The Pilgrim
- Intent: A unique dark side tradition stemming from the Chaos setting and timeline. Mostly created as NPC/Dominion opposition - I got tired of 'go fight generic Sith cultist #08362' - but by all means write one if you like. All I ask is you don't make yourself The Boss Of The Raskava, say they Joined Your Empire En Masse, Immediately Make a Splinter Group Completely Loyal to You, or any such malarkey.
- Image Credit: Call of Cthulhu
- Canon: N/A
- Permissions: N/A
- Links: The Holocron Eaters
- Organization Name: The Raskava Order, also known as the Holocron Eaters
- Classification: Secret society, dark side tradition
- Affiliation: The Raskava as a whole are not loyal to any particular character, faction, government, company or establishment, though individual members often do.
- Organization Symbol: None, though a stylized devilsquid motif is common in Raskava iconography.
- Description: The Raskava are an insidious dark side order with their own principles, goals, beliefs, tactics, and signature abilities. Their purpose is 'the Work' - securing knowledge by any means necessary, as a resource for the eventual reemergence of civilization. To the Raskava way of thinking, the Dark Age has not ended yet, and may not for another thousand years.
- Headquarters: None of note or any permanence. The Raskava have a decentralized structure that prizes adaptation and mobility. There's no dark palatial fortress at the heart of it all.
- Domain: Raskava coverts are hidden enclaves on various worlds. The Raskava do not publicly exist. Local adaptation means that a covert and its members might be disguised as an office, a monastery, a private retreat, or an agency. Individual members of Elder and Journeyman rank engage with the community as they see fit, but always under other guises.
- Notable Assets: None
- Hierarchy:
- Elder, equivalent to Master. A covert typically has only a single Raskava Elder as its leader. They coordinate with other coverts' leaders as needed, and make collective decisions on major questions.
- Journeyman, equivalent to Knight. Journeymen spend most of their time on acquisitions as wandering, autonomous thieves of knowledge. Journeymen may be associated with one or more coverts, using them as safe houses and bringing them stolen information to secure. They may operate alone or in acquisitions crews, sometimes overseen by an Elder and/or supported by Scriptors.
- Scriptor, equivalent to Apprentice. Children of the Raskava become Scriptors at age 10. On occasion, the Raskava recruit other Force-users who demonstrate deep commitment to their goal - securing and preserving knowledge that will outlast the coming dark age. New recruits, of whatever rank, typically spend a year or two as Scriptors to test their commitment and learn the Order's ways. Capable Scriptors may participate in acquisition crews. Their primary duty, however, is the care of acquired information. This often means transcribing it, through scanning machines or by hand, into imperishable formats that can outlast the next great cataclysm. The Raskava have zero interest in hoarding musty scrolls and arcane holocrons: Elders and Journeymen expose the content (often destructively) and Scriptors record it. Scriptors always answer primarily to the Elders of their covert. Formal or informal master/apprentice arrangements with an Elder or Journeyman are not unknown.
- Membership: Approximately 150, based around maybe a dozen scattered coverts. Most Raskava are born and raised in the Order. It is not unknown for the Order to recruit quietly from other Force organizations. In such cases the recruits, even the strongest, spend a year or two as Scriptors and then take on the Journeyman role. The ironclad progression - Scriptor, Journeyman, Elder - ensures commitment and conversion to the Work. It also creates deep awareness of the Order's work at every level. Individual coverts may have initiation requirements. Fail at them, or as a Scriptor, and a Force-user may find themselves with new memories to explain where they've been all this time. You could have been a Raskava and not know it.
- Climate: There's a strong sense of shared purpose. Rivalry and even violence, yes, but never at the expense of the Work. The Raskava disdain other Force orders as having no actual goals, and take pride in being better.
- Reputation: The Raskava don't exist. Those who know of them understand that the Raskava's uncompromising purpose is usually at odds with the interests of other Force orders, who would usually prefer not to have their most sacred records gutted, all else being equal.
- Curios: The Raskava often wear a demon mask bearing a devilsquidmotif, the obvious symbolism being something tenacious, tentacular, and beneath the surface.
- OOC note: The text from the Force and Destiny Core Rulebook: "Every species and culture has scary stories of monsters with supernatural powers. While the stories are - usually - only stories, disciples of the dark side throughout history have found value in adopting the imagery of the mythical demons to spread fear in their enemies and fearlessness among their followers. Having been worn by these adepts for generations, some demon masks have become imbued with the dark side of the Force, and grant their wearers certain powers." The attached game mechanics allow the wearer to keep going despite severe wounds, and add a fear effect proportional to the wearer's strength in the Force. Knowing the above, the Raskava founders created steel devilsquid masks and passed them down through generations of students. The masks have acquired significant power. Raskava of all ranks wear them at need or by preference.
- Rules:
- The preservation of knowledge, by Raskava methods, is the highest good. Force-related knowledge is important, but the Raskava take a broader view and prioritize information that will help future generations rebuild civilization after the Dark Age ends.
- The Raskava have rules against revealing the existence, extent, and mission of their Order. However, these rules are secondary to the overriding Work.
- The Raskava are a dark side order.
- The Raskava disdain holocrons as designed to withhold information, often from those who need it most. If the contents of a holocron have been secured, the holocron may be destroyed regardless of its antiquity and value. Some of their accepted methods of securing those contents are destructive.
- The Raskava Order focuses on basic Jedi abilities, with a few deviations:
- They are adept at stealing and altering memories.
- They keep their lightsabers hidden.
- Their founders spent sixty years breaking into a holocron that was unwilling to reveal its secrets. The Raskava can consume much of the information within intact or broken holocrons. They embrace the nickname 'holocron eaters' (largely symbolic, though some rituals do involve a token amount of consumption). They will happily destroy even the most valuable holocrons once they have secured the knowledge inside.
- The Raskava use the lightsaber, with some variations:
- Concealed except at great need.
- Blade is typically a greasy, corrupt off-white and stems from a synthetic lightsaber crystal.
- Robust and tricky defensive style ('Sharak') that draws heavily from Soresu and Trakata.
- The common blaster pistol is more frequently used than the lightsaber, and is carried in the off hand during saber combat.
- Goals: To continue the Work by stealing and hoarding information that could be important to the future emergence of stable galactic civilization, whenever that is. Raskava acquisitions crews and independent Journeymen target all repositories of knowledge indiscriminately, regardless of who controls them.
MEMBERS
- Jend-Ro Quill - former Raskava Scriptor
- Zeno Dremati - Raskava Journeyman
- Kal of Kaas - Raskava Journeyman
- 'Ceri' - former Raskava member, rank unknown
- Seit-Val - former Raskava member, rank unknown
- Note again that failed converts are often released into the wild with new memories to explain the time they spent with the Raskava. You could have been a Raskava and not know it.
HISTORICAL INFORMATION
In 427 ABY, two Jedi Knights and their Padawans voyaged 200,000 light-years through the Unknown Regions, in search of a holocron whose knowledge might have stopped the Gulag Virus. Within a year, not only had they failed to open the holocron, but the Gulag Virus had crushed interstellar civilization. The dark side clouded the Force on a galactic level, and these four isolated, worn-down Jedi fell away.
The Raskava have afforded their founders a unique status: their names are the only significant information that the Raskava have chosen to destroy. The founders wanted their followers to venerate the Work, not the people who started it. The four original Raskava are known as Qixoni, Sapith, Dantari, and Sorian (after the crystals of their lightsabers).
Qixoni spent the next sixty years attempting to break into the holocron that had kept them out. Ultimately he and his Padawan, Sapith, learned to consume the information inside, a destructive process akin to drain knowledge. They and their eventual acolytes recorded the contents rigorously.
Dantari, meanwhile, learned everything that could be learned about how the galaxy crumbled. She and her Padawan, Sorian, pursued every available archive and record. Dantari died of the Gulag Virus in 442 ABY, leaving Sorian and his acolytes to carry on the work of acquisition.
After Dantari's death, Qixoni, Sapith, Sorian, and their followers developed into an insular but widespread order of Dark Jedi. The Raskava spent the next four centuries quietly collecting information by any means necessary.
When galactic civilization began to reform in 835 ABY, the Raskava experienced a moment of hope. Later that same year, however, the Omni Crisis struck at the heart of every major government and killed billions. Many Raskava took this as a sign that the Dark Age was not over. Nine years later, the Second Akala Crisis reinforced their belief that their dream was still a long way off. Today, apart from a few enclaves of stability - Silver Jedi and Confederate space, primarily - the state of the galaxy confirms the Raskava worldview. The Work goes on.
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