“Are you really going to just leave your crew?” He called after the captain.

One would think a pirate Captain who had this much loyalty from her lieutenant would be better than me.The Kiffar didn’t push himself to go further, instead he just watched as an emptiness filled him in place of heat. “You will regret this for the rest of your life if you go!”

He wasn’t sure if he called that out to taunt her or himself.

Reiden watched as the remaining guard and Naomi were knocked down. He knew enough to tell that they weren’t out of the fight and would more than likely recover shortly. Tisto had tried to close the gap to Kelina, but, if the Corellian had to guess, his injuries hampered his efforts. His mind was trying to come up with a solution to their predicament when a voice from beside him drew his attention.

“Throw me!” He looked over to see Asani and noted the fire in her eyes, her face set in determination. Her body was braced, ready. She was being serious.

Well, if that’s what she wants…

Reiden quirked a brow and nodded once. He drew upon the Force and let it fill him, then thrust his arms forward. The Kushiban was launched through the air, heading for the lieutenant who had previously taken shots at the two of them. Asani wanted to get back at her and he wasn’t about to stand in the way, or deny her that moment.

His gaze turned to Tisto once more, then looked past him to Kelina. He hated to leave something unfinished, but he had to trust in his team that they’d handle the remaining guard. Muscles tensing for a moment, he took off, running towards their target, not wanting her to get even further away. There was no telling what manner of escape she may have at her disposal.

Asani flew like a vengeful whistling bird towards the Pirate Captain, propelled by Reiden's telekinetic throw. As the armored lagomorph came down on the target, she tried to simply use her momentum and weight to tackle Merrin to the floor. But perhaps her desire for violence was a bit too aggressive, and Kelina was able to scramble away from the tackle, stumbling through and slowing.

Seeing that Asani’s tackle was unsuccessful, Mex and Friend continued to push forward, and now set their sights on incapacitating the target using their blasters to maim or stun.

Merrin was off balance. Just as she was about to turn the corner, however, a set of screeching blue rings of energy slammed into her, sending her dropping to the floor like a sack of grain. Stunned and incapacitated.

---

Bounty 004: Complete

Thanks to the efforts of Envoys Asani, Tisto, Reiden, and Mex, field agents were able to scrub the enemy pirate base, and the Inquisitorius was able to interrogate Captain Merrin Kelina and her Lieutenant. Once each was pressured about each other, Naomi broke, and gave up a list of their contacts to chase down.

Read the full mission log here.

---

Mission 002: Complete

*Thanks to the efforts of Envoys Meero, Tisto, Tahiri, Titus, Nicfer, and Saal, the research base on Uskil that fell under siege from waves of mutant monsters has been safely evacuated. The Iron Legion has moved in to clean up and secure the remaining waves, but the source of the scourge still remains a mystery at large, and likely something future Envoys will need to tackle. *

Read the full mission log here.

---

Table of Contents

• Development
• Leaderboard
• Helpful Resources
• Closing

Exarch Report 12

While I'd like to keep to monthly reports, I just survived probably the most intensive 4-week period of my professional career while holding down my regular job and my side consulting gig while also running 2 DM-focused RPs. Hopefully I don't hit another patch like that, but we should be good heading into the summer.

Something that might or might not have been covered, as things happen fast sometimes, is a quick update to the Envoy Corps missions statement. If you check out the wiki you can see it now reads:

Guided by the Exarch, the Envoy Corps tackles bounties, contracts, and missions that burnish the Brotherhood's reputation among the galaxy's power players. Renowned for their expertise and shrewdness, Envoys deploy in diverse pairs or teams, drawing upon specialists from all seven clans and their associated allies. With conditional advisement from the Emissary or Herald, the Envoy Corps seeks to bolster the Brotherhood's standing with its current and potential allies while countering propaganda being spread by their adversaries.

The real take away here, of course, is that the Envoy Corps isn't just a diplomatic service for the Brotherhood. The Envoy Corps, narratively is focused on mixing and matching specialists from all the different Clans, and sometimes the Council themselves, to accomplish things. This gives us narrative freedom to continue to pursue bounties, missions, and contracts that can help with world building and character development alike.

Development

This section covers the developmental project work of the Exarch team. Please see my last report for a breakdown of the RP survey, statistics, data, and my thoughts/answers to a lot of that feedback.

RP Modules

One of the suggestions that came up during the member survey in regards to helping make DMing more accessible was to have pre-made modules that members could use. I’ve made my first attempt at this, and I’m happy to share our first two RP Modules.

To use them, all a member needs to do is make a copy of the Google Slides document, and then edit/modify assets and details as they see fit. The reason I’ve used Google Drive / Google Slides is that it’s easy to access on mobile, and requires no external apps for me such as trying to get Roll20 or VTT Foundry to work on my phone. In reality, you can use anything to run your RP, but this is what I’ve found helpful, as a tool.

• You can find the modules here in the Exarch Resources folder.

Tips:

• You can find new maps for your modules here.
• You can find npc and enemy tokens for your modules here.

RP Bounty Module #1

Bounty Module #1

The framework you see in this module was what was run for Bounty 004, which was highlighted in the introduction to this report. But it can be applied to any bounty you want to create. You can move the existing assets around, invent new stat blocks, invent new entrances or exits to the base, but the module at the very least gives you a basic, straight forward framework to start with.

Tips:

• You can use Page 2 to add an image of your Bounty/Target, and add stat blocks, unique information, character background, and anything else you want to be able to reference for your members.
• For a folder with a bunch of pre-made character tokens, click here.

RP Adventure Module

Adventure Module #1

This model is completely system agnostic, with no role or DC suggestions. It’s very straight forward, but has room for tweaking. We ran this as The Sceptre of Tu’torial, which was mostly used to show some old veteran members how the RP system could be used. I reused my floor plan and assets and shaped some basic guidelines, though that might be helpful for another DM.

Wally’s Guide to Running Organizing an RP herding cats

The name is a work in progress, but I’m still working on a Shadow Academy exam that will be a general guide to running a Brotherhood RP activity. This should not be seen in any way as a definitive “this is what you must do” and like the Pirate Code is more of a guideline based on what I’ve seen work and create fun, successful RP experiences.

It’s a work in progress, and I’ll be sharing what I end up doing with a few DMs I’ve seen step up and get their hands into the possibilities. This is something I work on in my spare time, but something I’m very passionate about and believe can be a helpful resource to continuing to build confidence in members to run more RPs.

Status Update: Rough Draft complete

I will continue to hammer away at this and work with my team, and other resources, to try and shape it into a helpful resource that can give more members confidence in running their RPs.

Some tips I can share for now on using Google Chrome to manager your sessions:

Chrome Tab groups are great for organizing snapshots of your players. You can also now save tab groups, which lets you easily recall/open them up on a different device if you use multiple computers (like me).

D6 Systems

There was some really good discussion on D6 based systems that members seem to be super excited about. I wanted to use this space to remind everyone that there is no central, singular system that the Brotherhood uses. Any system is viable, as long as it utilizes our Character Sheets, Possessions, and the DB/Star Wars lore sandbox to create fun writing experiences. Anubis’ D6 is currently on there, as well as Taldryan’s variant, so we do already have these resources available to you to try.

If you draft a ruleset, or want to share with others, we have a section in the Roleplaying Handbook for Rulesets/Systems specifically. We will make sure you are attributed as the creator or author, and the club becomes a better place for your service of sharing your ideas!

Again, the reason we’ve used “D20” or D10s has mostly just been a simplicity thing. There is no requirement or hard rule to use them. I’m always open minded to seeing new ways to use our Character Sheet system in creative ways that let me play my characters in a roleplaying fashion! There are no rules or limitations, however, other than to have fun.

Leaderboard

Each month, I will publish a top-10 list of members who have earned the most career-long Envoy Marks to date. So the “May 2024” leaderboard comes from a report run on May 1st, 2024. The June leaderboard will be generated on June 1st, 2024.

This was actually the first month we saw 10 members (thanks Wally and Bril) reach Rank 12 in the Players Gonna Play trophy.

Again. This is to hold over until we can figure out additional trophy ranks, how far we would push that, and just a healthy, fun way for. Envoy Marks are not a race, but we wanted to make sure folks that put in the work get noticed for their efforts over time :).

Helpful Resources

You can find everything you need in Roleplaying Handbook Wiki. This page hosts links to Exarch Resources such as maps, rulesets, system types, and information about Role Playing activities the Brotherhood.

Some useful pages to bookmark:

• Exarch Resources Google Drive Folder
• Envoy Corps Wiki
• Envoy Corps Trophy Rank Rewards Table
• Envoy Corps Items
• Envoy Corps CS Feats
• Character Sheet Reference Tool
• Roleplaying Handbook

Closing

TL;DR

• The Envoy Corps has been busy kicking names and taking butts butts and taking names.
• First set of RP Modules is now available for members to try out and use in DMing an RP.
• Reminders that new systems can be invented at will, and if something works, please write it down and share it with others so they can also utilize the system!
• May Leadboard posted.

That’s all for now. If you have assets you want to contribute to the Exarch Resources folder, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us. Any questions, you can always email us, or @Exarch Staff on Discord. We’re seeing some exciting usage of the RP system to replace the forum-based “RO” structure, so hopefully we’ll have more updates on how that’s working out after Tuq and Sock’s respective competitions wrap up!

Thanks for listening in. Peace.

-W