I am going to spin this a bit, in the hopes that it isn't too

nor too much of a hijack.
Rigwyn posted a while back an interesting comment- why do we even have Guilds right now? So there are reasons having to do with history, traditions, longer term relationships ig and ooc- sure
YET...
The idea of Guilds OOC is to include newer players, to allow those of various stances (I forget the D&D word for neutral, good, bad..etc) to align with each other and create newer, broader, deeper rps, and to share knowledge of mechanics and settings, how to's, histories, quest help, mob hunting help, etc. And of course to develop contacts ig and IC that you can play your character with...
With a low player count, the midbies and oldbies almost all at least know each other's names, and vaguely about each other. Roled for example doesn't know all the european players BUT knows others in their guilds. So RR suggests to newbies often that they meet with so-and-so to see if they would fit into an existing guild. RR met a dwarf miner for examples, and although I didn't know personally the particular Hammer who was ig at the moment, I sent an IC groffel to him telling him of the new person and suggesting they look for each other. OOCly I helped the newer player a bit, then also suggested to him to meet this particular Hammer, and I think they did ICly. So that's one use of existing guilds...
YET as newer player or those of us leftover with non-existant guilds enter and play, well, we gotta play with someone. So I am one of those in favor of the association approach- With the newer Master Mage questlines, a whole bunch of players met each other at least to loan wands back and forth, and to talk strategies for quests. Good rps resulting in many cases. A while back RR organized with others the Sons of Xiosia (SoX heheheheh) and held services in the Garden, and met a bunch of characters who were IG Xiosian's who didn't have much Guild contact.
My first conclusions are:

New Guilds are good, new guild welcome newer people who are IG now without burdens of history to conform to

Cross guild organizing is good, you meet allies, set up alliances and rps among allies- note the intertwining plots going on right now on various levels

Association/ interest alignments are good, you meet people to help you out, people you can send your "happy little yulbar" to in times of need, enhancing rps

OOC talking with opposite alignments are good for the sake of building rps. I used to be a purest- only playing RR in character in game, and never participating in gossip or alliance chats. Now I do that all the time. First, it's fun for me and I hope for others, goofy stuff happens, people crack jokes, you get to know other players. It's also a positive thing I think, to say hello to and encourage newer folks, and I hope to increase the fun of the game for all or most of us, while we're out leveling, which we all do from time to time, even those strict rpers.
Thoughts? Responses? Ideas?
RR
locked out but not gone...