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Quaestor Address: Introductions & Renovations

Dinaari, Taldryan, and to those curious enough to look in on us;

So there is no confusion; this is not a report, a status update, or even an announcement; all of which are designed to catch you up on information - which you can expect to receive these regularly and with consistency from Anderlious and myself (and the rest of the Taldryan Summit) as we move forward.

This is an Address. In the sections below, you can expect to find an introduction of myself, the assessment of the situation we are facing, along with an outline of key focuses that I submitted in my Quaestor application - and from which we will be progressing over the course of these next months. I do not apologize for the length of this article. It is lengthy because it needs to be, we have a lot to focus on and develop over the next few months, year, and beyond. Updates and reports from this will be kept at a better length, but I believe anything in this address needs to be...well, addressed.

I want to highlight this:

This House Address will be our mission statement, our mandate, our pledges; it will be what we need to address and what areas we will focus on to do so. Therefore it will be a piece of information we will reference back to should we lose our way. Mistakes, hiccups, and fumbles are part of the learning process; but excuses, losing our way, and failure are not acceptable.

We will be using this as a guiding tool as we put Dinaari, and in turn Taldryan, under renovations.

Vanguard Raiju Kang

Quaestor, House Dinaari

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Quaestor’s Introduction

“A good leader doesn't stand at the front and rope their followers, and drag them along to where they need to go; rather, a good leader tells people what's in front, what's behind, finds the right course, and invites others to follow towards mutual benefit. ” - Sith Bloodfyre, Recommending Raiju Kang for a Grand Cross

What this club means to me:

I’d like to begin by reposting an introduction I gave about myself some time ago:

“For the past nine years or so, I have gone by the name Raiju Kang. My real name is Brett, and before I rejoined the club as Raiju Kang; I was known as Warhunter back in the days of Clan Satal Keto and the early days of Plagueis. Over thirteen years ago, after my MSN Gaming Zone club, Corellian Knights (CK), disbanded; I was searching through the Battlestats.net (BSC) website looking for a new Star Wars club to join. For the previous four years I had been a top contender in Jedi Knight and through CK I learned of an earlier SW game; X-wing vs. TIE Fighter. These two games are what lead to my passion for all things Star Wars and they are what lead me to start reading the Expanded Universe, which in turn led me to begin writing fan-fiction. At the time I didn’t know there were clubs for this, but again as I was searching through BSC I found this funny image of Fox McCloud (the Nintendo character) with a lightsaber - likely which was an early concept design of our former Grand Master; Firefox.

I ended up going to the club it linked, found this amazing website with many different units (reminding me of the clubs TFA/TRA, who ran BSC), and discovered not only could I play my SW games but I could do fan-fiction with others as well. The concept blew my mind, I joined that day - being placed within House Kirleta of Clan Satal Keto. Within a week, there was this epic event known as a “Great Jedi War” and it was the first to be done in the DJB since some “Exodus”. The energy and hype lead to an incredible time and I was sucked in, there were nights I’d wait until my parents were asleep and then I’d sneak down to the family computer so I could participate - thanks DJB for keeping teenaged me at home and away from such things like drugs….or girls.”

I like to think the above does well to pay homage to the Brotherhood that I started with and have since grown up with. This club isn’t just about Star Wars, or gaming, or writing fan-fiction. So often I speak to others about what we do here, and many just don’t get it. It can be a little bit hard to explain the value of pounding out dozens of matches of Jedi Academy, researching trivial pieces of lore, or staying up late to see if GJW scores have been posted - but these are just the surface activities of a hobby that has changed my life in many ways.

Since I joined the Brotherhood, I’ve;

• Taken lessons on a number of topics including conflict mediation, grammar studies, proposal writing, and programming
• Become knowledgeable about countries, cultures, and people from place I’ve never even travelled
• Developed my hard skills in areas like photoshop, MS office, computer sciences, and writing
• Developed my soft skills in areas like teamwork, communication, debate, and leadership
• Been educated on literature, class struggles, and social minorities - having first met an openly homosexual person through our chatroomss and learning about some of the struggles
• Developed myself personally as an individual; growing from a bratty, unworldly country boy to a mature, contributing member of society
• Developed myself professionally; first learning here many of the skills I use as a business consultant as well as an owner

I share all this because I think it is important to know who I am is not a matter of what screenname I go by, what unit I come from, or how many positions I’ve held in this organization. I’m a product of this organization as a whole, who has been bettered by the time I invested in this club. I believe in the product we put out, and think that our time invested in this club is meaningful.

At times this hobby has become dangerously close to a lifestyle for me, but whether you come here for entertainment, enjoyment, or even as an escape (as I did at times); there’s a common connection we share and something we hold with high value the outside world may never understand. This is why we are fitting of the term; brotherhood.

At this point, I would like to invite hearing from you on your perspective of the club. Why did you join and more importantly; what does this club mean to you? I’ve opened a forum discussion you can access by clicking here.

My relationships with the club:

As I mentioned above, who I am goes far beyond what I have done in this club. For a complete understanding of me; my history can be found on my dossier or asking me since my time as Warhunter isn’t listed.

For those interested, I’ve served in every position from Battleteam Sergeant to Consul - and for most, multiple times. I’ve created successful, long standing Battleteams, founded a House, brought in new members and engaged them as Rollmaster, been both an Aedile and Quaestor of sub-unit houses, been Aedile of an independent unit, and lead separate units as Proconsul and Consul. I have been involved in this unit’s development for years now, while also being involved in the development of many others; and I recognized BOTH the bad and good that has came from my transfers between units. I’ve also been a Professor for the Shadow Academy, a member of the Appeals Panel, and a mentor of several prominent members of the Dark Jedi Brotherhood - and have grown to call on these people as well as others as a mentor to myself.

Most importantly, I hold friendships with someone from almost every unit of this club. I like every unit, and don’t believe in the attitudes certain units have had in the past. I do believe every unit needs to have its own theme (not everyone can be [unit] Darkity-Dark) and this should be a recruitment tool. I believe the MAA staff has a standard to protect, and that’s the betterment for the club; however, I also believe leaders have the responsibilities to insure their members are properly rewarded and must test these standards, respectfully. I believe the Shadow Academy’s importance is downplayed by some, and it’s potential has yet to be fully met. I think all the Seneschal/Herald/Regent teams are a luxury that no other club can compete with, and that some people have taken for granted. I’m glad to see the Fist and Voice replace the duties Order leaders had. And I think the Chamber of Justice is an imperfect system that is a requirement in our modern era.

Who I am, personally:

I’m a thirty year old employment counsellor from London, Ontario. Additionally, my family and I have business ventures in winery and cider. I have been living with my girlfriend and our three cats for over a year and a half now, after dating for five years - and somehow she’s cool with these magical internet friends I have and strongly believes she’ll never join it.

Over two years ago, I developed a (thankfully, benign) brain tumour that has given me a lifetime label as epileptic. The struggle I had with this robbed me of my job, (temporarily) of my girlfriend, and prematurely ended my term as Consul. #seizuressuck

To connect back to why I think all this is important, and to justify the length of this section, I share all this because I believe my role as Quaestor is to head the development of our little community. We are, afterall, a brotherhood within a brotherhood and I passionately believe that’s more than a motto. It’s something we have to put into practice, so to better develop our little club within a club - I think it’s important to know why I find this place important, what I’ve done, what I believe, and who I am as an individual. As always, please feel free to connect with me if you want to know more and I encourage you all to learn from each other how we each stand on these topics.

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Character Introduction

Touching on the last bit of who I am, I’d like to introduce you to my character; Raiju Kang. I want people to understand as we move forward; Dinaari is going to become a well rounded unit. No longer will we just be a gaming house. A modern unit has to appeal to the many interests of the membership, however, that doesn’t mean I will be asking you to do #AllTheThings.

Don’t feel you can write? Don’t own any of the games? Either is fine. My role isn’t to force you to participate. My role is content creation, and as we move forward; we will offer all content and let the individual membership pick what they consume and offer guidance when they crossover to unfamiliar waters. So that means, from this point on I will be highlighting the characters of our unit so others can get to know them and have a better understanding when they seek to use them.

That said, I’d like to start by introducing myself, as he comes face to face with Howlader Taldrya:

Excerpt:

“I’m betting you thought you would be rid of this ugly mug.” The words came with a stinging acknowledgement of their past. A Prophet of the Brotherhood, Howlader Taldrya was one of the few people Raiju Kang feared - what person wouldn’t fear a man who enjoyed being referred to as a panda? It was just one of the many peculiar traits of the man. A Sith in rites and title, but lacking the same level of cruelty; the man was most known for his insanity and unpredictable nature. It always had a habit of putting Raiju on edge.

Read the rest of the story - HERE

*Note: This particular piece deals with suicide; should you ever be dealing with feelings of this nature make sure you speak to someone. As someone with Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training (ASIST), I’m always willing to talk or provide any recommendations of local resources for you to use from my network.

**Also, if you are interested in getting your character feature - talk to me. I’ll be bugging people regularly for this.

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The Situation

“For whoever successfully is added to the new leadership team, those people need to face some hard truths about the situation they are entering. This isn’t going to be a cake-walk, this isn’t a high risk-high reward opportunity, nor is this a chance to develop oneself as a leader.”

Raiju Kang, Dinaari Quaestor Application

I want people to truly understand where we are coming from. Below is the exact text from my application to Aiden about how I view the state of Taldryan as someone who has been outside the clan for more than six months and was looking back in. This is something the entire Summit group (clan and houses) has looked over and discussed, and all of us had similar themes in our applications. We acknowledge this situation and this is what we are all facing:

1. Taldryan has had an attitude about itself. Unfortunately, success has caused Taldryan to stale. When I was a member outside and looking in toward Taldryan, I always felt these people were arrogant but damn they were good. For the first half of my DJB experience, Taldryan was the first unit of the entire club. They won almost everything, and it was a complete upset to see them fall out of the top one or two spots. Unfortunately, later on (and continuing on to when I joined the unit) they kept this attitude and air of arrogance but their performance had fallen. When I was Rollmaster of the Independent Unit and Aedile in one of the house units, I would bring up concerns about the slipping nature we had but was always assured that we were in a good place because we were in Taldryan. Unfortunately, that’s just not true anymore. That’s not to say Taldryan is in a bad place, it just needs to get back in gear and the starting point is shaking that attitude that everything is ‘okay’. We aren’t settling for ‘okay’.
2. Oldies need to be kept in the game, but a new Taldryan core needs to take the lead. The unit recycles the “Old Guard” too much. Whether it’s through necessity or a sake of protecting the old, I’m not sure, but older members tend to make it into the forefront of the clan moreso than the new. While the Old Guard could (and I would argue should) be included in the planning of the unit, they’ve sat in the seats of power too often and too long for new talent to get into it, crave it, or even see what Taldryan could look like with other faces. This is something the Old Guard has expressed themselves - no other place to looked then Yacks’ or Howie’s last Consul reports.
3. When Taldryan re-clanned, it wasn’t ready for it. It’s a harsh truth, but I think all the units that were reclanned at that time were all in the same boat. Everyone was so focused on just getting houses back, better rotation in the join cycle, or getting that clan title and other benefits - few had the foresight of how deep it would impact these units. Unfortunately, Taldryan stumbled and is still playing catch up.
4. House-specific roles was a mistake. I rejoined Taldryan shortly after this launched. Had I been back when this was first suggested, I would have objected. However, I came in after and unsurprising to me both Mark and I were asked to join Dinaari in hopes we could spark some new activity in the house because being a gaming only unit wasn’t working. I don’t think this ever works, it’s like when the club limited membership to houses based on order: the problem is it doesn’t recognize that people are interested in more than one thing and the unit itself needs people to look into more than just one piece of activity.
5. Reports are no longer regular. Preparing for this application, I spent a fair bit of time reading the last year worth of reports from the clan, and each of the houses. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much there regularly. Not only do they not have a regular release structure (whether it be monthly, weekly, or whatever) but too often material is repeated within the same unit reports. There needs to be a clear divide of what people are covering, when, and however it works with everyone else. Unfortunately this is something the Talryan Times used to mock people on...we need to correct this.
6. Merging of PCON & RM lessened their effect. Howie was an awesome Proconsul. He was also an awesome Rollmaster. Unfortunately, each position took time away from his duties in the other and it lessened their impact. While I understand that this was suppose to be a short time solution, it lasted too long. Taldryan needs a dedicated Proconsul and a dedicated Rollmaster. DGM Half Year Report: Unfortunately the Half Year Report put out this summer was not kind to Taldryan. Low Knightings, bottom three unique participants, lowest CIs, second lowest CFs, lowest CEs, second lowest merits, middle of the pack otherwise. However, these are things that can be built up. Taldryan needs to build a core of new faces, personalities, and leadership that is supported by the Old Guard. From there, we just expand our ring of influence and it will increase our standing in each of these areas. The report was not as damning as I have heard others state, it just provides goals for us to work on as a team.
7. No concrete solutions to the major issues of member retention and competition participation - an issue all the units must deal with. Recruitment and social media has slacked and fallen to automatic events. Statistically, as I know Mav likes to pound into the Consuls, a recruited member is much more likely to stay then a random join. We need to put effort into this, especially since we offer an experience no one else can (being light, gray, or dark and the fortune we establish from the Treason events).
8. Going through a period of transition. Unfortunately, Taldryan is getting it’s stuff reset. This is part of a rebalancing act - and that is going to rub some people the wrong way. However, it needs to be reassured to the membership that this is a good thing. New chances for lore development, stories, and most importantly; an opening for newer members to make their mark.
9. Taldryan is a club within a club. I love this about Taldryan and I want to finish this section on a positive hard truth. It’s supported by a strong, passionate core group. Not only this but it is one of the most welcoming groups, and are very good at making new members apart of it. While it may have caused some issues of isolation and not keeping the clan up with the rest of the club, it's something that makes it very easy to get new members that are engaged and connected to the unit. In other words, its really good at getting people to drink that koolaid. Which is a good thing when properly focused.

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Renovations; Key Focuses

“The Dark Jedi Brotherhood is an online club dedicated to Star Wars fans. Our club’s purpose is to provide entertainment, enjoyment, and fellowship to its members.” - Darth Pravus, A Letter to the Voters

Okay, so we identified the situation. What are some actionable items we plan to work on? Below is a list of key priorities that we are going to be working on as we move forward. Since being positioned as Quaestor, I’ve been involved in a lot of conversations; from clan level, to the individual emails I’ve sent out to each Dinaari member. From these conversations we are shaping our plans on addressing each of the items below and as we get back into the routine of consistent reporting you are going to see the Quaestor and Aedile reports dividing up what areas they will be covering.

Please understand this isn’t a complete list of what we are working on, just the key focuses we will be working to address:

1. Recruitment
   • Rogues
   • Friends
   • Family
   • Other social clubs
   • Other Star Wars clubs
   • Social Media
   • Other
2. Community Development
   • House Identity
   • Develop Membership’s characters
   • Fill out the House Wiki
   • Establish a core group
3. Promote the Culture of Excellence
4. Leadership Development
   • Open Two Battleteams
   • Identifying non-positioned opportunities for members to develop themselves
   • Promote growth opportunities within the clan/house so we aren’t losing members
5. Lore Development
   • Open the Sandbox
6. Accountability/Organization
7. New member experience
8. Bridge out to the club

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Conclusion

By now, each of you should have a good idea of what our situation is, where the summit stands, who I am, and what we will be focusing on for the few months. I plan on doing an address like this every quarter, which will be supported by Mark and I by providing regular reports, announcements, emails and other forms of contact over the course of this term. Should you have any questions, comments or concerns regarding the material above, please contact me directly at [Log in to view e-mail addresses]

D-I-N-A-A-R-I: No better way to spell pwnage

RK