With a GJW and progress on several fronts, it’s a good time to do a full update on things, and I definitely owe the membership some transparency on status of current projects. I will focus this report on a full list of projects, and then a look at the current status and priority. As well, I will highlight some upcoming opportunities for members to support the DJB with their efforts.

Content Expansion

There are currently 106 items either pending addition or being evaluated for inclusion in possessions. This is a mix of new items to expand society offerings, add new items that are part of Canon for a more complete Star Wars experience, some Legends items that make sense to provide a deep list of available options in all the categories as well as coming in from the Last Jedi. This list will continue to be refined until the next large content drop. This is the top priority for the staff and those supporting the team.

Society Experience

During the initial ramp up to possessions, the society items became a series of smaller discussions with a lot of decisions to make. Since each society had a different means of rewarding members, primarily around dossier graphics. When it came to bringing that reward system to possessions at launch I did my best to translate that experience into owning items heavily themed by the society they were awarded from. Looking at all societies side by side, it became clear that some work could be done to standardize and offer even more in addition to the dossier graphics. Most of this work is already done with lists sent to respective DCers prior to the GJW and seeing further approvals since. From a possessions standpoint, expect to see a new Society store, with a more standard set of offerings across all societies for free, and ability to purchase additional items including some not granted. Once it’s live I’ll post more about it, and hope everyone likes what’s been approved and prepared. This is a higher level priority with a new society in the works and want to do it right from day one.

Credit Supply

As we continue to add more stuff to purchase and look at adding upgrade functionality that makes owning more rare and expensive items more rewarding, this continues to be a focus. Supply and demand are carefully balanced, but what’s clear is the more credits someone has the more fun possessions is, up to a point where it all becomes trivial. I’ve finalized a few discussions with the DC on some options that I hope to see the light of day this year, now that the GJW is behind us. I continue to list this as a project because I personally find it important. Priority is hard to gauge because the list of ways to get more credits to members is long, and some are easier to execute on more quickly while others require more effort and would be harder to want to dig into.

Prototype Item Descriptions

Halcyon helped to lead an effort to look at every space vehicle in the system, where the team compared every space vehicle and discussed its attributes and ranked all of them. This resulted in already live updated descriptions that help members both in purchasing decisions and general Star Wars knowledge. We have plans to do this across other categories in the future. Next up is likely armor as we work with the ACC staff on giving armor quantifiable protection in the ACC and fictional world of the DJB and will need more details and consistency across what language is used to describe each prototype item. This entire effort is also closely tied to upgrades. So I expect to see this almost as a prerequisite of sorts with a slightly higher priority.

Upgrades

This is a large undertaking, that continues to see slow progress as other priorities are handled. This is also where I hope to get the membership’s expertise to provide a deep and rewarding system. The basic premise of upgrades will likely end up similar to CS feats, where an item can choose from a pre-written list of options to upgrade and add functionality to an item. The rarer an item, the better and more upgrade types and options will be available. This requires a unique consideration for every item category, type and in some cases prototype. That said, if you feel like you have a deep Star Wars knowledge of one of the item categories in possessions currently, like you’re a droid buff who can’t get enough of welding torches and assassination protocol software, send Halc and I an email and express your interest to join a future team to deliver content. I’d like to start brainstorming upgrade options and build some content and while we can always do it ourselves, support will speed the whole process up and be rewarding for both those who help and the membership in general. I don’t want to commit to a timeline here with other priorities to tackle first, but the entire project excites me and I’m very passionate about making sure it’s done right.

Celebration Store

As a reminder, the Celebration Store is a store that offers unique items that celebrate Star Wars. We will add new offerings and potentially re-offer old ones when the store likely shows up around the same time as it did last year, Star Wars Day. The priority here will continue to go up as we approach needing to open it, there is an already an initial list complete of what we plan to do that will be revised and executed on.

Faction

This was an important top priority for the GJW that delivered a large list of new possessions to represent the new enemy, as well as items in a new store that membership could purchase. This store, Shroud Syndicate Market, is now closed and it’s unclear when it will show up again. There is work to do to finish details with the enemy faction, update their fleet following the conclusion of the GJW, as it will be an important part of the story going forward.

Creatures

A pet project that I never lose sight of, but is currently on hold. Even with the addition of everyone's favorite new creature; porgs, it remains a lower priority than other projects to improve member experience in the DJB. I do have a solid start on this but currently no expected date for it to happen.

Change Log

Changed whip and electro-whip Item Type from Weapon (Blunt) to Weapon (Misc) to align with required skills to effectively wield them as weapons.

Added additional language to personal shield generator item to clarify functionality in the ACC.

Added additional language to the throwing knives item to specify use of Bladed Weapons skill to effectively utilize

Created new Iron Legion Uniform armor item, similar to imperial and first order uniforms.

Changed language on thermal imploder to better clarify it can be thrown

Conclusion

It’s been a while since a large project update, and with the largest accomplishment over the past six months being the new faction for the GJW that wasn’t even mentioned then, I wanted to get a full update out to everyone. I really look forward to what we can do with possessions in the upcoming year. It makes me happy to know that a year into possessions we can equip items to loadouts, can equip them to NPCs we own, and Clans can represent their fleets and armies in an official manner and have written hundreds of custom aspects to make them unique. Even more so that all the great work done by the more analytical minds of my team have created a balanced pricing structure that in general seems to have a good mix of effort and reward. I look forward to my next update and providing a lot more items to possess.

In darkness,