What do you get the Grand Master that has everything?

The Dark Council had been discussing what to get our illustrous Grand Master. Ultimately, we settled on a Ruby Scepter, fitting for the holidays given its festive red rubies and general awesomness befitting our Grand Master. Pravus has been an excellent Grand Master and has overseen some of the largest changes in the history of the club. While everybody enjoys his regular reports and all of us have benefited from recent changes the Brotherhood has undergone, most members don't get to see is the way in which Pravus manages and directs his Dark Council on a daily, sometimes hourly basis, to provide the best experience we can for you guys, the members. He really puts in a ton of effort, and I think we all appreciate the work he does. You guys can read all the recs here, and thanks again, Pravus!

Never too late to Celebrate! (At least for another day)

We still have our Celebration competitions running until tomorrow, so get your entries in! Don't forget to make character sheets for all the awesome new Force Awakens characters in my competition!

Star Wars Holiday Special

If you guys are anything like me, one of the best parts of this holiday season was Star Wars goodies. A bunch of mine got trapped in the university mailroom while the school closed for break, but what did arrive has me pretty excited.

X-wing, anyone?

I also stole an image shamelessly from Xen, because I think it is awesome.

Maybe we shoulda gotten the Grand Master one of these...

Did anyone else get anything cool over the holidays? Now that the spoiler ban is released, no need to hold back on all our action figures with lightsabers. ;)

Test of Identity May Be Working

Many of you will recall we introduced the Test of Identity to replace the Test of Lore in an attempt to get more members through the door and into the club itself. The below is a screenshot from the new Test of Identity, in case some of our rejoining rogue members have no idea what I'm talking about; we redesigned the Test to center more around character creation and less around Brotherhood factoids.

Our preliminary data show this may be working. When compared October, September, and December to earlier months, our percentage of members making it through the join process has skyrocketed. For example, in March and April we tended around 75% of joins finishing the Test of Lore. The last three months, our lowest percentage of members joining and finishing the Test of Identity was 95%, with November hitting 100%. Wow!

Unit Reviews: Coming Quarterly

We're looking to roll out unit reviews on a more regular, quarterly basis. I'll have the last quarter's unit reviews done in the coming week or two. Much as the last time, I will briefly summarize the data for the club, and provide Consuls extended information and general thoughts on their Clan's recent performance. I'll also let Consuls know how Pravus and I think they are doing a bit more broadly, and initiate some discussion with them to hear how they think their unit is doing, and how Pravus or I could help.

Vendetta Review: Clan Feuds

One of my jobs as DGM is to review policies, and following a discussion with Plagueis and Odan-Urr, it became clear we needed some clarity on Clan Feud policies. After a brief Dark Council discussion, we are enacting the below policy, which will get Wikified soon.

Vendetta: Clan Feuds

Background
Prior to 2007, Clan Feuds were treated as Vendetta level events that resulted in major awards for the winners and consequences for the losers. From 2007-2015 the Clan Feud decreased in prestige as major Great Jedi Wars, Rites of Supremacy, and Independence Games consumed the Dark Jedi Brotherhood's time. Starting in 2016, the Clan Feud will return to club prominence with Vendetta level prestige and rewards granted. Clan Feuds are a type of Vendetta where two to three units war directly upon one another, effectively engaging in a Great Jedi War on a limited scale. These Vendettas have a distinct winning unit, both fictionally and “out of character” from the competitions themselves. Feuds are overseen by the Dark Council, and unlike co-op competitions between units, can only occur a maximum of two times per year per unit. Additionally, as Vendetta competitions, Feuds are considered canon in the Brotherhood timeline.

Awards
Clan Feud competitions begin at Tier 2 Crescents (and relevant modifiers, e.g. for low effort or for >10 participants, still apply), and are organized under a parent competition which will track individual achievements via a leaderboard, similar to normal Vendettas. The parent competition will award Novae to the first, second, and third placements respectively, according to the individual leaderboard. Feuds are considered major competitions, and should reflect this in terms of duration of competition, nature of competitions offered, et cetera.

In addition, prior to the start of the Feud, the Dark Council may announce additional spoils as going to the winning unit in the form of a custom accessory or weapon, but potentially expanding to other items (from possessions system) in the future.

Units may choose to wager possessions in Feuds, but it is not required. Wagering of possessions may increase the spoils granted by the Dark Council; interested Consuls should discuss options with the Grand Master and Deputy Grand Master if they are interested in wagering possessions.

Dark Council Oversight
The Dark Council will oversee Feuds. Prior to planning a Feud, interested unit leaders should reach out to the Grand Master and Deputy Grand Master with a timetable for the event to assess if the Dark Council can oversee a feud at that time; the Dark Council reserves the right to postpone a timetable or table the proposal entirely in the event a suitable time slot is not available in the foreseeable future. Prior to the start of the feud, units must provide a detailed outline of the fiction relating to the Feud background to the Dark Council for canon review, and provide complete competition details to the Dark Council. Furthermore, unit leaders must both agree to a complete scoring system that will be used to determine the winning unit, as well as graders for each competition. Additionally, the Dark Council will assign a co-organizer from the Council to subjective grading competitions to provide final say on placements in those competitions.

Boost in transfers the last three months: An Awakening in the Force?

The last three months have seen a steep increase in both the number of totally new members, as well as the number of rogue members returning. To both groups: Welcome! It is great to see so many familiar faces coming back to activity, but it's also great to see so many people joining us for the first time. So welcome to new and old members alike!

Month	Returning Rogue	New Members
October	8	23
November	11	41
December	17	68

It certainly looks like the excitement from the movies is really paying off four units!

The Dream of the Nineties...

...is apparently icy and shuts down with a couple inches of snow.

I'm in Portland for a conference, but still have email and Telegram. While my responses may be slow, I'll try to get to things as they come in. If you don't get a response within a week, feel free to give me an extra poke!

That's it for this now!

TL;DR

• Congrats to Pravus on shiny RS!
  
• Celebrate! Do competitions!
  
• Welcome to our new and returning members, almost all of whom are finishing the Test of Identity! Yay!
  
• Unit Reviews coming in the following weeks.
  
• Clan Feud rules are out.
  
• Mav may be a bit busy lately; in Portland for a conference.
  

Telaris "Mav" Cantor

Deputy Grand Master