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     At long last!! It's been years, but AH Magazine is finally back in print!! (Yes, for you newer people, it did exist way back in '92 before the MUD crashed.) I, Phalanx, have taken it upon myself to try to bring back this vital facet of the After Hours experience. Oh, also, if there are a few people who don't hate this, and YOU would like to maybe help me, perhaps as a contributing columnist, feel free to reply to me with your ideas! And for the rest of you, make sure to give me all your comments!

     First, I would like to dedicate the first new issue to all the 'old' players of the OLD AH who made it great--especially the ones who toughed it out and stuck with the NEW AH. If we don't all appreciate you people, we should!

     I think we'll start off with the long-awaited (by some) list of credits from AH: THE MOVIE!! (Note: In some cases where the original Actor or Actress was forgotten or unavailable, I Phalanx have taken it upon myself to to make up names.)

     And now for a classic list from the ORIGINAL AH Magazine...

Now for all of you players out there who are feeling a bit generous and want to help a newbie here are a few tips to get you started:

1. Get them a quicktyper and a few days later tell them to type hoohaa for extra strength.
2. Take them for a stroll in the acid swamp and encourage to take a tip.
3. Give them a tour of Dragon Isle and let them get stuck on the raft.
4. Tell them this is an All pk mud and encourage them to attack fellow newbies.
5. Give them the Giant-sized belt for armour.
6. Let Rapture show them around the mud.
7. Encourage them to kill the town guards for easy exp.
8. Tell them to beg the teller for money by typing attack teller.
9. Tell them to shout cuss words to the gods for a laugh.
10. Tell them to become an adventurer!!!

     ....original by Karelle -- circa June 2, 1992.

     Also, I'd like to solicit original articles, advice columns, editorials, advertisements -- ANYTHING!! I can't do this all myself, ya know! ...which is why I plan on brazenly copying more work from the original magazine. And now, by popular demand (well, none of the people said they DIDN'T want to see it...), the (ancient) history of the Telnet Commandos, as told by the Godfather of the clan, TK!!

     (Written by S. Kelly [TK])

     As you probably know, the Telnet Commandos (or TCs as they are commonly known) were the first groups/tribes to become established on After Hours. They were unveiled to AH in August 1991 and were at first a party of 4 guys MUDDING from the University of Western Australia. The following article gives a run down of TC evolution from those first days when even I was only level 3/1 mage to November 1992 when the guys here at UWA lost their link.........

Chapter 1....The Creation.

     In the beginning, the Telnet Commandoes were a party consisting of Agrajag, Zodiac, Pokey, and Thunderknob. (Some of the older players may remember Agrajag and Zodiac, Pokey stills pops on occasionally to code.) This party enabled its members to advance through the levels reasonably quickly, and without too many deaths, fortunately. :)

Throughout the first few weeks, as people began to talk to them and even help them occasionally, they began to make a number of friends. (Zodiac and Thunderknob especially made a relatively large number of friends......quite different from the TK of today who is hated huh? :) )

Once they began to advance, they gained popularity and TK started to be labelled as a playerhelper. (He helped newbie chars by supplying them with money and weapons when he had them spare.) At about roughly the same time Pokey began to crave for a playerkill, which TK flatly refused to help with. Gravel, Bladehand, and Langspear made their debuts on AH then. (The first of the 2nd Generation of Telnet Commandoes.)

Chapter 2....The Time of Growth.

     Gravel, Bladehand, and Langspear advanced rather quickly (being aided by the first four who were now each around level 7/10.) The first American Telnet Commando was Bleys, who was made a member by Pokey and TK after they had partied with him. (Although TK and Bleys had initially been on rather bad terms after a disagreement over who took damage during fights, they soon overcame this.) In this same time period Thunderknob married Melissa. (Those of you who attended the ceremony will remember typing 'kill thunderknob' instead of 'kiss thunderknob'. :) However TK, being the gentle creature he was back then, ran quickly from the chapel and stopped the fight.) By now the Telnet Commandos were well established and well known throughout AH. (It had been commented to me since that in those days the TCs were well-respected, well organised, and among other things honourable....some tell me that they think this period was the peak of the Telnet Commando popularity, TK alone knew (and was friendly with) roughly 2/3 of all the players on AH at that time.

Chapter 3....The Realisation.

     At level 11/20 (with maxxed stats) TK suddenly realised that he was no longer a weak mage, relying on the strength of others. He was starting to kill things easily. He also had fireball and summon, 2 of his favourite toys. (They later became his pkilling trademark...See Later.) The Telnet Commandos were at most about 12 players strong at the time with some of the new members being Stark, Flayed, Ironwolf, Melissa, and Mei. (Bladehand's wife) Because of his new found strength, TK now began to listen to Pokey's playerkill pleas... then they saw their chance.

Chapter 4....The Initiation.

     Pokey and Thunderknob and Pokey decided he wanted to kill Gravel because of something Gravel had said to him in real life. Thunderknob scryed Gravel and told Pokey that he was killing the harpies near the entrance to the mountain. Pokey proceeded to the location and just as he got to Gravel and initiated the attack, a bout of lag set in. Gravel hadn't even noticed that Pokey had arrived, let alone attacked him. :) ) Pokey in a weird blast of sentimentality decided to wait until the lag had stopped to kill him and subsequently left the room. When the lag had stopped Pokey discovered that he had killed Gravel (who at the same time discovered that Pokey had attacked him) laughed, and then ducked for cover as Gravel as came after him in RL :) Pokey had just made the first TC playerkill and at that moment TK decided that he would kill only playerkillers and people who hassled him.

Chapter 5....The Reality Arrives.....

     The date would now be roughly January 1992. (The month in which AH would ultimately leave its initial site at WWU.) The TCs were now all at roughly even levels with TK being the highest at 15/20 with stats maxxed and the others not too far behind. A playerkiller called Slice had made his initial kills just recently and also a few verbal confrontations between him and TK had occured. The TCs, itching for a good to pkill, had recently turned their sights towards Slice and his mage sidekick Rastafan as possible kills, but needed a reason to attack them... (back in those days they didn't kill for no reason.) Then on the last day that AH was up at WWU (that legendary day when Huma told TK and Bladehand to "trash the place"), Slice had attacked and killed Melissa. The TC war machine was put into action... within one minute of Melissa dying, Slice had been summoned into the moving elevator by TK and met by a TC "greeting" party consisting of TK, Bladehand, Gravel, Pokey, and Agrajag.

From memory Slice died 4 times that day by various TC members.......

Just after this had occured, when Melissa came out of hiding from numerous wiz workrooms.....Gravel defied the first TC rule and attacked her, killing her again!! Thunderknob (being his usual honorable self) killed Gravel in response! (Gravel was also killed by 4 wizards for the death of Melissa.)

That day when TK found his thirst for pkilling and realised it was better than being a nice MUD player :) The TCs attacked roughly 30 through the course of that day (although without an efficient kill rate, people just kept quitting after being summoned into the elevator :() Melissa was given a freebee wizship at this time, giving TK once less thing to worry about (sorry Mel but you did seem to die a lot ;) )

TK had his first encounter with a character called Dredd on this fateful day too. Dredd was in the pub with Slice and spent all his time trying to get on TK's nerves while not venturing out of the safety of the pub where he would have probably died. (Little did anyone realise that later Dredd in various forms, would become a valuable member of the TCs, and a good friend.)

(AH had now lost its site and seemingly was gone forever.... Zodiac and Agrajag gave up MUDDING at this time... Ag returned to AH once every few months when it came back but he never stayed.)

Chapter 6.... The Immigration to Ivory Tower.

     Bladehand, Gravel, and TK quickly found a new home to establish the Telnet Commandos and soon found Ivory Tower quite a few AH players had also moved here so it seemed like a home away from home. The stay there is outside the scope of this article (as it is not linked to AH as such but let me state that on that MUD, TK came the closet he ever had to being pkilled.... the cause was Destructor.... a pkiller that even TK admired ...got him to 4hp once... luckily TK managed to wimpy and talk Destructor into an alliance. Both Gravel and TK did make wizship on this MUD before the return of AH, but both were promptly removed for trying to break security at various instances.

Chapter 7....The Return Home.

     In about March 1992 AH returned for a brief while at Cornell with a new God...Macron...the one wiz that at the time TK could not seem to befriend. The time at Cornell was a stale period for the TCs with the remaining members trying to advance levels (TK was the first to become 19/20) and the addition of a few new members...at roughly this time, the people here in Western Australia were starting to get hassles about using the US-OZ link for MUD. Bleys and TK began to disagree about a few things at this time as Bleys became a wizard and became power hungry.

AH lost its machine again...

Chapter 8....Goonsqaud to the Rescue.

     Not long after its leaving Cornell, After Hours returned at Goonsquad with Bleys as a God!!! :( Now most of the remaining TCs were reasonably high levels and TK, Grav, and Bladehand began the pkilling spree that ruined the TC honour and ultimately gave TK a reputation as a pkiller. Before long, many other groups had begun to emerge such as BOO YAH and the Tree of Life. The former immediately began hassling the TC but, without many high level members soon disappeared; however, the Tree of Life made a pact with the Commandos (if I remember) and still exists I believe. TK at this time had achieved wizardhood... but soon returned back to playing for two reasons:

1. He had no real spare time with which to code.
2. He wanted another chance to pkill.

Time after time, the wizards became sick of TK's summon and bash technique that had been initiated at WWU and many places such as the elevator, the raft, and the balloon were made either no kill or no summon zones. At this time... Bleys began to hassle the TC about their pkilling and was subsequently removed from the group... hatred grew quickly, especially between him and TK... whom everyone had started to blame for the TC's pkills (even though he was only the mage that summoned the victims in.) By now Dredd had become a firm member of the group and had achieved wizardhood. (The first of many times... he seemed to like getting himself removed then reinstated.)

Chapter 9...Modern History - The Fall of The Telnet Commandoes.

(In brief because more people will remember this time period.)

     TK by now had racked up 25 pkills, at that time the most pkills accomplished by anyone... beating Slice's record of 18. Access problems slowly began to hassle the players from UWA and many members went ahead and wizzed (Gravel, Pokey, and Bladehand namely.) Melissa and TK had divorced, everyone began to hate the former playerhelping group. TK fell out of favour with the wizards because of the pkilling (and because they had to code the summon curse to seemingly reduce the mage class' domination of playerkilling methods.) (By the way wizards....there was still a bug in the summon curse at the time I left AH in which you could see if you were cursed or not... maybe I'll tell ya's when I return if its still there :) )

Thunderknob, in a vain effort to keep the TCs alive and to increase their popularity, began to let almost anyone join the group... both playerkillers and non-playerkillers... such members are namely Silvergade, Keith, Vasso, and Palomane to name a few...
Ranks were introduced to try and order the Commandos
These ranks were:

     Lord: the highest (original members and 2nd generation only)
     Senior: (known playerkillers and good friends)
     Junior: (the lowest and least experienced members)
     Honorary: Characters such as Morannon, Hawkwind, Moonglum, etc...

Unfortantly none of these seemed to work... the ranks helped... the they gave players the idea that TK was the leader of the Telnet Commandos, something he had up to this time refused... until now... TK assumed leadership of the TC in the last month and a half that he was around... Gravel, Rastus, Bladehand, and Pokey had all left temporarily as in the Southern Hemisphere it was Summer Vacation. Note: By this time TK had married Ravenn and both her and Sarah (who was classed as TK's little sister) had become Telnet Commando Juniors.

Chapter 10....Dead at Last.

     On November 27, 1992, I got busted by the admin on my account for using the international link and so TK was put into storage on AH until sometime in March when I regained my Computer Science account. Since then I cannot tell the tale of the TC as I haven't been around--    so if someone who has been on can oblige, I for one would be interested to hear. From what I have heard, The Telnet Commandos have been dying a slow death and seemingly no-one will put them out of their misery.

Chapter 11...Future Rebirth???

     As you should have probably heard....myself and a few other UWA players SHOULD be returning to AH in early March. If we do, the TCs may be reformed with a COMPLETE purge of ALL the old members and a new start. We do not know what this group will turn out like... wheather we will pkill or not or wheather we will just come on to talk and catch up on some people we haven't seen in awhile.

Footnote: Thanx for reading this... sorry about the Grammar, Spelling Mistakes (apolgy no acceped - Tarrow :]), Lack of continuity & detail, Apparent First person viewpoint from TK... (well I did write it and can only describe it as I rememeber.) I hope to see you's in march sometime and take care!!!!!
     (See I'm not so mean after all :P What do you mean by "Yes you Are"??)

A few edits by yours truly -- Phalanx)

     Also don't forget to vote (by reply email) for your FAVORITEST and UNFAVORITEST players! And a whole seperate category for FAVORITEST and UNFAVORITEST wizards!!! (Also, I tried to get people to do before, but no one cared) send me suggestions on possible other categories!

And here's a new little section I thunked up all by my lonesome. (It will take some financing to keep this portion of the Magazine going... If anyone'd like to contribute a few (1000, I think) coins per week/month/however - often - I - decide - to - do - this, I would be much obliged!!)
Anyway, here are the....

VITAL STATISTICS

God (in Month Python Land)
Level: 35
HP: 2100
AC: 34
WC: 52
Alignment: 0
Str: 195
Dex: 195
Int: 195
Con: (you guessed it) 195
$: 0
Items: Hand of God
          Armour of Righteousness (AC6)
          Shield of Faith
          Helmet of Salvation

     hope ya liked it!

     This week/month/however - often - I - decide - to - do - this editorial is by a brilliant person, truely one of the greatest MUDders of all time. (Okay, okay. So it's just me.) He...err...uhh ...I have decided to speak my mind (as is common in editorials). My first is After Hours herself. She's a sprawling world that almost no one takes the time to explore! I've talked to players OVER 15/20 who don't even know where Hellebore's is! (You know who you all are.) It seems to me that what everyone does is he/she explores just enough to be able to eek out a successful living, then he/she stops finding new things! I mean, really. It's like having cable (or maybe even one of those NICE satellite jobs) and only watching what's on the airwaves. Yes, you can catch ER, but you'll miss all 40 channels devoted soley to Baywatch! So something has got to be done, obviously. Now to address another issue -- money. Honestly, what good does 150k coins do you if Oth's holding it? Does it help you in battle lugging around 40 lbs. of cash?? And, as Vortex can attest to, it CERTAINLY does no good if you should happen to walk past the Tax Collector (curse his tick-ridden hide).
Since the Kingdom of Lydia long, long ago produced the world's first coins, money has had one purpose and one purpose alone -- TO SPEND!! Tying these two subjects together, here is my advice to you who have all this spare cash: go to the Badlands. Buy yourself a level 17 Mercenary. Go to Maedicon Get yourself Crystal Skull, and make yourself a couple of undeads. (My, but Edward and Skeletal Warrior are popular for this purpose, though I hear the best undeads are Moonglum and Tiamat/ancient red dragon.) Now that you have 3 mindless slaves, go back to Ridgecrest, have a chat with Jritrix, and buy yourself 20 or so potions of varying strengths (or elsewhere --- see later). Now pull yerself up by ye olde bootstraps and EXPLORE THE MUD!! Brappy's area is widely regarded as the toughest on the MUD, but (and I have inside info on this) it is worth exploring. (Tons of great items -- wish I were at liberty to tell more.) But Brapnor's area isn't the only place worth exploring, which brings me to my next topic: widely unknown resources on the MUD.

     I'll start with the areas, I think. Brapnor's area is certainly near the top of the list, if not AT the top of the list. But there are numerous other areas that are (in my experience) virtually unexplored by most players. For instance, Slice Mysterious Castle. Many people go here to do the quest and they don't even explore it for that-- they just do what was emailed to them by their best friend and never go back. Explore Slice's! It has a number of great deals and steals, though these will be discussed in the 'items' section. And what about the area Morrannon coded, Castle Anthrax? I'd be willing to bet that more than a few people couldn't even tell ya where it is, let alone say they've ever killed anything in there. In fact, it's on the top of the moutain. And (though its pub is miles from the good killing fields) it's also worth the time it'll take a person (or, heaven forbid, a party) to find out its secrets. Another thing -- did you know there's an area specifically for levels 6 - 12 in Nnanji's? If you fit in this range, why not try turning east instead of west to the Swordsman??
Then there's the jungle -- you know the one to the extreme west of the world? North of the plains? (and don't forget the secret entrance to dinosaur land from here... though ya might have to take a 'dive' to get there. ;) ) And as for Hellebore's (I know what you're saying -- "Where's THAT???"), after you get off the raft to DI, go 2n and 'wake dragon'. He'll take you to a magical land with an Elemenatal Sword a maze of of sphinxes, a mystical tower with a Ki Lung dragon at the top *wink, nudge mages*, a custom weapon shop, custom bags, custom potions, a sign shop (!!), and numerous others attractions. A definate must-see. And finally, before I get on to the items section, one last note about NEW AREAS!! If you explore the forest south of town thoroughly (which you did a long time ago -- right?) you'll find a new feature -- a doorway to Goblin's new newbie area!! And don't forget the two other areas about to open up: Winter's version of the frozen North, and Hargrove's long awaited REOPENING OF FRENCHFRY'S!!!!! *bounce*cheer*worship_Hargy*

     Ahem... and now on to the items. First I would like to make everyone aware of a few items that have a special place in the hearts of PKers. Most of these you old hands will probably know, but in case this gets to any newbies out there (which I hope), being aware of these can very well save your life. First is the (in)famous Rot Grub from Brapnor's area. (Told ya it was worth it!) If someone should portal in on you and go off with the 'blast <you>' alias that he/she surely has, I bet you'd never notice if he/she slipped you a rot grub. This devious little critter gets you under your skin -- literally.
Very painful. And then there's the Giant-sized Belt. For male players (most of us), this is... erm... painful -- not to mention knocking you to a miserable 1 HP. Can we say 'Purina Goliath Chow' kids? And if any of you would get off your butts and kill stuff in the Underdark once in a while, you'd find an interesting black potion. Drink this little baby, and it's good-bye, 50 of my HP's!!' Then there're the Hot Coals in Malak's dwarf world. The generic PKer we've invented for this scenario has already given you a rot grub to eat away your HPs and a black potion so your 'drink potion' alias is screwed -- and you don't have time to change it. What else could he/she possibly do?? Think of Hot Coals as another rot grub, except you have to type something else to get rid of them. Hope ya lived -- maybe next time you'll know better ;) There's one more note on PK that I'd like to bring up -- scrolls. PKers have been known to buy several recall scrolls, not set them (or worse, set them for such places as the Badlands and Underdark -- *cringe* the Ever Changing World), and give them to the poor soul they catch in the Balloon. This makes escape nearly impossible. Well friends, PHALANX TO THE RESCUE!! There is one very simple way out of this seemingly iron-clad death trap. And if you knew Slice's very well, you'd know about it. You see, before Hawkwind coded the much closer and easier-to-use Recall Scroll, Slice coded a scroll (and Golden Spellbook) of his own -- with different commands to use them -- the perfect counter for the 'scroll trick'. His scrolls are available for purchase in Slice's shop, on the 4th floor of his Mysterious Castle. The other great value here is what I personally consider THE most under used resource on the MUD -- the Elixir. As you'll read, it heals a random amount of HP/SP (minimum of 50, no stated max) for only a little more than your average Jritrax potion! Also, if you happen to have an extra 10,000 coins and are of a level able to use it (curse WC restrictions on Clerics), the Dicer is also a great deal. High WC, and you don't have to kill ANYTHING to get it. The drawbacks? Mages and Clerics need not apply, and it is timed. :( Well I guess that's about it (for now) about the parts of the MUD that no one knew.

     On a follow or two, there is one item that I am extremely curious about -- Excalibur. This is Peetee's other area. But you can't get it, because he never finished it. And now another wizard wants to finish it, but Peetee's been on recently, so the gods are telling him no. But Peetee hasn't coded on it forever. This is one elf's attempt to start a letter writing campaign to the gods: WE WANT OUR PEETEE TV!! (btw, and lotsa people don't know this, if you go to the post office, you can 'mail gods' instead of going to the trouble of CC's to half the world. Same for 'mail elders' 'mail seniors' you get the idea. But remember -- only the gods really have power. And they like being bothered -- it's what they're there for since they don't code anything and hardly ever approve anything and rarely do anything but make beggars tougher.)

     Well, I'll shut up now. Please, if you're still reading this, send me your suggestions / comments / criticisms / ARTICLES for publication, so you don't have to listen to me drone on forever next time. (and for those of you who notice such things *cough*Rapture*cough*, I've gone to great lengths to see that this is as fair and non-sexist, non-racist, non-ageist, non-creedist, non-nationalist, and non-impairment-biased as I could be. Please don't get on my case for these things. =)

     Please! Forward this to ALL of your AH friends who aren't on the CC list! And (this is getting to the point of begging now) PLEASE PLEASE GIVE ME FEEDBACK! (It's sad when you get NO e-mail).

'til next time,

Your friendly staff of AH Magazine (currently consisting of Phalanx.)