Star Wars: The Old Republic – The Review. Includes The Story, So Far.

The discovery of the Sith people and the origins of the Sith as a cult.

The exile of the dark Jedi led to them being placed in unarmed transports and sent off into the unknown. When they came out of hyperspace, they found themselves looking upon the uncharted world of Korriban, some time around the year 6,900 BBY.

The dark Jedi used their force powers and technology to elevate themselves to a point where they were worshiped as gods by the Sith people, who were a simple, tribal civilization with little in the way of technology. The Sith lived in small huts and used primitive weapons. With the betrayal of the Sith king (Sith’ari) by his second in command, a power vacuum emerged and the most powerful of the dark Jedi, Ajunta Pall, filled it – becoming the first “Dark Lord of the Sith”.

Over the next 2,000 years, the dark Jedi interbred with the Sith people, through the use of the force powers the Jedi had used to create their monstrous beasts during the second great schism, and Sith alchemy. It is during this time that “The Sith” stopped being referred to as a discreet people and the term “Sith” began to be used to refer to the cult of dark Jedi we know of today.

In this time, the Sith built the Valley of the Dark Lords and the Great Sith Temple. It is also during this time that several exiles attempted to attack the Jedi order, again. They failed and revealed their existence to the Jedi, who now knew that they still lived somewhere in the galaxy. What they didn’t know is that they were thriving…and planning their revenge.

It was also during this time period that the Sith order started defining itself and how its members would live. The Sith (henceforth used to refer to the dark side users of the Sith Order) believed that the Jedi’s pacifist beliefs led to weakness and personal decline. They believed that conflict and strife were vital to the building of emotional and physical strength and used hardship and conflict to weed out the weak. One tenet stated that an individual was only entitled to what they were strong enough to handle.

The Sith also shunned the concept of morality, believing that such a concept simply got in the way of being able to take advantage of one’s situation and opportunities to gain power. These philosophies were taught to students at a young age and they were encouraged to challenge one another to open combat, fighting for prestige and recognition.

The Sith also believed that emotion was the cornerstone of their power and the Jedi’s teachings to overcome fear, pain and anger were wrong. The Sith believed that they could achieve true power by harnessing their emotions, rather than denying them and that emotions were the only path to truly understanding the force. It could be argued that the seeming invincibility of some of the Dark Lords was due to this line of thinking, with those individuals being able to pull off amazing feats of force ability.

These ideals are reflected in the Code of the Sith –

Peace is a lie, there is only passion.

Through passion, I gain strength.

Through strength, I gain power.

Through power, I gain victory.

Through victory, my chains are broken.

The Force shall free me.

Back to the timeline, it was right around the year 6,900 BBY when the Sith founded the Sith Empire.

From this point on, no major occurrences took place until 5,000 BBY, with the onset of the Great Hyperspace War.