(Where is the hord of screaming girls welcoming me in the meeting room ? :P )
1. TAC2K - 98 to go
Along with some TIE free missions, a new BoP-IW Battle has been released, first IW battle since the Rion Campaign. There are two others IW Battles (XvT, BoP) in the beta queue. With a turnout of around 50 missions released each month, TAC2K should be reached before the end of the year, hopefully. the Compendium stands at 1,902 total missions online !
2. FCHG Mission Design Contest #2
The second edition of this competition should be released on November 1st, end on December 15th ! This should allow us to release the winning FCHG Battles for the EH Birthday... more news in my next report, including the requirements about plotline, once the competition is approved by the TO.
3. XWA and unlimited ammos
As noticed by Major Linkan and tested by myself, it looks like using the ingame unlimited ammo feature of XWA do not reduce your total of points, unlike other game platform like TIE or XvT (the invulnerability feature does reduce score though). As nothing can prevent you to use this feature, and furthermore as nothing can be done to track the use of this feature, using the unlimited ammo feature within XWA to achieve high-scores is not forbidden; use of ingame helps has never been forbidden, EXCEPT skipping missions in XWA. I guess some had already noticed that trick and used it for high-score, now everyone should be aware of it. Anyway, if you really want to trully enjoy custom missions, do not use these features, whatever is the game platform ;)
4. Combined Arms Battles
A thread is currently available on the Mission Creation Board (http://www.tiecorps.org/mb/view.asp?b=3&v=2&s=1) about Combined Arms Battles, their status and their future. Currently, the requirements for CABs are a bit vague (ie ask the TAC), I would like to develop the idea of battles involving combined forced between the several subgroups of the Hammer, at a fleet-wide level.
CAB category will fit for battles involving combined operations between subgroups, ie battles which can't be only TC one or IW one, or DB one. Requirement for CABs will be to involve two or more subgroups in an *effective* manner, ie not just some cap ships from a subgroup just sitting around. Forces from these subgroups must be used in combat engagements. If a battle involves several subgroups, but focus more specifically on one subgoup, the author can ask this battle to be either a "regular" Battle (TC,IW,DB, ID,BHG.. one) or a CAB Battle.
Concerning the old "length" requirements, they are suppressed. On the other side, length restrictions on "regular" battles will be suppressed. A battle could be any length you want. Anyway, for technical purpose, long TIE Battles must be splitted into set of no more 8 missions and then use the battle1.lfd, battle2.lfd etc files. For XvT/BoP, I'm not sure there is a limitation in number (though it may display scores weirdly within the game). for XWA, I never tried to go above the 20 missions limit. In all case, you can release your campaign over several battles, *IF* it does fit a splitting (like let's say the Star Wars movies for example). It may be asked to release the entire campaign in one time, depending on the nature of the plotline. Concerning MoTs awarded, to encourage the creation of long battles (ie >8 missions), awards would be as follows:
- 4 to 8 missions: MoT-rh
- 9 to 13 missions: MoT-rh x2
- 14 to 18 missions: MoT-rh x3
- 19 to 23 missions: MoT-rh x4
- 5M-1 to 5M+3 missions: MoT-rh xM
5. IWATS10K Project - The Tug Menace
The battle is completed. It will be released once the SCO solves his connection problems and release the Ast-Tug patch, and once I get feedback/speeling correction from my playtesting staff. A little trailer:
Not far away from the Heir System, in a civilian spaceport...
Like every single day, Sentar Kalif, chief of security of the Tarrak spaceport, was having a break with his team in the cantina at 11am, local time. Whatever could say the spaceport doctor about some drinking problem he may have, nobody would prevent him from doing his morning break.
"Some drinks of chalquila per day can't hurt" he thought while ordering the bartender another shot of the precious alcohol. Suddenly, the little alarm attached to his wrist began to vibrate.
"Bah, another pirate attack, hurry up to the command center guys !"
When entering the command center, Kalif asked the new recruit you let in charge of the command while going to the cantina: "What's going on, young boy ? It'd better be important to prevent me from taking my mornin' break !"
"Sir ! We've got multiple unidentified echo radars on our screens !"
"How many ?"
"Sir ! The screen is full of them !!!"
Kalif looked on the screen.
"Indeed... they look small... bigger than missiles... not as big as fighters... what the hell it is ??"
A strange feeling went over him as a disturbing idea came to his mind.
"No, it can't be... can't we get a view on these things ?"
"One minute, Sir..."
After a few seconds, a direct view of the incoming targets was displayed on the screen.
"!!!... After all, I may have a drink problem...."
Soon in theaters, starring Dean Astatine, Princess Portman and Bob the Tug. No Tug has been hurt during the making of.
6. Phoenix Alliance Project
Correction of all 27 XWA Battles completed by yours truly ! I have been able to fly through all of those, so there should not be any fatal bug like some people did pretent to (XWA-TC #13 was free of bugs.. if people care about reading help sections). Phase II of this personal project will be the correction of XWA free missions.
Fencing rocks ! Epee rocks !
TAC-PROF/FA Striker/CS-3/SSSD Sovereign