Work In Progress Akiran Vigilants

[Lansal Akira]

OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION

• Intent: Create a Unique Knightly Force Order under the Ashlan Crusade for Lansal Akira's backstory (and other PCs that wish to join) and the village defence leagues associated with the Order
• Image Credit: N/A
• Canon: N/A
• Permissions: N/A
• Links: Knightly Orders of Ashla

GENERAL INFORMATION

• Organization Name: Akiran Vigilants;
• Classification: Force Order/Religious Order/Military Order
• Affiliation: Ashlan Crusade
• Organization Symbol:
• Description: The Akiran Vigilants, officially the "Vigilant Order of Pious Attendants and Defenders of Akira", is a martial Force order rooted in Felucian traditions and folk tales of vigilante warriors defending Felucians from predation by raiders and Sith. It has an eye towards training its members in all forms of combat and a focus on being a nucleus to train villagers to withstand outside aggression, notably in the form of the allied Farmers' League of Self-Defence, better known as the Farmers' League, a militia that used to count most rural Felucians in its number.

GEOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION

• Headquarters: Akira Village: once a bustling rural trade center at the heart of a valley between villages, the village has been almost completely razed safe for a few hardened structures
• Domain: Several shrine-sanctums in a few villages and along roads on Felucia, an office in downtown Kway Teow and a sub-office on Ession belonging to the Felucian embassy
• Notable Assets: 1x SS-54 Light Freighter, 3x Landspeeders

SOCIAL INFORMATION

• Hierarchy:
  • Fledgling: Apprenticed members with an affinity for the Force, Fledglings are typical train with their local Akiran Fraternity. Members may start young but are always volunteers, and they may leave at any time. In this stage they begin to learn and internalise the values of the Corpus as well as the ecclectic Akiran combat skills. Fledglings, once deemed responsible enough by their fraternity, join outreach missions to villages under the supervision of Vigilants.
  • Terrestrial Vigilant: Once proficient and deemed a "full brother" by vote of their Fraternity's Veterans, Fledglings are proclaimed Terrestrial Vigilants. Most Vigilants remain at this rank and are free to help out with the communities of Felucia as they see fit, with most informally associating with several Associations - single-interest cross-Fraternity interest groups dedicated to specific missions, training, arts, or other matters. Fraternities may assign essential duties to Vigilants such as patrolling their locality, cleansing a nearby Jungle or assisting with the harvest.
  • Solar Vigilant: Solar Vigilants are not so much promoted from Terrestrial Vigilants as they are trusted with additional responsibilities; important specialist knowledge falls under their domain, as well as usually being given small-unit leadership roles when the situation calls for it. The title is generally given by the Veteran Assembly of a Fraternity upon suggestion by a quorum of fellow Terrestrials.
  • "Mulberry" Vigilant (Veterans): The Veterans of a Fraternity represent the most respected community leaders of a region and the most proficient warriors of a Fraternity. While they may make important administrative decisions in their Assemblies, not all Vigilants view this as a promotion or even a privilege, as Veterans are expected to take a leading role in training, upkeep, and settling inter-village politics, which many experienced Vigilants view as a burden or unsuited to their talents. This is partly the reason why the original title for Veterans has long been lost, replaced with the more self-deprecating title.
    • Veteran Assemblies convene on a regular as well as a special basis: they decide when a Fledgeling is ready, when a Solar should be recognised, make large-scale military decisions in times of war, and countless other vital tasks. Each Veteran Assembly speaks for a Fraternity and hold an annual Grand Assembly between all Fraternities where knowledge is shared, disputes solved and large-scale administrative matters concluded.
  • Blade of Akira & Warden of Akira: Special titles granted to highly-respected and skilled Vigilants, these titles were once bestowed in times of great distress. While the Blade acts as a roaming agent of the Vigilants and communities of Felucia, taking any necessary action in times of emergency, the Warden functions as what might pass for a centralised ruler of the Order and allied communities. In the years before the Sith occupation, the titles had long fallen into abeyance, granted by acclamation as a ceremonial title to long-serving Vigilants for a single year, which was almost always ceremonially declined. Since then, both titles have seen constant use.
  • Associates: Not full members, Associates play a crucial role in linking the Vigilants with the communities they serve and functioning as much-needed labour to assist in the Order's mission to serve the rural villages of Felucia.
    • Workhand: Paid a competitive wage, provided with free travel and access to the Order's sanctums for free, the Workhands are tasked with supplying the bulk of harvest assistance, sanctum repair and village maintenance works. Most Workhands are either surplus labour from large villages or the cities, or Felucians leaving a checkered past behind to start a new life serving other communities.
    • Liaisons: Liaisons play the crucial role of linking village chiefs with the Akirans. Many a dispute or urgent communication has been speedily solved by way of these Liaisons and their courier network, which almost function as an intelligence arm of the Order. Thus, they also serve to report on chiefs intending to start trouble with other villages.
    • League Sheriffs: All sheriffs of villages with a good relationship with the Akirans are automatically considered Associates. They are in charge of training their local community in self-defence as well as reporting muster rolls to the League and Vigilants. Sheriffs are also indirectly monitored by Liaisons and select Vigilants to ensure their training standards are up to snuff.
• Membership: At its height during the Sith occupation, several hundred Vigilants actively defended the rural population of Felucia with almost a thousand Associates counted among them. In the brutal war of resistance, almost all of the Vigilants have been wiped out, with the exception of several associates, retirees and one Vigilant. The Farmers' League is likewise depleted, and many of its members have flocked to competing Defence Leagues that have grown in the power vacuum.
• Climate: Brotherhood and Service characterise the Vigilants: its largely horizontal ranks prevent Vigilants from lording over others, and the central mission of the Vigilants is to defend and serve the communities of Felucia. There is little formality in the Order and all Vigilants are seen as equal brothers able to speak freely on any issue. While Veterans are accorded respect, they are not seen as commanders or leaders per se, and Vigilants are expected to be frank with their Fraternity's Veterans.
• Reputation: Few outside the Felucia know of the Akirans, while on-planet, almost all rural communities have personal experience with it. They are seen as a much-needed and carefree band of brothers that rove around the countryside, defending villages from jungle threats, working on the harvest and setting up great feasts for villages every holiday. Within the Ashlan Crusade, few know of their existence especially due to their near-extinction, and are seen as a bit of a curiosity with little of the monasticism and ceremony that come with Force orders and the unusual cobbled-together combat style of the group.
• Curios: Most Vigilants carry some portion of the Corpus of Kuro and Akira, the collective name for the sacred texts of the Akiran Vigilants, consisting of an eclectic mix of manuals, religious texts, folk stories and even self-admitted fiction holos. The Corpus is rather large as a whole and most Vigilants focus on specific parts of the collection, frequently carrying them on their travels for instruction and even entertainment. A mini-economy of Corpus texts once existed between the most widely-travelled of the Vigilants. Vigilants also carry a ceremonial spear, a reminder of their rural origins, and usually religious aids such as prayer beads, prayer mats, incense etc. Few Vigilants owned lightsabers before the Sith occupation, though that quickly changed.
• Rules: The rules and values of the Vigilants are a mix of folk wisdom, Jedi teachings and indigenous religious beliefs. Generosity, humility, serenity and a sense of service and 'one-ness' are emphasised, and while emotions are not as regulated, there is still a focus on examining and controlling negative emotions. The war with the Sith have changed opinions on the Dark Side; where before it was a largely nebulous, almost primal and philosophical damnation (as a result of their interactions with the Jungle Felucians), it is now seen as a destructive and corruptive danger that, when given physical form, must be rooted out and excised. The Order also views aggressors, bullies and exploiters who would take away liberty with an extremely negative eye and encourage its Vigilants to take direct action against such people.
• Goals: Protect the defenseless, aid all in need, serve the community.

MEMBERS
Lansal Akira

HISTORICAL INFORMATION
The Akiran Vigilants were formed untold centuries ago. Few verifiable records remain of the early days, but the Akirans claim that they were founded in the village of Akira by warriors from the stars to defend and protect the villages of Felucia. Reliable sources in the past century indicate that village of Akira became a headquarters of the order, while the Vigilants recruited from all the villages of the planet and correspondingly operated on that scale.

Focussed on community defence, the Vigilants not only trained Force Users to settle disputes and protect the villages, they also became trainers of the many village militias. By the time of the last century, most of the villages were united under an overarching Farmers' League to defend themselves, though the reach of this alliance did not extend into the cities.

During the Sith occupation, the planet was put under the thumb of the Sith Empire and forced to pay tribute. In the case of the agricultural villages this took the form of agricultural export, extracting ever higher quotas and threatening starvation for the native population, with the Sith enacting brutal reprisals on those that failed to meet quota. The League and the Vigilants went into open revolt. The Felucian villages became well-defended from Sith reprisal as they were increasingly fortified, and the Vigilants carried out hit-and-run attacks on the Sith. In turn, the Sith began to enslave Jungle Felucians in their armies, turning many jungle tribes to their cause and using them for hit-and-run attacks to disrupt Felucian supply networks.

Over the course of this resistance, the Vigilants slowly bled to death, losing members and resources as the Sith warlords tightened their grip, unwilling to lose the agricultural yield of this planet and the rumoured Dark Side artifacts in the wilds. The situation took a turn for the worse as the Empire crumbled: Goaded by increasingly ravenous and desperate marauding Sith warbands willing to try anything to gain an upper hand, some Jungle Felucian tribes were enslaved wholesale, others chose to join them, entranced by the power of the Dark Side. Dark Side-infested Acklay, Rancor and even Sarlacc emerged in numbers unseen for centuries, likely due to Sith interference, and against such might even the Vigilants were unable to stem the tide.

Desperate to stop the roving Sith warbands, the Vigilants planned to break the ability of the Sith to reinforce from orbit. Gathering their forces for open combat, the Vigilants and League destroyed orbital landing zones and industrial facilities, slowly cutting off the Sith on-planet from being resupplied by their allies in orbit. When coordination between the Sith warbands began to fail, the ones in orbit left their erstwhile allies to die and fled for easier targets.

It was now the Sith that were desperate, and pooling their resources, they began to manufacture weapons that could tip the balance. Water processing centres in Niango and its remaining industrial plants were converted into chemical weapons production facilities. Inevitably, this invited the wrath of the Felucians, and the two wounded sides were headed to a final clash. In a climactic battle, all of the Sith leaders were slain, with most of their followers hunted down, but the Vigilants paid a steep price: already depleted for years, every last one of them died except for a single survivor, who was granted the title of Blade of Akira in his master's final moments.

The Blade continued the shadow war against the remaining Sith soldiers on the planet, but increasingly the Bogan-infested wildlife and tribes became the primary threat. Too busy fighting off this threat that seemed to grow despite the end of the Sith, the order remained reduced to one Vigilant and a dozen Associates, though the Farmers' League remained sizable, enough to defend the villages from wildlife.

When the Galactic Alliance and Ashlan Crusade came to liberate Felucia, it was just in time to root out a renewed Sith presence. Since then, Felucia has come under the control of the Crusade. Felucians are now emigrating in growing numbers, bringing their agricultural expertise to the rest of the Crusade, while the Vigilants are sworn to aid the Crusade. In exchange, the Order seeks to rebuild its numbers, root out the Bogan-infested wildlife and rebuild Felucia.