The fate of the Guild boards

[Huntress]

This'll be long, but if you're at all active in the Guilds or willing to be, you might want to read this in full and chime in, because this'll be a decisive thread and your opinion very much counts.

Notice how we've recently been deleting, merging and subboarding the boards that get very little activity and don't really justify their existence? Notice how we have six lovely subboards here that've been very much dead over the last months? Notice where I'm going with this?

The Guilds, in their entirery, are dead. There's activity, but it's limited to a few threads only even after it's slowly picked up after the last roleplay-monsters. And most of the activity is focused on the main Guilds board, whereas none of the subboards really warrant their existence (two or three active threads in the best cases are nowhere near enough). So it was proposed in the modly regions of this forum that all the subboards could be deleted, all the threads moved from them to the main Guilds' board, and the board itself possibly made a subboard in Splatterboard or somewhere similarly fitting, with stickied threads for the guild HQs.

Personally, I'm very much not fond of the idea (why yes, Mod Squad often looks like a battleground) because dead as the guild subboards may be, I've always seen them as facades/ad posters/clubhouses for the individual guilds, giving them that official aura and separating them visually as well as mentally. On the other hand, let's face it, the separation is what's killed them. The guilds started out on the note of secretiveness and Thou Shalt Not Cross Borders, and even after they opened up, the mentality has remained. Whereas membership has dropped a lot and some of the guilds only have a few people left in the dusty corners, with no guildly activities going on. So we're all sitting in our own corners, with no real guild-wide activities except for a select few, everyone's pretty much tired of roleplaying, and we're nearing a dead end at 200 mph.

An additional problem is, and pardon if I get harsh with this: we sorely lack initiative in these parts. We don't lack activity per se, new threads tend to get a lot of interest, but very few new threads are actually started. Granted, I know all too well that good activity ideas don't grow on trees, but we're still all creative people in this forum, ne? Three or four people can't pull the whole place, the Guilds are all about being a group effort. As it is now, nothing's really going on in the guilds besides a few dragging-on roleplays, and it's obvious that we're all dead tired of roleplaying after a year and a half of solid ongoing textwallish RPs that're always exclusive as a format because they're very hard for newcomers to get into. And all potential newcomers who show up see that there's nothing going on, so they don't join, and all the deader this becomes. And how many of the current guilds still have five active members that's required to start a guild?

Of course, making the guilds a sole subboard may easily kill even the little activity we still have left. At this rate the guilds are the territory of a few devout enthusiasts, but at least the main board is easier for potential newcomers to find. So option two would be to keep the guilds a main board, with stickied guild HQ threads, and all sorts of guild activities would then be on that same board, intermingled and open for all. It might work pretty well, but we'd lose the fancy HQ facades. At the same time, right now those facades are empty houses with covered-up furniture while we all sit in tents in the frontyard to talk to each other, so would demolishing the houses make any actual difference? And at the same time (yes, I'm very much torn on this question) having a tent with HERE BE HQ written on the side is not the same thing as having a big fancy house.

Option three would be leaving everything as it is and filling all guilds with a flurry of open-for-all activities like a big spring fair after a long slumbery winter. Which frankly sounds like a miracle at this rate, especially since it'd have to last. Like I said, it's the whole mentality of keeping away from other guilds and their business, and the subboards were originally created to keep non-guilders out (with passwords and everything) which is no longer the case. Whichever way this goes, it's pretty obvious that something needs to change.

There's probably more arguments and upsides and downsides and ideas I could point out, but it's nearly 3 a.m. and my brain's a tad fuzzy already, so now it's your turn. Opinions?

[Deleted]

*chimes in* I think the guilds still deserve a main board. There is potential, there is interest, and we've got to give it that one last hope. I also think that, while it is important to keep our guild homes (Mage Manor, Castle Kestrel, the Weewoo) they should be as open as possible. I agree with the idea of taking away the guild sub boards, though if the guilds do get very active again, the lumping of all guild threads into one board may get busy!

T_T IUNNO!

[Stal]

Considering how often guild quiet comes up, option 3 doesn't sound to me like it'd work.

I'd be all for moving deleting the subboards, combining all the threads, but also deregulating the other aspects: membership requirements to start a guild (if someone wants a Thieves or Assassin's guild, go for it), as long as the concept of guilds was maintained (a group of comrades, pseudo-RP with activity, competition, etc... like the Hogwarts Houses). With less structure and fewer barriers to entry I imagine that activity would actually increase...

My fear, and what I think tends to be happening, is people are coming in, seeing dead guilds and inactivity, and then being turned off from joining. The subboard form is no longer working, and certainly not doing anything to help (so few threads all-in-all, it's not going to make a disorganized main board... especially with guild titles edited into threads)

[Elcie]

Hm, I myself am on hiatus from my guild, partially because of being rather burned-out on it and partially because, as you say, there was nothing going on but roleplaying. If the other guilds are the same, yes, some changes are in order. I would vote to keep the main Guilds board, but delete the sub-boards for now (adding thread title headings to distinguish which thread belongs to which guild). Also, perhaps the guild members and mods could collaborate on some non-roleplaying ideas, because it IS alienating people.

The most exciting, large-scale guild activity to date has been the Guild Wars roleplays, but they're big enough and insanely active enough to scare people off... so perhaps it would be good to create a more extensive inter-guild activity? Roleplaying included, but also incorporating "forum-game" aspects that have been seen in things like Karmageddon, the scavenger hunts, etc. I'm not saying use those exact ideas, but they're merely good examples of non-RPing activities that everyone can be involved in.

Hopefully by doing those sorts of things, we can draw in more members and get the guilds active again - and once the guilds have more active members, the sub-boards could be restored.

[Cyborg]

Personally I agree with option 3, because honestly I think if we change anything to the guilds it will most likely kill the little activity we have. I know if we do change it, I would most likely not be staying in the Guilds area. This is just my opinion though.

[Stal]

I have a question for everyone that's afraid of change killing the activity... could you elaborate as to why you feel that way? i.e. Explain why you feel that just making one main guild board would suddenly change your posting habits, or why you'd stop posting, or why you think others would suddenly stop posting. To me, I don't see any theoretical connection. To be honest, I would like to be more involved with Guilds myself, but I have no desire to because their current form is too not-for-me. Too much RP, not enough other stuff, too little activity from others as a whole.

Elcie: The problem with that is it puts it all on the mods. We want actual Guild members to come up with non-RP activities. To come up with ideas that would draw people in, etc.

[Huntress]

Jun 18, 2009 19:16:26 GMT -5 Stal said:

Considering how often guild quiet comes up, option 3 doesn't sound to me like it'd work.

I'd be all for moving deleting the subboards, combining all the threads, but also deregulating the other aspects: membership requirements to start a guild (if someone wants a Thieves or Assassin's guild, go for it), as long as the concept of guilds was maintained (a group of comrades, pseudo-RP with activity, competition, etc... like the Hogwarts Houses). With less structure and fewer barriers to entry I imagine that activity would actually increase...

See, now that I have a problem with (and now I'm repeating what's been told in MS, but this was taken to the open air for that exact reason). If everyone and their cousin ran a one-man guild in their own little corner, there'd be even less overlap and contact between guilds as there is now, and most of those little guilds wouldn't last because we don't have enough membership base to last even for the existing six guilds. Whereas any given idea could easily be incorporated into any of the existing guilds (Assassin is just a western, or actually Arab term for ninja, for one), and the variety within guilds is only a good thing. As it is, there are no actual barriers (I don't even enforce the 'must not be a ninja' things for the Pirates). There just aren't any members xD Or anything for them to do, better put. The membership limitations ensure that the group of comrades aspect is there from the start.

[Stal]

Jun 18, 2009 19:38:36 GMT -5 Huntress said:

Jun 18, 2009 19:16:26 GMT -5 Stal said:

Considering how often guild quiet comes up, option 3 doesn't sound to me like it'd work.

I'd be all for moving deleting the subboards, combining all the threads, but also deregulating the other aspects: membership requirements to start a guild (if someone wants a Thieves or Assassin's guild, go for it), as long as the concept of guilds was maintained (a group of comrades, pseudo-RP with activity, competition, etc... like the Hogwarts Houses). With less structure and fewer barriers to entry I imagine that activity would actually increase...

See, now that I have a problem with (and now I'm repeating what's been told in MS, but this was taken to the open air for that exact reason). If everyone and their cousin ran a one-man guild in their own little corner, there'd be even less overlap and contact between guilds as there is now, and most of those little guilds wouldn't last because we don't have enough membership base to last even for the existing six guilds. Whereas any given idea could easily be incorporated into any of the existing guilds (Assassin is just a western, or actually Arab term for ninja, for one), and the variety within guilds is only a good thing. As it is, there are no actual barriers (I don't even enforce the 'must not be a ninja' things for the Pirates). There just aren't any members xD Or anything for them to do, better put. The membership limitations ensure that the group of comrades aspect is there from the start.

But I don't see where you're coming from saying "With more guilds, there'd be less inter-guild activity!" That statement just doesn't make any sense to me! XD

Take Thieves. I'd [re]join Ninjas, I'd join Thieves. I wouldn't join Pirates. And I'd interact with the existing guilds because there'd be nothing for me to do otherwise. There's still barriers of "need five people or no >| " and yeah. I don't think trying to force somebody's idea into what already exists really works for everyone... not everyone operates that way. Assassin may still only be a western-form of ninja, but as a Ninja guild, you can't get away from that NINJA aspect. It's omnipresent and part of the atmosphere of the guild...

[Huntress]

Jun 18, 2009 19:33:29 GMT -5 Stal said:

To be honest, I would like to be more involved with Guilds myself, but I have no desire to because their current form is too not-for-me. Too much RP, not enough other stuff, too little activity from others as a whole.

Elcie: The problem with that is it puts it all on the mods. We want actual Guild members to come up with non-RP activities. To come up with ideas that would draw people in, etc.

...

*throws hands up*

That's what I've been saying! e__e It's all RP, but nobody's been coming up with anything else either. And everyone's waiting for someone else to come up with something other than RPs. I came up with the Pirate Puzzle a year or two back, and revived the RCP, and Rider created the Ask a Pirate Pet, and I have this karma-based tournament idea... it's all stuck behind ideas. Couldn't you just join a given guild and post 'o hai guys, I has this nice activity, here's the rules, go crazy'? It's easy to say that RPs are exclusive, but it's not easy to come up with an all-encompassing idea that'd be easy to get into and for everyone to join. There is no form other than what we give it, but there seems to be a significant lack of givers at this point. And so the guilds die, because any and all new threads hang off a few people who come up with them, and said few people aren't bottomless idea pits.

Jun 18, 2009 19:43:31 GMT -5 Stal said:

Take Thieves. I'd [re]join Ninjas, I'd join Thieves. I wouldn't join Pirates. And I'd interact with the existing guilds because there'd be nothing for me to do otherwise. There's still barriers of "need five people or no >| " and yeah. I don't think trying to force somebody's idea into what already exists really works for everyone... not everyone operates that way. Assassin may still only be a western-form of ninja, but as a Ninja guild, you can't get away from that NINJA aspect. It's omnipresent and part of the atmosphere of the guild...

Then join Mercenaries x3 You could be a thief and earn money on the side. Heck, the Mercs don't even earn money on the side, their guild is a kind of trivia place for random missions, as much as I've kept up with them *used to be the Merc mod* The current guilds are only there for the background setting and general aura, but it doesn't influence what your character can be like. The pirates haven't been doing any looting and yohohoing for two years now, the only underlying narrative we have is the sea- wait, we don't even have that, the last RP took place on the moon.

[Rider]

[glow=red,2,300]Oh God, the textwall argument got taken to the public.

No one's allowed to make any posts longer than my arm, comprende?

Personally, I think making the Guilds a sub-board of Roleplay would turn them into exclusively roleplays... and making them a sub of Splatterboard would essentially make them clubs.

As for the "anyone can make a guild" thing, well, as it is, the guilds have a fair amount of overlap. (By "fair amount" I mean "bloody mercs." They're like if you took a pirate and a ninja and a lot of gold and threw them in a blender). A little more inter-guild competition could prove interesting. The guilds that no one's really interested in would get picked off by natural selection and the ones that people really are interested in would gain a following. The ones who manage to keep that following for an extended period of time are the strongest guilds.

In the end, I predict we'd have even less than our six major powers competing. I mean, people are gonna stand up and pay attention to a guild that has earned its place instead of guilds like the ninja, who are mostly inactive but have a long history, so we keep them around. [/glow]

[Stal]

RIDER YOU SPOKE LIKE AN ECONOMIST! <3 I was getting ready to make that argument and you did it for me. I'msoproudofyou. :')

[Rider]

Jun 18, 2009 19:57:02 GMT -5 Stal said:

RIDER YOU SPOKE LIKE AN ECONOMIST! <3 I was getting ready to make that argument and you did it for me. I'msoproudofyou. :')

[glow=red,2,300]... I take back my argument. Someone gag me until I stop sounding like Stal. XP ... On second thought, just kunai me now. [/glow]

[Cyborg]

Stal if there's the more little guilds, said Guilds would die a lot quicker. With less members, there would be less activity. I personally wouldn't post for this reason and others. I like the way the Guilds board is right now, the only problem is we're running a little dry in the fresh idea well.

[Shadaras]

Grah. Was going to avoid posting here, but...

I can see benefits to each of these ideas, and quite honestly, I think that the best idea overall is to have all the guilds in one space. We need cross-fertalization, a community that isn't either the NTWF as a whole or just the guild one is in. Having all the guilds in one board will have the greatest chance of accomplishing that. If that were the case, and each guild had only the number of threads necessary (which is probably two or three. xD ..a roleplay thread, a not-roleplay thread, and maybe a random resource thread. Assuming roleplays start, anyway.), then I know that I would be more likely to look at what other guilds were doing and see if I could find a way for that to work with my guild, or get inspired to create an activity for my guildmates.

If we continue down the path we're currently on, we will stagnate. It's obvious from the past that, ever since the Guild Wars idea took off, most of the roleplaying energy the guilders have has been directed towards it. I'm not saying that's a bad thing, since the GW roleplays were epic. But for each guild, and the guilds as a whole, it means we have a season or two of crazy activity followed by nothing at all. Yes, I know that some of this will change depending on where people are in school and vacation and the like, but it's been a long while since GWII ended, and the only roleplay that's really gone anywhere is the Pirates/Fleet roleplay. A cross-guild roleplay.

That simply furthers the idea that having multiple guilds involved in a given project helps it along. It means that no one guild can just die; they have an obligation to the other guild(s) to stay alive and continue the project, whether it be a roleplay or something like Fraze's Guild Shop Wars.

I don't really have an opinion on the whole thing about dropping the restrictions to create a guild thing, though. Mostly 'cause I wouldn't join any.

Um. I think that's it. For now, at least.

[Stal]

Jun 18, 2009 20:52:38 GMT -5 Cyborg said:

Stal if there's the more little guilds, said Guilds would die a lot quicker. With less members, there would be less activity. I personally wouldn't post for this reason and others. I like the way the Guilds board is right now, the only problem is we're running a little dry in the fresh idea well.

Again, why do you think so?

You guys are approaching it from the idea that there's a set amount of attention, or a set number of people. And from that point-of-view, yes, taking a fixed number of people and dividing them up into smaller guilds would be a death.

But you DON'T have a fixed number of people. In fact, there's quite a bit of room for growth. The current numbers wouldn't be divided up into small guilds... it'd open the door for people who have previously not wanted to get involved. It doesn't change the demand, it doesn't dwindle the current guild numbers. It opens the doors for newcomers. And if you can honestly say why that's a bad thing... well... *shrug*

Then as well, as I see it, if we insist on approving guilds, and insist on membership requirements, then we now need to get rid of Ninjas, Mages, and Mercs. They don't meet the requirements we're currently making for people.

Barriers to entry (i.e. the starting of guilds people want) will only hurt things. Harm and restrict the supply and interest. Opening it up won't change the current guilds one lick... it'd just let other people start their own. And what does that have to do with you? You're in your guilds and working with their activities. Would these new guilds somehow prevent you from being able to do that? Or would you refuse to associate with them? What is it?