Ok, guys.
First I want to thank you all for sharing your opinions and going deep on this topic. I’ve learned a lot just by reading these few posts.
Second I want to make clear why I stated I felt the game encourages people to stay in one guild:
I felt this because rep transform into relevant currency (Influence). This means having someone rep has a concrete, cold numeric value for guilds, and so guilds would naturally compete for that. 100% rep requirement is a logical result of this system.
Now I see there are also other aspects behind rep: advertising, ease to make activities on the fly, control the space available in the guild, number of faces on chat, etc. I can understand much better now why our guild leader consider this so important, and that is not only about influence.
Sadly, understanding it doesn’t make the system any better, because there is a huge inconsistency in its core.
The system reward guilds for having people to passively rep, allow guilds to arbitrarilly put 100% rep rules, and allow people to have multiple guilds. Problems are inevitable. One of these 3 should go.
I know the 100% rule “is up to each guild to decide”, but I see it like commercial monopoly: law watch over and discourages it, because it is nocive for the economy. If Anet were to actively combat the practice I probably would support them.
Other possibility is to completely remove the option of multiple guilds. This would be difficult because the extremely diverse playstyles the game offers. I think no guild can offer all of them, even a really big and organized one.
The last option is to stop rewarding currency for passive representation. This, I think, is the best option, because then guilds would try to get players to actually DO specific, concrete and time-limited things, instead of trying to rule over the whole time the players are connected.
Third I must mention the 100% rep is problematic not only for players, but for guilds too:
There are a lot of people that doesn’t understand what rep is. Agreeing to a 100% rep rule doesn’t make sure people actually observe it, less when they don’t know what they are doing. While I choose to investigate thoroughly before making any choice, most players I know would simply break the rule whenever they want and eat the warnings later. This means the leaders have to be constantly confronting people.
Also there is the recruiting issue: of the last 5 guys that ask me to enter the guild, only one choose to stay. The other 4 don’t like the 100& rep rule, so they left asap. While it could be true that the ones who left were “not fit” for the guild, I think the guy that stayed do so only because he doesn’t really care about rules. So which is worst?
What Im trying to say is rules too strict tend to not be respected, and that is worse in the end.
Personally, I feel my problem is bigger. I was almost prepared to judge my guild leaders as the baddies on the movie and left for good, but now I see their standing (if “monopolizing”) is totally legit.
My ideal solution was to convince the leaders to soften the rule to a 90% rep, but they stayed square in their “rules don’t change” policy (Wich they have the right to do).
So, for now, I will wait. if the incoming changes make the currency less associated with dumb time and more with specific activities, maybe they relax the rule. If they don’t, I think I will have to say goodbye.
Thank you again for your opinions, and please, keep the words rolling.
Changes are coming with HoT. For example, one of the big problems with multiple guilds is having to choose which guild to participate in guild chat with. You’ll be able soon to make a tab to chat with all your guilds at once.
The removal of influence is probably due to the way that influence forces people to insist on 100% representation, but that said, my guild has well over 800,000 influence and half our people aren’t repping at any time. We’ve never been a 100% rep guild.
800,000 influence with everything unlocked forever. As long as you have a core of a hundred people playing, it doesn’t matter if a hundred people don’t.
You might ask, well aren’t the 100 people carrying the other 100. Not really. It’s like saying 15% of the people carry the forum, and so no one else should read it. That’s how all things work in life.
If you have a successful business. it’s likely a handful of people making it successful. Some see the guild as an end to itself, but I see the guild as a service to others.
Here’s the guild., I’m offering a service. A place to meet with friends (mumble and guild chat), a place to get your guild commendations, a place to get some buffs, but in our case, a place to hang out with like minded people, often while doing your own thing. It’s a service we offer, that a very very small percentage of the guild makes possible.
This week, on social night, we did jumping puzzles, for people who don’t enjoy them. We had mesmers everywhere. People who hate jumping finally got some of those achievements.
The amount of people involved in making that happen was half a dozen, and one person led it. Last week we did the diving goggles run. The week before we did the diving goggles in Not So Secret, because it’s a pain to do alone. And the week before that we did living story achievements. The same half a dozen people ran events for those who don’t run events.
We didn’t require anyone to rep to get that stuff. We don’t care if someone shows up for guild missions and never reps again.
But the real value of my guild isn’t that someone got an achievement or a diving goggle. The real value of the guild is getting to know these specific guildies. The banter and camraderie. The personal touch.
Yes there are well over 200 people in my guild (usually around 230). Yes 100 people log in each and every week.
But there are under 30 core members, who keep it going for everyone else.
And we have plenty of influence to keep it going, even on days when only a handful of people are repping and everyone is working on their personal guild banks, or helping others work on theirs.
Do I care if there are 6 people repping. Not really. Because the core people find their way into mumble.
