Guide - Guilds

[Pyewacket]

Edit by Ghrae: Started a new thread to post your suggestions, comments, experiences

 

I know it isnt a specific skill as such and is probably under the title MISC if the section is ever made here, but..anyone think there should be a need for a guild-making guide? Something to put a newly created guild and its owner on the right path to help them grow the guild etc? Doesnt and SHOULDNT conform to one single players' opinions on how the guilds policies should be set but it SHOULD include some of the more obvious suggestions for those policies and the benefits/drawbacks that are entailed from having them. (IE needs to have an unbiased view of each guild-type, whether its a pk guild, pirate guild, alching guild or just a plain old mixed bag guild and state what are the pro's& cons in each case).

 

I think its about time that anyone wanting to start up a new guild had some basis of expertise to refer to from the vast and rich experience out there amongst the current and prior guild leaders in the community, both good bad and ugly.

 

 

- PYE

Edited May 2, 2008 by Ghrae

[Pyewacket]

Guess I better kick start this thing then with a few ideas on how to get started for a new leader.

 

Ok, am going to assume you have read the encyclopedia and discovered the guild commands listings and already made the guild.

 

You now need to scratch your head a little and work out exactly what kind of guild you want to bring to the community. There are many different kinds already in existence, take a look around this section of the forums for an idea of whats already out there. As a rough guide though, here are a few of the main types:-

 

Pker guild (speaks for itself, this is mainly for the fighting types, with perhaps some members who act as suppliers, but mostly it will be constituted by players who prefer to fight other players, either in melee, using magic, ranging or summons; for the purposes of their ingame entertainment)

 

Harvester guild (again, easy to guess at, this type of guild will have members who quite happily sit for countless hours on end mining or flowerpicking. Either the members harvest for their own later usage or the items they gather can/will be sold off.

 

Mixing guild (similar in nature to the harvester guild, this type will mix items up from harvested materials, either gathered themselves or purchased from the ingame harvesters, and again will either use or sell the produce, whether it be potions, alchemy ess, crafting goods or any other item produced ingame).

 

Outlaw guild (yep, there are one or two of these in the community, and despite regular outcrys from the people in EL, they continue to exist. Whilst the majority of players in EL usually regard outlaw guildmembers with scorn and distrust, nevertheless the outlaws provide an element of additional player-driven danger to EL that would be sorely missed by many. Whether it be having to keep an eye out for them bagjumping you, or simply attempting to catch one of the outlaws in a pk map; without them in EL, things would lack a realistic feel for the games ambiance. Please bear in mind: that if you intend to mold your guild into an outlaw band of players, most other guilds will hunt you on sight given the chance, and MAY even refuse to trade with you!

Allrounder guild (by far the most common type, this guild is a hotchpotch mix of most if not all the above elements of guild types. It has the advantage of having members who are willing to do any of the requirements of the other guild types, according to their preferred methods of playing, either by being made up of the different specific types of players (harvesters, mixers, fighters etc) or by having actual allrounders skill-wise on the guild roster)

 

Ok, so once you have made up your mind which type of guild you would prefer, you then need to decide on a name for your guild. It is recommended but NOT a requirement for your name to have some association to the type of guild you envisage. Do try, however, to be original with your name, as copying other guild names can be confusing, and even lead to being investigated for impersonation by moderators if foul play is reported, with possible punitive action being taken.

 

Once you have picked the "long name" for your guild (IE the full name) you also need to decide on the shortened version which will appear on your tag (the bit that appears after your name ingame!). Again, some originality is recommended here, and again do take into account that impersonating another guild may land you in hot water.

 

Ok, so you know now what kind of guild you want, what the long name is and the tag..now..

 

RULES

 

These define your guild. They make up the backbone of how your members should behave in accordance to your godlike wishes and if they break those rules once set, you have the authority to act as judge, jury and er...well..you can boot them out, derank them, promote them for being VERY badass (in the case of outlaw guilds) or just rewrite your rules to make it all go away. How your guild is perceived by the rest of the EL community lies purely in the way your rules have been defined and made clear to your guild members, and also how good a leader you are at ensuring they stick to them (this is true regardless of what type of guild you want to run).

 

Once you know what type of rules you wish to set, be it a policy on bagjumping, spawnstealing, scamming, pking or any other ingame action where your members interact with other players in any fashion, then you can decide what exactly are the minimum requirements for new recruits who wish to join up. You can find the information to set the #guild_info in the encyclopedia helpfile under the Guild Commands section, and set the various items for your guild using that, everything from the guilds tag to the URL you wish to hold your forums on.

 

Speaking of forums, its a good idea to think about making some for your guild at some point. If nothing else, its a good place to set down your rules list (for easy reference in cases where you or other members need to refer to them), for guildless people wanting to apply to your guild (they can post up some info there about themselves and it will buy you some time to check out their ingame characters to see if they conform to your guild type), and also a place to discuss things with your guild in privacy (gossip may got struck by lightening without warning again, so its a good idea to have somewhere where you can all msg each other when others inguild are offline).

 

If you follow the above, you are ready to start recruiting, and this section of the forums is the ideal spot to place an advert for new members. Post up according to your guild type, using whatever clever marketing skills you possess, but even if you are a hard ass pker guild or a badass outlaw guild, remember to follow the forum rules or you will simply find your post may get deleted.

 

Hopefully there will be more tips on how to deal with disputes from other players/guild coming soon, as well as handy tips from other guilds/leaders.

 

- PYEwacket

 

*edit:spelling

Edited May 3, 2008 by Pyewacket

[vytukas]

I can add one more specific category that I have some experience with - a country based guild. I have been a guildmaster of Lithuanian guild, LT, for a while. Unfortunately our guild is almost dead atm, with most pro members left or inactive (as me).

 

In short, country based guilds are problematic to manage. First of all, most likely your guild will be an all-rounder one. However, to find something to do together, you will need to focus on some areas. Just being of the same country/same language will not make a cool guild automatically, unfortunately. Even some of your countrymen can be ugly persons Or some persons can be fine but cause conflicts when together, for instance. So, don't be afraid to boot some members if they are constantly causing problems or conflicts within a guild. This is even more problematic if there is a limited amount of players from your country/language, then you will be afraid to boot anyone... Also, maybe you don't need a country based guild - maybe just a language channel is enough even if you are in separate guilds. In conclusion, country based guild is a fun experience, but don't be surprised when they die as easily as other EL guilds.

[Kalix]

Ok my friend recently gave me his guild not to long ago. It was hard for me at first 'cause i was only in 2 other guilds before holy and ngi, but they gave me tons of experience with the game. Of course i was in this guild before my friend gave it to me but it still wasn't big and it isn't that big now. I had some of my friends join this guild that where in it before that i knew and that helped me get it started. Also I did not set any specific requirements. I set what i looked for, but i said i can make exceptions. Right now its doing much better then when i first started.

 

By the way we are recruiting:) DiEd info

[Thrice]

Edit - Delete.

Edited May 27, 2008 by Thrice

[LabRat]

A tip:

We use Agneum to announce that we are recruiting on channel 4. Players that live on channel 4 comment pretty much after every single recruitment ad in a negative light.

 

I get more PMs after the bot has done her ad on channel 3 than I do on channel 4 (@@3 buying this selling that [inv/loc/wanted/jointc]) and most of the PMs are from lower level players, perfect material to mould into my own image

 

So if you use a bot to recruit on @@4, make sure that it is not so often that it peeves the people that live on channel 4. Agneum is one hour with up to one hour extra delay (so anywhere from 1 hour to 2 hours between ads).

[nathanstenzel]

A quick word of advice to anyone trying to keep a guild going smoothly.

Make as many friends as possible, chat with everyone under the sun and be Very careful about your guild politics.

Public relations between different guilds can be very difficult if a member of one guild does something or is suspected of doing something that would harm another guild or one of its members.

It would probably help greatly if you had a member that was good at being a fair judge of incidents....or get a mod or another person that is good at handling such disputes.

 

I spent alot of time in ALCH being a mediator for when someone did something stupid or annoying.

[Ateh]

Some Tips from a GM who thinks he has a well running guild which is an all rounder group of people.

 

1. Lead by example : Dont ask people to do things you are not willing to do yourself, nobody likes that.

 

2. Be ready to drop what your doing to help a guild member , again , lead by example

 

3. Set clear boundarys as to how you want the guild to be seen in EL, and make them available for all new guild members to see.

 

4. Dont be pushy about recruiting, if someone says they will have a think about joining, then let it be. Dont keep PMing them every ten minutes asking if theyve decided yet. Thats just annoying.

 

5. Dont spam channel 4 with recruitment ads alot, thats annoying to LOL .

 

6. Be generous with your time towards each member, ask them how they are finding their feet in the guild. Make sure they still feel like theyve made the right decision.

 

7. Actually physically get together and do things with your guild, yes there are issues of time zones and such, but at least try.

 

8. As a guild, do projects together small or large. Its something to work towards as a group , it helps everyone get to know each other better and creates a sense of acomplishment when the project is complete. But dont work it too hard, youve got to remember people play EL to relax and have fun, not to slave away every time they log in.

 

9. Let each member follow thier own path, dont try and force roles upon people that dont want the role. If theres a Title or Position to be had in the guild, offer the position yes but make it clear it can be turned down, pressure is not a good thing.

 

10. Keep a good forum going, some people like them, some people never use them. But keep one going, its a handy place to communicate with the guild when your not in game.

 

 

I could think of alot more things, but I dont want to seem as if im some sort of know it all when it comes to creating and maintaining a guild. Perhaps i'll come back another time to this post and add some more until then I hope at least one person looks at this section of the forums and gains some something from it.

 

Oh , I forgot the most important one of all :

 

Be yourself