Author: Ken Gillis

Greetings, officers!

I wanted to take a moment to address a topic that continues to come up regularly. I feel that we have failed in communicating the fleet structure, and how the Admiralty fits into all of this.

First of all, being an Admiral in IDF is just a special title for “fleet staff”. We have jobs that are important to the administration of the fleet outside of the sims, and traditionally we are named Admirals. However, we aren’t going to hop onto your sim as an admiral and start roleplaying, or commanding you around.

In IDF, COs are the “kings” or “queens” of their sims. This means they maintain the storyline, they maintain their rosters, and they decide the rules of the sim. There are a few minor exceptions, which are outlined in the Command agreement we make with each CO. But, our involvement in the management of the sim is limited to the placement of the CO.

This means, if a CO decides that they are going to run a sim about a Warship Intrepid with phaser cannons and transphasic torps, it is not the purview of the Admiralty to tell them otherwise. It is up to the individual members if they wish to remain a part of the sim.

To be clear: your recourse for a disagreement in how the sim is managed is twofold. First, you discuss with your CO. Second, if you don’t come to an agreement, and you don’t wish to RP there anymore, you may leave.

The Admiralty will be happy to mediate any such talks, but we will not use our authority to modify how the sim is run, with some very specific exceptions.

As far as the “political” structure of IDF is concerned, there really isn’t one. We don’t have a council, we don’t vote on things. The best description for the structure of IDF is a fan club/not for profit business. IDF is owned by Admiral Star and myself. There’s really not much more to it than that. We of course will ask for the opinion of our COs when making changes that will affect them, and individual CO’s may at times ask their crews for their opinion on a matter. But, at the end of the day, Charles and I have the final say in the administration of the fleet organization, and the COs have the final say in the administration of their sim (once again, some specific exceptions apply).

At the core of it all, we are striving to create a fleet structure that exists purely to support the sims. We provide certain services: central Discord server, community events, IT infrastructure, tech support, fleet awards, etc. Everything else is up to the COs and their crews.

Thank you,
Admiral Ken Gillis
Fleet Executive Officer
Chief of Technology