So you've figured out exactly what you're aiming for in a Guild, now lets look at some of the finer details. No I'm not talking about the name, really as long as it's not offensive the name is fairly irrelevant, i'm talking about Structure.
First off you're going to want to outline some Rules.
Simple guidelines your guildies can follow to keep a harmonious playing environment, and to be perfectly honest it's better to have a rule for everything you can think of and not just believe "oh i'm sure people will just 'blah blah' without me telling them", seriously it's better to have it in writing than not.
Simple guidelines your guildies can follow to keep a harmonious playing environment, and to be perfectly honest it's better to have a rule for everything you can think of and not just believe "oh i'm sure people will just 'blah blah' without me telling them", seriously it's better to have it in writing than not.
Simple rules the like of "No Spamming in Guild chat", "No selling items out of the Guild Bank on the Auction House", "No buying gold from Gold Sellers", "No Trade Trawling" and "Don't be offensive to other Guild Members" are all good rules to keep things in guild running smoothly.
More specific rules appropriate to the type of Guild you decided to start are also necessary, i.e. if you are making a PvP Guild you make want to have a rule stating that members must be a part of Guild Based Arena teams before they can make teams with non members. If you have formed a Raiding Guild you may want to have rules referring to PuGing or Loot Distribution (well get back to Loot in Raiding Guilds at a later date).
But with Rules comes the possible Need to enforce them. While you can do this alone, as I said in Part 1, having some Officers can make all of this much easier to enforce. As for actual penalties for breaching the rules, I'll leave that up to you. I myself have only ever had a couple of situations occur where an immediate Guild Kick was the only way to resolve the issue, most problems can be resolved through open dialog with the parties involved. If that fails you can introduce steps such as Rank Demotion or Event Exclusion. Just remember that we are all here to have fun and while rules are rules, being too heavy handed can have adverse consequences.
So moving right a long, Ranks.
Ranks are a fairly important part of Guild Structure. Ranks are used to define a members position in the Guild, Social Members, Raiding Members, Officers, etc. Each of these ranks can have different Guild Rights, Bank Access, and Rules attached to it.
Having a Rank setup for New and Probation members can be a useful tool, I personally use the First rank as such, all new members go straight into it. The rank has no Bank access, and breaching any of the guild rules or not performing well in raids can get you immediately removed from the guild while in that rank. While this can have the effect of people being on their 'Best Behaviour' while on Probation, generally I haven't found this to be the case.
Ranks are a fairly important part of Guild Structure. Ranks are used to define a members position in the Guild, Social Members, Raiding Members, Officers, etc. Each of these ranks can have different Guild Rights, Bank Access, and Rules attached to it.
Having a Rank setup for New and Probation members can be a useful tool, I personally use the First rank as such, all new members go straight into it. The rank has no Bank access, and breaching any of the guild rules or not performing well in raids can get you immediately removed from the guild while in that rank. While this can have the effect of people being on their 'Best Behaviour' while on Probation, generally I haven't found this to be the case.
Probably something I should have covered first off, but really when you are making are making a guild for the first time this will come with experience is Officer Rolls.
I've said previously how having Officers can make your job as Guild Master easier and more enjoyable, this is done by having specific guild members in charge of certain aspects of your guild. A simple example of this is having a Bank Officer. A Bank Officer can be used to keep the Guild Bank tidy and divide Wealth, Items, and Trade Materials between guild members.
Generally the bigger the guild, the bigger need for Officers. In Raiding (more so 25man than 10man) and Hardcore PvP Guilds you may want to have Class Officers. These are people who know specific classes and roles 'to a tee' and as such are in charge of making sure every member of that Class/Spec are getting the most out of their characters.
In short Officers are a useful tool in keeping your Guild a well oiled machine, whether you are running a Hardcore Raiding/PvP guild to a smaller Social guild, having people to bounce Guild issues off and share the work load with will be invaluable to you, trying to do everything yourself will eventually burn you out and have you dreading logging on.
So now you have your Guild! You know what you want to achieve and how you're going to get there, you have people in positions of power to help you achieve these goals. Structure in the form of Rules and Ranks and level headed Officers to help you monitor, alter and enforce them. I sincerely hope that these 2 parts will help you in your journey as a Guild Master
I've said previously how having Officers can make your job as Guild Master easier and more enjoyable, this is done by having specific guild members in charge of certain aspects of your guild. A simple example of this is having a Bank Officer. A Bank Officer can be used to keep the Guild Bank tidy and divide Wealth, Items, and Trade Materials between guild members.
Generally the bigger the guild, the bigger need for Officers. In Raiding (more so 25man than 10man) and Hardcore PvP Guilds you may want to have Class Officers. These are people who know specific classes and roles 'to a tee' and as such are in charge of making sure every member of that Class/Spec are getting the most out of their characters.
In short Officers are a useful tool in keeping your Guild a well oiled machine, whether you are running a Hardcore Raiding/PvP guild to a smaller Social guild, having people to bounce Guild issues off and share the work load with will be invaluable to you, trying to do everything yourself will eventually burn you out and have you dreading logging on.
So now you have your Guild! You know what you want to achieve and how you're going to get there, you have people in positions of power to help you achieve these goals. Structure in the form of Rules and Ranks and level headed Officers to help you monitor, alter and enforce them. I sincerely hope that these 2 parts will help you in your journey as a Guild Master
