About a guild

So I've always wanted to make a guild, probably because I see being a guild master a good spot and it may be because I'm greedy or because I just harshly ever win at anything, but I had this idea for a guild anyway, and a part of the gimmick of the guild would be that it wouldn't actually have an official leader. It would be a guild made out of 5-10 very active members, a small band of these sorts of ''elite soldiers'', not exactly elite, but fighters that all specialize in different skills. Why such a low amount of people would be because the activeness would be needed, and in order to keep the guild in it's own gimmick, we can't have too many members or it may just look like some sort of an army.

And about the whole leading system, all decisions would be made by democracy, and OOC settings I don't actually know yet. So this thread is not a guild advertisement or any sorts of info, but discussion about an idea.

What would be the difference between this concept and... for example... Band of the Brave?

Yes, I did think of them while I got this idea in my head. And pretty much just now I realized that what I thought of was pretty much like the Band, with just a slightly different concept. Should've had another thought before I started the thread. x)

What kind of "diffrent" concept though?

I think it would be fun with a mercenary guild, (would be pretty much like the braves, yes)

I can easily imagine mercenary guild being very numerous, though there is so much more to consider as well. I'd think about this carefully If I were you. but from what i've heard in whisp-chats, it seems to take shape nice and slowly, and very well.

Don't start a guild just to "be the guy".

Start a guild if you have an idea that you think others will enjoy RPing under, and feel committed enough to it to make it work. Excitement and commitment starts with the guild leadership, if they aren't that into it, noone will be.

And then, don't feel terrible if it doesn't either. Sometimes they don't.

Dwyburn wrote:Don't start a guild just to "be the guy".

Start a guild if you have an idea that you think others will enjoy RPing under, and feel committed enough to it to make it work. Excitement and commitment starts with the guild leadership, if they aren't that into it, noone will be.

And then, don't feel terrible if it doesn't either. Sometimes they don't.

I said I wouldn't be ''the'' guy, because the guild would have no official leader. It's like everyone's the guild leader, like my first and original idea.

Gerard/Gramot wrote:So I've always wanted to make a guild, probably because I see being a guild master a good spot and it may be because I'm greedy or because I just harshly ever win at anything, but I had this idea for a guild anyway, and a part of the gimmick of the guild would be that it wouldn't actually have an official leader. It would be a guild made out of 5-10 very active members, a small band of these sorts of ''elite soldiers'', not exactly elite, but fighters that all specialize in different skills. Why such a low amount of people would be because the activeness would be needed, and in order to keep the guild in it's own gimmick, we can't have too many members or it may just look like some sort of an army.

And about the whole leading system, all decisions would be made by democracy, and OOC settings I don't actually know yet. So this thread is not a guild advertisement or any sorts of info, but discussion about an idea.

When you're an officer or GM, you have to understand the primary rule of playing a game; RL always goes first.

that said democracy is all good; but someone has to make the events, someone has to make the members invested, someone has to get the members doing shit. Because they won't do that on their own. someone has to make the settings. most people want to log in an participate, not create. usually that's why you have officers, people that actually like doing the creating. you can have an open invitation for others to actually make their own shit, but its going to be sporadic and someone is still going to need to get shit done.

this isn't to say that members can't have a say, the more say the better i'd think, It is just that there's a lot of work to be done to keep a guild active.

probably because I see being a guild master a good spot and it may be because I'm greedy or because I just harshly ever win at anything

I guess this right here just gave me the wrong impression.

When I was in blades for hire It was always done as a group. From the moment I was A scrubby cadet to when I became an officer/GM. The reason it failed, is because the group moved on from WoW. And that took 2 or 3 years? You just need to all get on really well OOCly etc. The only pitfall is, Once a person leaves, It's hard to fill the gap.

What has been described in this thread is pretty much how I wanted the Band of the Brave to work. It's been founded from an ideal that everyone that wants to, should be able to participate in creating and unfolding story-lines. I wanted characters to matter! To accomplish that ideal, I've taken the following steps:

The main rank of the Guild is "Braveheart". Ideally, they make up the majority of any party. Anyone that meets the level requirement and logs in regularly to contribute to the guild progresses from "Greenhorn" (the noobie rank) to "Braveheart" pretty quickly, and once they're there, they are allowed and encouraged to pitch in, or even invite new members and plan events on their own.

We have a trial period on the "Greenhorn" rank because we need a way to ascertain if someone is the right fit for the guild, especially if their character is a good fit. You don't want someone inviting new members and creating events that doesn't fit in, but you certainly don't want a character that doesn't quite fit in the main concept of the guild to run around and project a wrongful image of what the guild is about!

Then we have a couple of special ranks above Greenhorn that where created during role-play, because they where needed:
A) You need someone to oversee the entire guild, make sure there are no planning crashes, and set a general tone and direction for the guild. That person is the Guild Master.
B) After role-playing for a couple of months it became apparent that we needed to add a special rank to take charge on the battlefield, and sort out conflicts between characters. So we created a rank that would allow some characters that where already good at filling that role do it in a more official capacity.
C) Just for fun, I gave every character that signed the guild charter with me a "Founding Member" rank with maximum officer authority.
D) We've set up a "Villain" rank for characters that make themselves enemies of the guild, played by people we'd rather not remove from our community. So instead of a guild kick, they would be demoted to the Villain rank.

We decide the direction of the guild almost entirely through role-play, by having meetings, and just general conversations. Even the different ranks that are in play now, where made for in-character reasons and they will continue to change as the guild progresses through it's story.

Amaryl wrote:Because they won't do that on their own.

I've found that, as long as you give players the tools (both in- and out-of-character), they will create content.

erwtenpeller wrote:

Amaryl wrote:Because they won't do that on their own.

I've found that, as long as you give players the tools (both in- and out-of-character), they will create content.

This is indeed true! When you have people that know each-other, have spend a decent amount of time with each-other and the guild direction is pretty well established, people know what to do etc,

Though, when there's a lull, or a sudden inactivity of the most active members, or whatever - someone has to keep things moving - and usually that's the GM.

When guildmembers know each other really well, that's when its going to be breeze, getting to that point requires some effort though.

Heck, I've been the main guild-officer for my guild since 2008 across a myriad of games, and these days the only thing I have to worry about is making sure the infrastructure is functioning decently..