This week I sat down with the leadership of Jensäarai, a group of hardcore PvPer’s with a strong core of Raider’s/PvEer’s, one of if not the longest running guilds on the Star Wars: The old Republic forums. I hope you all enjoy reading the interview as much as I did doing it.
Where did your guilds name come from?
We were looking for something original that hadn’t been seen on the Star Wars: The old Republic forums and searched the Sith language and found the word Jensaarai, meaning hidden followers of truth.
Can you give me a quick 2-3 sentence description of your guild?
We are a laid back group that likes to joke around and have fun, but when it’s time to get serious then we bring the pain. In gaming terms we are an end game PvPvE, Raiding Guild.
How did your guild come about?
The majority of our senior members were in another very casual guild that had little focus on gaming, we left to create Jensaarai who’s focus would be to enjoy all aspects that Star Wars: The old Republic has to offer at end game and the path up to end game.
What kind of play style do you focus on? PvE, PvP, RP
The majority of members are PvP’ers but with that being said we have a great balance of PvE and Raiders mixed in.
What is your guild set up? How do you run your guild?
Well you see we have a gigantic super computer that we pour coffee into every morning and it takes care of the rest. Actually it quite simple, it goes Dark Council, Officer, member. So we have the Dark Council (Darth Reaper and JëzterXIII) who look after the day to day running of the guild then we have our Officers (Darth Valtar, Darth Corilus, Warlord Hazis, Darth Krezon, Lord Drenn and our Raid leader Ralley) then we have the members. The guild is ran by the Officers and DC with an open door policy, the opinions of every member counts, from the Dark Lord all the way down to our Hopefuls.
How serious do you play and/or run the guild?
Well there is a time and a place for all things, so unless it time to be serious then we are smoking and joking, we are here to have fun after all.
Do you have ranks or a certain hierarchy in your guild? If yes, could you tell us a bit about it?
Dark Council, Officer, Member. Once in game we will be electing class leaders their job will be to know everything about their chosen class and stay up to date and any changes. It will be up to them to guide all members playing that class and to make sure they are geared and socketed correctly.
Why did you choose the Sith?
With our cast of characters in the guild i think Sith was the only real option.
Why do you run a guild?
It actually happened quite by chance, most of us were looking to just join a guild but when that guild wasn’t moving in the direction we wanted we created our own.
How do you approach Raid Planning?
Our raid leader usually sets the plan for raiding, a schedule is set with a start time and when we gather up at the RV he runs through the plan for that raid and also to see that everyone is stocked with the right gear and consumables for that particular run.
Are you always open for new recruits or do you want to keep a certain guild size?
Size does matter, if you get too Big then you are just a Zerg Guild and we don’t want that, it has always been quality over quantity with us. We are also very selective of who we recruit, only experienced MMO gamers that are looking to enjoy all aspects of end game content are approached.
Age Requirement?
We base this of the Maturity of the individual, seeing how the handle not only there application and the question that follow but also a Ventrilo interview followed up by a two week trail period to see how how mature they are and if they will fit in with the community we already have. But in general it is 18+.
Guild size?
We currently have 53 active members. We are vigilant in only keeping members that are truly active on our Roster. We have purged hundreds of inactive members and we will continue to keep only those that stay active.
What makes your guild stand out from everyone else? What makes your guild unique?
Well I can’t really accurately compare our guild to others because I haven’t been in theirs but I can tell you some things we have done that we are proud of.First our website, http://jensaarai.com/ it was created by one of our founders Darth Valtar and is with out a doubt one of the best of all of the guilds on the entire Star Wars: The old Republic site and the thing we most commonly get complimented about. Secondly we have a rigorous application process and evaluation period to make sure the potential members will fit in well with everyone and that we don’t have any personality conflicts or drama within the guild. third, and I have already touched on this, everyone of the members listed on our Roster is Active we do monthly purges to ensure this. Also we have paid and maintain our own website jensaarai.com and Ventrilo server. Also there is almost always people in Vent no matter the time of day, we have members all over the world and a few insomniacs. Our leadership is also very unique, everybody who is in a leadership position knows that it is for the betterment of the guild and are willing to help out members in anyway possible. We don’t promote people to leadership positions for time served. Only those that have the respect of the members and that will spend their own time helping other members without thought of reward will advance to officer and above.
How do you spend your time until release? Do you know each other in real life or do you spend a lot of time on forums?
Real life? What’s that?. Forums? While useful not the best way of communicating. Everyone is required to have Ventrilo and use it. Through Ventrilo most of our members are now real life friends and stay in touch outside of the guild. Until release we will continue to play pre games and do what we do.
What Other Games are you currently playing as a guild?
WoW is our main pre-game at this moment while we have a few people who also dabble in some others like Rift and Aion.
Guild systems in other MMOs? (Likes/Dislikes)
As much as I personally dislike WoW, the guild system they have is really quite impressive compared to other MMO I have played.
If somebody is interested now how and where can they apply for membership?
jensaarai.com is our portal and jensaarai.com/forums are our forums… obviously
One last question, if there was one thing you could ask the Dev’s to include, what would it be?
How about a guild beta pass?
Thanks guys for taking the time to answer my questions.
Would you like to have your guild featured in The Guild Sphere? What are you waiting for? Drop an email to ralley752@gmail.com
