Introduction

    Sovereign Forces (=SF=) is an organization founded in 2006 by Wesley Bright, Reuben Baker, and Trevor Lynn. =SF= primarily hosts servers for several popular first-person-shooter games, primarily on Counter-Strike: Source, Battlefield 2, and recently ArmA 2. However =SF= servers can be found on Team Fortress 2, and occasionally servers are hosted for Call of Duty games. =SF= was also the short time owner of Sovereign Gaming Network, a child company of =SF=, in 2007 that rented out server boxes located in Chicago, the UK, and Amsterdam. Today =SF= runs several popular servers in Battlefield 2 and Counter-Strike: Source, including the 1st ranking Battlefield 2 Highway Tampa map server(1). The largest department of =SF= is the Sovereign Forces Clan in which members wear an =SF= tag before their usernames. Members of the =SF= Clan primarily, and are encouraged to, play on the servers owned by =SF=.

Background

    =SF= was established in May 26th, 2006 by Wesley Bright (commonly referred to as Wes-dog),  Reuben Baker (commonly referred to as Aldy) and Trevor Lynn (commonly referred to as Hyrax). They separately employed Regan Packwood (commonly referred to as Ziram) to design the initial webpage for =SF=, and soon after Packwood became part of the =SF= organization. Their first operation was launching three servers under KillerPings for Battlefield 2, located in Chicago, Illinois along with creating the Sovereign Forces Clan department. Funding for the organization was made available by members of the clan to pay for the servers of =SF=.

    During the first year several of the new members had come from an older clan, many of which also played in Counter-Strike: Source. In a successful attempt to attract new members into the clan, and increase funds, =SF= launched servers in Counter-Strike: Source and took a giant percentage of the members from the competing clan. In =SF='s first attempt to reach the European gamers, they hosted a Battlefield 2: Euro Force server in the UK. After a few months without any Europeans joining the =SF= community, Bright shut down the server.

    Upon the release of Battlefield 2: Armored Fury on June 6, 2006 Bright immediately contacted KillerPings to update their Battlefield 2 servers with Armored Fury. Through this process =SF= has reported to have been one of the first five servers in the USA to have installed Armored Fury. After =SF= had hosted several servers in both Battlefield 2 and Counter-Strike: Source, KillerPings went out of business due to fraud from inside the company(2), Bright then changed the server providers several times until he ended up with Hypernia located in Chicago. In hopes of expanding =SF= business, Bright initiated the Sovereign Gaming Network. It had four servers located in Chicago, one in Amsterdam, and two in the UK. However due to technical difficulties and poor budgeting =SF= decided to close the Sovereign Gaming Network.

    In late 2007, in a second attempt to further expand the =SF= community overseas, =SF= launched a Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare 52 slot server in Amsterdam. While the server performed exceedingly well, ranking in the top 10 servers according to Bright, after a few months none of the European gamers who played in the server ever attempted to join =SF=. This in turn resulted in the closing of the server.

Current and Future Affairs

    Currently =SF= is mostly active hosting the servers in which its clan is located. However preparation is being made to create new departments of =SF=. =SF= plans to launch a new website that will provide professional and user reviews of technological products and video games. =SF= is also considering to create =SF= apparel. There has also been some discussion to begin participating in competitive gaming tournaments. However, major changes in the organization may not begin until 2011. =SF= continues to grow in membership, emphasizing quality members and continues to travel mainstream to be a leader in the gaming community.

Sovereign Forces Clan

    Membership into the clan requires a minimum of $5 USD a month. Each member is provided with administrative rights within their game servers. Members also have access to an FTP server, personal email, and private forums. =SF= requires all members to be mature and positive representatives. Members must wear the =SF= tag in front of their username, whereas nonmembers cannot wear the tag. There are occasional tournaments provided by =SF= that members and guests can participate in.


As of August 24th, 2009 there are 96 members of =SF=. The member list and positions are as follows:

Futebant Executioner5007 Aldy     SorrowSeven Xtremeforce1     CCB        Scarecrow     Taxman CerberusDraco Tig-eerr     Teal661         Tipsy1668 MrT     StealthTCF      LoastLocos

Jackslayer         RaoulDuke      ColumbusBlueJackets  Tuffkix         Creasy     AWanderingMage     Aggressor40      aGGraVaTOrNeT     Cerebral_Assassin     hambone31     Panzerkanonier     GameMaster      Wulfy darkunited     Rolomothy

TheHousePain  JokesA157 FFANGG         cobramus     Strike Team Jesus kenny85246  DaPoets         SkyShreddar  DJ_BONEZ      crashman99 Jamadara         HotdogFarmer       Smokechaser

HeldThread         BOY A157      _-_-_Girl_-_-_77  Titler78      wholmes73 Jimmi_G         mechman072     Zohan         waswas         Fmrdevildog    Think        Thumper Back From Prison   Bubba_With_A_Gun

BackFromHeaven marcusw         KWH55         MAD        sparticus         Moving Target  Xearo      ShadowSniper  pools_closed     Jon      TomiVercetti     Sink        ChromeLBZ

Additional Links

    Sovereign Forces Official Website - http://www.sovereign-forces.com/

    Sovereign Forces HLstatsX Page - http://sf.hlstatsx.com/hlstats.php

    Sovereign Forces Gamestracker Page - http://www.gametracker.com/clan/sfclan/

    Sovereign Forces Twitter Page - http://www.twitter.com/sovereignforces

References

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