Since I don't have a guild, and but have actually been interested in having a good one for a long time, I do have a lot of thoughts on the matter. They aren't necessarily fair ones. However, they come from somewhere. I have been an officer in several guilds and in several games over the last nine years; some fell apart due to this or that, and some I didn't WANT to leave, but they weren't moving to a game I wanted to play, so I had no choice. I'm likely going to come off sounding pretty brazen in this, but it's a sticky subject to me, and I am not afraid of being straightforward.
So, consider this what I keep in mind when looking at guilds, having been both blessed and burned in the past:
1) Size - small is NOT what I want
Unlike Sylas, I do NOT want a small guild. At all. I have some good friends with whom I'd have already guilded up with were it not for this personal restriction. In a game that offers so many linkshells and a really comprehensive friend-list system, I don't need a guild for socialization or finding friends or just to hang out. If I am ever, EVER the only person online in a guild, even if it's 4am, I am looking for the door.
Guilds need people to survive, because that's what they are - collections of people with some common bond or interest. What I want from a guild is a collection of people with whom I can chat, RP, or do PVE at a moments notice... or work together for larger, more common goals. That requires people to be IN the guild. There's nothing I can do in a small guild that I can't do in a linkshell, and having too few people means that one bad day or season, and I'm wearing an empty tag. I can handle a large number of people - give them to me. Quantity DOES have a quality of its own, even if it means you CAN remove the problem people and still have folks left over.
And guess what? If you get cliques, a Big guild can handle it. Small guilds risk becoming just a clique with a house and a community storage chest. That's great... until a few members get hit by RL, and then your guild is four people not knowing what to do next. That's not a guild; that's a circle, to me.
2) More than rules: A code of behavior,
My best guild experiences were the ones in which we welcomed members when they came online, new or old. It's amazing what such a simple little gesture can do. While every guild should have its rules - which others have already touched on - I find it MORE important to create a place where people are given direct and positive reinforcement for being part of the team. If no one says hello when you come into your guild, why are you in it?
3) Officers who understand the balance of power and responsibility
This is a sticking thing to me. The point of having guild officers at all is to give structure and content to a group, and to initiate actions needed to keep these things. Too often, I see guild leadership become a thing where 1-3 people claim all the power - "Our decisions are final" - but refusing the responsibility that comes with it. At least twice in my time, I accepted an "officer" position that took jobs and responsibilities off the "big wigs", but gave me and the other people busting their arses to make the guild run smoothly absolutely no say in important matters. I quit two guilds, over time, whose superior officers told me point blank that I, as a fellow officer, still had zero say in what they did, but expected me to work just as hard - and harder in the case of those two - to make it all WORK. No. If I'm pulling the load, I get a say in where it goes, or I ain't takin' the work. Pure and simple.
4) "RP Guild" instead of "RP Friendly"
Hard experience has told me that "RP Friendly" means the opposite of what it says, in the long run. I don't want to be in a non-RP guild, since RP is my favorite part of the MMO experience. When a group says it is "RP Friendly", it means to me that it is a social guild and can't make up its mind, and tried to have it both ways. It doesn't work for me in the long run, in every experience I've had. Eventually, you get a critical mass of RPers and people who don't care about RP, and resentments build, and when a group just says it is "RP Friendly", it means that SOMEONE in the core membership, high in the ranks, doesn't really like RP but is just tolerating it. I respect Non-RP guilds more than "RP Friendly" ones because at least they know who they are. Know who you are as a guild.
5) A common story big enough to take all kinds of characters
Look, there will always be themed guilds, and I think that's a GOOD thing. Military-themed guilds can be spectacular when they are made up of people who like that. I did, for a long time in the 2000s, but not so much anymore. The point is that an RP-oriented guild should have some energizing, stimulating theme/story/concpt that DOES link together all its members in some fashion, and that allows individual stories to flourish while still powering the whole. It can be done, and it doesn't have to be complex. It just needs...
6) Enthusiasm
This is the single biggest trait I look for in RP, in RP partners and colleagues, and groups. Are you enjoying yourself? Are you into your story and characters? Can you spare enough of yourself to give others the good time that we're all here for, so that they will want to do so for you? If a guild lacks an overall general enthusiasm for what it is, who is in it, and where it is going, it's just a holding pen and a storage facility, in the long run
7) A Consciousness of the Community
To start to bring this rant to a close, I'd say that this element was missing in several groups that I joined over the past decade. Balmung has a lot of people, and it is inevitable that your guildies will want to meet and have fun with people outside it. Do that! Host events! Maintain a public as well as a private face. We aren't gaming in a vacuum. But.... don't send out blind invites? Recruit by RPing IN THE COMMUNITY, let new people see what your members are and do, and let them decide!
Now, there's plenty more, but it starts to come to the individual level after this, and that's not our thread's subject.
I realize that I probably come out sounding terribly picky and elitist in this, but I guess I would prefer that to being wishy-washy. I have been in good guilds, and in ones that weren't very good, and seen the two types become one another. Also, I am very much willing to put my money where my mouth is. I don't want to build a guild from scratch, and I don't wear a guild tag on Nathan, because I haven't found the right offer, and I don't want to waste a guild's time and goodwill when I can't find a good fit. The linkshells and the people I've met in FFXIV have been some of the greatest in my gaming career, and I'd rather keep riding that wave of awesomeness than join something that I feel uncertain about.
So, consider this what I keep in mind when looking at guilds, having been both blessed and burned in the past:
1) Size - small is NOT what I want
Unlike Sylas, I do NOT want a small guild. At all. I have some good friends with whom I'd have already guilded up with were it not for this personal restriction. In a game that offers so many linkshells and a really comprehensive friend-list system, I don't need a guild for socialization or finding friends or just to hang out. If I am ever, EVER the only person online in a guild, even if it's 4am, I am looking for the door.
Guilds need people to survive, because that's what they are - collections of people with some common bond or interest. What I want from a guild is a collection of people with whom I can chat, RP, or do PVE at a moments notice... or work together for larger, more common goals. That requires people to be IN the guild. There's nothing I can do in a small guild that I can't do in a linkshell, and having too few people means that one bad day or season, and I'm wearing an empty tag. I can handle a large number of people - give them to me. Quantity DOES have a quality of its own, even if it means you CAN remove the problem people and still have folks left over.
And guess what? If you get cliques, a Big guild can handle it. Small guilds risk becoming just a clique with a house and a community storage chest. That's great... until a few members get hit by RL, and then your guild is four people not knowing what to do next. That's not a guild; that's a circle, to me.
2) More than rules: A code of behavior,
My best guild experiences were the ones in which we welcomed members when they came online, new or old. It's amazing what such a simple little gesture can do. While every guild should have its rules - which others have already touched on - I find it MORE important to create a place where people are given direct and positive reinforcement for being part of the team. If no one says hello when you come into your guild, why are you in it?
3) Officers who understand the balance of power and responsibility
This is a sticking thing to me. The point of having guild officers at all is to give structure and content to a group, and to initiate actions needed to keep these things. Too often, I see guild leadership become a thing where 1-3 people claim all the power - "Our decisions are final" - but refusing the responsibility that comes with it. At least twice in my time, I accepted an "officer" position that took jobs and responsibilities off the "big wigs", but gave me and the other people busting their arses to make the guild run smoothly absolutely no say in important matters. I quit two guilds, over time, whose superior officers told me point blank that I, as a fellow officer, still had zero say in what they did, but expected me to work just as hard - and harder in the case of those two - to make it all WORK. No. If I'm pulling the load, I get a say in where it goes, or I ain't takin' the work. Pure and simple.
4) "RP Guild" instead of "RP Friendly"
Hard experience has told me that "RP Friendly" means the opposite of what it says, in the long run. I don't want to be in a non-RP guild, since RP is my favorite part of the MMO experience. When a group says it is "RP Friendly", it means to me that it is a social guild and can't make up its mind, and tried to have it both ways. It doesn't work for me in the long run, in every experience I've had. Eventually, you get a critical mass of RPers and people who don't care about RP, and resentments build, and when a group just says it is "RP Friendly", it means that SOMEONE in the core membership, high in the ranks, doesn't really like RP but is just tolerating it. I respect Non-RP guilds more than "RP Friendly" ones because at least they know who they are. Know who you are as a guild.
5) A common story big enough to take all kinds of characters
Look, there will always be themed guilds, and I think that's a GOOD thing. Military-themed guilds can be spectacular when they are made up of people who like that. I did, for a long time in the 2000s, but not so much anymore. The point is that an RP-oriented guild should have some energizing, stimulating theme/story/concpt that DOES link together all its members in some fashion, and that allows individual stories to flourish while still powering the whole. It can be done, and it doesn't have to be complex. It just needs...
6) Enthusiasm
This is the single biggest trait I look for in RP, in RP partners and colleagues, and groups. Are you enjoying yourself? Are you into your story and characters? Can you spare enough of yourself to give others the good time that we're all here for, so that they will want to do so for you? If a guild lacks an overall general enthusiasm for what it is, who is in it, and where it is going, it's just a holding pen and a storage facility, in the long run
7) A Consciousness of the Community
To start to bring this rant to a close, I'd say that this element was missing in several groups that I joined over the past decade. Balmung has a lot of people, and it is inevitable that your guildies will want to meet and have fun with people outside it. Do that! Host events! Maintain a public as well as a private face. We aren't gaming in a vacuum. But.... don't send out blind invites? Recruit by RPing IN THE COMMUNITY, let new people see what your members are and do, and let them decide!
Now, there's plenty more, but it starts to come to the individual level after this, and that's not our thread's subject.
I realize that I probably come out sounding terribly picky and elitist in this, but I guess I would prefer that to being wishy-washy. I have been in good guilds, and in ones that weren't very good, and seen the two types become one another. Also, I am very much willing to put my money where my mouth is. I don't want to build a guild from scratch, and I don't wear a guild tag on Nathan, because I haven't found the right offer, and I don't want to waste a guild's time and goodwill when I can't find a good fit. The linkshells and the people I've met in FFXIV have been some of the greatest in my gaming career, and I'd rather keep riding that wave of awesomeness than join something that I feel uncertain about.
"But in the laugh there was another voice. A clearer laugh, an ironic laugh. A laugh which laughs because it chooses not to weep."
![[Image: 3610850.jpg]](http://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/1266293/pics/original/3610850.jpg)
