Do you feel the Barony is ready for a Baronial TW Champion now? If not, how would you judge when we have reached that point?

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In general, the Society doesn't explore the alternative ways of recognizing Good Stuff nearly enough. I suspect that this is something Caitlin and I would play with -- we're both fond of seeing more variety in recognitions. (Even a different term can help -- I vastly prefer to think of the "Royal Bards", rather than "Bardic Champions".)

I do think that TW has reached a point where it's worth getting a bit of particular recognition, but I think it's worth spending some time and seeing if we can come up with a recognition that's more distinctive to that particular form than just another Champion. Don't know offhand what that might be, but I'd love to talk with folks about it...

Bear in mind that this isn't anything against TW, and shouldn't be interpreted as a desire to see anything "better" or "worse" for that as opposed to any other martial art. It's mainly a desire to see each art get something a bit *different*, and appropriate to that art...

As far as Champions in general go, there certainly has to be a sizeable community of people active in that martial form before a Champion is a sustainable and viable position. Ideally, it should not be a burden to choose the next one. It is my impression that there is something of a burden in sustaining the Champions we already have and reliably producing a successor.

I had a discussion with Jehan on this issue and he had the idea of establishing a guard made up of the different martial arts forms chosen by consultation. (And I definitely give credit to him for this guard idea.) I think this idea has merit and the added advantage of providing an opportunity to give recognition to those reliable work horse types that may never be at the top of their martial form in terms of "scoring" ability, may not win tournaments regularly, but are dependable, reliable, people that help support and sustain a martial activity.

It's possible Carolingia could have Champions and a guard. In any case, I think the Champion issue should be examined and reevaluated by the incoming baronial coronets.

I just want to say that I do think it is important to recognize and encourage those of the barony who participate in and support our martial activities.

Considering my dislike of particularism (see above), I'm a little leery of creating too many different baronial champions too easily. Gwendolyn and I have talked about looking for other ways of recognizing and celebrating the best of different activities, perhaps something more like a baronial "household," using the word in its more historical sense - the term is so firmly locked into a different SCAdian meaning that we'd probably have to call it something else.

As for the champion, I wouldn't presume to dictate to the TW community on that issue. Since it takes effort to organize a championship, it would have to be something on which the TW folks at least had a majority opinion :). Perhaps the guard concept would be a first step. I do think Carolingia should be very proud of how TW has taken root and flourished here.

When is any martial group ready to produce a champion? If you have a relatively stable population, are respected by the Barony and the group feels that they want to put forward a representative for court it may be time. If you are holding successful theme events where the draw is thrown weapons, then it is probably long past the point the point that you should have a champion.

If you can average 8-10 people a week at your practices during the summer and/or around 15-20 at events then it is probably time to push for a champion. If you are lower you might want to wait longer unless you believe that having a champion will encourage more people to join thrown weapons.

The problem with a Champion is that you have to attend the same courts as the Baron, but you just stand there. While this may be interesting for a reign or two, it gets old quickly. If you do not have a large enough and fluid enough base of people to draw champions from, the same small core of people will keep becoming champion and that can become boring and can be a disencentive to people participating.

I would welcome a Champion, so long as the activity base is large enough to support one and keep them fresh. I however would not want to have an event four or five years from now when all the main members have been champion and no one wants to compete and do it again...

Insofar as TW needs representation, we personally do not know whether there is a sufficiently large base of practitioners to justify a Champion yet - you need to have sufficient competitors to keep from rotating through the same few people each time.

We support having Baronial Champions because we believe that a large and thriving barony like ours deserves to have this source of pride. We think that a Baronial Thrown Weapons Championship Tourney would, overall, be a good thing. Judging *when* is harder. However, when the time comes, we suggest it should be scheduled about a year in advance, so that there is ample time for new people to become interested and skilled in the art with that goal in mind. Then the Champion, with the Baron/ess, would need to maintain and even expand the level of interest to ensure an interesting tourney the next year.