPERATOR II CLASS STAR DESTROYER THE VANGUARD BATTLE SUBMISSION FORM:
SUBMITTED: VA E.mBind, Vanguard Commodore
 

you can read over the current story/download the mission at http://isdvanguard.eh.ro
 

I think that's it – If I've forgotten anything, let me know via email (use only a.c.w.t.zwegers@bk.tudelft.nl for official TC/Wing mails.) or ICQ (9706474). Also READ the Wing report! It contains far more useable information then mt scribbles.

All my COM  reports are online as well: you can reach them via the Ship's roster on the TC database. http://www.tiecorps.org/reports/tcreports.asp?shipid=9

Until next time, good luck and have fun!

<salute>
COM/VA Ender mBind/Wing XV/ISD Vanguard
GS/SSx3/BS/PCx5/ISMx13/MoT-2rh-1gh/LoC-PSx79/DFC/CoL/CoB/LoA/OV
[CAVL] {IWATS-GFX-IIC/1/2/3-M/1/2-SM/2-TT-XAM-XTM-XTT}