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Welcome to my sixtieth public report as a Science Officer, not quite on time again... (Was busy doing IA stuff *g*) Onwards to the news:

Science Office News:

1. We had a lot of fun last Saturday evening/night flying a lot of Imperial Alliance Multi Player matches in all kinds of combinations and formats. Which ended up with Den fixing quite a few bugs in it and us now fully knowing what still needs to be tackled for the "MP demo"... all in all a fruitful weekend.
2. The Multi Player matches also functioned as a Beta testers AWOL check, so several changes have been made to Phantom Squadron... Including the new CMDR, Savageaz. We're hoping to see a bit more results from the beta testing now.
3. The rest of the Imperial Alliance development has continued steadily as well, with more of the interface being remade in 1024 resolution and missions getting fixed. Don't hold us on our word, but if everything continues as it does now we should be able to have the MP demo out by the holiday season.
4. The Order of Battle is being updated, which means that there are differences at the moment between the fully graphical version and the other versions. The new version is not completed yet, nor approved by the FC and XO, so must be considered for the time being as unofficial. A lay out of what has been changed so far:
   • All craft icons now link to their Fleet Manual entries again, if available.
   • TIE Corps ships originally set up for TIE-CD have had their Missileboats changed to the version of that game, others still have the TIE95/XWA version.
   • TIE Corps Battlegroups originally set up for TIE and XvT have had their Dreadnaughts changed to the version of those games, others still have the XWA variant.
   • Ships belonging to closed subgroups have been reassigned to the main Fleet. This means so far that most of the Infiltrator Wing Battlegroups have been tagged on after the TIE Corps ones and that the former BHG flagship is now in the Sovereign Battlegroup. What to do with the HCI Subgroup is still under consideration.
   • The Corporate Division Order of Battle has been fully updated and expanded to reflect the changes in that subgroup over the past years. The platforms/factories of the corporation have been or will also be adjusted more to their use.
   • The Directorate Fleet will be completely changed. The DIR's old fleet has been valued and a new Fleet of equal value has been picked. The new DIR Fleet has lot more variation to it and will probably be more useful in the defence of our systems.
   • Several smaller changes have already been made to the TIE Corps Order of Battle, mostly to reflect changes already made, like on the ISD Predator.
5. In line with these updates I still need to hear from the TCCOM and several SGCOMs if any more changes need to be made to their Orders of Battle. They are all requested to see if anything needs to be changed/updated. It is especially bad to see any units or ships named "TBA" :P
6. I currently cannot texture any OPTs because ACEDXF requires "palletised textures" in Open GL and apparently my new ATI card doesn't support that. So I bought a newer Nvidea card - which made everything even worse (That'll teach me to buy any of their stuff). The final solution is rebuilding my old PC...
7. Again: Do NOT use the minos site anymore: It cannot be updated any longer, so patches there are outdated. Use the emperorshammer.net site.

Science Office Status:

CA:SCO: has again worked hard to code in especially the Multi Player section of Imperial Alliance and has been doing a lot of flying (with a Keyboard!).

SCOA: CPT Timmay was back, but has disappeared again...

Site: The Science Office site can be found at http://sco.emperorshammer.net - which includes the Fleet Manual at http://sco.emperorshammer.net/fleet-manual. The Imperial Alliance site is located at http://ia.emperorshammer.net - which includes the ImpED site/course at http://ia.emperorshammer.net/imped.

Command Staff Objectives:

Continued patch development and platform resource: Focussed on upgrading resolutions in Imperial Alliance.

Get a release candidate version of Imperial Alliance released: Beta phase running, upgrading resolutions, checking Multi Player.

Upgrade and add to the Fleet Manual: The Order of Battle is being updated.

Science Office Projects:

Cockpit Project: With most craft now working and updated for TIE95, XvT and BoP I have started on adding custom cockpits to them. These should make it clearer to the player that he's actually is flying a different craft (instead of just seeing a GUN or T/D cockpit). The craft inside the EHSP are all provided for now, loose patches that have been processed already are: the Plt/F, the V-W, the S/Y-W, the TOS, the M/GUN, the ISP-6, the T/Pr, the IES, the T/Prot, the T/Sn and the PHX. Currently on hold.

Imperial Alliance: With the release of the freely available source code of FS2, we have started on making a Star Wars game out of it. We can freely distribute a finished game as long as we have all our own data files (graphics, sounds, models etc). Most other projects are currently on hold while we get this thing done some more.

Finishing up:

I think that's it - If I've forgotten anything or if you have comments, suggestions or corrections, let me know via email or look us up at #vsd_sinister. Don't forget that all the projects are described in more detail on the SCO site.

Use only endermbind@gmail.com for official SCO mails. I’m practically always online at #vsd_sinister, #emperor’s_hammer and #tiecorps using the nick MindB_ndr (or variations.)
 
All my SCO reports are available online as well: you can reach them on the SCO site but they are on the TIE Corps site, CS reports, as well.

Until next time, good luck and have fun!