It’s not truly news anymore since I have announced the intent to end my involvement in the Dark Council with the end of the 6th Great Jedi War, but now is the time to really do it. As soon as this post is made, I will enter my transfer request to Clan Scholae Palatinae and thus my reign over the sudued worlds as Lord Hegemon is over.

I am looking back at a long time in the Council – 3 years, 2 months and 21 days. One of the longest in the history of the Dark Jedi Brotherhood and almost the entire time since the split. In this time, the Brotherhood has evolved from a fragile split-off of the Emperor’s Hammer whose future was uncertain at best to the dominant Star Wars club on the internet in terms of activity, consistency and appeal. It is a development I take pride in having been a part of first as Headmaster and then as Lord Hegemon and finally, for the last months, in my role as the host of the Sixth Great Jedi War.

I will not deny that, during this time I have seen and experienced many things I would rather have not seen and been disappointed more than once both on a personal and on a (DJB) professional level. Yet I have also seen many many things that I am happy to look back to. Over the years, I have seen the Shadow Academy grow from a pure inprocessing facility that ended the careers of over 60% of members before they had begun to an important, living part of the Brotherhood. That was not entirely my work – much of the groundwork has been laid by Pyralis and the policies and structures have been improved and expanded upon after my tenure by Spears and Anshar Kahn. But I do take pride in having been a part of it, even when the state I did hand the SA over in has been just as much forgotten as the one it was when I took it. And probably this is a good thing – both are nothing when compared to today. Especially to Anshar I wish to extend my fondest compliments at this time – when I look at your Shadow Academy, I see everything that I would have done myself had I still had the drive to stay Headmaster and a lot more on top.

Looking at my tenure as Lord Hegemon, I am admitting I am leaving an incomplete work behind. And yet, this is not what it may be, but in many ways, I am implementing a proposal I wanted to make reality should I have become Deputy Grand Master without ever taking the job: The proposal that projects should be projects and not positions. Lord Hegemon was never anything but a project granted Council authority. Under the structures of 2004, this was standard practice and also necessary since a normal, unpositioned member was just not allowed to have the access rights and privileges needed to complete a complex task working with member data and directly interfering with a future database structure. With Project Amalgamation, the need for such positions was eliminated, yet the position of Lord Hegemon was grandfathered into that proposal. And at that time, I still had need for it, but now with a completely different reason: it was now essentially a position and status I needed to be able to complete the other major project I had taken on, namely GJW6. However just in GJW6, I have been shown how much demand and interest there is for roleplaying in the DJB and over 50 members used the bits and pieces that were released from the RPG creation project, or their very own systems, to have fun in some entertaining adventures. Which brings me to one of the true purposes of this resignation – it will allow me to work on the RPG and hopefully finish it without the many pressures and duties that come from holding a full-time Dark Council position. It will enable me to take a development directory on the server, whip out a few coding tools and make it happen just like I did for the pinball game. Not having the pressure to have it seen as a duty but with the simple premise of “it’ll be great when it works, if not, no harm done”, the game just slowly but steadily grew over the last six months. Maybe it will take a while longer for the RPG, but without it being a duty to coordinate with many others but as a simple coding project to be done on my own, it has the best chances to one day show itself in your admin menus.

Lastly comes the third DC position I held, although that one never had a name: that of hosting a Great Jedi War. Even being given this possibility is an opportunity only the fewest members of the Brotherhood have ever received. There have been fewer GJWs than Grand Masters and the competition to get the contract for GJW6 was fierce – fierce enough for Jac to have decided it on a proposals stage. I am sure after this war, many of you who are in leadership positions, especially those of middle and upper levels, dream of their own chances. You have seen where GJW6 worked and where it did not work. You ultimately have many ideas on how it could have done better and frankly, so do I. If I had had all the wisdom and experience I have now, some things would have been done differently and the overall impact and fun level of this past war would have been even higher. If you believe you are the one who can take it to the next level, I commend you. You are taking on a task that requires an immense amount of energy and dedication. The last 80 days in retrospect feel to me like a year, if not much more. I really have trouble remembering what it was like to be “just in the DC”, without this Jedi War. To whoever is the next to take on such a mission, I wish you all the power and luck you can get, you will need every bit of it and then some and even then, you’ll have more days when you just want to quit than those where you feel it’s worthwhile. But ultimately conquering such a mission is a rewarding feeling in and of itself, although it will likely take me several weeks to really enjoy it because at the moment, frankly, I feel completely drained.

I am in the enviable situation of being able to leave the Council at a point in my Dark Brotherhood career where I can feel a winner. Not the absolute, overall winner who has realized his every dream, vision and project. No, that would never be possible – with everything you complete, you have two new ideas. But a winner in that I have seen a major project that will hopefully be remembered for a long time to its successful conclusion and that in spite of not having had optimal circumstances, and with “not optimal” I am not referring to the Dark Council members here who have rendered me invaluable assistance and support when it was most needed. I am referring to those of you who felt the need to let personal dislikes and hatred escalate to a level where it endangered a major Brotherhood activity.

As a closing remark to the war, I can say that it brought out the best in each of the members. What makes me sad is that, not for everyone, this sentence is a compliment. Thanks to the vast majority of you for whom it is.

Finally, some thanks.

I wish to publicly thank Jac, Xanos, Muz, Dalthid and Anshar for their contributions to the GJW. You did what was needed, when it was needed and even if not everything went smoothly, it was beyond your duty to the Brotherhood. All of you have either received a medal or, when I felt the medals I could award were inadequate, I have put in a recommendation with Jac to count your contribution towards a greater reward combined with your other services. To all of you, congratulations.

Thanks also to Spears and Anshar – yes, you, Spears. When I was Pyralis’ Praetor back early 2003, we discussed a lot of things we wanted to see for the Shadow Academy. I managed to instate a lot of those during my tenure, but others were left behind. When I look at the SA today, I see that they are there and in many ways better than we planned them. You both truly belong in the line of great Headmasters.

I also wish to thank the Lord Hegemon staff. I know my resignation will leave you a position short and I apologize for that. I hope you will still have the motivation to see the project through together one way or another. I am not giving up my plans just yet – but we’ll do it differently.

Special thanks to Arania for putting up with my stress level and mood over the last three months :P

Then a very personal thanks goes to the members who have, at some time during the last months, had encouraging words for me. I have not replied to every one of those messages but I have appreciated them all. And my greatest kudos go to those who have initially been against the war and given me hard times and in the end come back to apologize for it and tell me they enjoyed it. I dedicate the 6th GJW to you – you have shown a greatness that is rare in today’s world.

Second last, I have to mention Jac again, this time in his capacity as Grand Master. You’ve led the Brotherhood in troublesome times and while we did not always agree on things, I cannot deny you’ve realized something big. It’s been my pleasure to have been part of it.

But in the end, the last and most important thanks goes to a man who has long since faded from the limelight. To the man who has, right after the split, trusted a measly Quaestor with the implementation of a Brotherhood-wide “emergency” competition and later entrusted that same person with care over the Shadow Academy. My heartfelt thanks go to you, Firefox, for believing in me and I hope to not have disappointed you.

See you all,

Kaiann Yetaru Entar

Lord Hegemon Emeritus of the Dark Jedi Brotherhood.