**>> SPYNET BULLETIN **>> EARTHDATE 93.04.04 **>> AN H-by-A SERVICE **>> Compiled by Hazed plus a team of specialist newsdroids **>> your news and gossip and get paid good groats! **>> SPRING FLING - EASTER FROLICS Oxcart's April Fool planet, Arcadia, has been in for the past few days and is certainly well worth exploring. Our newsdroid got completely lost, met several of the Beatles, fell into a subway, and hasn't been seen since! Next weekend is Easter, and as is traditional the Easter Bunny will be visiting Fed Data Space. On Good Friday and Easter Saturday, he will be popping in from time to time to play games of hide and seek, giving groats to the winners. Easter Sunday will be a day for treasure hunts and other fun and frolics, with prizes of free Fed time. The fun will start at 3.00 in the afternoon, with a few warm-up treasure hunts to get you in the mood. At 3.30 will be the first of the prize treasure hunts: this one will be restricted to Poor People (Adventurers and below), with a prize of a free day's play in Fed. After this, at approximately 4.00 (depending on how long the first hunt takes) a general hunt, open to all, will take place with a prize of a free weekend's play. The day's festivities will wrap up with an Easter Bonnet competition, with another free day's play going to the person who decorates themselves and their ship in the way most pleasing to the Easter Bunny. On Easter Monday, the bunny will have given away all his goodies, so from 3.00 to 5.00 you will have the chance to KILL THE WABBIT! Anyone dying will automatically re-insure for the duration, so no worries about the fighting getting fierce. Hunt down that pesky rabbit and dine off rabbit pie! All times are in eastern. Exact rules for the treasure hunts will be announced just before the start of each event. **>> NAVAL BASE ENHANCEMENTS Lucky Dukes and Senators can now build Destroyers and Cutters to add to their naval bases. The commands are the same as those used for Detectors. In tomorrow's new version of the game, you will be able to start building Cruisers. These heavy-weight ships will take 10 hours to build, so will be best left for weekends - and they will cost 3 meg up front, in addition to the materials! **>> BYE BYE CONCLAVE The Conclave has outlived its usefulness and will be abolished tomorrow. Although it's been around for long enough to seem like a permanent institution, the Conclave was always intended to be a temporary body to deal with claims and disputes until there was a Senate in the game. With a full complement of Dukes, that time is now! Eventually the Senate will be made up just of Senators, but for the time being it will include Dukes as well. When the game fires up it will work out how many of Senatorial rank have been on the game in the last ten days, and will publish a list of their names. The command will show you this list. To have a claim upheld, you will need the vote of half this body. **>> SENATOR'S SLUSH FUND Also new in tomorrow will be an entry on the Senator's naval base display showing the content of their slush fund - money they rake off from every single transaction undertaken in Fed Data Space! Also, since at this rank it's not so much what you own as the power you wield that is important, networths will not apply to Senators. **>> THE FUTURE OF SMUGGLING At last week's "Ask Bella" RTC, Our Illustrious Leader outlined some thoughts about changing the way smuggling works to make it more interesting. She will be making it more flexible, so that if you fail at one aspect of smuggling, you will be able to try something else - for example, you can try running, but if you get caught you can fight; or if you fail to bluff your way out of trouble you can attempt bribery. If you choose to fight, it won't be decided automatically - you will actually be able to fight "virtual" ships, the power and number of which will depend on the duchy's capabilities. A new area of space, entitled Arena Space, will be created and you will be transported there to fight. Arena Space will be a set of locations apart from the normal spacelanes, to ensure innocent bystanders don't catch stray laserbeams. There will be just one Arena Space for all the duchies, so if two people attempt to fight at the same time, the battles will take place in the same area - with possibilities for all kinds of confusion! It is possible that non-smugglers will be able to go to Arena Space to duel their enemies. The details haven't all been worked out yet, so we will bring you more information as it develops. You'll also be able to see the discussion from the RTC when it is uploaded to the library. **>> THE ORIGIN OF THE COMMAND A Poor Person recently asked what the command was to sell your ship. He'd been trying and it hadn't worked, but he didn't think to try the correct command, . It seems like a good opportunity to drag out the old anecdote about why the command is the way it is! Way, way back in the mists of time, when Fed was new and the players were stumbling around trying to circumnavigate the "features" of the game, a player called Zugger was happily trading away in the exchange on Mercury. He had a cargo load of assorted goods, included some gas chips, which he was hoping to sell for a profit. Unfortunately, he made a small typing error, and instead of (in those days they didn't have a hyphen) he typed . The game ignored the word GAS and promptly sold his spaceship, leaving him stranded on Mercury with no way to get home. After she'd finished laughing, Bella gave him a lift to Earth (charging him a small fortune) so he could buy a new ship, and she changed the command to to prevent anyone else being caught out. **>> NICE TRY... A Captain (who shall remain nameless because we're basically nice droids) was heard recently asking if anyone could lend him 3 meg. "I'll pay it back straight away," he said, "I just need to hold it so I can get my next promotion." Given that the requirements for Adventurer have absolutely nothing to do with money, this made certain Rich People just a tad suspicious. He was pointed in the direction of the command... **>> A MARRIAGE MADE IN... ERM... Much to Destiny's chagrin, Jade and Glurg got married last week - and after they called off their wedding, too! For those that haven't come across Glurg, he has the delightful habit of carrying an enormous thing-crushing snake around his shoulders, which he lovingly calls Squeege. Quite what part this creature will take in the marriage is not clear, and we're not sure we want to follow that train of enquiry any further. We managed to bug the honeymoon suite, and can report that Glurg is quite the romantic! The action went as follows: >Glurg has taken off your clothes >Glurg has taken off his clothes >Glurg has consummated the marriage He has been heard murmuring the following endearments to his beloved: "You are the dung beetle to my mound of excrement", "You are the pus in my pimple", and he made up a little lovesong for his new bride: Why do maggots suddenly appear Every time you are near? Just like me, they want to be Close to you. But perhaps the most disgusting thing of all is that he calls Jade "Snookums"! **>> PLANETS AND DUCHIES There's been quite a change to the make-up of the Duchies. First, we have a new Duchesse: Freya is now in control of the Duchy of Vitros. Her elevation to Duchesse meant there were seven duchies, and the game only allows six at a time, so Bella bumped Hazed up to Senator so she could test the new "Senator" features being slowly introduced. Hazed claims it was sheer hard work that got her where she is today, but we know she has been sleeping with Galactic Administration bosses! The loss of Scratchwood as a duchy shunted Rookery and Muse to Independent status. Condor lost little time in joining up with Krell's Gotham - obviously he's used to being oppressed by a woman after his stay in Scratchwood. Muse will stay Indepedent until such time as Mirth advances to a rank where he can control it again. Freya has declared that she has no intention of ever doing any work as a Duchesse, so she doesn't want to form alliances with any planets. If anyone joins her duchy, she will probably eject them swiftly. Meanwhile, Riccardo's planet Links is back in. He suicided months ago, but returned recently and asked for the planet to be put back. Since he can't alter any of his planet settings until he has regained his lost stature, the planet stays Independent. Plantking advanced his planet, Canna, to mining. It will be turning mini shortly, so if anyone hasn't explored this excellent planet do it now! Finally, Jade and Destiny are now both back in control of their planets, so expect to hear from them shortly as they try to sort out their long-neglected economies. The league table today shows 6 Indpendent worlds (but one of those is Arcadia, the April Fool planet, so that doesn't really count). Occy's Zippy has 8 planets; Inversity, Scadia and Megalusa 1 each; and Gotham 4. **>> SPYNET REVIEW New players are continuing to join the happy band of Fedders; welcome to all of you. The new Captains this week are Kurgen, Zan, Nomad, Tavo, Willow, Sonicwear, Scott, Mel, Ishmee, Pepe, Dolhark, Ed and Pug. The promotions to Adventurer or Adventureuse were Wolfman, Hans, Wanderer, Flamin and Ishmee. Wolfman and Ariadne joined the Traders Guild. Glurg made it to Explorer, and has started making plans for what sounds like a truly gross planet! We look forward to reporting on it soon. Destiny and Jade continued their rise back up the ranks following their suicide pact and return. Jade did the GM puzzle, became an Explorer shortly thereafter and was bumped straight up to Squire (her level before her demise). Destiny did JP early in the week, then this morning completed the GM puzzle, and shot through the remaining ranks to his old rank of Industrialist. Freya joined the select band of those who've solved the devilish Duke puzzle. She's now the Duchesse of Vitro. Hazed has become a Senator. Amazing how far you can advance if you have connections in high places! There's been a large number of deaths this week, but we suspect they are all lower ranking players. The unfortunates are Kurgen, Goalie, Ishmee, Aeklug, Scott, Sonicwear, Douger, Akiko, Dakhwon and Pepe. We are lobbying Bella to include the rank of those whose deaths are reported in the SpyNet Review. **>> BULLETIN ENDS