On September 24, Justin quietly stepped away from Dark Warriors leadership. Let us examine his history, accomplishments in the army, and what occurred leading up to his retirement.
Dark Warrior’s Resurgence
Founded on October 16, 2007, by Ambrosha and Elite 910, the Dark Warriors (DW) established a consistent presence within the army scene. The Warriors would hit their pinnacle of performance in 2014, winning both Champions Cup III and Christmas Chaos IV, consistently maxing sizes of 40-45.
After Club Penguin’s official shutdown in 2017, Dark Warriors went silent for quite some time, only to hit another golden age in 2019. The army hit sizes above 100 during this generation, and several #3 Top Ten Placements. However, the army eventually began to decline, before closing its doors sometime in 2020.
After a period of inactivity, the Dark Warriors were officially granted permission to revive by founder Ambrosha on May 23 this year. The army made its official return on July 5, drawing a peak of 41 members at their revival with Holo2, Subzero, and Coolguy crowned leaders of this generation.
Since revival, the army has seen consistent maxes between 15-25, making them one of the fiercest S/M armies at the time. Dark Warriors would even go on to claim victory in S/M Tournaments Summer Blitz, and October Horrors hosted by Club Penguin Armies earlier this year, both of which being under Justin’s leadership.
Justin’s Career
Justin initiated their Club Penguin Army career in 2012 with Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT), becoming fully active in 2014. Over the years, Justin developed into a respected veteran, holding key leadership and high-ranking positions across multiple armies and generations. Notably, Justin served as a brief Leader of Dark Warriors before its shutdown in its previous generation, Fourth-in-Command of the Nachos, and Third-in-Command of the Smart Penguins. In 2017, they also held major positions with the Ice Warriors (Fourth-in-Command) and the Rebel Penguin Federation (Third-in-Command). Years later, Justin became the 26th Leader of the Templars, guiding them through a highly successful era before retiring sometime in 2021.
More recently, Justin co-founded the Void Troops alongside Logical this April, and led it to sizes of 20+ in the army’s early days. However, after internal conflict within the Void Troops leadership, Justin abruptly departed from Void Troops on June 14.
Back Again
About three weeks after he departed from Void Troops, Justin was instated as Dark Warriors Leader.
Throughout his tenure in DW, Justin lead Dark Warriors to the aforementioned tournaments victories, and even to DW’s 18th anniversary earlier this year, on October 21st.
Dark Warriors were undeniably seeing new highs this generation under Justin’s leadership. However, in an unexpected turn of events, Justin quietly left the Dark Warriors, with no official announcement from himself or his co-leaders.
Club Penguin Army League reached out to both Dark Warriors leader Coolguy and Justin for an interview to learn more about this situation.
Justin’s Interview
What led to your sudden departure?
Justin: What really made me retire from Dark Warriors was the lack of a strong, healthy mentality within the army. When you’re leading alongside four others, you’d expect at least one of them to have the mindset needed to guide the army properly. Despite my efforts, I grew tired of the others making every decision based on how they thought people would perceive them and the army.
When WV wasn’t willing to give us land, one of the leaders suggested we should build up just to go to war with them. And when things didn’t go their way with VT, they started claiming that Ant was manipulating us, didn’t want him in advisory, and ended the TCP war because of it. On top of all that, I also found out that one of their leaders was possibly planning to coup me so I left. I am getting too old for this anyways
What kind of an impact do you think your retirement will have on the army at large? Most importantly, what do you think the future holds for the army?
Justin: I think DW will die, I won’t get too much into detail but others do not trust the rest of the leadership.
What would you say have been some of your favorite memories as DW leader?
Justin: Winning Summer Blitz & October Horrors, Especially OH as I believe the finals caused a upset
Do you plan to stay involved in armies in any way, or is this a complete retirement from the community?
Justin: This is a permanent retirement, considering I left every single discord CPA related besides my own army, Void Troops.
Thank you for your time, any closing remarks for the community?
Justin: Use the skills you learn from CPA into the real world as CPA teaches you about leadership and responsibility.
Coolguy’s Interview
What led to Justin’s sudden departure?
Coolguy: Tensions were brewing throughout the war period, and if I’m being honest, there have always been tensions between different people because let’s face it, people have different ideas and thoughts so it wont always be simple. Yet, his sudden departure followed our move not to aid VT any further and to call off our war with TCP. Of course, we had to be ready for anything following this and Justin’s departure was, as you said, sudden but even he will say, it was not the first time it was mentioned as a possibility.
How do you feel the army performed under Justin’s leadership?
Coolguy: I think that the whole leadership worked hard to get DW to where it is and a person is nothing without the troops that follow them. It takes a team to run a ship and that is exactly was DW has. Ultimately, he was part of that team which successfully helped DW to reign supreme in tournaments.
What kind of an impact do you think this sudden retirement will have on the army at large?
Coolguy: I think the sudden retirement has already had an impact but we hope to make the best out of every situation we get into and this will be no different – no disrespect to him.
Thank you for your time, any closing remarks for the community?
Coolguy: “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”
It appears that Justin has left the community with a sense of ambiguity regarding this unexpected situation. This begs the question: why do you think Justin left DW? How do you think DW will be impacted by this sudden change in leadership?
