A few thoughts on the Guild-system

[Cyl]

((I am not sure wether this is supposed to be in Guilds Forum or Wishlist, so I will leave this to the first Moderator who passes by to decide))

As far as I can see, a contigent of good (in sense of well made) guilds could be a great basis for Roleplay. (No, not only roleplay events) However the current set of guilds is a shame. The guild tag being the only connection between members. The only goal to get the members to powerlevel as fast and as much as possible, just to be able to shun other guilds, and to \"p4\\/\\/n\" in guildwars.

Guilds tend to jealously poke pointy sticks at any idea done by another guild. One guild says \"We were here for hundrets of years\", the next brags that they were there since the creation of the lemnurs by Laanx, the following one goes around saying that they were before Laanx or Talad, or even before the gods existed. The only motor of these guilds being \"betta\" then the others, if not being \"da Best!ZOMG\". \"Dragons are cool! Our Guild is about Dragons, so that we are cool, who cares about settings?\"...

Even with guilds getting hundrets of members, no guild ever took a real position of power. Usually based on reasons like massrecruit and Quality over Quantity, Powerlevellers first Roleplayers maybe afterwards. There shouldn\'t have been the need to create a guild just to elude guild invites.

To me it appeals to be obvious, that players tend to be incapable of creating guilds themselves. Not able to figure out that a guild is more than a fancy name, 20000 Trias and a bad excuse of a backgroundstory.

What I want to say, currently guilds are plainly farts in the wind, due to the sheer ammount of little guilds, and people scattered around, often without any ammount of guidance, the biggest thing involving interguild work was a retarded spell, and a certain raid on Bodacher\'s store, of which nothing has ever been heard.

Could it be different? Of course it could.

A very small ammount of guilds, probably GM assisted (and monitored), which, however are more than just name tags. Oposing guilds should be oposing each other, from the smallest newcomer to the very leader. People should _join_ these guilds, instead of getting invited. The \"Yes/No\" Question should lie in the hand of the guild not of the \"to-be\" Member.

This would result in a few powerful and influencing guilds, instead of a manyfold of guilds about the wierdest things, while the really important points.

Said guilds shouldnt be the usual coal copied \"Good Aligned\" or \"Evil Aligned\" guilds, no rather they should be what the term \"guild\" actually means. Gatherings of Specialists and tradesmen. Yes a kind of \"Warriors Guild\" or \"Mages Guild\" could, no should, exist, but with the reason to gather said specialists. A Miner\'s guild (Actually there has been an totaly awesome initiative into that direction lately), probably several trader\'s guilds. But not the freaking \"We do that because of the ohh so tragic history!\" guilds.

As mentioned above, these guilds should be under supervision of GMs. Lead by players, of course, but created only if an acceptable concept is present.

Had to get that out of me.

Had to get that out.

[druke]

Heh, this is what I\'ve always thought to.

[Levski]

Cyl, sometimes there is nothing wrong with the tail wagging the dog.

What I mean is, it is often good that guilds pay attention to newer members, and help them out while they are first starting.

[Zan]

The problem is that specialized roleplaying guild initiatives don\'t stand a chance against the free-for-all massively recruiting powerlevel guilds.

I will take the CoV as an example since that is the \'guild\' I\'m active in. Our idea was unique and most definitely very positive for the roleplaying community but after an initial burst it was already burning out due to a lack of interest and things to do. Part of that is because fighting is the only main thing to do on PS at the moment. Luckily crafting is coming on and I expect that addition to revive the CoV for a part.

Either way we don\'t spam new people to recruit us, we have a website and a guild thread here. Aside from that we show ourselves in-game and only loosely \'invite\' those new players who turn out to be good roleplayers. This gets us as good as no fresh meat.

Then seeing some new guild with no background known to me run up to people in the sewers and say \"U wanna join a gang?\" which is sadly accepted too .. that is sad, yes.

[Valbrandr]

I hear you Cyl... and it would be nice to be apart of such a guild that you know wont be gone tomorrow.

 

A very small ammount of guilds, probably GM assisted (and monitored)

GM assisted?  Sounds like a bad idea man.  Really its tough.. some people want something like this but no one wants to make the sacrifices.  But everytime there is something like a Guild Union idea most people frown upon it.  I wish there could be some kind of Guild Union.. making these small guilds apart of something much larger.  Each guild pick a field they are going to try and focus in... Fighters Guild, Mages Guild, Thieves Guild, Merchants Guild and so on.  I would prefer that.. because it would link the guilds together.  It all depends on how you look at the situation... either we are all in this together or all in it for ourselves.  Really its upto us.. we just have to do it.  A player driven world.

[Thedrish]

Originally posted by Cyl
People should _join_ these guilds, instead of getting invited. The \"Yes/No\" Question should lie in the hand of the guild not of the \"to-be\" Member.

I have noticed when moving around in Yliakum that there are (new?) Guilds who run around shouting \"join us and get a top-position\". I agree completely with you that this gives the Guild-part of the game a bad image. Because it\'s showing that these people have no idea what a Guild is about.

Of course I can not speak for other Guilds, only for the one I am a member of. New members are encouraged to first introduce themselves at our Guildforum after which they can be invited ingame. Of course it can happen we meet someone in the game who shows such enthousiasm and spirit that at that moment it can be decided to invite him. But this choice lies always on our side.

As far as free-for-all Guilds go, I believe they will not survive. Because if you can\'t give members something to work for / something they can achieve, the game will be less fun/interesting as time goes by. An active Guild (which a clear policy or ideals) will encourage their members to be active and improve their skills. If you join an \"easy\" Guild, get anything you want you will not enjoy it (in fact, hate it you still need to train your skills).

[r.guppy]

I agree with some of the points hear so wont go into them, i am looking  to the day when this is implemented read first and last post please.

 http://www.planeshift3d.com/wbboard/thread.php?threadid=21418&boardid=11&styleid=3&sid=0a6a512628e29cf410982a0d1d09652e
 
 This i fell will help solve a few of the problems mentioned hear.

[Sangwa]

Even with guilds getting hundrets of members, no guild ever took a real position of power.

That\'s because people aren\'t willing to simply be controlled by others, and it would be the same if GM\'s jumped in.
Also, the last thing I\'d want would be to have a GM in my guild. It\'s pretty nice to have them around, but not too close mind you.

The Dark Empire might grow slowly, but that is because we are still sharpening our own guild system. We currently try to aid in roleplays the best we can, but there are also priorities within that we must tend to.

Mass recruiting guilds are the same thing as no guild. One can recruit people from these guilds without much effort, if the guild is as unorganized as we\'d like to believe. Else, they are doing a good job in keeping people interested in their way.

What could fix these things you\'ve mentioned would be to give economy, crafting and other non-fighting elements more weight. This way people would join guilds for other reasons, besides looking cool under a tag.
I\'ve heard they are going to implement crafting, I just hope money gets alot harder to get.

[Pestilence]

mass-recruiting guilds and roleplaying guilds. Ofcourse there are many shades in between and shades that even go an other way.

Personally I am a bit dissapointed in the role guilds play in PS, but I don\'t feel an attack like this on guilds will help anything at all. It will only push the ones you are mentioning in the defensive and will negate any good will on their side.

Ofcourse roleplaying should be more a role in guilds, but that it isn\'t is not the fault of the guilds, the reason they don\'t roleplay much is that roleplaying isn\'t around much in the game as a whole. The guilds here in are just a representation of this.

Find a way to have the majority actually roleplay and the guilds will roleplay aswell.

As for your solution I don\'t see it working. Things like the mining guild and the trading guild simply don\'t seem to work and I don\'t feel it\'s the job of the GMs to make them work by simply elliminating the other guilds that do work but you don\'t seem to like becuase most people don\'t roleplay.l

[Sangwa]

Exactly, devs should push their efforts into making roleplaying something more bearable. They should have information in the /help and guide regarding roleplaying, so that players would have more credibility when pointing people towards roleplaying.
One of the worst problems in guilds is that players are sickly informed about PS\'s objectives and setting and GMs do not waste time trying to monitor guild development. I had to restructure DE recently just because devs never took a solid stand on the fact that players will not be allowed to play evil. Stuff like this shouldn\'t happen, but still does, because players are misinformed by misinformed players and misinformed GMs.


Getting the crafting skills will be a good change. I just hope they come up with a way to earn PPs without slaying, because that\'s just completly wack.