Community building vs "Uberguilds"

[Sleeky]

Sorry this and the next post can be deleted. Something when wrong on my end here.


Please ignore. Apologies.

[Sleeky]

Excellent replys gang. It's good to see well thought out and mature responses.

It seems to be the generally accepted view that it is up to the Guild itself how it wants to be represented to the rest of the server. Clatu writes above that it's up to the guild leadership to be selective in what members to include.

I can agree with this. But also feel that would be the responsibility of the guild membership itself to behave accordingly.

I've been in Guilds before that had sent blind invites to everyone on the server it could. This practice managed to get the numbers needed to do some of the game events needing large numbers of people. Yet because of the indiscriminate inviting the general behavior of the Guild, both inside and outside the Guild, took a nosedive. So it came to a point that if your toon belonged to that Guild, your name was dirt. And to honest because of the behavior of the guild members I found out about later I couldn't blame the general server population in thinking this.

It was true. We could field enough people to to the high-end content. Our continual practicing with each other in PvP gave us and edge. We were very disciplined on TS (I mean VERY disciplined. In PvP or big PvE encounters the leader barked an order and you jumped. The only time anyone else would speak would be to relay crucial information.). We were it. We were the Guild that did the server firsts. It was a point of pride for us.

However because of our size we had almost inadvertently insulated ourselves from the rest of the server. There was no need to send out a general LFG message. All you had to do was send out a LFG type message on the Guild channel and you were in a group. Because we only hung around with our own, we started to be seen as arrogant. That we felt the rest of the server was not worth our time.

I came to this realization when I wondered over to the official forum. Now you would expect to see the occasional smack-talk post about your guild, but nothing outright hateful. Just something in good fun. However when I found the copious amounts of threads going on about the actions of the guild membership (and the Leader in particular) I was surprised. And being the loyal member I was it angered me. So I would start to defend the guild. I would point out the positive things about it. Always helping out a guildie...never needing a LFG. Sharing of items and currency without ever looking for something in return. All the things you would want out of a Guild. Still it didn't matter. It was all about perception. Inadvertently or not we had put forth the image that we were an arrogant lot who could give a rats ass about anyone else. If you weren't part of the guild, you weren't worth the time.

I slowly came to ask myself "What was the point in collecting all these trophies (first to kill X boss, first to get Y item, etc...When you would announce it on the forums and find not to be congratulated for it, but be hated for it. Of what value is that particular trophy if it suddenly becomes worthless because you are the one who got it?

Because of this experience with that guild that I've come to the conclusion that while you can certainly take pride in your accomplishments in these MMO's, it's dangerous to let that success go to your head. It's easy enough to do (and I suspect even more so in the "dark and brutal" game that Funcom is planing.)

*Reads above* Yep.... Blithering on again. :P Ok I'll stop now and ask if anyone else has had a similar experience?

[Rohanna]

Well that was a long read... geesh but very interesting to say the least.
In my experiences Game dynamics can change what an uber guild was, is or is going to be.

My definition of an uber guild: any grp of people who can reach the most and hardest content within a game.

Back in the beggining days of EQ2 the uber guilds would not take any non guildies into grps or raids, thought they were better than everyone else and for the most part got a bad reputation for being that way. However in the past 4 months there was a great shift in the uber guild attitudes. Hrmmm maybe it was that server merge.... instead of having only the same 4 guilds competing for First in this and that, they had 8. Not too mention EQ2 was cycling players left and right.

So what they did was open their doors for non guildies to tag along on the high end raids and hosted Epic Events for the server communities.... This would have been unheard of before the merger. It was no secret that these uber guilds were losing thier top and key players to other uber guilds because of the availability of them. So that caused a chain effect of dropping their guard a bit and loosening their rules for their members (for fear they would lose more players). They all compromised what they were because they had to.

But I wont forget how some of those uber guilds treated me along the way either... how do they expect me to take their invite inquiry seriously after always being treated like I was'nt good enough...now that they needed me it's ok? NOT!!!

So in my mind Uber DOES NOT=Good guild. There is one uber guild that always grped outside of members, always allowed outsiders to tag along if they had the space and they never compromised their vision as a guild. Hats off to those folks... because it was the individuals in that guild that made it that way. So defining whats good vs. uber is really dependant on the indiviuals in a guild for me.

It's sometimes hard not to put a stereotype on a guild that has wronged you as a player... and to this all I can say is be yourself and represent yourself and your guild well. If each person does their part and makes the community better, it makes the game better and thus the guilds. It can be done alone or in group form to act to make a better community.... and good communities help make a great game experience.

I know that LOS will be Both good and Uber... this is one of the best communities for an MMO I have ever had the pleasure of experiencing and it will only get better after launch. Besides have ya ever seen such a collective of us Nerds all together talking so passionately about a game 6 months out? LOL I love it here. We rock!

[Avari]

I have never been in an uber guild and I have always favored the feel good guild, so I might have a prejudiced opinion.

I don't like the uber guild because they unbalance the play for everyone outside the uber guild. It is like Darwinian natural selection. A server is a collection of players of varying talent. The talent segregates into...mmm...gene pools. In the server the not so good players get completely left out (out competed) and their interest dies. The uber guilds feed like crazy on the game content and belch their triumphs around the server. Do they leave a scrap for the rest of us? Never (Uber guilds never invite non guildies to the big events). What about the middle sized/middle skilled guilds (the majority by the way)? They can play the game well enough but maybe are a bit more causual about the game. The uber guilds rape them for all their up and coming players. Leaving them in perpetual mediocricy. My WoW guild would bring players to 60 to see them all apply to the elite guilds.

I guess what i'm trying to say is that to me uber equates to elitist. LoC definately has the skill to be an Uber guild, howerver from what I have seen, the ideals of equality, fair play, and just have fun attitude prevail here. If we ever get elitist I'll rouse Torr and ya'all will be sorry.

[Rohanna]

Not all uber guilds are like that.... it takes a fine balancing act to make sure uber guilds dont become elitist... Most of them just start out that way. I think TB has his vision for this guild and he has never lead me to belive that we will have the standard "Elitist attitude" that so many of the Uber guilds have.
It's also important to know what to say, how to say it and who to say it to when aquiring the "goods" or defeating an enemy. Elitist should learn to talk amongst themselves in that manner and the people with thin skin about it should learn not to "feed" into them with responses in OOC or shout. As humble as TB is I doubt he'll stand for much of any Elitist flaunting.

I myself am in between, I walk the line more as an informative rather than an elitist. Since most of my loot is given away to those that need, I dont shy away from linking stuff in GU seeing if someone wants to purchase it or just outrightly wants it. But I know alot of people who can't stand that either, they view it as showing off. So to each his own in that respect.

[rocqua]

Originally Posted by Rohanna

Not all uber guilds are like that.... it takes a fine balancing act to make sure uber guilds dont become elitist... Most of them just start out that way. I think TB has his vision for this guild and he has never lead me to belive that we will have the standard "Elitist attitude" that so many of the Uber guilds have.
It's also important to know what to say, how to say it and who to say it to when aquiring the "goods" or defeating an enemy. Elitist should learn to talk amongst themselves in that manner and the people with thin skin about it should learn not to "feed" into them with responses in OOC or shout. As humble as TB is I doubt he'll stand for much of any Elitist flaunting.

I myself am in between, I walk the line more as an informative rather than an elitist. Since most of my loot is given away to those that need, I dont shy away from linking stuff in GU seeing if someone wants to purchase it or just outrightly wants it. But I know alot of people who can't stand that either, they view it as showing off. So to each his own in that respect.

well i am sure that LoS is not planning on becoming an eltist guild i know this because of ninjakitten insulting our guild

[Lunch]

An uber guild is one that screens its members diligently. Only accepts those already geared up with the best they can aquire solo. Guilds of high caliber need folks that are dedicated to the game and will put time and resources to better the guild and those in the guild they play with. Teamwork is a necessity. They are for the most part elitest and want to stay that way. Strict rules of conduct that are enforced. They have a requirement to attend functions scheduled and will boot folks for excessive lack of participation. These guild will seem snobbish and you will never see them actively recruiting. They will accept applicants for review based off of word of mouth from its members and normally takes one of its members to vouch for an applicant. I've seen guilds boot a member and the person that vouched for him when they do stupid stuff to give the guild a bad name.