Following on from the Motto comp, we now have the Daedalus Banner Competition. This competition is about designing a new banner for the TIE Corp's training platform. Full details are available here.

Mission skipping is only allowed if a bug prevents you to complete a mission. It is strictly forbidden to skip a mission just in order to complete more easily the battle if no fatal bug is present in this mission. Even in XWA where skipping a mission is an ingame option, only use it in case of bugs. If you encounter a fatal bug and skip a mission, tell your CMDR when submitting the pilot file. CMDRs, please state then the mission has been skipped because of a bug; a bug report MUST also be filled by the pilot. Failure to do so may result in the cancellation of the BSF, the played battle being then removed from the pilot profile. The aim of this rule, part of the TC Cheating Policy since it exists, is to prevent people from gaining easy FCHG points in skipping missions without reason (FCHG points are awarded for the whole battle, even if you skipped a mission) whereas some pilots would take time to complete all missions. Fairness...:-)

The Tactical Office will not accept new free mission or battle submission until further notice. *Updated* versions from authors are accepted though. This decision is made for two reasons:

• First, I need to make an audit of the Tactical Office to evaluate its current situation, following the resignations of both previous CAs, and to get a listing of the battles currently in the hands of the Tactical Staff
• Secondly, new requirements are going to be set for submissions; you will need to pass the appropriate IWATS Course (TM,XTM,XAM) before being able to submit new missions, and you will have to send along with your battle/mission a pilot file to prove you did playtest it; little and painless requirements which should improve the efficiency of the Tactical Staff. The Tactical Manual is going to be updated as soon as possible.

After four years and an a month, Fleet Admiral Kramer has chosen to hang up his Sovereign Commodore uniform.

As FA Kramer writes:

I resign my position as Sovereign Commodore effective immediately.

That may have been the hardest thing I've ever had to write. I've been in charge of the Flagship for four years, and loved every minute of it. I've made some fantastic friends, seen some amazing things, and I thank all of you for the great times I've had. I still love the Sovereign and the Empire as much as I ever have, however my time constraints in "real life" are such that I can no longer devote the time to one of my favorite pastimes.

I would like to thank everyone who has meant something to me, but I'd forget somebody important and I just don't want to do that. Thank you all . . .

He'll be greatly missed. Kramer is a great friend to myself and was an excellent Commodore.

With the resignation of Fleet Admiral StarLion to be CA:TAC, Fleet Admiral Striker has returned to be the Tactical Officer once again!

The Logistics Office is seeking one Command Attaché to upkeep certain duties within the Office. If you are interested in what the job entail read below:

CA:LO2: The First Command Attache will be in charge of maintaining a website for the Imperial Historical Society and assist in publishing news from around the Star Wars Universe (including Episode II) whether it be from magazines, websites, or other sources for the EH Newsletter. This CA will be charged with revitalization of the Sentinel Project and the IHS.

Requirements:

1. Knowledge of Star Wars News Sources and where to find good information on Star Wars happenings in General.
2. Web Creation skills- Have the ability to make a site that incorporates all the CA's duties and responsibilities. If possible show former work done on previous sites you have made.
3. An Astute knowledge and dedication of EH History. I would like you to submit your own EH History to me in this application with an analysis of it so I can see your ability to write on the subject you will be dealing with.
4. Anything else you think is important mention in your application.

Pluses:

• Be a member for more than a year
• Have no HCI record
• Have One Recommendation
• Any Skills you believe are valuable to the spot
• Good Personality, Easy to work with, Good ideas

Include anything else you wish within your application that you believe would help you.

Mail all applications to LO Admiral Ramos Kanzco with the subject: CA Application.

The person seeking this position should have the following criteria:

1. At least hold the position of Flight leader, meaning that you do have ?some? related experience in command.
2. Have completed the IWATS Squadron Management 2 course.
3. MUST be a self-starting; driven; and, motivated person willing to serve the said squadron in an exemplary manner; which is a trademark of the command structure in this wing.
4. Have the ability to reply to e-mails with-in a 48 hour period and be fully familiar and understand the Standing Orders of the ISD Relentless

All applications should be submitted to myself, Lieutenant Colonel Lohr Zadash

The winners of the Daedalus Motto Competition have been selected. They are:

1st	FL/LCM Brian/Odin
2nd	FM/LT Tatsu/Viper
3rd	CMDR-COOA-AMB-TCC:XWA/CM Kyle Katarn/Mu

A special award to CM Flelm as well for the funniest submissions.

Thanks to the efforts of CPT Darknyte, there is now an IWATS course about the AOL Instant Messenger program. You can check it out at http://www.imperialacademy.org/aim/.

A while back, I showcased "Shadows of the Force" on this site as a new Episode I Star Wars mod that was coming out. Over time, it seems to have changed everything and now it seems to be a brand new mod that's going to take place during the Sith Wars prior to Episode I. The good news is that there are no more gungan Jar-Jar players. The bad news is that there are no more gungan Jar-Jar players to frag.

The way it sounds on their disclaimers section is that LucasArts probably put the stop on the original version of this mod too and now they had to go with a completely different angle.

You can see the new homepage at: http://sotf.thebackburner.net/

Just a quick reminder, if you would like your profile to be updated with the CSMA courses you have completed, email me at tphennir@hotmail.com with the following info:
Your HF Name
The Courses you want added
(SSBTC, SSITC, and IOTC only)
*The Date you completed said courses
(if you cant remember exactly, just
the month and year will do.)
Any requests not following this simple procedure will be ignored, so pay attention :P

The Hammer's Fist medals are all being redesigned! The Cross of Obedience was finished today and is displayed in the online roster. If you've earned the CoO, go to your roster profile, click on the medal link, and see what you've got pinned to your dress tunic. More medal images will follow in the coming weeks.

That's right, IWATS now needs less than 750 graduates to hit the big 10,000. Do a course today and let the insanity end! :P

New Executive Orders (#4 and #5) have been posted on the Executive Office site at http://www.kawolski.com which will affect members who have been convicted by the High Court or are currently on trial.

Membership: 87 active, 107 total

1) The Hammer's Fist growth has begun to slow, but new recruits continue to sign up at a steady pace. This is what we all like to see. I believe the HF is starting to break through the image of being a dead subgroup. It is never an easy subgroup to keep active, but we seem to be on a roll. We are bursting at the seams, so as the last posts are filled in our existing platoons, a new platoon will open in Alpha Company. We are now the equivalent strength of a full Tie Corps wing!

2) The HF has not had a full revamp of its medal images in over 2 1/2 years.A few medals have been redone, but nothing major. I am doing something major now. All HF medals are being redesigned and rendered. The first new medal image (Cross of Obedience) is to be completed today. It being the first, it took far too long to make. Now that a template is done, following medals will take half as long. The medals are being designed to be compatible with the current TC medals, so pilots may display HF medals on their uniforms. Likewise, HF members will be able to display TC medals on their own uniforms. This inter-operability is part of my continuing push to bring the HF closer to other subgroups.

3) After reading the most recent information on Jedi Knight 2 on the EH news page and other sources, I will revive the "Unreal Tournament: Emperor's Hammer" on the assumption that JK2 will not be suitable for us. It very well may be, giving players the chance to play as stormtroopers in multiplayer matches, but all descriptions of the game I've read concentrate on playing the good guy. In light of Lucas Art's recent batting average (Force Commander flopping, Obi-wan going console-only), it is only prudent for us to develop our own games. Of course, if JK2 turns out to be appropriate, or editible to make it appropriate, everyone here will be most pleased. Also, "HF Tactics" is an in-house game being developed in case Galactic Battlegrounds goes the way of Force Commander.

4) The Hammer's Fist is also pushing an inter-subgroup banner exchange. Participating subgroups would place up to three 450x50 banners in a rotating banner pool. When the main page of a subgroup site is viewed, another subgroup's banner appears at the bottom. With the recent retiring of IO Absolutek, the banners may be served from the HF. Subgroups definitely signed on thusfar are the Hammer's Fist, Dark Brotherhood, and the Directorate.

Prefect of the Legion
Surface Marshal Ares

From the "Well-that-was-quick dept.":

[To GA Ronin]:

Dear Sir,

I would like to unresign from the spot of Logistics Officer of the Emperor's Hammer if possible. I did to much work to let off now. I am going to rekindle my fire and finish everything where I left off, and have that timeline up and running by christmas, but hold to my original commitment and finish all the EH Histories. Every single one. Squadron, Wing, Ship, Battlegroup, Subgroup, every single unit will be historied and archived. Im ready sir, just give me the oppurtunity again and Ill strike back hehe empire strikes back. By the Way EH Princeton meet soming soon.

A welcome-back celebration will be held in the ISD Relentless's IRC channel.

Just a reminder that both the Daedalus motto competition and the Shameless Promotion Competition end THIS Monday, the 27th of August.

Oh yeah, I guess I forgot to post it. Admiral Ramos resigned too, so send applications for the position of Logistics Officer to Grand Admiral Ronin and Sector Admiral Kawolski.

It has been a long rewarding 6 years in the Emperor's Hammer. I must now go on to life and live it. I love life, I expect to love it more when I go to college this year. I must now move on. I hereby at Midnight EST, will resign my commission as LO and step down to LOA. I would like MAJ Khaen my LOA to become the new CA:LO and my current CA:LO Vice Admiral Crusader to become the new Logistics Officer. I would also like to request a promotion for my long standing CA VA Goatham to Admiral. These are requests, and I hope my six years of service will stand by them. Thank you everyone. Kawolski, Ronin, everyone.

I salute you all friends, you're like brothers to me. Never change, only for the better.

I leave you with one word of advice.

Peace

As e-mailed by Fleet Admiral AbsoluteK:

This is perhaps the hardest thing I have ever had to do in my EH career. But it must be done, for my own good primarily, but also for the good of the Hammer. For some time now, I have not had the same drive to do work for the EH. I have made many sacrifices to my own detriment, for the EH. However, it is a time for change, as I am going back to college in hopes of finishing a very tough 3yr program so that I can have a better future for myself, which unfortunately being IO cannot provide me. Most of what people will remember me for, is likely to be the now defunct hosting service I used to offer. Some may also remember me for some of the other minor projects I created, like the EH Images Archive, and the Greeting Card Centre, but as for any of the other ambitious projects that are listed on the IO projects page, I have not been able to deliver the goods. While some work has certainly gone into them, none of them are even near completion. Because of this, I must face the fact that I am burnt out, and have little drive to continue on in the EH in any capacity. Therefore, I resign from the position of IO.

I would like to thank my CA, AD Ari for all his efforts, and I believe he will make an excellent successor to me as IO should you approve. Ari is knowledgeable in PHP, ASP and HTML programming, as well as possessing a great number of ideas for improving the IO.

I will greatly miss being part of the command staff, something which I consider a great honour and privilege. I will also miss many of the people I have worked with, and helped out in my time in the EH. While I may stop by from time to time on IRC, I likely will not be around much. Anybody wishing to continue to stay in contact with me, may do so via email.

Send your applications for the position of Internet Officer to Grand Admiral Ronin and Sector Admiral Kawolski.

Our beloved Channel Service Bot, X, has returned to #Hammer's_Fist! GS and AGS members, please contact me to have your access set up.

Many congratulations go out to Rear Admiral Shadowhawk who has been appointed as the new Commodore for the SSD Avenger

With her promotion, the position of Wing XVIII Wing Commander is now open, and applications are being accepted. The requirements are as follows:

- Must have TIE Fighter (TIE 95 preferred)
- At least 4 months of command experience at CMDR level or higher (the more the better)
- Must be a member in good standing of the Dark Brotherhood (AED or higher will be given preference)
- Extensive IRC use

All applications should be sent to Rear Admiral Shadowhawk and Vice Admiral Firefox. Good luck!

With the recent formation of the TIE Corps newest Battlegroup, the Avenger Task Force (see my latest report for more info), I have selected it's first Battlegroup Commander...Vice Admiral Firefox! Many congrats FF!

(From OPS/FA Howlader:)

For those of you that didn't read the Operations Office Report, or attend the last few Emperor's Hammer meetings (you bad, bad people), recommendations are due to the Operations Officer at Midnight Eastern Daylight Time, on August 19th. That being today. You must follow the instructions within the Operations Office report, otherwise your recommendation will not be counted.

This week's Flight Office report, which contains some important news relevant to everyone, has been uploaded and can be viewed here.

You can download NL #77 (5.80 mb) at:
http://nl.infiltratorwing.org/hammer77.zip (Europe - Fast)
http://lo.minos.net/nl/hammer077.zip (N. America - Slow)
http://www.eh.ro/hammer77.zip

You can view the Newsletter online at:
http://nl.infiltratorwing.org

Membership: 85 active, 103 total

1) We have surpassed the landmark total 100 members! I'd have to check official records, but to my memory, this has happened once in the past 2.5 years. Next watermark we are aiming for is 100 active members (those not counting our Homeguard reservists).

2) The CSMA has slowed in the past week due to abnormal real life pressure on our Commander, Training, Lander, but he hopes to slog through the backlog of work over the weekend. Good luck to him!

3) The current Operation, "Crimewatch" enters its final phase next week. Its objective was to generate material for future subgroup-wide competitions. It has also turned out to be a lesson in how to run, and not run, large operations, and pitfalls found in this one will be used to make future Ops better.

4) The server on which the HF site currently resides is proving too small for our needs. Preparations will be made to move it to a roomier service. The URL, however, will remain the same of course. My own Office site, the HF newsletter site, and various HF and EH resources are down due to my ISP shutting down my server without notice. Another reason to avoid national ISPs.

5) In the coming week, brand new HF Medal images will start appearing on the HF site on roster records so people can see what they've earned. I am creating these from scratch using a combination of 2D paint and 3D modeling programs, as I did with the HF combat uniforms, so hold on to your hats!

PRF/SM Ares

Effective immediately, all multiplayer competitions held on IRC (unless otherwise noted, i.e. this does not affect the Imperial Naval Fleet War Night) will be moved into the channel #EHCOC. The new Emperor's Hammer Combat Operations Center is now completely in use. For all competitions, the moderation bot, WillyB0T will control handing out matches, recording scores, etc. Also, the rule for setting up matches outside of channel is now void, you must come into #EHCOC and use the bot to set up a match. The triggers for the bot are basic, !add , where is the game xwa, xvt, or jk, and your TC PIN number (example: !xwaadd 296). The moderators will be there to help you, or may contact me with questions, wetwilly@ehnet.org.

The votes are in! And here are the winners for the 3rd Annual Mr./Ms. EH Competition:
Mr. EH: Vice Admiral Mell
Ms. EH: Vice Admiral Adrenaline

Congratulations go to the two winners!!

EHVOGUE #3 has just been released. You can find it at http://vogue.ehonline.org/. Inside this months EHVOGUE you will find:

Week of War Beginners Guide

Previews of Jedi Outcast, Galactic Battlegrounds and Starfighter

FMC Pins Uniform Feature

Week of War results for June and July

Reviews of recent LucasArts re-releases on the PC

Movies, music and literature reviews

...also featured columnist, Fiction and Graphics submissions, and regular features

Just follow the link above to find it...and enjoy!

EHVOGUE #4 will be released on 9th September. All submissions must be sent to vogue@isdchallenge.org one week before release.

It's that time of year! Football time! There is an open league for anyone in the EH who is interested in playing. If you want to play, or just want some more information, email Vice Admiral Troutrooper. Space is limited, so if you're interested, sign up today!

Greetings, everyone. As some of you may have been aware, over the past two months, the first annual Psi Squadron Invitational Tournament has taken place. Designed as a TIE competition to give some of the smaller squadrons (9 or below) fleet-wide recognition and stiff competition from their equals, the PSIT started out with nine squadrons involved - the host squadron, Psi, Tartarus, Delta, Eta, Chaos, Koph, Nun, Shield and Yod - one squadron from almost all TIE wings, including one representing the ASF. Over three rounds, the numbers were whittled down to five squadrons, then three, then the champions. Today marks the end of the PSIT, and it is Ford's pleasure to announce the champions. Behold, the scores of the final round!

Yod Squadron - 1,136,476
Eta Squadron - 968,419
Koph Squadron - 897,325

That's right, congratulations to the champions of the Psi Squadron Invitational Tournament...Yod Squadron! Well-played, Yod! A hearty congratulations to runners-up Eta and third-place finishers Koph Squadron on a fight well-contested. Superlative work! Congratulations also to MAJ Halcyon of Yod, who was the top-scorer in the competition overall, with LC Iceman of Koph as the runner-up and CM Night Grue of Eta in third.

Thanks to all who participated from the start...maybe we can do this again sometime ;P

I'll be posting a bunch of really late headlines. I think I might have to get my CA to help me out with making news posts. I'm still "out of town" for another week, so updates are slow at best, unfortunately.

The Emperor's Hammer has been invited to participate in a war this weekend! All are welcome to come to the Imperial Naval Fleet War Night, simply join the channel #Warnight on Undernet, and you're there! XWA, XVT, and JK will be accommodated, so there's a game for almost everyone. It starts at 8 pm EST, and goes until midnight, so everyone come and give the EH a good showing!

Check the combat calendar for more information.

Following several months of hard work as Relentless Commodore, Rear Admiral Ricaud is today rewarded with a promotion to Vice Admiral. Congrats Ric!

Well, IWATS has just passed the total of nine thousand graduates since I took command of it all that time ago. This leaves a mere 1,000 graduates til we get to that 10K mark. I've made an updated graph and posted it here.

The 14th TO Communique has been mailed out to all TIE Corps members from Flight Member to Battlegroup Commander. If you're an EH member outside this group (ie. subgroup member, CO), you can get it online here

As you may or may not know, due to a variety of reasons, the Imperial Storm battles scheduled for last Thursday did not take place. So, they've been arranged for this Wednesday, 15th August @ 11PM GMT / 6PM EST in the channel #project_faithful. For more information on the battle, please go here.

Congratulations to two long-standing Flag Officers in the TIE Corps, who today are rewarded for their tireless work: Rear Admiral Khadgar, Commodore of the Grey Wolf, has been promoted to Vice Admiral and Lieutenant Colonel Proton, WC of Wing V, has been promoted to Colonel. Again, congratulations to both of these fine Officers!

The Training Office is running two small competitions. The first one is to come up with a motto for Daedalus. Details are available here. The other competition is related to which ship, wing and squadron will get to be in the first issue of a cadet newsletter of sorts which the training office will be starting soon. Details of that are here.

Oops! I didn't realize text had to be manually formatted. My weekly domain reports can always be found at http://www.tiecorps.org/reports/default.asp?commandstaffid=0&staffid=42.

Those are formatted in paragraphs. I'll do better next time here. :)

The Hammer's Fist has had a website at http://www.hammersfist.net for a while, but now I can say it is a stable permanent site. The site is also getting more complete every week. The site is moving toward more and more integration of all facets of the subgroup from the roster database, to links to all official HF sites, to the Carrida Bank and Quartermaster.

With a real web-presence and increased recruting, the HF is seeing a huge influx of new members and returning members. We have jumped from 51 active members to 81 in just 10 days. With the increase in numbers, our activity has also increased. Hopefully this more members / more activity cycle will continue. People do get medals for recruiting!

Jedi Knight training games have been implimented. Every week we train and compete amongst ourselves. Plans are to compete with other subgroups when our playing level is high enough.

Flash will play a part in the HF. A future Dark Legionnaire will be in Flash format and if it goes over well, our newsletter will make the changed from HTML to Flash. Also, "HF Tactics" will evolve into a Flash platform rather than a mediated IRC game. In this way, high resolution graphics (and possibly sound and animation) can be added, and cheating curbed. The HF website may also have one or two simple Flash games.

There will be two meetings a week again. Enough members are in channel Fridays to warrant bringing back the old meeting time. So our meeting schedule now looks like Friday 8pm EST and Saturday 1:30pm ESTA new rank, Officer Cadet (OCad), has been added to close a potential abuse of the rank conversion table. Previously, an enlisted member could be promoted to platoon commander (lowest officer posting) and then transfer to the reserves. Upon returning to active duty, his enlisted rank could actually be higher than what he had when he left (if reposted as an enlisted member).

We have a number of subgroup-wide Operations either going on or ready to go back-to-back. Between them all, troopers have o want for activities. With this kind of momentum, I am very pleased.

"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.

With Mrs. EH chosen already, there's one final round to determine who will be Mr. EH. Go vote at: http://iw.ehonline.org/LO/polls/mr-missEH/

I'm back from leave now and I've already added some new items to the roster and am working on more still :)

After a short break Imperial Storm II (updated!) has resumed play, and its been a very busy turn for all three teams...there are two more battles at the end of Turn 8 to play out. For details on these, please click here.The time of the battle is Thursday 9th August at 11PM GMT / 6PM EST in the channel #project_faithful. Please attend the battles if you can!

The title for the next installment of the Star Wars prequel trilogy will be entitled Star Wars: Episode II Attack of the Clones. Like most Star Wars titles, this is a very blunt to-the-point title similar in such to Return of the Jedi. The following is taken from the news report posted on starwars.com:

"starwars.com is pleased to announce that Star Wars: Episode II Attack of the Clones is the full title for the next Star Wars film, scheduled for release in 2002. Attack of the Clones joins The Phantom Menace, A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi as chapter titles in the six-episode Skywalker saga. It harkens back to the sense of pure fun, imagination and excitement that characterized the classic movie serials and pulp space fantasy adventures that inspired the Star Wars saga."

For the full story, visit the source at starwars.com

As you may, or may not, know a competition based around the Emperor's Hammer Timeline which involves the return of Grand Admiral Thrawn is set to start on the 15th of August. This is set to be a huge project with around 120 missions required to get through the story, along with a lot of plot to accommodate for the involvement of all the subgroups of the Emperor's Hammer. Thus we need your help in order to complete this, so if you are any good at making missions, or at writing fiction and wish to help please contact VA Goatham (rgoatham@aol.com), AD Ramos (magedon42@aol.com) and COL Blackbird (dex@cyborrea.cjb.net) for further details on what we would require from you, thank you.

Hello pilots. I come to you to inform about new time of Euroloc. As always, it's on Saturday, but 09:00-12:30 EST (15:00-18:30 GMT).

As from now on, the Fleet Medical Corps will not take any new applicants or transfer/assign already present personnel.
This is due to an internal FMC operation where information about will be released later. This recruitment/assignment
stop will last for at least one month.

Congrats to Crusader Squadron on the ISD GreyWolf ASF for being named the first ever ASF BG Escort Squadron. The exhibited the best activity, and group skills over the last few months, plus gaining 100 citations in the process. They are unparalleled in the ASF or the TC for that matter. Congrats to all of them!

In light of the newly announced (and rather pathetic) title of Star Wars Episode 2, the TO/IWATS site has a new poll on what you think of it. You can check it out here.

Following some recent talk on the TC message boards, General Kaerner, Commander of the Elite Tau Squadron has issued a challenge to any TC Squadron - If you feel that your Squadron has what it takes to beat Tau in an XWA/XvT multiplayer competition, then email GN Kaerner with your challenge today!

Well.. partly cause I know you all care, and partly cause there is no news on TC.org...

THE SO IS ON LEAVE!
Yes it's quite exciting I know. But I will only be gone until the 21st. I'm sure the club wont fall a part while I'm gone.

Seeing as how its been a slow news week here on TC.org, here are some things for you all to check out.

The EH Meeting Log for (2001-08-04) is up at http://www.ehnet.org/article.php?sid=344. The newest IO poll titled "Cooking Skills" is up at http://www.ehnet.org/pollBooth.php?pollID=51. If you are really bored, go post on the EHNet.org Message Boards. :)