The Gungan Council Role Playing Galaxy does not begin with the founding of TGC, nor will it end with the death of the community. TGC is part of an illustrious lineage of web sites and communities with roots that stretch back to the beginning of ezboard, and indeed to the beginning of Star Wars fandom on the net. Along that lineage, The Gungan Council is the torchbearer for Star Wars Role Playing on Ezboard, an honor inherited following the departure of Swfan.Net to vbulletin. In the course of our history, many memorable events have happened and much has been created. From characters to groups, customs, events and even struggles, as the years turn on, fewer and fewer remain who remember the early days. This Role Playing Hall of Fame is my attempt to preserve the history of Star Wars Role Playing on Ezboard before it is forgotten.
Please use the INDEX to make navigating the Hall of Fame easier.
If you would like to contribute to the hall of fame please CLICK HERE to find out how.
If by chance the Hall of Fame does not satisfy your lust for infomation, please vist the TGC Historical Archive and the Owner's Diary Archive for more.
And if you are really a glutton for information on TGC check out these other resources:
THE GUNGAN COUNCIL WIKI
THE GUNGAN COUNCIL WOOKIEEPEDIA
UPDATED: Nov 30th 2008
- May 25: 1977 A New Hope (Star Wars) Released
- February 16, 1978: First Bulletin Board System (BBS) Comes Online
- Invented by Ward Christensen
- 1979 - Uesnet invented by Tom Truscott & Jim Ellis making Newsgroups possible
- Government, Labs and Colleges begin to connect
- May 21: 1980 Empire Strikes Back Released
- May 25, 1983: Return of the Jedi Released
- 1983: First Star Wars News Group net.movies.sw Created
- First Online Star Wars discussion takes place
- 1984: FidoNet Created by Tom Jennings
- An inter-connecting file & message transport system used by bulletin board systems
- Like Usenet, FidoNet is a precursor to the WWW
- 1987 - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game published by West End Games
- established groundwork of what later became the Star Wars Expanded Universe
- February 25, 1991 - FidoNet Star Wars Echo BBS Founded
- Moderated by Eli "Skip" Shayotovichone
- It is one of earliest influential forms of Star Wars on-line fandom
- Kevin J. Anderson is one of its members
- June 1, 1991 - Heir to the Empire by Timothy Zhan Released
- Lucasfilm sent Zahn box of West End Games Star Wars books
- Zahn directed to base his novel on game's background material
- Success of book shows popularity of Star Wars 8 years after Return of the Jedi
- 1991 - World Wide Web (WWW) makes public debut
- Birth of modern intenet, however few sites exist yet.
- Regular people can now legally get online
- 1992 - Only 50 Sites on the World Wide Web
- 1993: net.movies.sw becomes Rec.Arts.Sf.Starwars (RASS)
- 1993 - Lucasfilm announces Special Editions
(Source: RASSM)
- 1993 - World Wide Web Reaches 150 Sites
- 1994 - Star Wars Prequel Trilogy Announced
- Reported on front page of "Variety"
- April 26, 1994: Jason Ruspini Creates Star Wars Home Page at UPENN
- One of most talked about SW sites at this time
- 1994: Popularity Forces RASS to Split into 4 Groups
- RASS.Games, RASS.Info, RASS.Collecting and RASS.Misc
- Future TFN co-founder Scott Chitwood is among members of RASS.Misc (RASSM)
- 1994: Mike Farnham's Star Wars Inter-Fido BBS Opens
- Star Wars Echo BBS members migrate here and to RASS
- Kevin J. Anderson, Mike Stackpole among members of SW Echo
- October 1995: John Benson begins to visit Star Wars Home Page at UPENN
- 1995: World Wide Web Expands to 25,000 websites
- Begins erosion of newsgroup and BBS popularity
- Subsequently Usenet & Fidonet decline
- 1995 - Message Boards (Internet Forums) Invented
- Early Internet forums are like world wide web versions of newsgroups or BBS's
- March 20, 1996, JediNet.com Fan Site Comes Online
- Founded by John Benson & Carl Cunningham
- Lack of updates on UPENN page inspired Benson to set up own site
- Only 100 hits in 30 days
- August 15 1996: RASS.Misc Newsgroup Creates Homepage on World Wide Web
- Slogan "Because we know you don't read Usenet"
- 1996 - World Wide Web Reaches 250,000 Sites
- 1996 - Starwars.com Comes Online
- Official site promotes Sepecial Edition Trilogy and Prequels.
- 1996 - Scott Chitwood & Darin Smith found Star Wars Page at Texas A&M.
- Page becomes theforce.net
- TF.N & its forums become major hub for online Star Wars fans
- Alumni of many earlier newsgroups, websites, BBS's find their way to TF.N
- January 1997 - Prequel Watch Fan Site Comes Online
- Originally founded by Donald Vaughn (1996?)
- Became Prequel secton of JediNet under Carl Cunningham in Jan 97.
- 1997 - World Wide Web Surpasses 1.2 Million Sites
- Internet becomes part of everyday life for most people during the next two years
- 1997- Countdown2titanic.com Comes Online
- Founded by Tim Doyle
- 1997 - Special Editions released
- Star Wars Popularity explodes again
- Oct/Nov 1998 - Countdown2titanic.com Becomes Countingdown.com
- Lincoln Gasking helps Tim Doyle expand Titanic page into general movie site
- First Star Wars fans arrive at Episode I section (future role players)
(Source: Figrin D'an)
- November 25 1998 - Ezboard Comes Online
- Vanchau Nguyen, Founder - - Learn More: Ezboard Wiki
- Late 1998/Early 1999 - Jawafortress.com hosts message board dedicated to TPM boxoffice.
- Countingdown.com users are among first to join
- Debate about TPM's chances to top Titanic begins
- Jan-Feb 1999 - Jason Freiert starts SW vs Titanic page.
- Jawafortress forums become part of this new site.
- Activity on message board increases as TPM release date approaches.
(Source: Figrin D'an)
- April 7 1999: Countingdown.com lines up outside Grauman's Chinese Theatre for TPM.
- Line lasts 42 days
- $30,000 raised for Starlight Children's Foundation
(Source: JonathanLB)
- May 1999- Role Playing Begins
- SW vs, Titanic forums move to ezboard following constant troll attacks.
- Role Playing Begins
- The first roleplay Council created, The Sith Council lead by Itala Marzullo (Board Owner: Darth Bane)
- The next day, Sir Dizzy calls the Jedi Council into being. 150(!) people join up
- May 5 1999: Talk City Chosen as Official Chat Provider for
Lucasfilm and the release of TPM.
- May 19, 1999: The Phantom Menace Released
- June 1999 SW vs Titanic becomes SWFans.Net
- A General Star Wars site,
- Brian Kunkle comes across SWFans.Net and begins lurking in the forums
- June 1999: Itala Marzullo forms a second TSC at TalkCity.
- Intermingling of members between chats and swfans begins.
- Encouraged (mostly) by Itala, many members come to Swfans from TalkCity in the next year.
(Source: Itala Marzullo)
- July 12th 1999 - The board splits into Coruscantcity.net and SWFans.Net
- all roleplaying groups move over to CC.Net.
- only a handful of roleplayers remain on SWFans.Net
(Source: Atreyu)
- July 20 1999: Brian Kunkle begins posting as Darthbeerman
- participates mainly in Boxoffice Forum at Swfans.net.
- Late July 1999 Re-establishment of roleplaying groups on SWFans.Net begins.
- Jedi, under leadership of CMJ, refound Jedi Council. Early members include jjwr, Atreyu and obiwan2.
- Sith under Darth Sidious and Mara Jade1 (later Lady Mara Jade) found a new Sith Council (not Italas group)
- August 1999 Further reorganisation of Jedi and Sith groups on SWFans.Net
- Jedi Council renamed The Jedi Order
- Darth Fenris takes over leadership of new Sith Council and renames it The Sith Empire (TSE)
- September 1999 CC.Net Jedi begin to lurk at SWFans.Net forums
- including Darth Turbogeek, Master Yogurt, JediBoricua and Figrin Dan
- Result isincreased interaction between Jedi from the 2 boards.
- October 1999: Reunification of the Jedi Begins
- Attempts made to join both Jedi groups into one, but discussions fail to bring result about.
- One universe, two boards concept proposed by jjwr is adopted.
- The Jedi Alliance is forms between the 2 Jedi groups
- November 1st 1999: SWFans.Net and CC.Net Jedi officially reunite.
- New group renamed the Greater Jedi Order (GJO)
- Nov 1st 1999: Brian Kunkle creates his General Ceel account on Ezboard
- The Gungan Council founded same day.
- Early 2000: TalkCity becomes Pay-to-Use. As a result TSC becomes an Ezboard-Only entity.
-Stranded members come to TSC and Swfans on Ezboard.
(Source: Itala Marzullo)
- January 26 2000: The Gungan Council Ezboard founded.
- Jan/Feb 2000: Darth Turbogeek invites TGC to join Swfans Role Playing Galaxy.
- TGC Accepts.
- Early-Mid 2000: Many CC.Net Jedi leave roleplaying while newer members join through SWFans.Net
- RP activity steadily drifts away from CC.Net to SWFans.Net.
- TSC under Itala re-establishes presence on SWFans.Net.
- TSE continues to function as primary Sith group.
- Mid 2000: TGC begins distancing itself from Swfans
- Formation of TGC Role Playing Galaxy.
(Source: General Ceel)
- June 2000 - June 2001: The Golden Age of TGC.
- TGC reaches a plateau of both creativity and activity.
- August 2000: Itala overthrown as leader of TSC.
- He soon returns, resulting in the defection of many Sith
- Defectors establish new group: The Sith Order.
- January 1 2001: TGC Officially Separates from Swfans.net.
- September 2001: Swfans leaves Ezboard for vBulletin.
- November 2001: Organa Solo calls The Rebel Faction (TRF), a competitor Ezboard, into being.
- Aprox 80% of TGC's groups and members leave to join TRF.
- TGC soldiers on to become a success once again.
- May 16, 2002: Attack of The Clones Released
- May 2002: Primary SWFans.Net RPG groups become hosted by SWFans.Net vBulletin forums.
- Exception being TSE, which remains the only major group not hosted on SWFans.Net.
- June 2002: Following disagreements with the SWFans.Net administration plus members of other roleplaying groups, TSE breaks away from SWFans.Net to found
a new roleplaying site.
- February 2003: Roleplaying site founded by TSE officially renamed StarWarsRPG.Net
- June 2004: TRF Leaves Ezboard to set up a vBulletin.
(Sources: Organa Solo & General Ceel)
- Nov. 5th 2004: Revenge of the Sith Teaser Trailer released.
- Hundreds begin to flock to the board in anticipation.
- TGC Renaissance begins.
- TGC Becomes bigger than it was in its Golden Age
- May 19th, 2005: Revenge of The Sith Released
- May 30 2005: "Ezdude" hacks the Ezboard Network.
- TGC loses Aprox 200,000 posts, including the role playing archives.
- Many other Star Wars communities leave ezboard.
- October 21 2005: General Ceel begins Alpha Testing Yuku.com
- Yuku is a new message board product from ezboard inc.
- Sets up test version of The Gungan Council
- TGC is the first Star Wars community on Yuku system
- TGC is also one of the first dozen communities on Yuku
- Meanwhile TGC ezboard remains in full use
- March 15 2006: Ezboard announces that it will be replaced by Yuku.
- Traditional Ezboard will go offline once Yuku is fully developed and all boards are migrated over.
- December 2006: Discussion on consolidation of TGC's last remaining "Force" Factions begins.
- January 15th 2007: The Jedi Council & Jedi Brotherhood Merge to become "The Jedi Council"
- January 16th 2007: Dark Sith Order & Sine Occasu: Sith Brotherhood merge to become "The Sith Council"
- February 6th 2008: The Gungan Council informed by Ezboard that the message board will be migrated to the new Yuku system within the week.
- February 6th 2008: The Gungan Council Moves to Yuku.
- August 15th 2008: Star Wars: The Clone Wars Released.
- May 19th 2009: TGC celebrates the 10th Anniversary of TPM by concluding a 1000 day countdown thread
- Oct 17th 2009: TGC reaches 1.5 million total posts
- November 1st 2009: TGC to celebrate 10th Birthday
I do not claim that all information and dates found in the hall of fame are completely accurate, and apologize for the lack of detail in many descriptions. During the last 3 to 6 years The Gungan Council has had little or no contact with many of the characters found in the HOF. Many of the characters have been long since retired, and few official sources of documentation remain on the net, or even existed in the first place. Furthermore, everyone recalls the past in different ways. Ask a dozen role players about the history of Swfans, TGC and role playing in general, and you will undoubtedly hear a dozen different versions. Even the history of TGC, which i myself created, is highly debated.
And so, from old messages, websites, and memories; with the help of those willing to offer their assistance, i have tried to reconstruct the past the best that i can.
Special thanks are extended to all who have supported and contributed to this project both directly or as source material. Contributors include but may not be limited to the following people:
Atreyu, Itala Marzullo, Figrin D'an, JonathanLB, Darth Turbogeek, Organa Solo, Lady Syren, Danster The Gangster, Bane Nathos, Lady DeVille, Quel Jin Lorn, Darth Roul, Jen Katrina, Diete Somir, Malice Draclau, Dark Lord Maim, Keira Lyshaa, DarkSkyKerberos, Vega Van Derveld, The Devil Sith, Lynch, Hwoarang (Ice Fox), Korran Halcyon, Kassandra Distorith, Jan Dondana, Supernova (Lord Psychic), Recon Klain (Darth Stone), Sith Ahnk, Rogue Steiner, Spark Vallen, Darkestsith6, Remy Gray
