April 25, 2006
Story by Chris Rhoads (dustrho)

INTRODUCTION
Two years ago I was approached by Chris Spice (Darth Spice), who was searching for new talent to add to the staff at this website. He had been searching for someone who knew a little bit about web design, who could write well, who could cover local events, and loved Star Wars as much as all Sandtroopers do. We spoke for several hours on a couple of separate occasions, and he had then become convinced that I would be a great fit for Sandtroopers.com. Little did any of us know just how critical my involvement was going to be for this great site.

TIME FOR CHANGE
Since assuming the title of S.C.A.L.P. Weapons Supplier, one of the immediate things I wanted to bring to ST.com was the ability to think and act freely, and to bring new life to the place. The previous management of Sandtroopers saw fit to share a forum with another Star Wars site but working alongside others proved to be of little interest the need to part ways became inevitable. Pat Carlucci, Jason Meyers and Chris Spice met at Wizard World 2003 to discuss the possibility of doing a Sandtrooper forum, however none of the three would be able to extend themselves for this to happen. The fact was Sandtroopers.com now had a person who was willing to put forth the daily work and dedication of maintaining a board of our own. I felt that it was time for ST.com to make its own presence on the Internet, and after much deliberation with Spice the green light was given to me to start working on designing a forum for us.

FORUMS ARE NEW FOR ST.COM
Designing a forum from scratch is no easy task, but in less than one week I had completed the “guts” of the forum. The look of it was quite basic, but you definitely knew where you were by looking at the main forum page. Plus, the different sections in the forum made it loud and clear that you were in a totally different community, one that was only going to be beneficial to all the loyal troopers out there. The main focus for the forums was to create a trading community, where everyone could do trades with one another, sell items from their collection, and buy items from others’ collections. And with a marketplace like that it was essential to create the Feedback thread, where all the tallies of feedback that were to be left for other troopers would be neatly organized, so you knew who was truly an asset to the site and forums.

After the majority of the forum design was finished, it was time to start figuring out who would be moderating the forums, as they don’t moderate themselves. Spice and I were going to be the Administrators of the forum, along with the help from the retired Pat Carlucci, but it was up to me to start finding some very reliable people to help moderate a brand new forum for the first time in ST.com history. We of course brought in Dan Eversdyk (Sandtrooper Dan) who was already a huge part of the site. Another great person was Julian H. Betancourt (Desert Rat), who was the master behind all the great images and artwork you see on the site. The images can only be rivaled by the intense detail and breakdowns throughout his guides he provides for us. But, after those two were added we were going to need more, because I knew how big this site was going to become. If we were to go to war, I wanted to have a couple of people alongside me that I knew well. With that I brought in three people who were very close to me, two of which who are still with the site today, and those two individuals are Wayne Roberts (Reconsgt) and David Syczylo (Boba Binks). These two guys have been here the entire time that I have been here, and ST.com wouldn’t be what it is today without their help.

Throughout the last two years the forums have gone through a total of four re-designs, with the latest one being by far the best look we’ve had so far. Along the way we have added more staff to our team, and what started out with just a few forum members has now blossomed into almost one thousand members. Granted that doesn’t mean they’re all active members, but the ones who are actively participating in the forums are the ones who make us what we are today. With great local news reporting from troopers all across the country, to event coverage, to one hell of a trading community, ST.com was turning out to be one of the best Star Wars sites on the Internet. The only thing that was lacking was the look of our site, but that wasn’t going to last for long.

GOING BACK IN BLACK!
Shortly after I joined the staff it was brought to my attention that Jason D. Meyers was going to retire from his post as Webmaster. We were all concerned about what this could do to the future of ST.com, but Spice was cool as can be and asked if I could take over the helm as Webmaster. I immediately accepted the new role, and started working on the site right away. The first thing I wanted to do was to completely re-design the look of the site. I was tired of how the site was looking with the black text on white background, and I’m sure many other loyal troopers were feeling the same way. It was time to change things up a bit. There was some great graphic work provided so you could say some of the ingredients were already there for me. It still amazes me how well the core group operates as a unit. It was time to go back to black!

I worked for a couple weeks making the necessary changes to the main front page and all the sub-pages of the site, showed them to Spice and the rest of the staff, and I think everyone was impressed with what was about to become the new ST.com web presence. No one could have been happier than Spice himself, as he was just floored at the amount of progress that was made in such a short amount of time. It was on July 21, 2004 when we unveiled the new look for ST.com, and we were amazed by how much positive feedback we received from all the loyal troopers. We knew right then and there that we were doing the right things, but that didn’t mean my job was close to being done.