Federation Commander

[terryoc]

How to put your campaign ribbons in your signature.

I've been putting my ADB Inc. Campaign Ribbons in my signature, and a few other people have been asking about it. Here's how to do it:

Step 1: Contribute something to the Star Fleet Universe, the games, or the players. ADB, Inc. awards ribbons and medals to those who contribute to improving the products or the business. There's a lot of ways to do it: making multiple, useful comments in the development topics on the boards; translating an SFB scenario into FC format which gets published; writing a new scenario which gets published; demoing games at game stores; writing fiction that gets published; finding intellectual property pirates; and so on. For example, Will "djdood" McCammon's signature shows the GIA intelligence cross with two stars for finding two SFU pirates, a superior service ribbon for creating the F5W ship miniature, and a general service ribbon for contribution to the Romulan Border product. As a matter of courtesy and protocol, don't use ribbons or awards you didn't earn in your signature or avatar. ADB, Inc. takes them seriously and it's wrong to take credit for something unearned.

Step 2: Wait for your ribbons to be awarded. These are listed in Captain's Log every six months. They are published on the Medal Wall and Honor Scroll, here: http://www.starfleetgames.com/discus/messages/12032/25046.html?1274463410 If you want Steve Cole to send you pics of your medals, or if you think one is missing, email him about it. Requests like this are handled on his Customer Request Wednesdays, and Steve's a very busy man, so please be patient about it.

Step 3: Once you have pics of your medals in the right format (I use .jpg), host the picture on a hosting service. Get the URL of your picture from this service.

Step 4. Go to your profile page, you can see the link at the top of the page under "profile".

Step 5. In the "signature" section of your profile, put your URL from the hosting service inside image tags, like so: [img] your url [/img]. Click save your profile and it wil appear!
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"Captain" Terry O'Carroll, fourteen papers published including six best of issue
"Man, Terry, you are like a loophole seeking missle!" - Mike West

[pinecone]

Thanks Terry, I was wondering about that.

I realize that just posting a lot on the FC fourm doesn't make you a real supporter of the SFU. Sending in scenarios and fiction (and other things) does. If you really want to earn "captian" or whatever, you have to support the SFU with more than just random comments on the fourm.

I'd like to apologize to everyone once more about the misguided mistakes I made, what was it? Two or Three years ago?

Anyway, sorry for hogging your thread terry. Back to you

[Steve Cole]

Well done, Terry.

I am personally very gratified to see people using their ribbons in this way.
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The Guy Who Designed Fed Commander

[terryoc]

Pinecone, this post wasn't directed at anyone in particular or even anyone here at all. I had forgotten about the forum ranking thing in fact. You're cool mate

The blurb at the top was intended for those who are completely new to the forum and how ADB, Inc. does things. Jean has posted repeatedly about making sure that you don't use unearned ribbons and decorations. Everyone already here knows that already, it just needs to be said for people who don't already know.

Steve, I'm very proud of my decorations for my contributions to the games. I think everyone who loves the game enough to contribute is.
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"Captain" Terry O'Carroll, fourteen papers published including six best of issue
"Man, Terry, you are like a loophole seeking missle!" - Mike West

[djdood]

I applaud Terry for being the first to think to do it. I'm also proud to wear my decorations on my posts.

I also host mine on Photobucket. I use the png format on mine, so I can set the background transparent (so they look good on both the blue and white backgrounds of the FedCom board). Being a neat-freak, mine are shrunk down in size (to 98 pixels high) to keep them from distracting from the [sarcasm] really important words I type [/sarcasm].
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[Bolo_MK_XL]

Thank you terry for minimizing the size of your ribbons --

They stretched the window so it all wasn't on screen, you did it before I got around to saying something --

[Jean]

Pinecone, I have been trying to think of how to say this for a bit.

I really think that people who post on the Forum do support ADB, but they get a different sort of recognition here. One is the recognition of your peers that you have worthwhile answers and thoughts. Another is your rank, showing that you are posting frequently and keeping the Forum active.

There are many opportunities for you and others to contribute to the SFU and earn ribbons.

You can playtest rules and scenarios.

You can write FC scenarios. If you aren't sure of things, team up with someone experienced. I wasn't sure about ships in some of my scenarios so I ran some ideas by Mike West and Scoutdad. Choose scenarios you want to see -- I wanted to see some matches and situations that couldn't happen in the "real" history, so I borrowed Olivette and her historically less-than-accurate trivideos. That's how I found her Evil Feds files.

Think of sneaky or clever things that you do in your fights. Write them up and submit them as Command Notes.

I'd like to see the rangers revitalized and out running demos at their FLGS or local cons. Rangers are recognized in Captain's Log.

Visit the BBS and keep an eye out for things that SVC says he needs. Then try to help him out.

Work with Paul Franz and see if you can get organized tournaments started for Federation Commander. With enough interest and participation, maybe we can get SVC to consider an equivalent of a Rated Ace for FC.

Always think positively. If you see a problem, think of a possible solution and offer it as a suggestion. If you are right often enough, you might get an invitation to participate at a higher level. (That's sort of what happened with me -- I saw a problem while working on a different project and offered some fixes.)

I have faith in the creativity and inventiveness of every person on this Forum. I'd love to see everyone working hard and earning medals.

Jean
(Who is wearing her Director of Marketing hat which today is large and has a beautiful white plume (also known as panache -- why, yes, I have been watching Cyrano de Bergerac recently) on it)
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Business Manager/RPG Line Editor
Amarillo Design Bureau, Inc.

[djdood]

I will say that it is easier to participate in the development of the SFU (and get ribbons for it, etc.) on the legacy board, as that is where all development activities tend to be done. Nature of the business.
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[Jean]

Will, you are generally correct. Of course, on the legacy BBS you don't get a rank, avatars, or really neat sigs, so it is a trade-off.

I'd like to see the Federation Commander crowd be as active as the Federation & Empire group on the BBS. Remember that your Command Notes go there, contribute and critique the ones that have problems.

Just remember that you do have to use your real name there (that is how you get credit for the ideas).

I hope to see you there!
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Business Manager/RPG Line Editor
Amarillo Design Bureau, Inc.

[Bolo_MK_XL]

Some may think its a minor thing --

There were many who contributed to the On-line Catelog with pictures of minis --- Is that a recognizable contribution ---

[Jean]

I would check with SVC about that.
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Business Manager/RPG Line Editor
Amarillo Design Bureau, Inc.

[mjwest]

Made the topic a sticky, so it will be easy to find.
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Federation Commander Answer Guy

[Steve Cole]

Random comments....

I am deeply happy and gratified to see so many people putting ribbons and medals in their sig files. I need to figure out how to do a few of my own. Maybe I can get Jean to do it for me.

Doing it is going to get a lot easier for all of you in a week or two. So before spending hours redrawing medals, just hang loose.

Painted minis recognition: Maybe. (the guys who did them DID get paid for them, but so did a lot of guys who did other things.) There are so MANY of them that we'll have to be VERY careful finding a formula. It cannot be a medal (those have to be harder to get), but could be a campaign ribbon, with higher "devices" for more selected submissions. We might also include points for mini of the month in Hailing Frequencies.
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The Guy Who Designed Fed Commander

[djdood]

If anybody wants help with making theirs transparent (so they don't show the white background when viewed on the board's light blue backgrounds), I could throw together a walk-through.

It's not hard, but requires some basic image-editing skills and an appropriate software application (MS Photo Editor, Photoshop Elements, GIMP, etc.).

That may (or may not) become a moot point in a week or so, depending on what we should hang-loose about.
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[Kang]

Scrounge request: Please would it be possible for us to have 'rank badges' for our ranks? Not the ranks in the forums ( ! ), but for the rank we get for posting Command Notes and so on. Not as prestigious as a medal but a sign of having contributed nonetheless.

Or perhaps a ribbon for having had a Command Note or scenario published, or more than one, whatever?
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