arbayer2

UPDATE: Well, I'm back in my hometown on the West Coast, having struck out for the moment with the Armed Forces. My package got routed, re-routed, re-re-routed through the Navy's system for nearly a year, and in the end my application was rejected for academic reasons, of which I'm trying to set up a brief stint in college to help resolve. Time will tell if that even happens, much less if it has an impact on my ability to serve, but on the plus side I don't have recruiters to worry about at the moment. As for the branches, I looked into all three, with the assistance of my father, who's in active duty in the Navy, and came to the conclusion that my best chances for picking up MC or an equivalent is in either the Navy or Coast Guard. I have all but settled on MC (Naval Mass Communications Specialist) as it's both a rating I can get into right away with a minimum of general duty beforehand, and it's the most easily applicable outside of the services being an amalgamated kind of rating. Ultimately, for the moment all this is on the back-burner until I can complete some college credits. It's a convoluted way to get in, for sure, and it may not even work, but that's what I'm up to for the moment. Thanks for your support and attention. With Unquestioned Loyalty, Aidan

I've been out of the loop for a while, so forgive my ignorance, but I didn't realize this was a problem. From what little I'd heard DoopyDoo was quite reputable, as I'd hope they'd be seeing as I'm probably going to buy a DD kit for my first or second blaster. Perhaps it's because the thread's oriented around contact issues, but this sounds like more than a couple of coincidental shipping errors, which worries me. I should look around more, I guess, I need to anyway to get more familiar with what troopers sell which items these days.

I gotta say, that's a pretty crazy cross-section. Have any pics of the pads in a bucket? They seem a little thick but I don't know if that's the case.

I have to go on record here and back up the kind words Rob's gotten, as they're completely true. Even to a guy who can't afford armor atm (a real buzzkill, but I'll get there eventually ) Rob was extremely quick to reply to my emails and let me know just about everything I could need to know, and then some. All I've got left to say is that when armor-buying and assembly comes along, if I choose RT-Mod, it'll be one of the wisest investments I've made yet. Thanks for all you do for the community, Rob.

This film is awesometasticalicious. That's the official term for it. Happy Birthday, Star Wars! May the Force be with you. Always.

That is a kickass Cylon costume, if I may say that. TD behind him looks a little annoyed, but it's hard to tell with buckets on, isn't it? Glad to see another Centurion in the ranks!

Another quick update: I got a score of 112 on the DLAB (Defense Language Aptitude Battery), thus hopefully giving me the opportunity to be a CTI in any language. I'm considering switching to that over MC, as I've always wanted to learn a language, especially Japanese which I qualify for now, but we'll see, I may just do MC if available as it's a good all-rounder for me. Also considering CTN, IT, and ET as backups. As for now, I'm just getting my med-docs processed and hopefully I can return to MEPS to file a rating and sign a contract. Question for any current/ex-service CTI folks: how tough would you think "A" school is on that rating? Seeing as it's immersive I may get used to it quickly, but at the same time it's learning a new language and I believe you have to use it as your primary language through the majority of your time in "A" school, so...

May be a stupid question but have you checked out the RT-Mod website? I think it's more up to date, but I don't know off the top of my head. Either way, that's a good resource for images and contact info for Rob, as is the "Getting Started - Read this first!" section for general armor information like dimensions and height-weight limitations. Other than that, just keep scouring these forums and I'm sure you'll find a lot of good information. -Aidan

I'm with Jason - I wondered for the longest time the way the rankings system worked, and boom! Here it is. Goes without saying, the FISD is awesome. It's like a computer -- you can easily get miscellaneous info via it but you have plenty of reasons to get used to working with it.

Thank you, Paul. Were it possible to give you an awesome trophy, I would.

Thanks to everyone for your advice, again! It's been fun going through the enlistment process with the recruiters, finding interesting ratings, and so on. An update - I got an ASVAB score of 92, I don't know what I got for each section yet however. I've been finishing my NASIS application the past couple days and should be seeing a contract pretty soon, hopefully. Like I said before, I also have several ratings lined up which interest me, and I seriously doubt I'll find myself job-locked at any point. While it makes me feel a little apprehensive and unprepared, I doubt there wasn't a time in every potential sailer/soldier/marine/guardsman's life when they didn't feel that. I'm doing my best to stay optimistic and objective about it, and from what inside perspective I've heard from my family (having a family with a lot of veterans) I feel I'll be going in with a positive attitude, knowing what to expect, which I think is ideal. I'll keep you posted! -Aidan

Thanks to everyone for the advice, I'll keep it in mind. I am indeed looking into the services from a more job-centric standpoint, and yesterday I took the ASVAB to help continue down the path. I'm primarily going for the Navy's Mass Communication Specialist rating and I have quite a few other backup preferences in case I can't get that off the bat. My dad helped me contact the Coast Guard for their available ratings but their reply was essentially "we can't guarantee anything until you go through boot camp". I'm currently waiting on the ASVAB score, but I think I did well. I'll keep you posted once things move along, thanks again! -Aidan

Starting the recruitment process tomorrow with the Navy Recruiting office in Virginia Beach to start feeling out my options for a military job while I look into post-high school education and jobs to fit my interests. After the Navy I'll also look into the Coast Guard and Air Force just to be thorough, I'm not interested in the Army/Nat'l Guard as I want to be as far away from any form of combat as possible, I suppose you'd call me a pacifist. Anyway, interesting time in a person's life, don't you think? Wish me luck, guys, and feel free to suggest intelligent questions I should ask the recruiter(s). And, thanks for your support with everything, it means a lot even though I've remained mostly silent about my personal life on these forums. The Detachment is awesome and I'm proud to have at least a small part in it. -Aidan

I'm actually a little curious myself, being a Navy brat too. I guess it probably had to do with Paul and company's wanting to keep the militaristic spirit of the Legion intact in detachment form, but is there an actual story behind it? If there is, it'd probably be a good article to post in the Getting Started/TK Info Post/ what-have-you section as a little history lesson. I'd read it!

Sounds awesome! Shame I couldn't have been there. Glad to hear you got a few MIA troopers back into action, that's awesome! That's the kind of attentiveness and consideration to the membership that the Legion has which I'm proud to be a part of. Can't ever leave a good man behind, right?