Creating a guild

[Tiberius Fireskull]

Looking to start a guild? Try here. I will be creating a walk through on the best way to create a guild. If your starting a guild, and need a little help, try reading this guide.

PLEASE NOTE: These are more opinionated than actual fact, so some of you may disagree with my opinions. If you have comments, please comment below and I will consider changing my guide.

Onward!

The Guild's Birth

The very beginning of your guild. This is one of the most delicate parts of the process, as it can determine what will happen to your guild in the future. First, lets start with a name. All guilds have names, obviously. Now, when you are picking your name, don't rush. Think about it for a while if needed. The name of your guild is the first impression someone has on it, so make sure it is something that will make someone go "Hey! This guild has a pretty cool name, they must be a good guild." Obviously, the quality of a guild is not based on its name, but it can give people a good first impression. So, make sure the name is a good one. Also, you may want to be of a descent level. If you are too low of a level, nobody will really want to listen to you and join. Its quite sad, but thats unfortunately the way most people think. So you should probably want to be at least a level 30 before you start one.

Now, before you actually create the physical guild, make sure of this. DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT, start your guild alone. If you start a guild with just one or two people, it will be extremely difficult to make it grow quickly in the future. It can be done starting solo, but it is a lot of extra work for you. The best thing to do, is to start a guild with a group of loyal friends. These people will be the start of your guild, your first officers, and perhaps some of them will later become Co-Guildmasters. Starting with a group helps keep you with a small group of loyal members that can help you lead your guild, recruit, keep order, and more.

In my opinion at least, it is best to wait for your name to get approved before you begin to go recruiting members. People are more encouraged to join if they see a name instead of Pirate Guild ######. If you want to do a bit on a small scale, then thats fine, but it will probably be easier once you have a guild name.

Also, when you first create the guild, you probably shouldn't worry too much about rules. You may want to have a few basic ones, but don't have many in depth rules. During the Guild Birth period (as I will call this phase) you really just want to worry about keeping your guild alive and together. When you feel ready, add in some more in depth rules.

Promotions. Everyone does this differently. When you are in the very beginning of your guild, you really shouldn't be too strict with promotions. For this time, the biggest problem to face is keeping members in your guild. Now, this doesn't mean you should be on Abassa saying "Everyone is an officer!". In the beginning, you should make people veterans not really based on responsibility, etc, but based on how long they have been in the guild. If they have been in for a few days, or even a few hours if you want, then make them veterans. However, you should still be careful about officers. Even though they can only remove 5 members per day, in the beginning phase of your guild, that is a lot. Make people work towards it, this will make them want to stay active in the guild. However again, don't be too strict in the beginning of the guild. Again, its up to you when to stop doing this, but I would probably start getting a bit stricter on promotions somewhere around 30-50 members.

Follow these steps when you are first making your guild, and it should start out quite well. Again, this is my opinion, and if you have differing thoughts, please comment.

I will be adding more to this guide as time goes on.

[Ofury/ Tom]

Just an Addition -

I would not make EVERYONE an officer as some guilds do granted everyone is equal. Having members WORK towards officer is something to get them to WANT to be active. I have been told by many of my now officers that making it down the officers path makes being an officer even more rewarding.

Other than that Awesome Guide Davy!

[swordshot]

Yes, Davy, its amazing! Just do what Tom said because in my opinion to.

[swordshot]

I hate to double post but, also i think you should add a good idea is too start a guild when they are around lvl 25-28 because if you are lower, no one will listen to you and not join.

[Tiberius Fireskull]

Just changed it, is that what you meant Tom?

[swordshot]

Davy, thats good now. I think a veteran is a good promo, everyone that is a veteran cant crash guild but the can add. But not EVERYONE, i think they have to work for it. But your VERY close!

[Captain Sharktooth]

Great job Davy

[Davy_Mcwrecker]

hm hm HM hm- REGULAR SHOW

yes i agree but i starts guilds when im a lvl 1 Hoping to cathc someones eye lol

[Tiberius Fireskull]

The Early Stages

These stages are very critical to the guild's future. Some guilds will die at this stage, but don't let that scare you! The ones that die are the ones that have Guildmasters that give up. Mates, these are some of the most stressful times for your guild, so be prepared for a bit of stress.

For those of you that need to think of every step as one chunk, with a set beginning and end, I'll give this stage one. This stage begins once you have a set group of loyal members that will likely stay for a very long time, if not forever. This is about when the guild has become stable, and we have people coming into it at a constant rate. Again, this may not exactly fit what your guild has gone through, but I am just placing it into set steps for those that need it.

During these stages, you must be ready for your guild to occasionally be quiet at times. Sometimes, you may be the only person online, or with just one or two others. This is just the way it will likely be for this stage, for most guilds. Again, some guilds will be different. During these early stages, EVERY MEMBER COUNTS. If a guild with 400 people loses a member, eh, big deal. But if your guild of 20 loses one, it hurts a lot more for most people. You have to be emotionally prepared for some of this. This stage is quite stressful for some people. It was for me, and I'm assuming it was for most others.

Every person I recruit leaves my guild! What do I do? First of all, I warned ye :P. However, there are ways to stop this. First of all, avoid Abassa for recruiting. Most of the time, people on Abassa will be guild hoppers. Also, many times if someone leaves their guild for yours just because you have a thought bubble above your head, these people will not stay. As soon as they see another person with a thought bubble above their head, BOOM there out. Something I noticed also. If you guild high level players, they will either be loyal members, or guild hoppers... at least for me. Now, when I go after people that are lower levels, that have not been in a guild before, those people stay. I guilded a girl at level 5, and she is currently level 32, still in my guild.

Also, you want to make sure that you do fun things with your guild. It is early in the stages, so planned events may not work as of yet. Instead, spend time with them. Go raiding Tormenta or plundering ships. Make the bond of friendship build between you all. If these people feel close to you and the guild, they will stay, and further grow the group of loyal members.

Also, people like social guilds. If your guild is still in the early stages, it may not be very social. Instead, make sure that when there ARE people online, that they are really friendly, kind, helpful, and want to spend time with people. This will get people to stay in the guild. Getting people to stay in your guild during this time period is very difficult.

Now, once you have a descent amount of members in your guild, you should make sure that people have to work hard for promotions. Maaaybe early on you can still make veteran rank easy, as this will help make it so people can bring in members to your guild, but with officer, make them work hard. Don't make it so they have had to have been in the guild for a year or something, or you won't have any officers for a while. Make them really work for it. This will also give them something to strive for in the guild. You can still be fairly easy, but no more free promotions.

Rules. Now that you are getting a stable supply of members, its time to whip out some real rules. Its up to you which rules to make, but I will offer some suggestions.

- Respect. Duh, no need to go into that. Make sure that everyone respects everyone.

- Ask before teleporting to guildmates. This makes it so that you don't have people teleporting to others randomly and bugging them.

- Don't steal people's kills. This prevents "rep stealing".

- Be helpful. Self explanatory.

- Ask for permission before taking the wheel of a ship that is not yours. It is the Captain's ship, so you have to respect the fact that they have the right to the wheel.

There are more, but that is just some suggestions of ones you may want to add.

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Ok mates, there is the next part of my guide. Chances are I will add one or two more entries before it is complete. Please post comments!

[Jack Shipsteel]

Another helpful rule is a sort of "Help" word that can immediately bring people to you. This rule should be used when your Knocked out, and need a revive. Even if nobody gets there in time, you can teleport back to them and immediately return to your former position.

Some words can be SOS, REVIVE, or something as silly as PEACHES.

However, make sure to add another rule saying you can't say this during an invasion because, honestly, we know your in trouble during an invasion.

[Tiberius Fireskull]

Aye, Jack is right. I won't add those in though, because I was only listing a few that could be good starters. Although that is a good suggestion.

[SEAKING23]

My guild has worked well with everyone being an officer. this has helped make our guild grow. mainly because we have a lot of good people in our guild, and good people tend to guild good people, so why should they not be an officer? I'm co gm, but with the fact that everyone is an officer you might ask, "why does it matter of the gm says your co gm??" well, everyone in our guild respects the co gm and third gm. we have a huge guild, and whats better than a huge, friendly guild? in my opinion, a huge friendly guild would beat a friendly low level guild any day. that's my two cents.

[Slouyx]

Originally Posted by SEAKING23

My guild has worked well with everyone being an officer. this has helped make our guild grow. mainly because we have a lot of good people in our guild, and good people tend to guild good people, so why should they not be an officer? I'm co gm, but with the fact that everyone is an officer you might ask, "why does it matter of the gm says your co gm??" well, everyone in our guild respects the co gm and third gm. we have a huge guild, and whats better than a huge, friendly guild? in my opinion, a huge friendly guild would beat a friendly low level guild any day. that's my two cents.

I can see you like being in a guild with many people. But why would a "huge, friendly" guild beat a "low level friendly guild?" Err. Maybe you didn't mean it the way it seemed. I know occasionally having low levels in a guild can cause many inactives, but when did levels prove anything? They most definitely have never proved loyalty or character. Having a "huge, friendly guild" with everyone being an officer isn't an automatic win-win. Personally, in a guild, I like working to become an officer, not join and become an officer straight away. And the other downside; any officer could invite anyone. This, no matter how it is now, will slowly if not quickly turn into a huge problem. There's almost no organization, and most people in the guild won't have knowledge of each other.

That's a problem with huge, extremely active guilds; there is very few members actually bonding with others. To me, a guild slowly built, a huge, family guild, beats a huge guild with no-organization or guild-bonding anyday. (Not saying your guild is that. I'm saying that is what most guilds that have that kind of system are.)

[Captain Jason]

Good tips, I'll try them out some time.

[SEAKING23]

well, didn't want to be mean or anything, its just if you have a huge high level guild, you will get lots more help then a low level guild.