I am pleased to give my first State of the Community address as President of The Last Outpost. I congratulate you all on being elected Senators in TLO’s new leadership system. These next few months will be critical as we work together to bring this system from paper to reality. There will no doubt be several times where situations will pop up where we’ll have to determine what precedent we’ll set in the future—and I look forward to working with you all to make sure that we maintain a proper balance between both the executive and the legislative.

This is an exciting time for TLO. When Veritas, Klaw, Telex, and I formed TLO in June of 2010, we had no idea that it would become such a success, nor did we envision that TLO would be involved in 5 games. New opportunities bring new challenges, and TLO has always met these challenges, and adapted itself when needed. We’ve made a lot of adaptations recently, and I’m confident these adaptations will allow TLO to continue to thrive and grow throughout the gaming community.

The community as a whole is very strong at the moment. We have many enthusiastic individuals at all levels of the community working hard to contribute in various areas.

RPG-X continues to thrive and to be our strongest division, and its SRPs are flourishing. We remain the most active RPG-X server, and our members represent almost the entirety of the English-speaking RPG-X community. I look forward to working with the RPG-X leadership team on keeping up this reputation, and will work with them on how we might be able to better advertise RPGXCE to bring in new recruits to the RPG-X community and TLO.

The STO division has encountered problems as of late due to high leadership turnover and a lack of new recruits. With the sudden departure of Eris, the division is really at a difficult point. I know we do have a fair number of members who play STO frequently; however, the division needs a strong leader with a strong vision. The division also needs to focus on recruitment, and member retention. The STO division needs the most work out of all of our games; however, I do believe it to be salvageable. With the right person at the helm, I believe the division can become much more active in the future. The new Senate will no doubt have to make a call about whether or not STO should remain a division or be demoted to a sub-division. I will stand by whatever call the Senate makes here, but if STO is reduced to a sub-division, I suggest to the Senate to keep the goals above in mind for STO, and to do everything possible to see that STO receives the attention it needs so that it might be able to return to division status in the future—if this is the path that is taken.

The Minecraft sub-division has been the great success story of our push into new games. The Minecraft server is always well-populated, and a great number of our members spend a lot of time in this unique game. xHellfire has proven to be an excellent leader for this division, and much of the credit for the success of this sub-division goes to him, and I would like to thank him for his hard work! I hope that the Senate will seriously evaluate the possibility of elevating the Minecraft sub-division to a full division within TLO. I will be happy to sign any such measure coming from the Senate.

Both Armada 2 and BC are doing as expected. Although they aren’t ready to be raised to division status, they have a respectable number of members playing each game, and are both healthy sub-divisions. I will be working with the BC and A2 coordinators to foster continued events for both of these games, as well as looking into seeing how we can go about recruitment in both of these games. I look forward to seeing what we can do.

Overall, we are doing quite well gaming wise, and I look forward to seeing our sub-divisions grow further. I also hope that the Senate will be open to expanding into further games, if there is sufficient interest from the members. I believe the central thing we need to focus on moving forward in our divisions and sub-divisions is recruitment—especially in STO and in our sub-divisions. Now that we have built a foundation in these sub-divisions (and for STO, have a larger base to draw from with F2P), it’s important on us to bring in new members to help sustain continued growth in these games and for TLO as a whole. I will be asking all game commanders to look into ways that they can bring in new recruits for their divisions, and I look forward to working with the Senate on this matter as well.

Finally, turning back more towards TLO as a whole, I believe that we need to embrace the ability of this new leadership system to bring in new levels of transparency. I urge the Senate to pass new transparency measures that allow for both executive and legislative actions to be disclosed to members, with a few exceptions in sensitive areas such as discipline and promotions. I will be happy to sign any measure that comes from the Senate that increases transparency, and I look forward to working with you soon to see how we can accomplish this.

I look forward to seeing what the next few months bring us, and I’m confident that TLO will continue to move forward and grow as a community. I look forward to working with the Senate, the Game Commanders, and all of the members. As always, my door is always open for any questions, comments, or concerns you may have, and I hope you all won’t hesitate to contact me with any ideas you may have for making this community even better.

Signed,

President of the Last Outpost

Andzzy
Central Plexus
Griffiths
Grizz
Klaw
Nancy Turton
Veritas

Congratulations to all those who have been elected to the Senate! Stay tuned for more information about Senate Assignments. The Speaker of the Senate, once elected, will be making determinations about what Senate Assignments will look like, and who will have what assignment.

Server Status

This hopefully, will be the last time we update you on the “situation” we’ve been having on the servers which started back in early November. Veritas has worked extra hard, and put in a plethora of hours working on the servers with multiple VPS companies trying to solve the issues we’ve been having. We have finally come to a solution it seems, and found a very capable, and dependable host – Virpus! Virpus has not only proved to be a reliable host for our RPG-X servers, but they’ve also saved, and will continue to save us money.

Throughout the entire server ordeal, the Council voted to start up emergency backup Linode Servers, which while much more expensive, are very reliable. This bought the time needed to find Virpus, though it did drain our reserves slightly more than usual. (See the “Financial Report” for more information!)

Though we’re fairly certain you shouldn’t experience anymore issues, if you do, please post in our Engineering Forum, or contact our Technical Head, Veritas, via whatever way you prefer. (All those ways can be found in his profile!)

Financial Report

There was only one donation for the month of December – $19.62 from Griffiths. Thanks Griff! As a reminder, due to costs incurred in previous months, we’ve had to make far more expenditures in November and December than we generally do. This shouldn’t continue into the new year, however, we really appreciate any support given.

Financial information at a glance:

Our current balance is $153.22 USD
Costs this month were $37.62 USD ($15.00 servers + $19.62 backup servers + $3 webhosting)
Costs from January forward should be roughly $18.00 per month.

We currently have enough standing funds to operate for another eight months, or another three months without going significantly below $100 in funds. We are still waiting on a refund from a failed hosting provider, and will keep you updated.

Thanks again to all who have donated – we appreciate your support!

Divisional Updates

With the server situation resolved, RPG-X activity has boosted on the servers and returned to its normal level! Star Trek: Apocalypse is scheduled to debut January 14th with Episode 1: “These are the Voyages…”! Star Trek: Frontlines continues with its usual level of popularity among TLO! (Grizz is even willing to skip Sherlock Series 2 to attend!!) Lastly, the next scheduled episode of Star Trek: Dauntless is scheduled for January 6th, sure to be a hit no doubt. Oh! Gametracker now correctly displays the server statuses on the site!

The STO Division continues to move forward, looking forward to F2P, when it’s expected a great number of new members will flood in. Griffiths’ Marvelous Costume Contest concluded just a week ago, with Pupbenny winning, congratulations Pupbenny! Stay on the lookout for new members, and lots more events as F2P rolls in, and the STO Division grows stronger than ever!

Looking to the Future
As you’ve all seen, TLO will be moving into Star Wars: The Old Republic, Star Trek: Armada II, Star Trek: Elite Force 2, and Minecraft! The Council is looking for sub-division coordinators, so be sure to apply! For more information, see these threads: http://last-outpost.net/forum/viewforum.php?f=36

TLO’s publication is still in progress, but will be finished soon! Be on the lookout for updates from Editor Nancy Turton!

As you may have read in the Council Meeting Minutes, the Council is working on a new Leadership plan. Please be aware we will be revealing this to you all soon (probably early February), and welcome your comments! We’ll be taking them then, and will edit our plan again before voting.

Thanks for reading, and Happy New Year!

Griffiths & The Council

Yes, it’s the most wonderful time of year, holiday season is upon us and The Last Outpost will be celebrating the end of another successful year on Saturday the 24th of December.

Join us for a line up of holiday roleplays on RPG-X, the winners of the Star Trek Online Division’s holiday uniform contest will be announced and the TLO Council will be giving their views on the past twelve months. The details of these events and more will be published throughout the week ahead, leading up the day itself.

So come, mark your calenders and be here (if you can) as we look back on what we have achieved and take time out to enjoy ourselves this coming holiday.

Or, if you would prefer, the Right Honorable Gentleman Councilor Griffiths IV will be hosting a tea party at his country retreat. <- that is a lie.

Hope to see you there. Happy Chrismahanakwanzica!

–Grizz

P. S. For members, TLO is currently running a poll to help us determine what games to support in the future! Vote now!

By popular demand, TLO is proud to introduce our TeamSpeak server, available now for your team-speaking convenience!

Connect to server.last-outpost.net (default port, no password) for general chatter, voice RP, and game discussion. Members can request access to members’ rooms and special areas by PMing a Council member who is on the TS server, or by contacting JohnF.

You can download TeamSpeak 3, the required client, from http://www.teamspeak.com/?page=downloads – it’s free, though you will need a microphone to take advantage of the voice features.

Please remember that TLO’s rules apply while on TeamSpeak, as much as they do while on the forums or server; breaking them can result in your being removed from the TS server, or in other punishmetns.

A massive thanks to JohnF, who took the time to get all of this setup for us! If you see him on TS, be sure to say thanks 

Hope to see you on TeamSpeak!

Veritas & the Council

Server Status Update

As many of you know, our servers began to experience prolonged downtime near the beginning of November, for reasons which were initially unknown. Despite our best efforts (which ultimately resulted in at least temporary resolution of the problem), we were unable to work with our then-server host to resolve the issue. As far as we can tell, the ultimate issue was related to their systems, not ours – after authorizing payment to another (more expensive but reliable) host, we had no success replicating the problem. In fact, we’ve been unable to replicate the issue on any of three separate providers whose services we have retained over the past month.

Therefore, we have switched server providers – as many of you have noted, our first choice didn’t work out as planned, and so we’ve had to continue paying our (expensive) backup provider while we searched for another which met our cost requirements. Fortunately, we appear to have found one, and they seem to be stable, though we are still in the testing phase (they host the TLO servers you are now seeing; as I have mentioned before, gametracker and other such services are NOT properly reporting this). If we are able to continue with our current choice, we should not face any further service interruptions, and our monthly costs will remain around $15 a month.

However, these issues have been a serious drain on our financial resources; we’ve incurred a great deal of cost in order to keep the servers running while working to find the source of these problems. However, we’re hopeful that this will not continue; we ask that if you have any issues, you report them in the engineering forum, or contact me (Veritas) via whichever means you prefer (all that info is on my profile).

Financial Report

Our only donation this month was $33 from Grizz (thanks Grizz!)

Financial information at a glance:

• Our current balance is $161.57 ($169.05 – $19.95 December emergency server payment + $12.47 refund owed) USD
• Costs this month were $56.57 USD ($12.95 server + $25.62 emergency server + $15.00 new server payment + $3 webhosting )
• Our emergency host, at limited capacity, is $19.95 a month; at the capacity required to support two RPG-X servers, $29.95 a month
• Our old host was $12.95 a month for 2-3 servers; our new host is $15 a month for 3-4 servers (based on RAM requirements and bandwidth/storage)
• On our current host, we have enough funds for 10 months, or 4 months without going under $100
• On our emergency host, we have enough funds for 8 months on the limited plan (3 months above $100), or 5 months on the higher plan (2 months above $100)

Our hope is to limit costs to $18 a month ($15 server + $3 webhosting) beginning in January 2012; unfortunately, December costs will be higher by at least $19.95 owing to the needs to continue having an emergency backup server online.

Thanks again to all who have donated – we appreciate your support!

Server Activity & Status Report (STO + RPG-X)

Unfortunately, the recent issues with providers has made it very difficult for us to gauge server activity, or push updates to the servers. Therefore, we have no activity information for this month (though we believe activity has decreased, probably due to the lack of GameTracker and reliable servers).

On the SRP front, Star Trek: Apocalpyse is preparing for its second episode (technically episode one of season one, excluding its pilot) and Star Trek: Frontlines continues next week with season two, episode six! Star Trek: Dauntless will be going on hiatus for the next month, and will resume in mid-january.

On STO, division leader Central Plexus reports, “While the division has been mired by delays and cancellations these past few weeks due to unexpected (and unfortunate) circumstances, we still look forward with confidence. Confidence that we will step up our recruitment efforts considerably before F2P hits, as well as organizing some new and exciting events for the membership over the next few months.” To learn more, see the statement issued by division XO Eris here.

What’s Coming Up

The TLO newsletter is striding towards publication – more on that coming soon!

Meet the Staff is our next upcoming event – stay tuned for that as well!

The Technical division is looking for a development assistant to help out with various projects; skills ranging from Teamspeak administration to web development are needed! Click here to learn more.

The Council would like to remind members that civility and respect in public discussions are absolutely required on our boards; this includes discussions in the TLO shoutbox. In addition, we would like to remind members that discipline incidents are considered to be confidential, and that while members are permitted to discuss discipline incidents involving them, we recommend against public complaining in the shoutbox or on the boards – it will NOT change anything.

As always, the Council invites TLO members to view Council meeting logs and voting records posted in the Disclosure Database. Members interested can view them there at any time, and all users are encouraged to contact us with questions or concerns regarding any aspect of TLO.

Thanks for reading, and happy RPing!

Veritas & The Council

There’s lots of change coming in the RPG-X division! With Banting on hiatus and Tipping Point cancelled, we are now holding a poll to fill our fourth SRP slot. RPG-X playing members are invited to vote here for their favorite out of our three exciting, member-submitted choices! The winning SRP will be commissioned to run officially on TLO’s servers.

The next Great Events Poll is almost upon us, so if you want to submit an event, you should do so by clicking here now! Your event will be voted on by the members, and possibly run on our servers! Get them in before Tuesday, November 8th.

Council Updates: Wrath of John, Staff Changes

The Council has voted to continue supporting TLO’s Wrath of John Unserious Server for the forseeable future. After just over a month in existence, it has become the second-highest-ranked RPG-X server (behind only TLO’s serious server), has reduced n00bing behaviors on the main server, and has played a large role in attracting dozens of new members to the group. Therefore, we think that despite its downsides, the Wrath of John deserves to live – it will therefore remain operational. As always, feedback and comments are welcome.

We’re also pleased to announce that the Council has selected a new server administrator: Jantrix, better known to many of us as Nancy Turton, will be assuming the position of Server Administrator immediately, helping to monitor the RPG-X servers. With his long history of experience and contribution in SRPs, events, and general RPG-X gaming, we look forward to seeing what he can do as an admin. Congrats, Jantrix!

Additionally, with Grizz taking the role of STO Division Supervisor on the Council, Central Plexus has stepped up to act as CO of our STO division. With his experience as an RPG-X administrator and an STO player, we think Central is a great choice for the job, and we’re confident in his abilities. Good luck! (read the whole announcement here)

Financial Report

We had a record number of donations in the last month, totaling $72.20! (less transaction fees). They included:

• $18 from Grizz
• $31.44 from TalusRoben
• $7.70 from JohnF
• $20 from Tony

A massive thanks to all those who donated! We’re extremely proud of and flattered by your generosity.

Financial information at a glance:

• Our current balance is $188.48 USD
• Costs this month were $15.95 USD ($12.95 servers + $3 webhosting)
• We currently have enough standing funds to operate for another eleven months, or another five months without going below $100 in funds.

With the help of our new server setup and incredibly generous donation support, we’re now in a better financial state than ever before!

Thanks again to all who have donated – we appreciate your support!

Server Activity & Status Report

Despite the switch to a new server, TLO’s activity rate on both the serious RP server and the Wrath of John has remained extremely high! We hope to see activity continue to increase over the next month.

We are still testing out the best possible options for hosting our servers at the lowest possible cost. Right now, we think we’ve found a fairly good balance between speed (amount of lag when playing), memory (maximum players who can be connected at once), and uptime/bandwidth (availability of the server). However, if you’ve been experiencing any issues at all, don’t hesitate to contact us or post in the Engineering forum.

Other Notes

Thanks to everyone who participated in Community Day! We hope you enjoyed it as much as we did, from our special RP event The Deeps to the awards ceremony to our Community Q&A. We’d love to hear your feedback, so don’t hesitate to contact us – we hope this is just one of many successful community days to come.

The Council would like to remind members that while we encourage productive, civil debate on our forums and on TLO issues, we do have rules regarding personal attacks and harassment of other members. When you are discussing divisive topics, please remember to be civil and respectful – otherwise, you might be subject to moderator action.

Council meeting logs and voting records are now posted in the Disclosure Database. Members interested can view them there at any time, and contact us with questions or concerns.

Thanks for reading, and happy RPing!

Veritas & The Council

I’m pleased to announce that effective today, TLO has upgraded its servers, doubling the amount of available memory, quintupling storage space and increasing bandwidth by 9 times – plus, it will cost less, $13 a month as compared to $20 per month.

Now, these changes do come at some (non-monetary) cost; we are still investigating the overall speed and reliability of this new setup. Additionally, since we have changed IPs (the server is still accessible at server.last-outpost.net but the IP is now 174.140.161.188), our Gametracker stats have been reset, which means our servers appear artificially low in the rankings – activity on them will move them up again!

We’ll keep you posted on developments, but it’s our hope that this change will prevent or greatly lessen accidental kicks from the server, server crashes, and other such issues – it should also allow more people to be on server at one time. Please report any problems you have here or in the Engineering forum, or by contacting me.

Thanks, Veritas & the Council