Mass leave

A mass leave refers to an event when a large segment of the Emperor's Hammer leaves the organization, typically to go on and form their own splinter or breakaway group. Historically, this has typically occurred at the subgroup level, where leadership for a given subgroup or a component within that subgroup will attempt to "break away" to form its own organization, usually under the rationalization that such an action will allow for freedom from perceived interference and control.

Arguably, the most infamous mass leave event involved the formation of the Dark Jedi Brotherhood, which occurred when a large segment of the Dark Brotherhood left to form their own organization. The DJB remains perhaps the only splinter group that has remained an active organization after a mass leave event.

No mass leave has occurred in the Emperor's Hammer since the banishment of disgraced former Fleet Commander Astatine.

Qualifications

Generally, a mass leave has each of the following qualifications:

• It involves a large segment of a given population. Specifically, a majority or near-majority of a subgroup or the overwhelming majority of a large unit in a subgroup.
  • For example, a Clan of the Dark Brotherhood would qualify, but a Squadron of the TIE Corps would not
• The members participating in the mass leave attempt to form a new organization
• The members participating in the mass leave are not allowed to remain members of the Emperor's Hammer, either within the "splitting" subgroup or any other subgroup they may be a member of.

Under these qualifications, there have been a number of mass leave events of historical note, although it does not account for all events where a portion of the population has left, such as groups of people that quit but did not attempt to form new clubs, or small units that left and continued to operate together in a more ad-hoc manner.

Events

The following is a list of notable mass leave events, marked by the primary organizations in which they spawned.

Intruder Wing

Around September of 1997, members of the Infiltrator Wing command staff, under the command of Admiral Dogger, were accused of plotting a mass leave event by one of their own members, Major General Oberst. Debate surrounded whether such an event was being actively planned or merely considered, but the accusation resulted in an immediate ban of each of the accused command staff members. In retaliation, all Infiltrator Wing members were advised by the banned leadership that the club was seceding from the Emperor's Hammer, effective immediately.

In the resulting chaos, Infiltrator Wing members were generally confused as to who was in charge, and as to what organization they belonged. Only after the Intelligence Division was able to obtain a roster of this splinter group did the Emperor's Hammer proceed with mass bans for anyone aligned with the rogue Infiltrator Wing.

The Undernet channel for the Infiltrator Wing, #iw, was owned by Admiral Dogger, and it remained in use by the splinter group after the mass leave. In the future, all ownership of Emperor Hammer's Undernet channels would be managed by the Command Staff, and not by individual subgroup leaders.

At the time of the split, the Infiltrator Wing was approximately 150 members. This mass leave resulted in the diminishment of the subgroup as a whole.

This mass leave event is mentioned the Dark Sentinel Issue #43.

Non-Events

The following events do not technically constitute for a mass leave event, as they did not involve a group of people voluntarily leaving to form an outside organization. However, they are notable for events in which a certain segment of membership was banned, demoted, and/or otherwise punished for involvement in an outside organization, often over the perception that such involvement was in preparation for a potential mass leave event.