Re: Guild Entry and Roleplaying

[Postmaster]

Originally posted by Madmartigan

Hello all,

I believe this thread is digressing from its original path, even though the
other paths also bear talking about.

The original post was about inactivity of the guildmembers who sit in various
positions of approving new members into their guilds and possible solutions to
this.

From this I notice two additional paths, one has to do with the fact that
certain guilds deny a lot of members due to various reasons (roleplay being
one). This is something that is either good or bad, and is discussed in between
the third path, which has to do with roleplaying in general and abilities
within guilds compared to other guilds.

Concerning the first point, people have stated pro's and con's for how to
handle this. Gorboth have also asked guildleaders to present their suggestions.
Does this mean that the discussion is over and a possible solution is in the
workings?

The second path has to do with the fact that certain guilds might limit entry
despite having active members in their guilds (I have been away for some time
but I hear Morgul Mages pop up often enough). Is this a bad thing? Someone
mentioned the Rangers a while back, I was active when they started enforcing
those kinds of rules (maybe not the current but defenitly more effort then
simply walking up an joining) and it was pretty ugly, however the amount of
active players still made it worthwhile to join.
The need for these rules was brought by the war in Middle Earth between the
Mages/Army and the Rangers and the amount of spies (i.e. seconds) that
infiltrated the guild. This was equally ugly and pretty sad. So the guild
suffered(?) for it and from my understanding still does since there are
extremely few active Rangers about that can approve applicants.
The Morgul Mages have always been restrictive about their members and might
have been spared the brunt of this but I believe even they had their share of
spies and information that filtered to the other side.

For many guilds this might still work, active members screen players and decide
that no, they are not the right stuff for their guild, which they have spent
years honing into being what it is. I think this is not wrong, it also
encourages people to make an additional effort to roleplay, which in fact is
not very hard to do, you just have to stay in character more then not.

Other guilds where the number of members that are active are too low have to
change their rules or they will not get any new members. Again, the Rangers and
also the Dragon Order have been mentioned by people I've met.

The third path which feels like that is something more of a "they have it why
can't I" attitude. Certain wizards have put in a lot of effort to create a
guild that resembles either something out of some literary work (Middle Earth,
Krynn) while others have made up their own (Ansalon) and their guilds are well
thought out, and with well thought out abilities.
If an abilitiy is waaay to powerful, it will get modified. But in general they
get what they pay for (higher tax), and what has been motivated by the history
of the guild. Certain guilds have had to fill in both their occupational and
layman guilds to provide the "full" experience but they still pay (tax) for it.

Other guilds have a less rich environment but that doesn't mean they lose out
on anything. The Gladiators get one skill, axe. They get their attack ability
and berserk. That's it. But it is enough. I have played a Gladiator and I
enjoyed it immensly.

Right now, the Madmartigan character is a Mercenary. Also "less" rich according
to many but I don't mind, nor do I see anything negative with it. I get to
choose from a few weapon skills and I get my special attack and the parry
ability. Perfect. I also roleplay, so my choice of guild has nothing to do with
any other thing that might go on around me, and my character. I also believe I
have a deep and rich history for my character which is also often brought up
when I meet people.

But why is this wrong? I was around when the discussion was there to get a
chest that saves items for the Gladiators. I believe the wizard responsible
said something like if we want to pay 3-5% extra in tax then fine, we can have
it. Many voted no to this and it wasn't implemented. Again (at least
hopefully), the guilds that get these benefits pay for it.
Gladiators have a very low tax (or had at least). It was very nice. Anything
more would have been less nice and the members at the time also felt like that.
It was simply decided that people had to make the effort to save the chest
items themselves. Which again worked when there were more active players
around.

In the years that I have been gone a few new guilds have popped up, some of
them magically inclined. I have no idea what they do or how they work. But in
general, a guild is seldom released if it is too powerful. And if it is, then
it can always be changed when people give enough input back to the wizards.

I still fail to see why we should be envious of the guilds where both wizard
and hopefully members put in a lot of effort and pay more tax then other
guilds, get more benefits.

Madmartigan's player