Closing Guilds (moved from Keeper's Korner)

[Padraig]

• put in NPCs as councilmembers, so people can grind up to the ranks just below council positions?
• disable the restrictions on gaining rank, if every rank has to be approved by the council?
• or can't we simply have the guilds running in their current form and have members mail the AoP when they need a promotion to reach the next rank? We're not taking about 100's of players needing this all the time, so it probably wouldn't be a huge job to do it manually, until a better solution can be made.

I like this a lot. I like what the Rangers did with the automation of the Pupil process -- but I'd like to see it taken a bit further in most guilds. Make the "lesser active" guilds free to join -- full member instantly once you pass an automated task system. Nothing is a secret in Genesis anymore and I know personally a lot of players who would play Rangers, Knights and PoT if it weren't for the Pupil/Squire/Initiate process, the lack of activity, and the awful council systems in place. Rangers need a recode badly, but the current state of the guild player-wise makes it nearly impossible to join. The Priesthood is a disaster, a shitstorm of awful. Knights are the best guild no one's playing.

The Knights fought for years to see Eagledraco removed from his position, now that he's finally been dethroned, most of the guild has gone to sleep or left because of the lack of help from "above" (or that Poet is a member.)

Priests of Takhisis...yeah...wow. How long do people have to suffer and complain to the Immortals for them to actually do something? It still boggles my mind that Diri is allowed to keep her position without any means of replacing her other than the hilariously easy to abuse 14-day login window. What a joke. Navarre's better than this and he knows it but his hands are tied by Upper Management. (As scary a thought as it is, I'd like to see Ravhin and Draugor heading up the Priesthood.)

I don't want Wizards to meddle directly in guild affairs on a daily basis, but in such extreme cases things need to be done to keep things flowing smoothly.

[Cherek]

Creed: Just as Makfly said, thats just my extreme idea. Its not a law just because I say it. I am just a player like anyone else. And I think so because I used to enjoy PVP as a knight, and for me it was perhaps one of the reasons for chosing a knight. Because about that time they were a more PVP oriented guild. (All guilds were more PVP oriented though). And players in general perhaps was as well. But its a free world, knights can take any stance they want. If the Knighthood does not want PVP then its really up to you as a guild to somehow RP your way out of it. Even if it means "surrendering" or forming some type pf treaty with your enemies. You are _coded_ to fight the DAs but all guilds are pretty free to find their own way. Which is what I like about this game.

Today I think we are are left with just a few PVP-likers, and many who dont like it. Which causes a pretty strange situation. Where PVP-likers wanna PVP and those who dont feel "bullied" by them. I dont think anyone is at fault, its just two different styles of playing clashing...

I still think the game needs conflict to be fun in the long run, but I certainly think the PVP system should be changed to make it was less punishing and more rewarding, and possibly restricted (or atleast focused) to a few areas. Then perhaps even Creed could find some fun in it.

Now for the topic,
I think knights is a very essential guild for Krynn, and for the balance of the whole game. I think it would be a very bad idea to close such a guild if that thought had crossed someone's mind. I seriously hope some type of solution to make them more active can be found instead.

[gorboth]

It is important that we stay on-topic here. Please do not derail this topic by dragging it into yet one more discussion about pvp or guild-vs-guild balance. If you do, I will delete your posts. (Creed's came dangerously close, but I left it because it had a few on-topic points.)

Good stuff so far, but most people continue to suggest solutions that require a large staff of coders or the idea that the AoP itself should run guild councils by proxy. Solutions must take into account that the wizard world is just as slim as the mortal world. We do not have a huge staff to tackle these problems. Solutions must be elegant and easy to implement unless we (as I have said) want to delay promotion for another year or two.

G.

[Draugor]

• put in NPCs as councilmembers, so people can grind up to the ranks just below council positions?
• disable the restrictions on gaining rank, if every rank has to be approved by the council?
• or can't we simply have the guilds running in their current form and have members mail the AoP when they need a promotion to reach the next rank? We're not taking about 100's of players needing this all the time, so it probably wouldn't be a huge job to do it manually, until a better solution can be made.

I like this a lot. I like what the Rangers did with the automation of the Pupil process -- but I'd like to see it taken a bit further in most guilds. Make the "lesser active" guilds free to join -- full member instantly once you pass an automated task system. Nothing is a secret in Genesis anymore and I know personally a lot of players who would play Rangers, Knights and PoT if it weren't for the Pupil/Squire/Initiate process, the lack of activity, and the awful council systems in place. Rangers need a recode badly, but the current state of the guild player-wise makes it nearly impossible to join. The Priesthood is a disaster, a shitstorm of awful. Knights are the best guild no one's playing.

The Knights fought for years to see Eagledraco removed from his position, now that he's finally been dethroned, most of the guild has gone to sleep or left because of the lack of help from "above" (or that Poet is a member.)

Priests of Takhisis...yeah...wow. How long do people have to suffer and complain to the Immortals for them to actually do something? It still boggles my mind that Diri is allowed to keep her position without any means of replacing her other than the hilariously easy to abuse 14-day login window. What a joke. Navarre's better than this and he knows it but his hands are tied by Upper Management. (As scary a thought as it is, I'd like to see Ravhin and Draugor heading up the Priesthood.)

I don't want Wizards to meddle directly in guild affairs on a daily basis, but in such extreme cases things need to be done to keep things flowing smoothly.

The dragonarmies system for promotions is awsome imo, the General, HOs or Officer can promote, or they can go to ariakas and get a promotion (need more guild xp but who gives a shait?) But HO as in council rank so to speak requires the generals vote, so people are able to get up to sup guru sword and max skills AND have a dragon so they can play around

And aye, the priesthood is a disaster... And OI! Why is it a scary thought ya bastard?

[Greneth]

Here is my issue.. some councils can be a problem sure. BUT! If you remove the application process for them and just allow people to join your going to get a bunch of people that cannot RP within their own guild. Alot of the time the application process is to learn how to act otherwise everyone would think that the PoT are just suppose to hate the knights, kill on sight while running around shouting "Paladine sucks, Hail Takhisis!"

No most you will run into will show you that they are the followers of the true god and are trying to correct Paladine's deceitful ways, showing Krynn in their time of need there is no Paladine to save them but Takhisis is still here and has not abandoned them. Alot of the times this isn't something most people already know right in the beginning, if I had a dime for everytime I've seen an applicant tell Diri they want to join because they hate the Knights I'd be rich. I fear that allowing the opening of guilds that there will be a good chance that alot of the hardcore RP within those guilds may be ruined.

So how to fix our problem.. start combining guilds and add a few tweaks.

RoI+RoN = Combine, open the pupil stage to anyone with a timer set for 6 weeks to become a full member if no one promotes you

RDA+BDA = Combine, same as above

Knights - Remove the need for a Council to allow players to join, give Full Knights the ability to take on a Squire at any time and as such the Squire is the Knights responsibility to raise properly. (This will allow people to join quicker without having to wait on councils and allow people to find a Knight and get to it)

Glads = Close them but allow the mercenaries to still use the titles as if they were a glad through the maffiliate. And for gods sake put some form of a private rack system in like the old Mercs had. People get more disappointed with the rack looters then anything.

PoT - Allow for the same system as the Knights



This should allow people to still join guilds that have started to die and yet give those people who wish to join the time to run into a few people and learn how they should be behaving.

[Wolverine]

Instead of shutting down some guilds why don't you give each puppetmaster the ability to leave and join any combat guild out there.

I believe that the playerbase of the Rangers, Knights, Calia would increase immensely.

Yeah, it might be insane for an old enemy to be apart of your guild, but for the life of Genesis and its guilds it might be necessary.

Just an idea..

I agree with alot of what Greneth came up with, when a guild lacks active council and an active council is needed for application then squire/pupil/trainee time its tough to get a playerbase.

I would become a Knight or a Ranger to keep those guilds alive with their wonderful themes fitting perfectly into the world of genesis and their domains..

[Uther]

Gorboth, or any other wizard, can you make some statistics of what guilds the active players are members of?
With active I mean logged in at least once a week doing something. Actively keeping the guild alive.

Example

BDA 4
RDA 2
Monks 3
Rangers 2
SS 0
Knights ½ and so on.

[Cherek]

Okey, I have given it some thought, and here are my three suggestions that I think should be tried before we start closing guilds.

1. Council voting/revolt system

I think all guilds to begin with should have some type of automation process. Calians for instance now seem to have a fairly working system? Why cant all guilds with council have similar? I dont know how hard it is to code but most guilds have councils and many have some type of voting system already in place?

So in a council of three basically every month a new vote is automatically started for every council member. If the council member is active and doing his/her job, he'll most likely be re-elected. If not someone else will take over. That way "loggin in and idling a few hours not to be kicked" wont work very well.

I dont know exactly how it works in knights, but surely that could work if they dont already have such a system? The key is the vote being automatic, so every council member if up for voting every third month. No exceptions. Ever.

In the evil guilds where "voting" perhaps isnt such a thematically correct thing to do I bet our wizards can come up with something creative to make something similar work there as well. Call it a "revolt" if you want that needs a number of "supporters". Basically the same thing, different name and different story.

That could help alot with some of the more inactive councils I think. If it needs alot of work and code? I dont know. Maybe its too much? Only a wizard can answer that. It does not "sound" like that much, but as Gorboth said all guilds probably have alot of different code. But if it can be done fairly easily in atleast some guilds, I think it should be done.

2. Absolute power to all council members

This one needs almost no code at all, just a different mindsent from the players in councils.

Players IN councils can help out by agreeing that all council members have complete power. Meaning they dont have to speak to the other two for everything, but they can act on their own. That will quicken up things, and if someone makes some terrible decision he or/she can always be voted out in the next voting cycle. Or before. I think this is something that we really can work on ourselves. The best examples of active guilds lately has been the DAs, basically it works great when one active player takes over as General with absolute power, and luckily, most of the time when he runs out of time and becomes inactive, he leaves the command to someone else active.

This could work in the council-based guilds too, as long as the three in the council view themselves as three equal "Generals" who can act on their own without the need to discuss everything. In some cases there might be a slight coding adjustment needed, so that instead of requiring two council members to carry out some commands, only one is needed. In theory it should be almost like just changing a number in the code? One would think anyway...

3. Give all full members of a guild power to accept and promote new members

The third suggestion has already been mentioned, but I think it would help greatly if a few more guilds could accept members on their own. A knight finding a squire and accepting him. It could work in rangers as well, or MMs, or Pots. Also give all full members who take on a squire/apprentice/etc the power to promote them all the way to full knight. If you are a full member of a guild you should know enough, and be trusted enough, to be able to do this.

Abusable? Bad for RP? I dont think so. Any full member of a guild usually does have enough sense to actually bring in people they think would fit the guild, and try to teach them the best they can. And if it does not work, the council/genereral/whatever can step in and say: "Hey, this isnt working, shape up or you will be kicked out".

So in short, give all full members of all guilds power to accept and promote new members all the way up to the maximum full member level. The council should be around to decide big global policies for the guild, interact with other guilds, and _oversee_ the members. They really dont need to meddle in each and every new member and their growth. They scan meddle when it IS NOT working and leave it to all full members to actually carry out. (including themselves of course). I think that would be a much better system than the opposite where a council of very few people has to accept and promote all new members.

It would also work very well with a possible future batch of new players as they would just have to find one member of the guild they want to join, who can help them join, and then also promote them.

It would mean even without an active council most guilds could still be playable and still be able to grow in numbers as long as they have atleast one full member.


Those are my suggestions.

[Creed]

I actually don't think its a problem for the goodie guilds with having old enemies as new members.

I believe most of us have moved past those things, since we also want our own guilds to prosper.
I think many of these difficulties lie in the old evil chars own perception of themselves.

I can see a problem with accepting a member coming directly from AA, MM, DA or such..
But if such a player want to be a knight, then use 6 months being a gladiator or mercenary, use that time to change your allegiances and who you associate with, and then you will probably have no problem, at all, in joining any of these 3 goodie guilds.

They might want the cream of the crop, as does everyone, but they're not blind to the situation of the game. Any new person in the guild, in a gift. Its that simple.
But if you were a DA yesterday, and today you ask for a squirehood.. then it might be quite difficult to take you serious..

[Kas]

We have no problems giving x-members from enemy guilds a chance to join...why have you?

Spending 6 monts(!) in an neutral guild to "prove yourself" sounds daft to me...