Roses are red,
Violets are red,
The carpet is red,
So much blood...

The results from the Great Jedi War are out, and hopefully you've had a chance to take a look already. I won't sugar coat it - we lost. We were only about 20 points behind CNS, but the other units that were behind us after Part 1 really pulled out the stops and accumulated a lot more points than we did in the second round. Let's dig into the numbers a little to see what happened.

The thing that bit us the hardest was the long term events: the Run-On, Battleplan and Multimedia. Where we got 14 points for our RO, PLA got 123 points for theirs. That's a difference of more than the entire Part 1 put together. We had only one top 10 Battleplan and one top 10 Run-On entry, where most other units had multiple top 10 entries in all three.

Egregious and Frosty took two top 10 spots in gaming, but we had no other top 10 placements in Part 2 and that hurt us a lot as well.

I don't have the comprehensive participation list from the Dark Council yet, but my sense is that our participation in this GJW was very strong compared to the last two or three we've been a part of. Tarentum Momentum really is a thing and it really is building up, slowly but surely. We have a growing core of loyal, active, dedicated members who are writing, gaming and participating and I can tell you that people around the Brotherhood have certainly noticed that.

Unfortunately in this GJW raw participation wasn't everything. Quality was a critical factor as well. Scoring was based on the top 10 positions in each event. I thought that was a vast improvement over prior GJWs where only the top 3 counted, but the fact of the matter is we didn't make the top 10 enough to earn the points we needed.

The thing is we're the smallest unit, by a lot. We have 25 people, not all of whom participate in these things (you know who you are) whereas the next smallest unit has about 40 people. That means we have many fewer chances to get into each top 10, and puts the burden on each individual participant to not only participate as much as they can but to produce top quality work. That's not an excuse, it's just the way the math worked out this time.

So here's what our House as a whole is going to do about it: we're going to train. Between now and the next GJW we will be running a steady stream of competitions, from all over the spectrum. There will be fiction, puzzles, trivia, graphics, gaming, Run-Ons, Battleplans and Multimedia competitions. All the same stuff we typically see in a GJW. The main focus is going to be on honing everybody's skills so that next time we can take more of those top 10 spots. I want us to learn to be better writers, better gamers, better artists, and get everyone some practice doing ROs and Battleplans. We missed a lot of the organization and teamwork that we needed this time around. Practicing will help us do better next time.

I welcome anybody who would like to help run these competitions. They're good for Journeyman requirements, for building leadership skills and for participation in general. Just run your idea by a Summit member and we'll help you pick a timeframe to run it.

The other part of this is that we absolutely must grow. If we want to compete we have to get bigger than 25, and try to push our way up to at least 40. You can't recruit from other units, but you can talk to your friends and families. You can talk to people you game with, use [DJB] as your clan tag, and try to get the word out about Tarentum. If there are people you know in the Rogues, shoot them an email (please do NOT just spam all of the Rogues) and see if they'd want to come back.

There's no debating that this is a disappointing result. After seeing the results of the first round I was sure we wouldn't be last this time. Unfortunately that's just how it worked out. We will pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and keep going forward. We will practice harder. We will focus on retention and recruiting. We will do better next time. There is nowhere else to go but up.

SBL Scion "Firebird" Altera (Sith)/QUA/Tarentum [SA: IV]
GCx2 / SC / ACx3 / DCx3 / BNx3 / Cr:1A-3S-10E-1T-1Q / CFx52 / CIx17 / DSSx2 / SI / SotM / LSx3 / SoLx5 / S:6U-4B-3De-2Dec-3Aff-14Cr
{SA: MVL - SVLC}
PIN: 9335