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Eyes & Ears - Search And Rescue


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Organization Name: Eyes & Ears - Search and Rescue

Website: eyesandearsrescue.org

Discord: https://discordapp.com/invite/ETk5ubw 
Mission: "Achieve the preservation of life when found
in dire straights"
Allegiance: Neutral, with a slight lawful bend
Gameplay: Semi-casual, yet can be active at a moment’s notice

Roleplay: Freely allowed
Currently Recruiting: All Positions

 

When you're out in the void of space, alone and unsure and in need of help, who do you turn to?

 

Many would say "your organization", and that is very much correct. Most organizations are like family units, all of its members looking out for each other. Family can be fickle though.

 

Do you have the biggest organization of them all? You're only one person and bound to get overlooked.

Is your organization made of thieves and pickpockets? They'll come after you when it suits them best.

Does your organization cover a vast swath of stars? They'll come after you, once they get out of their own territory.

Is your organization tirelessly working on greater and better things? They'll get to you, right after their current job is finished.

 

These organizations, great as they might be, may not lack the familial tightness that holds a family together. If a child wanders, its mother will instinctively pursue, but if a member of an organization finds themselves stranded in space, will their organization put everything on hold and pursue them?

 

Enter Eyes and Ears - Search and Rescue.

 

Our sole devotion is to bring lost Noveans back to civilization. If our purpose hasn't yet been betrayed, we are in the broadest of terms, a rescue organization.

 

     Why Rescue?

While Resurrection Nodes can return you to familiar territory and Blueprints might be handy to reconstruct your lost ship, we can all probably agree that some things just aren’t worth loosing. 

 

Maybe you put a lot of time into your ship and can't afford to rebuild it? Perhaps that ship is made of or carries a lot of resources which may or may not be particularly rare? Did you acquire your ship through questionable means while knowing that you would most certainly lose it if you abandoned it? Were you on a supply run and made a risky jump knowing your fuel was low? Was a vital element damaged in flight and now you are as spaceworthy as an asteroid? Does an item in your personal inventory make a forced respawn too much of a risk to chance loosing?
 

These are the problems we aim to solve.

 

     Who we are looking for

We have a variety of positions need filling by a variety of different people. From people who are active in discord that can act as dispatchers, to pilots experienced in commanding various craft, spreadsheet workers who can keep our data organized.

 

We are also looking for organizations who would like to affiliate with us. If you provide some sort of service that you think would be useful to our organization and those that we serve, please send me a private message.

 

How our affiliates will work is by getting a direct referral from us to everyone we provide our services to in exchange for our customers receiving a discount on your services.

 

Our affiliates will also work with us since we will come to them first with our own needs (of which there may be many) in exchange for a discount on their service given our direct connection.

 

All the details on these positions and more can be found on our websites hiring page.

 

     Speaking of website

You can find it at eyesandearsrescue.org

 

Originally almost 3,000 words, I've moved much of my post that would have gone here onto my organizations' website so as to keep this post a bit tidier. This post is more so meant to give a brief introduction rather than a full and complete overview.

 

     If you would like to join

You can find us here on the community page.

Eyes and Ears Community Page

 

Join our Discord here.

Eyes and Ears Discord

 

     If you have questions

I implore you to please ask them. Not only will it help others who view this thread, but it will help others who view my F.A.Q page in the future.

 

The only dumb question is a question never asked.

 

     If you need to contact me directly

You can either private message me here on the forums, or ping me on the Unofficial DU Community Discord @DarkHorizon.

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An interesting promotional website and of course organization idea, something we seem to relatively lack compared to other things.

 

Of course, a lot is yet uncertain (to me anyway), making me wonder how feasible such ideas might be as standalone version. But time will tell, in the end.

 

We as organization will very likely acknowledge and support such groups if all goes well and if those groups and we make it to and past release, of course.

 

Even if groups can later mostly rely on themselves or may not need such a service, it adds some kind of organizational diversity to the community and caters to a certain interest group I would describe loosely as "EMT players". Basically those who pick doctors, EMTs, maybe firefighters in games where this is possible just like some people like to play as cops.

 

You can see those roles (and players) or game modes in some RPG communities in "Armed Assault (3)" or "Garry's Mod", for example, and those roles usually serve some practical game play purpose or are an integral part and are not just there for fluff or "RP".

 

To advertise this and encourage people who might be uncertain about it:

 

As someone who played firefighters, EMTs and cops in various games with practical game play I can tell you or generally summarize that those jobs or "shifts" are sometimes menial or uneventful, and at other times the most challenging and rewarding. Either way, you never know what might happen next.

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13 minutes ago, Warden said:

As someone who played firefighters, EMTs and cops in various games with practical game play I can tell you or generally summarize that those jobs or "shifts" are sometimes menial or uneventful, and at other times the most challenging and rewarding. Either way, you never know what might happen next.

I'll emphasize this last part as well as it is an excellent point. Straight from our websites Anytime Anywhere page:

Quote

While in our organization, we will not enforce any period of time where you must be on call and ready to deploy. You can still be with your organization and do things with them, we just ask that you, if okay with your superiors, be able to leave your duties behind before you approve to embark on a rescue mission.

 

Rescuers are by no means obligated in any form to accept a mission. It is an entirely voluntary option.

While we do not necessarily run on shifts, that's not to say that you might not be left for stretches at a time not doing anything for our organization. You are either doing something, or you are doing absolutely nothing. There is pretty much no middle ground.

 

Relevant members (rescuers, supervisors, etc) will be called up as things happen while they are playing DU and/or are presently online (ex: Discord) but are free to reject if they lack the time or ability to do so.

Another key player, the dispatcher will always have an ear in our Discord listening for any emergencies as they come in so good multitasking skills if you intend to play at the same time would be a real help here.

 

And as for our spreadsheet managing positions, I don't know if they're always crunching numbers like in EVE, but these roles will most likely be either slow or non-existent until we start branching out into other planets and systems.

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  • 1 year later...

A Quick Recap

 

I should post here a little more often. Thanks to NQ for clarifying the necro rule on org-registry threads!

 

Well we're now just over one solid month into Alpha 2. I think it's high time to do a quick recap on how things are going with Eyes & Ears.

 

Starting out as a mere idea in Pre-Alpha and fleshing out in mid-2018, the idea of a rescue focused organization was something I never thought I'd find myself doing in Dual Universe.

 

In the early days of Alpha 1, Eyes & Ears made it's first official Alpha-1 rescue, Glavies. Throughout Alpha 1, the organization would answer a handful of distress calls from solo players that crashed their ships and were unable to repair or had simply run out of fuel.

 

The highlight of Alpha 1 would turn out to be the Ministry organizations craft The Rex Liberata having run out of fuel with Bramse, PirateTrader, and WhiteMEat on board. Their anti-gravity craft was brought to a stop a little over 50 SU from Alioth and while a flight to them would have been easy enough, NovaQuark was intent on having them rolling ASAP. With Stormeyes assistance and some fancy teleportation, The Rex Liberata was refueled and it's crew were once more on their way.

 

Further rescues would be performed in the lead up to Alpha 2. The week after Alpha 2's launch, two back to back rescues would be performed.

 

The first rescue was simply returning a grounded tester to a construct they respawned from in Alioths orbit.

 

After some time spent debugging their craft, a second call came in from a tester flying to another planet. Unfortunately due to problems out of their control, they were unable to make it all the way with the fuel they had on hand so more was flown out to them and they were able to safely land.

 

Through these activities during tests, Eyes & Ears - Search And Rescue has successfully run 14 rescues in Alpha 1, and thus far, two rescues in Alpha 2. Our membership has also ticked up to eight members. Additionally two organizations, Vulture Cooperation and DYNAMIC AEROSPACE INDUSTRIES have formed partnerships while Albatross Inc in discussion with us. Eyes & Ears has also tentatively acquired a launching platform in Tortuga City. Details haven't been ironed out but we hope this location will make a great first location off Alioth from which we can launch rescue operations from.

 

If your organization would like to form a partnership with us, feel free to get in touch with me privately and we can discuss things.

 

Alpha 2 is looking bright so far even though I've been personally hampered with hardware issues and have been unable to participate in recent testing. Just because I am down, however, does not mean the rest of the team is out! If you ever find yourself in trouble on the test server, feel free to enter the '911' channel. Since it's hard to see if anyone's actually listening, another option would be to head over to our Discord. Friendly chat is also always welcome so stop by and say hi, we don't bite!

 

Outside of testing, things have been quite mild. Earlier this summer, the Eyes & Ears website has seen a minor face lift in its design and a few things like parallax backgrounds were removed to simplify the design. The 'Our History' and 'Media' pages (with signs by @Geo, and an inspired logo by @Spiridon, thanks again both of you!) are both fairly new so check them out!

 

'Stats & Stories' has been filled out with 12 separate pieces of feedback by those who have used our service, check that out as well.

 

That about wraps things up.

 

Safe flying,

DarkHorizon

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Yah, really love your organization and the work you are putting in to it, As told before, you are Always welcome on Tranquility. And when the facilities are ready and working as intended [after release]  i throw in the "Emergency teams free Use" Package for you and all other organizations that are legit working in the corner where Community is helped freely.

 

Greetz Aaron

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  • 2 weeks later...

20 Rescues!

 

With this weeks longer than usual test, Eyes & Ears notched four more rescues to its belt, bringing the overall total to 20 rescues.

 

@yamamushi made his first recorded rescue of another player out in deep space, 50 SU from Talemai. With a minor language barrier, Yamas linguistic skills proved exceptionally useful and with one medium space tank refueled, our travelers were on the (space?) road again.

 

Just as that rescue was wrapping up, I was on my way to Madis to resupply a newer player who didn't expect fuel to be so expensive at their destination. In most situations I would have told this player to mine and sell resources so they can get to know a bit more of the game. Needing something to do, however, I went out to help.

 

Early Sunday morning prompted a little bit of teleportation from Alioth to a player who had run out of fuel on their way to Talemai. Normally I would have made the manual trip myself, but in the interest of getting to bed I contacted someone from NovaQuark who was able to assist with my transportation.

 

The very next day with another early morning rescue, our fourth call came in from a pilot flying away from Alioth and was unable to change course. After catching up and tinkering with their construct for a half hour, the straight flying Novean opted to leave the construct behind and was returned to terra firma.

 

With the test now over, feedback is being gathered and I'll have it posted in next weeks update (should we make any rescues).

 

Safe flying,

DarkHorizon

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Weekly Update - Sept 2nd

 

Another test come and gone, two more rescues this session makes for eight in Alpha 2, and 22 total. Eight rescues is a little over half the number of rescues we made in the entirety of Alpha 1 so I think that's a good sign that people are taking notice!  ;)

 

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@Haunty made their first rescue on record on Thursday, saving @Dejwid who had made their first trip to space and unfortunately (or fortunately depending on your perspective!) crashed on one of Alioths moons. A helpful hint: Equip some reverse thrusters, turn and burn, or equip some space brakes.

 

The second rescue which was actually made earlier that day was more of an assist. I suspect most Noveans are equipped with radios in their suits, but what if you weren't? What if you left your only line of communication on your construct, and what if your construct was floating over a hundred meters in the air due to a sudden act of Lord JC? Luckily we don't live in this world yet and we can still communicate outside the game!

 

While watching the chat, I noticed that @Furaites needed some help. Less than ten minutes and one trip half way around the planet later and after an admittedly rough landing (ended up on my side) because of the previous weeks tinkering, we had our Novean on a one way trip up to their construct. With nothing further needed, rescue 21 was a wrap.

 

Aside from these rescues, testers may notice a small advertisement at each district now.

 

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Outside the tests a minor addition has been made to our website.

 

Normally after rescues are completed, rescuers will ask the former victim a few brief questions on how things went, along with any feedback they have for submission on our website on the Stats & Stories page. This process has been moved over to our website in the form of a new Feedback page. 

 

I am also seriously considering a minor color change. Testers would probably note that black is an oft used color for most all of my constructs. I just love how it goes with almost any other color out there, it just looks nice in general IMO. A couple of downsides do exist in the fact that it can be hard to spot at night (maybe a good thing?) and is also very hard to spot in space. This impression of stealth may be misinterpreted which could be unduly provoking from an outsiders perspective.

 

Partly inspired by the US Cost Guard as seen in the E&E banner, and suggested by one of the organizations members, I'm thinking of a renewed color scheme replacing black with a slightly dark shade of white, red and blue for accent colors, and black as a lesser trim option.

 

This won't impact the background of the website as the current layout makes it easy to read in gamers dimly lit rooms. Links however may go from red to the more traditional blue while the white font color will not change.

 

----------

 

Additionally last weeks feedback has been added to the website alongside this weeks feedback since both rescues were early on in the test. Thanks to all those that submitted their feedback which can be viewed on the Stats & Stories page.

 

Spoiler
I've edited this post twice now but this big gap keeps appearing. Please scroll down.
 
 
 
Spoiler
Quote

My friend and I built a ship. He finished it while I was offline and told me to take it for a ride. We hadn't made it to space yet...but this ship was good enough to make it into space! The problem was, the ship wasn't good enough to make it back from space. Its steering was not working.

 

I found myself 3.5million meters away...floating randomly into deep space. I was running low on fuel...but couldn't make a push back either way because I couldn't turn around, I could only aim further into space.

 

After hearing my plea, Eyes & Ears had someone up and out in space within minutes and high-tailing it towards me. They were helpful and professional.

Though my rescuer wasn't able to diagnose the issue and we weren't able to make the ship flyable, they did offer me a ride back and instructions on how to later retrieve the ship. Overall, the service was wonderful!

 

This is a very cool thing you are doing. There is a huge learning curve when it comes to building/piloting a vessel in space. The service you're providing helped me out of a pickle and will help many more people out of similar situations! 

- @Kremchek

Quote

Well I was coming in for a landing on Allioth, and DU ended up crashing on me. When I logged back in, I fell from my craft and hit the ground about 160m below it. I could not fetch it due to a past incident, and it was just outside of maneuvering range.

 

With it being outside of Maneuvering range and having used fetch in the last 24 hours I was out of luck, so I asked for NQ help in chat.

 

DarkHorizon, the leader of Search and Rescue was on the ball and actually responded faster then NQ, and arrived on site within minutes to lift me to an altitude to retrieve my ship.

 

As for suggestions or Feedback, I have none...except it was exceptional service right when I needed it.

- Furaites

Quote

It was my first time in space - I didn't know how it works and I wanted to try to go to another celestial body. I wasn't able to stop the ship and hit the moon hard, I guess i forgot space brakes?
 
The impact totalled my ship, I had no idea how to respawn back at my base so I was stranded on the moon.

 

Eyes & Ears service was just great - I was just standing there waiting and then Haunty flew over and I was able to board his awesome ship with seats and a beautiful cat in the front. Thanks guys!

- Dejwid

 

 

Finally, in more regrettable news, some of my hardware issues from earlier this month are back which means that I personally am out of commission as far as testing goes.

Possible motherboard issue but I'm leaning more in the direction of the power supply. Throttlestop indicates PL1 in yellow under Core if that gives anyone any ideas, please discuss it with me via DM.

 

Don't worry though, you can still find me on Discord both on Eyes & Ears Discord server and the Official DU Discord. Members of Eyes & Ears will still be conducting their rescues during tests like normal, just enter the 911 room in chat, or stick your head in our Discord and we will assist you the best we can.

 

That's all for now, until next time, fly safe everyone!

 

- DarkHorizon

 

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Weekly Update - Sept 9th

 

It was a quiet period this go around with no recorded rescues. While I would be tempted to say that's bad news for us, it's really good news for all of you!

 

Our 10th member was just added to our team today, welcome @DarkTemplar to our organization as our first dispatcher!

 

The role of a dispatcher in Eyes & Ears is much as you would expect it to be in real life. A distress call comes in, details are gathered and routed to an appropriate first responder who then moves to engage the problem.

 

In Dual Universe, it's not much different. A distress call will come in through a 'emergency' channel in Eyes & Ears Discord, details will be gathered and passed over to one or two points. For small calls like refueling or repairing a smaller construct where only a single responder is needed, that individual is briefed then sent on their way. For more complex situations where multiple responders are needed, the details are passed off to a supervisor who will coordinate with the responders to ensure everything proceeds smoothly.

 

Once an operation is underway, Dispatch will connect the player in need with either the supervisor or incoming rescuer so they can provide further updates should the situation change while the rescuers are in-flight.

 

From here, Dispatch can then proceed to engage other players with their emergencies so that additional rescue teams may be dispatched in an orderly fashion with minimal time delay.

 

Dispatch is a role where a watchful eye on Discord is more useful than one in-game alongside the ability to organize during times of high volume. As testing moves into PVP and our inflow of calls increases to the point where a dedicated dispatcher is needed, I'm sure that our dispatch staff will find the role plenty engaging.

 

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One other tidbit of info. I was in talks with Kurock earlier today about an upcoming race organized by DICE at some point during the last test of October. I'm currently seeing how Eyes & Ears can get involved but given my current hardware related problems (PSU is now RMA'ed) I'm not too entirely sure how things will play out. At a very minimum I hope to have some sort of advertising space.

 

Further details to come.

 

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That's all for now, until next time, fly safe everyone!

 

- DarkHorizon

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  • 2 weeks later...

Weekly Update - Sept 24th
 

 

No Jack isn't back in DU form, but when speed is key and you need help ASAP, Eyes & Ears is here for you 24 hours a day (in the future!). It also happens that our 24th rescue so I thought all of this tied in real well with the video.  -_-

 

Testing started out fairly slow this go-around with me mostly working on coloring up a small construct from plain black to an assortment of red stripes, minor blue accents. All this ontop of a white base with black at the nose and tail of the construct, with a bit of a personal touch to make things hopefully recognizable to anyone familiar, yet subtlety different. My inspiration mostly came from US Coast Guard helicopters which you can view in the following images. 1 2

 

For those of you that have seen it in person, the layout might be a bit funky, but it's all for weight distribution purposes, trust me! Still not sure if that's an actual thing, but my pre-alpha experiences were 'fun' enough to convince me that it is such.

 

Rear Thrust > Passengers > Fuel > Vertical Engines > Cockpit

 

I'd love to share a picture of this very simple construct (now colored!) but unfortnuately the NDA prevents me from doing such. Perhaps you should head on over and purchase a pack from NovaQuark if you're so intent to see it in person? ;)

 

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Enough about me, lets get on with this weeks past two rescues:

 

Our first Novean, @Pwnst4r found himself stuck on Thades. Still relatively new, a combination of inadequate vertical engines and fuel mismanagement led to their situation. While one of our rescuers was up to the job, their four hour journey would have proven too time consuming for me to accept. With my position being closer, I flew out with a supply of fuel and after a rougher than intended landing, Pwnst4r was off.

 

The second Novean left Alioth but forgot to put space brakes on. Faced with crashing into their destination or force re-spawning, they choose the latter. This, however, left them unable to retrieve their ship from deep space. With no alternative and no one from NovaQuark on hand to handle the situation, a member of Eyes & Ears stepped up and flew the player out to their craft which secured our 24th rescue.

 

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With regards to the upcoming race I have a few things I'd just like to mention real quick.

 

@Kurock visited my place at District Lag 1 and we advanced further discussions previously had in Discord. For starters, the race will be a double sprint from Alioth, to a checkpoint on one of it's moons where racers will verify themselves through currently undisclosed means, then back again to the starting point. I've purposed the idea of Eyes & Ears setting up a fueling station, nothing too complex, just a couple dozen decorative fuel tanks. No convenience store or canopy and pumps like modern stations so racers will have a very easy time coming and going from this checkpoint without fear of crashing or landing unevenly.

 

I have yet to decide if this station will be comprised of dispensers or if it will have an actual "pit crew" with which racers can refuel and repair at, it's something I'll be talking with the rest of the Eyes & Ears team about.. Some ideas were thrown around DICE about prizes for the player with the least damage to their construct. You know what that means, no uncontrolled descent through the atmosphere or crashing through the finish line. Considering the numbers I've seen thrown up from various organizations, potential winners have the chance to rake in several million quanta for top prizes. A bonus for a clean finish only sweetens the deal.

 

@Haunty has thrown their hat in the ring and will be representing Eyes & Ears in a surprise twist that I had forgotten to mention last week. While Eyes & Ears as an organization isn't seeking fame or fortune with this event, we do seek more community involvement through in-game events such as this, alongside my weekly updates here in this thread.

 

We wish him and all the other racers the best of luck and if you ever run out of fuel or scrap, you know who to call!

 

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Finally a few brief things might be added onto the website. I'll discuss those with the team and let you all know when we're ready to present the changes.

 

A slightly new logo might also be in the works! It's a minor addition to the current logo/banner but it's a change nonetheless. These will also be run by the team before presentation.

 

That's all for now, until next time, fly safe everyone!

 

- DarkHorizon

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Weekly Update - Sept 30th
 

No rescues were made this test so that allowed me to work more on ship design.

 

The small (core) craft that I mentioned previously, it will have a medium (core) mothership that also serves as a bulk fuel transport with over... 600L of fuel storage? I think it was 20 medium tanks and 2 large tanks apiece for both space and atmospheric fuel, so if you know the numbers, you do the math. I added some small fuel tanks because round numbers are nice.

 

This craft was originally devised in Alpha 1 testing as I was looking into future game play of larger ships needing resupply where three small tanks and half a medium simply wouldn't do. After the original concept was created and I realized I had a large empty upper deck that I didn't know what to do with, I decided to turn it into a storage space to launch and stow the smaller rescue craft mentioned in last weeks test. This of course increased the size considerably, but I feel like it will prove useful further down the line, especially in more crowded areas and cities. I'm also considering a second version of this craft which is simply the one deck for fuel and maybe a small living quarters.

 

After recoloring the entire craft with a base white, I took to more real life inspiration for my design. On the back left and right third of the local fire trucks I noticed upward diagonal patterns in a yellow/red banded color. With an easy, flat backside on my construct, it was a logical place to start. While I decided to invert with the bands converging downwards instead of upwards, I may change this in the future but for the sake of different yet familiar, I'm sticking with it. 

 

With this out of the way, I decided to do some work on the sides with a red trimmed Z stripe that is present on various emergency craft. Since we're dealing with space, it's an added spot for illumination and a glass covering. Prior to adding lights, I pondered just leaving a gap exposing the internally alternating space and atmospheric fuel tanks. The jury is still out on this as to which I like more so I'm open to community input.

Inspiration: 1 2 3

 

Given the width of the small rescue craft in the upper deck, the construct is divided into two separate decks; the upper being wider and slightly taller, while the lower is narrower from the front and lower. With the doors underneath the bridge, both aligned to the center, and the top being non applicable to design since it serves as the small constructs service entrance, the construct is broken up into eight zones. Stern, lower/upper port and starboard sides, left and right bow sections, and the 'neck' area between the bridge and upper decks hull.

 

With the rear and lower starboard (soon port) faces featuring designs, I'll be working more on the remaining faces and further working on the interior.

 

----------

 

The entire construct for the most part is very heavily in its initial design phase. From there I'll be working on creating enough fuel to fill all the tanks (donations always accepted!) so I know how much in the way of engines I need unless I actually decide to whip out a calculator and math the whole thing. Then from there will come the flight testing.

 

I'm not concerned at all about the smaller construct, if anything, I'm waiting on new elements...

Spoiler
 
 
 
 
Spoiler

Rotating engines when?

... before I decide to make any serious changes to this particular construct as element size, engine power and other variables require.

 

While the larger construct is now taking priority, I already have an idea for a space only, large (core) fuel transporter that would work in low or zero gravity environments. With no need for atmospheric engines, I can stick more fuel on board. As this idea is still way off (probably late A2 early A3), I'll leave that for a future discussion.

 

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In the non-testing space, I'm hoping to have some meetings with the team this Saturday. In-game +/or over discord will be great. Of the four that have given me times, I'll be seeing two members around the same time, potentially a third if they're available. While two others will be entirely separate and most likely one on one discussions.

 

I have yet to throw out any formal agenda, but points of discussion will again be logo additions, and some additions to the website.

 

Anyways, I hope you enjoyed this description of my activities this past test regarding Eyes & Ears. If you have any content suggestions, I'm always open to hearing them.

 

That's all for now, until next time, fly safe everyone!

 

- DarkHorizon

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Weekly Update - Oct 7th

 

With one rescue made over the course of this recent test, Eyes & Ears has secured its 25th rescue

 

Perhaps it was luck that more rescues didn't need to be made this weekend! Due to a bit of admittedly poor planning on my part, a meeting that was intended for the test prior was held over the course of this test where our members availability was more conducive to allow us all to meet at one place in-game and at the same time at our base in District 1.

 

Our agenda (link) which was initially focused on only a few topics that I expected to take no more than 15 minutes quickly expanded and ended up taking over an hour in-between questions and what I think was some productive discussion about various topics. I ended up getting some good, actionable feedback which I will be working on over the course of time as my empty time allows. I'm already bubbling with ideas and have even written some of the good ones down for future work.

 

Among some of the changes or additions you can expect:

  • A slightly modified look to our current logo and banner in favor of something a touch more recognizable with our real world counterparts.
  • A few updates to our website:
    • The 'About Us' page will see the introduction of a manifesto, charter, and a list of values held by Eyes & Ears.
      • This may get an entirely separate page, I will be discussing things further with my team.
    • Our Mission will be expanded upon.
  • A PDF file which we will distribute to those who call upon us with best practices so they need not call us again, or at the very least, as frequently!
  • Additional graphics in our Description tab on the community website
  • More media created from with in Eyes & Ears

Finally, after gathering input, our website itself will be undergoing some minor changes. With a focus on speed and responsiveness, I dialed back some features of my website like parallax images (archive) in favor of static ones like which you see in our current design. These features and more will be returning in a future iteration as all members that I had interviewed said that they were more than happy to wait a second or two longer (in my testing) for more design elements over the purely static website of today and will announce when these changes roll out.

 

Encouraged with this meeting, I'm already planning a second and already have a list of things I want to ask in my head.

 

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@Ardes refueled a dried up Novean with a quick spot of fuel on the far side of Alioth where civilization is perhaps more sparse.

 

With this Sunday rescue being the only interesting activity aside from the meeting, coding took up the greater bulk of the rest of testing. One of our members in collaboration with a partner cooked up some LUA that allows us to switch between two images at the press of a single button.

 

For Eyes & Ears this purpose is quite clear. It allows us to alternate our banner image between an emergency and non-emergency state. If only I could share this with you all! Flashing lights are next on the menu.

 

----------

 

Three new members were added in an unprecedented time frame over the course of the test!

 

A big welcome to:

@Annabella - Rescuer

@JackTricolor - Rescuer, Dispatch, Supplies Manager 

@maxamized - Rescuer, Pilot

 

JackTricolor receives a small bit of praise for having joined only a day prior to our meeting. By all accounts he stumbled into our meeting in voice chat even though he was not on our schedule and immediately started participating. I like this get-up-and-go so a round of applause for them.

 

----------

 

Always open to content suggestions as usual.

 

 

That's all for now, until next time, fly safe everyone!

 

- DarkHorizon

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Weekly Update - Oct 14th

 

4 rescues during one testing weekend. This is so far the most rescues we've made over any one testing phase which brings our Alpha 2 total up to 15 and our total rescues to 29.

 

This is also a somewhat special event seeing as we have now surpassed our number of rescues made during the Alpha 1 stage, 14. Congratulations to all members of our team who have taken part in helping people in the testing process. While our impact may be small, we sincerely hope it's meaningful. Now, lets get on with those rescues!

 

----------

 

Haunty started out Friday morning flying alongside @WhiteMEat in assisting them move two XS constructs from Teoma to Madis on a lengthy three hour journey. These constructs WhiteMEat described as "priceless" made the journey safe and sound to their destination which completed rescue 25.

 

@Annabella marked their first recorded rescue on Saturday when @Rabbyte overshot his destination, the planet Symeon. One fuel run later, rescue 26 was completed and you can view their feedback included further down the post.

 

Later that day and quietly beside myself, I got a call for help in general chat by @mghtyred after they had run out of fuel away from home. Fifteen minutes later they were on their way.

 

Finally on Sunday I had assisted @Phyzic who, after encountering a sudden problem six kilometers above ground, ejected and found themselves suddenly separated from everything they had created since they had started testing. There's a saying around the Dual Universe Discord, you can always tell who is new to the testing experience, with elements stacked on elements, Phyzic proved no different. Not being outfitted for hovering in low orbit, we had to return to Base Alpha at District 1 to refit for two vertical engines and stow some additional fuel. 

 

We flew up to where the construct was and while some might think that the hard part was done, not quite! The way the small rescue vessel is designed is so that a fuel bay door and a rear crew door automatically close once the construct detects no surface a short distance beneath it, think of it as a safety measure against jumpers...

 

tumblr_mbylreZ9nZ1qz9wlpo1_500.gif

 

Having not foreseen this ahead of time since previous times players have just rode on top, with no way to open up the doors from the cockpit unless I exited and performed some acrobatics which surely would send us both plummeting, we elected to land while I coded this oversight into oblivion.

 

With doors that now open from the cockpit, Phyzic was able to make a short leap to his construct and maneuver it safely to the ground which rounded out the test and our 29th rescue.

 

----------

 

Here's the feedback that was obtained over the course of this last test!

 

Spoiler
 
 
 
 
Quote

I made a request for a tow. I had three xs ships on Teoma, and needed them all taken to Madis. We were unable to dock the ships but luckily E&E was able to get enough people to help fuel and fly back the three priceless xs ships over two hours away.

 

Thanks Eyes & Ears!

- WhiteMEat

Quote

Annabella came to my aid all the way out at Symeon. I had overshot the planet, and burned my remaining fuel returning to the planet with minimal fuel in reserve to make it back from Teoma once I left. It would have been impossible to refuel once I got planet-side.

 

Thanks to Eyes and Ears, my friend will get to rejoin our group on Teoma.

- rabbyte

Quote

Excellent service!! I had a broken down ship in low orbit, that required some tricky maneuvering to repossess. Your representative DarkHorizon came to my aid in a matter of minutes and even retooled his rescue vessel for the job at hand, providing a safe and expedient recovery. 

 

Thank you E&E, and thank you DarkHorizon. 

- Phyzic

 

 

----------

 

Outside of rescues, much of this test was spent looking at code. With the assistance of a private individual, a few minor yet very useful improvements were made to the small rescue craft. The starboard side of the craft features dual screens which sport an animated GIF of the Eyes & Ears banner (thanks again @Geo!). To increase the sense of role-play, this banner can be toggled to an alert styled animation designed by @Spiridon with the press of a key-combo.

 

- Flashing lights warning -

 

Spoiler

Siren_.gif

 

A bit more work was required to transfer this from a single sign element to two split screens of comparable size, but I think the noticeable definition upgrade is worth it in the end.

 

Vertically positioned engines can be used to easily give constructs vertical take-off and landing capability as opposed to needing a long stretch of runway to takeoff and land, or enough brakes to stop on a dime. While very handy, they can act like driving a car with a missing gas cap and waste precious fuel which is not only expensive, but can cut down on critical operating range. With the help of the same individual, the status of VTOL engines are now displayed on the HUD! I'm hoping to have something similar to this show the state of gears, doors, and even flashing lights on the hulls exterior to give it more of that emergency response look. All of this will come in due time.

 

Speaking of the HUD, I scraped up some code off the DU Discord and after some tinkering, all my fuel gauges are off to one side, while everything else is off to the other side. Orderliness demands it!

 

I can't wait to see what other possibilities in Lua await us for the future. I've seen some of the things people are working on, both in person and through shared pictures and videos. It's all very much exciting.

 

----------

 

And finally wrapping things up, a group contacted me during the test about a potential future partnership. Things are still shifting around but I can't wait to see what they bring to the table. No details for now so keep an ear to the ground!

 

That's all for now, until next time, fly safe everyone!

 

- DarkHorizon

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  • 2 weeks later...

Weekly Update - Oct 28th

 

This will be a relatively thin update compared to past updates. No new rescues were made and aside from resource extracting I didn't do anything worth discussing.

 

Most of this past test was done in preparation for this coming weeks test. The main spectacle as you all know will be the upcoming DICE race, scheduled for November 2nd. I wasn't able to complete as much as I had hoped to but I suppose it will have to do.

 

As far as the future is concerned, I've floated the idea for another team meeting at some point during the next test, both in-game and through Discord.

 

Our previous meeting we had on October fifth went well and I've already implemented some suggestions that were pushed forward by the team. Some of these changes will be previewed in our next agenda while a few new things will come up including: 

  • The upcoming DICE Race
  • A preview of the changes to the logo that was pushed during the previous meeting
  • A list of values held by our organization
  • Ideas for a PDF to distribute to those we help and post publicly in the forums

This is of course preliminary and will be expanded upon as the week progresses.

 

That's all for now, until next time, fly safe everyone!

 

- DarkHorizon

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  • 2 weeks later...

Weekly Update - Nov 4th

 

Apologies for the delay in my usual weekly update. A combination of real life work and a poor mood on Monday and Tuesday respectively restrained me from my usual posting.

 

Four rescues during this testing period raises our Alpha 2 count up to 19 and our total rescues to 33.

 

Haunty carried out the first two rescues to kickoff Friday. The first being a fuel run to the new spaceman @Emyrs1701 who encountered a few problems on their way back from Teoma and ran out of fuel. A two hour journey into the black void was all it took before they were on their way back home.

 

With a fancy jetpack strapped to their back, players can effortlessly EVA around or in-between constructs, or just float off aimlessly into space as one @sadmandono accidentally did. Haunty was able to pick them up a few hours after their previous rescue and expedite a return to their craft. This concluded the days rescues 30 and 31.

 

A mishap on Sunday afternoon found myself picking up @Madrummer after they also got separated from their construct in space. With the position I found them in on Alioth in relation to their construct all the way on the other side of the planet, I took an easier half orbital route around Alioth and expended a minimal amount of fuel to fly the short 2 SU distance where a successful recovery was made to conclude rescue 32.

 

Finally, as the test was wrapping up on Monday morning, Annabella assisted a new player who got trapped in space (yes, this is possible) on a friends construct. After providing some more technical assistance, they were able to respawn back on Alioth, and so capped off rescue 33.

 

-----

 

On the second of this month, @Haunty claimed 6th place in a race hosted by the DICE organization in his construct named "Scrambulance" among . Congratulations for the great showing!

 

This race started and ended on Alioth, and featured a checkpoint where racers had to land in a designated zone to get a secret number before returning back to the finish line to claim their place in the rankings. Reading in a correct secret number would cement their position among the pack of twenty. An incorrect number on the other hand...  nobody knows. :ph34r:

 

Three additional prizes were given out:

The best looking ship which was a Halloween themed human skull created by @helvetian.  :o

The best crash at the start / finish line was awarded to @Grimmethy.  B)

A random prize was given out to @Dhara.  ;)

 

Congrats to everyone who was involved. The success of this event excites me greatly for the future.

 

-----

 

Aside from all this, I did put a small dent in my medium fuel transport after a bit of thoughtfulness. With some ingenuity I've been able to boost the fuel carrying capacity and even add on some storage room to boot. This particular construct, as mentioned in a previous post, has been sitting largely unfinished for months now, it's really about time I start working on it. -_-

 

Still batting around an idea for that large fuel transporter I was talking about a few posts ago. I can't wait to start working on it.

 

That's all for now, until next time, fly safe everyone!

 

- DarkHorizon

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Weekly Update - Nov 11th

 

Two rescues were made this test, that's 21 rescues for Alpha 2 and 35 overall!

 

I took off on Friday evening to transport @Kasper_DU from the North Pole to a marketplace where they were subsequently picked up by their organization. Having quickly fulfilled the request and needing no further assistance, I returned home and marked down rescue 33.

 

Annabella secured the second rescue as the test was ending. Lowly space traveler @Redneckwombat got stuck in the black void between Lacobus on their way to Alioth due to computer problems. With some real world technical support and a fuel resupply, Anna helped the player fix a problem for them both in, and out of the test environment. That's what I call a team player, and a lock on rescue 34.  B)

 

----------

 

Not a whole lot happened this test on my side of things. Work was mostly done on the fuel transporter which to me doesn't feel like much progress was made, but I'll let you be the judge of that.

 

Starting out with the main feature being the raising of the landing platform in the docking bay allowed for some additional room for fuel storage in the storage deck. Seven medium space tanks and six medium atmospheric tanks were added while the large tanks and their carrying cages were raised higher up where the ceiling used to be.

 

I threw on some screens  by each tank, hopefully sooner or later I can implement some proper Lua gauges but that will require a bit of coding. I'll also have a master gauge that will combine all the fuel tanks for the construct on one screen. This will help make things more at a glance instead of needing to whip out your tool and check each tank individually. For those of you that have never looked into it or implemented someone else's code, Lua can up your game a fair bit so I'd strongly suggest at least looking into it!

 

Container storage space that was formerly at the back of the constructs fuel bay is extended to the front of the docking bay and only a short walk from the bridge.

 

The bridge itself is currently designed to seat only a single person with full ~200 degree view from side to side as well as ~30 degrees down and ~80 degrees up. I might just expand this head and neck of sorts to more of a wide bridge section for a small three to four person crew that's more or less the width of the craft.

 

Texture was added to the floors while depth was added to the now four voxel thick walls around the windows. A bit of black and white contrast was added to the boarders around the windows and along the baseboards meanwhile some lighting elements were either tucked into the walls or extended over walkways for optimal brightness.

 

It was here that I had realized that I didn't have a lot of design skill so I went out and had a look around at what people had created in times past for a bit of personal inspiration. While I still believe in function over form, I'm trying to come up with some utilitarian design ideas but just not coming up with any at the moment. I'll have to look around for some real life examples, perhaps that can kick something into action. Perhaps instead of voxels, more elements?

 

----------

 

With all the work on the interior, the exterior hull got very little love. What I did get done, however, was mounting some engines, vertical ones in particular.

 

With 55 medium plus 4 large tanks, an awful bit of fuel will require an awful dozen engines or so. Aside from two large engines, several medium ones were also placed on either flank of the craft with some initial and rudimentary support structure for one. Final placement is of course up for debate as they don't in any way appear structurally sound so I might just lower their placement and design around it.

 

----------

 

Finally as far as the Lua front goes, aside from fuel tank gauges, I'm planning on also implementing @Melvin 's artificial horizon script which I sadly didn't get to play with since I was too engrossed in design.

 

That's all for now, until next time, fly safe everyone!

 

- DarkHorizon

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On 11/6/2019 at 12:50 PM, DarkHorizon said:

Apologies for the delay in my usual weekly update. A combination of real life work and a poor mood on Monday and Tuesday respectively restrained me from my usual posting.

 

Four rescues during this testing period raises our Alpha 2 count up to 19 and our total rescues to 33.

 

Haunty carried out the first two rescues to kickoff Friday. The first being a fuel run to the new spaceman @Emyrs1701 who encountered a few problems on their way back from Teoma and ran out of fuel. A two hour journey into the black void was all it took before they were on their way back home.

 

With a fancy jetpack strapped to their back, players can effortlessly EVA around or in-between constructs, or just float off aimlessly into space as one @sadmandono accidentally did. Haunty was able to pick them up a few hours after their previous rescue and expedite a return to their craft. This concluded the days rescues 30 and 31.

 

A mishap on Sunday afternoon found myself picking up @Madrummer after they also got separated from their construct in space. With the position I found them in on Alioth in relation to their construct all the way on the other side of the planet, I took an easier half orbital route around Alioth and expended a minimal amount of fuel to fly the short 2 SU distance where a successful recovery was made to conclude rescue 32.

 

Finally, as the test was wrapping up on Monday morning, Annabella assisted a new player who got trapped in space (yes, this is possible) on a friends construct. After providing some more technical assistance, they were able to respawn back on Alioth, and so capped off rescue 33.

 

-----

 

On the second of this month, @Haunty claimed 6th place in a race hosted by the DICE organization in his construct named "Scrambulance" among . Congratulations for the great showing!

 

This race started and ended on Alioth, and featured a checkpoint where racers had to land in a designated zone to get a secret number before returning back to the finish line to claim their place in the rankings. Reading in a correct secret number would cement their position among the pack of twenty. An incorrect number on the other hand...  nobody knows. :ph34r:

 

Three additional prizes were given out:

The best looking ship which was a Halloween themed human skull created by @helvetian.  :o

The best crash at the start / finish line was awarded to @Grimmethy.  B)

A random prize was given out to @Dhara.  ;)

 

Congrats to everyone who was involved. The success of this event excites me greatly for the future.

 

-----

 

Aside from all this, I did put a small dent in my medium fuel transport after a bit of thoughtfulness. With some ingenuity I've been able to boost the fuel carrying capacity and even add on some storage room to boot. This particular construct, as mentioned in a previous post, has been sitting largely unfinished for months now, it's really about time I start working on it. -_-

 

Still batting around an idea for that large fuel transporter I was talking about a few posts ago. I can't wait to start working on it.

 

That's all for now, until next time, fly safe everyone!

 

- DarkHorizon

Don't forget to mention I showed you a new trick on how to right-click in chat to set coordinates ?

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  • 2 weeks later...

Weekly Update - Nov 25th

 

One rescue was made this test, that's 22 rescues for Alpha 2, and 36 overall.

 

Annabella made the fourth (27, 33, 35, 36) and final rescue of their career on Saturday. @Sigtyr 's construct had a breakdown near one of the markets, after making some repairs they were back in business again.

 

We wish them all the luck outside of Dual Universe.  ;)

 

----------

 

Bugs, don't you hate them?

 

What should have been a simple trip from Alioth to Sicari where one round trip could have been completed in a gaming session turned into a day long excursion. I can't go into detail about the bugs but lets just say I had to make three trips instead of one. Not the best experience, but what can I say, it's alpha.

 

The rest of the time was spent on design elements around the fuel hauler. A bit of color and new materials were added to it's largely white canvas of a hull. Couldn't figure out how to make it visually distinctive from the small transport that can dock inside of it so I opted to go with a somewhat similar color layout. I'll work on it a bit more next week and we'll see how that turns out. I've been really leaning into the gallery for some inspiration to jump start this brain of mine but for the past few weeks, it just isn't happening.

 

I'm thinking about taking some adventure over the test this long holiday weekend (at least for us americans), but for now, the drought persists. :(

 

----------

 

Finally, work on updating the website is wrapping up. All that remains is interlinking all the pages together, some touch-ups, spellchecking everything (if you spot anything, let me know!), then finally having my team preview it to gather their suggestions for any additions before publishing it live.

 

That's all for now, until next time, fly safe everyone!

 

- DarkHorizon

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Weekly Update - December 2nd

 

Five rescues were made this test, this is the new highest number of rescues made in one session since breaking four on the week of October the 14th. This brings our total to 27 rescues for Alpha 2, and 41 rescues overall! With only a month to go, only nine more rescues until we crack 50 total, which I think is a very achievable number to cap off 2019! I'm not asking you guys to crash into the moon so we can get some arbitrary number, or am I?  :D

 

---------

 

The first rescue of this test was also one of our newest members of the team! While on my usual watch I had spotted @Rok in the 911 channel in the middle of his first unsanctioned refueling mission. After assisting @FU3GO out in the black sea near Madis, we had a bit of discussion and I brought up the organization which he promptly decided to join during the flight back home.

 

Haunty went out for the 38th rescue to transport @archerer8791 back to their camp.

 

I myself went out on back to back missions, first to transport @LISPYxLUNA to a far off construct, they then the followed me around as I picked up another player and dropped them off at their mining site to cap rescues 39 and 40 respectively.

 

@Flamm made their first rescue during the Alioth Aerospace Expo which was held this weekend at Objective Driveyards base on Alioth. @Kasper_DU was supplied with a fair 2000L of fuel.

 

----------

 

In the downtime I put in a fair bit of work on the medium hauler over the course of this test. The single person 'bubble' cockpit was replaced with a three person bridge. Mind you're head since headspace is somewhat limited. This combined with the cockpits distance from the windows in favor of a viewing port to the ground necessitated lowering the windows, so feel free to either crouch, or go out to the launching bay if you want a good upward viewing angle. This is somewhat by design given more or less the function over form utilitarian feel that I'm starting to go for.

 

A new crew compartment is situated in-between the bridge and launch bay with seats for a tight group of twenty with ample leg room unlike most real life coach flights! Aside from a couple of windows into the launching bay, doors in and out of either the bridge or bay, and some screens which I'll put to future use, nothing all that special here. The voxels didn't exactly turn out as clean as I'd like, but the game is still a work in progress.

 

Finally, as the test was wrapping up, I painted the entire front section black, in line with the small transport that the hauler was designed to carry in its bay.

 

Of special note, on Sunday, I had a small stroke of genius. Normally, if the game is having an issue and you end up getting respawned, it's at the north pole of Alioth. It's here where I've positioned what I like to think of as a storm shelter of sorts, in particular I was thinking of a blizzard given the environment. Aside from some signage that details out a few things and a couple of fuel tanks for those who'd like to donate fuel, a second floor was added with accommodations to make it a sort of living space and less gloomy. A bed, a desk, a TV with no reception, and a keyboard with an attached screen with a few words on it's display. No facilities, if you gotta go, go outside and don't stink up the place. Exposed roof access is available giving you views of the scenery and a great place to watch for our rescue team on those crystal clear nights.

 

Above all this shelter serves as a means for other people to call on us for transport to some location on Alioth. It's one of those 'nice to haves that you never want to use' sort of thing, so if you get stuck up in the snowy white, you know who to call!

 

----------

 

I hear that the Alioth Areospace Expo was quite the thing. It sucks that I missed it because those pictures that were taken of the event look quite great, hopefully I can attend and run around next year. I wasn't entirely inclined to stop by because the last event that was held, the DICE race to the moon and back, lets just say my computer wasn't up to spec to handle it. So, in spite of this, I may or may not have purchased me a ryzen 37x and gigabyte x570 for today, cyber Monday. I should have the two parts in time before the next test which I'm sure NQ is keen for feedback on. Before you say anything, no, I didn't make this purchase because of the event. It's something I've had on my mind since earlier this year, finally pulled the trigger on the main two components. Cant wait!

 

---------

 

Finally, I wrapped up work on the website and have pushed it to the public. It's mostly the same thing aside from a few additions of various design elements, and some new odds and ends like our mission, a manifesto, and a charter on the About Us page, the new Sponsors page, some solid stats and additional stories of survival on our Stats & Stories page, and added more of Eyes & Ears history to its Our History page. The Index page has been condensed down to lower the amount of scrolling needed and as a matter of fact, I did that as a part of the overhaul in general. Paragraphs were split up into blocks to increase readability and breakdown walls of paragraphs.

 

Aside from a bit of rewording of some other phrases throughout the site, that should about cover everything major. I might push out a few smaller things but those would be largely inconsequential overall.

 

The banner image at the top I'm still looking at. It's not as much of a work in progress as before, it's actually something I could publish right now, but its something I'm still thinking about.

 

That's all for now, until next time, fly safe everyone!

 

- DarkHorizon

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I love this!    Not sure what discounts I could offer on my non existent equity trades.   I could bestow the occasional Knighthood though, on whom ever rides the rescue steeds.  

 

Have you considered branching out into tutoring?    May need help learning about life, the Universe and everything.  

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8 hours ago, Her Royal Highness Starslyder said:

Have you considered branching out into tutoring?    May need help learning about life, the Universe and everything.  

Tutoring in general is not something that has been or is currently being considered as it currently isn't in the organizations purview. Maybe for some dedicated organization or group with a lot of members, but not us. We will teach members the basics of Dual Universe, should they be new, along with the ins and outs of our organization. Aside from that, in the future I will also be adding an additional page to my website consisting of best practices to observe so your risk of needing our services are greatly lessened.

 

I know what you're thinking about that last part, we're just like any real life emergency service provider. Nice to have, but something you don't want to need.

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