Secret Order of the Emperor-Who are these guys?

Hey folks.

I recently aquired the game TIE fighter, and was wondering exactly who and what these secret Order people do. Are they COMPNOR? The reason I ask is because I never heard of them before TIE Fighter. Any info will be appreciated.

 

I think they're the "Prophets of the Dark Side". They certainly look like them.

 

According to the Dark Side sourcebook,they're the Prophets of the Darkside aka the Secret Order of the Empire.

 

I personally don't think that the Secret Order and the Prophets are wholly synonymous. I think it's more a case of the Secret Order being the executive agents of the Prophets.

 

If I had to give a speculatory history of the Secret Order of the Emperor I would go with something like this....

Emperor Palpatine was always aware that one of the failings of the New Order would perpetually be the fact that he was insinuating people with not only uncertain allegiances into the annals of power but also those who were both predatory and evil in their nature.

Supreme Prophet Kadaan and Prophet Jedegar along with all their associates were thus placed in charge of a project to attempt to remedy this by using Cult brainwashing techniques mixed with military conditioning to create an organization from the ranks of the most loyal and fanatical imperials in order to serve as the engines of the Emperor's will.

The Emperor of course knew he would have to watch the secret order but pyramidizing conspiracy was a speciality of his.

Initiates were tested a long time for loyalty to the Empire as they were drawn from the ranks of pilots and it stands to reason Intelligence agencies, Ground troops, Stormtrooper ranks, and the like.

Members under the veil of ritual were taught to become spies for the Emperor as well as assaisins that became actually a training ground for Emperor's Hands so that their previously once 'lofty place' could actually be institutionlized. No more Shira Bries or Mara Jades raised on estates or honorary titles like to High Inquisitor Tremayne.

Members who proved they loyalty were instructed in the rudiments of the Jedi Way, Dark Side meditation, and possibly Sith magic as they were probably the founders of the Imperial Soverign Protectors and a number of the "Dark Jedi" we see in Dark Empire.

Unfortunately the experiment never really got off to a grand start as the Emperor died soon after and the Order went into Hiding. My guess is that they remained there until Dark Empire save for those ferreted out by Issard and executed (she seemed determined to slay his agents) where the majority if not all of them all died in eventual agony on Byss or the Eclipses or in Luke Skywalker's hunt.

A few may have remained active like Maarek Steele, the two leaders, Kir Kanos (if that's how he was found by the Empire) but most likely the Order dissapeared and was never heard from again by the galaxy

 

I'd say they're probably Palpatine's Dark Side Adepts. Byss is their home, so theirs no need to for the secrecy and ritual shown in the great Galaxy.

 

DSSB says the real prophets, including kadann and jedger are still in hiding biding there time. If they were captured later on we have no idea.

 

Well I have basically a standing rule about these sort of things.

The Dark Side Handbook treats the Dark Side profiles for the most part in "real time" so the fact is we have no idea what happened to them.

It's possible that they survived til the New Jedi Order but my general "EU limbo answer" to any character (Adalic brandl, Faith, and Jaaib brandl are the exception-too bad their finale was never liscensed) of dark side bent is that they were all destroyed on Byss.

It gives closure while not being too troublesome to the story. The only problem is that still leaves Luminya who we KNOW did survive out there, plotting.

 

This secret order could be refering to the allied dark side forces, Emperor's Hands, Inquisitorious, Prophets, Adepts and the like. This would only be logical, as each of these groups operating independently could cause petty squables.

 

Well they were definetly part of the prophets of the darkside as that is pretty much been given in the NEGTC, DSSB, and Gamer #5.

Now the only reason I say we don't know exactly what happened to the prophets is that Kadaan was said to have been captured by a grand moff and killed in NEGTC.

Now that source was written by an inuniverse stance. From their point of view the false prophets and the real prophets were one and the same(infact they aren't awhare that there were two seperate groups). So from their point of view there was only one Kadaan and one Jedjer, and the history of the prophets is strung together as one cohesive timeline from their point of view(rather than two histories for two groups).

They know that a Kadaan was killed by a grand admiral (Makati as I recall). Now this makes two possibilities, but we won't ever know for sure which is the exact outcome as we don't have the omnicient view on the matter(unless a later omnicient source clears it up).

1. Kadaan escaped the Lost City of the Jedi, even after the one exit was destroyed and the life support was taken out according to the book. Something that would have surely killed him anyways. He is later captured and put to death by Makati.

2. The real Kadaan was some how captured by Makati and put to death. The republic scholars thought it was the Kadaan they had problems with earlier, and they thought he escaped somehow. But their belief is a misconception of the limited facts they have, as they can't see the whole picture that the omniscient sources can see.

Either outcome is technically possible, but since we only have the thoughts of the inuniverse scholars who don't have the exact details or all the information, it is flawed at best to say which way is the correct way.

 

Wasn't there an article in some gaming magazine (not SW Gamer) about the Prophets? Didn't it have loads of info on them?

TC

 

My guess is that's the final word on Kadann and company then.

The Emperor's Dark Side users were probably the most hated group in the Empire. I can't imagine the Inquisiton survived long after Palpatine's death, those who didn't flee to the core

 

Inquisitorius was based on Byss. The members of the order probaly all got nuked along with Byss.

 

"Wasn't there an article in some gaming magazine (not SW Gamer) about the Prophets? Didn't it have loads of info on them?"

It was in an unofficial non-star wars magazine actually, and as I recall it postulated that GODV series was an inuniverse fairy tale, and not an actual event, but was based around characters that may have actually been around. It was written by the author who wrote the DSSB as I recall(not sure if he wrote it before he worked for WEG or after). He took some ideas from it and used it in the DSSB, which is why we have the false prophets idea, compared to real prophets. But not all the article was reused of course, since we know that officially GODV happened as we saw it canonically.

Anywho I was told by an editor from LFL that rpg articles in the unofficial mags are considered appocryphal, and only marginally official at best. But only time will tell if that internal policy is actually kept, and if any more refrences to the non-star wars mag RPG articles are refrenced in newer sources or like the case of the prophets article only a few ideas make it while others contradictory ideas are completely ignored.

Note don't mix up the current policy to print WOTC official star wars rpg('gamer' articles)in the dungeon magazine, with the old WEG style articles in older magazines. As WOTC stuff is a new and seperate thing.

 

So we're decided that the Secret Order was the Prophets?

 

Well that's what sourcebooks say. But if all prophets were the secret order or the secret order was a branch of the prophets, seems to be up for debate by some people.

 

I'm fine with the Secret Order being the Prophets.

Stele was a prophet,w00t

 

Agreed. It's true some prophets can be hands, or even greater(Emperor's Reach).

Now one issue is up for debate, is the secret order's order of promotion an internal premotion, and you hold a position within the order, or is an external promotion as well, so being a hand in it is the same as being given hand status by palpatine himself.

In any case the DSSB says only palpatine can make someone one of his emperor's hands. So my idea is you have the internal order which just status while your in the order, kind of like branches in masonry. Stele made it to "Emperor's Reach" that way. But he was said to have been given emperor's hand status by palpatine himself in gamer #5. So perhaps he shares both level in secret order, known as emperor's reach, as well as the status of emperor's hand both at the same time. Just my oppinion. But others differ and belief being promoted directly by the prophets is the same as being promoted directly by palpatine. But everyone has a right to an oppinion, on something we don't really have much clue on beyond Tiefighter(and the strat guide),and gamer #5.

 

What's "Emperor's Reach"?

 

What is believed to be the highest promotion achievable on tiefighter given by the secret order, if one completes all of tiefighter and it's expansion campaigns(completing all the secret order's objectives, bonus and level objectives) on the most difficult setting with a certain score. Beyond that the novelized strategy guide went from the point of view that all objectives were completed by Stele.

It's known about by the best players, but I never achieved it myself, as I'm not that good of a player(though I remember a friend achieving it).

It was almost put into the gamer #5 emperor's hands article but it was cut due to constraints to the size of the article, according to the author of the article. But as I recall the tatoo on his arm is the sign of the emperor's reach as could be seen if you got that far.

I've also been told that highest navy promotion in the game was "Grand Admiral"(I actually can't remember if this is true or not) as well, so one ponders what that could mean for stele, (but since we have official word as to what he was doing at several given times in other sources, we can't exactly say he was a grand admiral of course, but it's fun to speculate, you know).

Here is the order of the secret order for anyone interested:

First Initiate
Second Circle
Third Circle
Fourth Circle
Inner Circle
the Emperor's Hand
the Emperor's Eyes
the Emperor's Voice
the Emperor's Reach

 

Actually I believe General was the highest rank you could achieve. Thus unlike Mara jade Maarek Steele ended up with real military power as well as Sith magic and all the emperor's codes and stuff

 

Regarding the article, as you said, it'll be interesting to see if the policey is changed, now that offical gamer-type stuff is going into non-SW mags.

If anyone has a copy of the article, I'd really like some info, a summery, scans, trascripts, some qoutes... Anything you can give me.

TC

 

Charlemagne, looks like you are right, I found this hexidecimal editor information that has the list of promotions:

tie fighter promotions

That's alot more believable than grand admiral.