Hi, fellow Settlers!
My common "nicks" are Auratus and Chippoka, but my real name is Tracy. I enjoy life as a single caucasion man in my early 40s, a Southern Baptist. I generally keep to myself and live away from my relatives in Idaho. I came to this region of Virginia, Virginia Beach, as part of my Naval Career of 9 years; sonar man, submarines. I love the area, so I never left it.
I began playing Setters shortly after Settlers III was released among other games, such as Master Of Orion, Civilization, Quake, Reach For The Stars, Spaceward Ho, and Unreal Tournament. It wasn't very long before Settlers became my top game of entertainment on the PC. I began playing PC games for enjoyment back in the late 1970s on an old Radio Shack computer, the TRS-80. From there I moved over to the Commodore 64 and the Atari 800XL... then eventually over to the PC in the middle 1980s.
Needless to say, I enjoy most kinds of computers games, but my career keeps me pretty busy as a professional in construction these past nine years as an electrician, foreman. Prior to electrical work, I sat behind a desk for 9 years as a technical writer working on engineering drawings and associated installation and test-validation documents for a large defense firm. But, it wasn't to be my career. Computers had become popular among middle level managers and then the 1990s defense cuts arrived. Ultimately technical writers fell out of demand and I had to change careers. Between all that, I decided to attempt my own destiny, and open a tropical fish retail store. It wasn't meant to be. After 2 years, I closed it. My nick "Auratus" comes from the name of a popular African Cichlid I used to sell: Melandochomis auratus.
As I rebuilt my life with a new career, I discovered the internet along the way and became active in political forums and active in the Settlers community for the last 4 years; two years in the Settlers community. I have met a lot of fine people.
As having once been a technical writer, I enjoy writing Settlers walk-through's, story telling, and creating Settlers maps. Some of my work can be found at:
My best Settlers IV maps are: Island Fest, Mexican Stand-Off, and All Wrong and Ugly. I also have also created some Settlers III maps. All my Settlers maps can be found at the Maps Base:
My other past-time activities include studying various science issues and reading. When not doing that or games, I spend lots of time watching DVD episodes of some of the most common "Space" TV SciFi shows, such as Star Gate SG-1, Earth Final Conflict, Andromeda, Battle Star Galatica, Far Scape, Star Trek DS-9/Generations/Voyager, and Babylon 5. Back during my years as a technical writer, I was also heavy into bodying building, but, heh, I've been "out" of that for sometime now and, "lost it all," as they say.
