Guilds: Good or Bad?

• Guilds are a fun way to make a small, cozy, community of like-minded people,
• Guilds are a great way to get things done. They focus the goals of several individuals with the exclusion of distractions,
• I find that guilds become ghettos where community members disappear to and barely participate in the non-guild activities,
• I think that Guilds take players AWAY from the community as a whole, obviously becoming a smaller entity that doesn't communicate with others,
• It seems that Guilds turn inwards, becoming self-reinforcing cults, justifying their own beliefs and activities with the approval of one another and a lack of detracting voices.

What do you think? Am I wrong or not? Let's see your comments.

I accept that the responses will be opinions, and that ultimately we won't come to a conclusive answer. The discussion is worth having, however, because it could help Arenanet decide whether or not to put effort into Guild-oriented content/mechanics.

• Guilds are only as good as the people in them.

With a thread like this, you're just going to get a bunch of remarks on the human condition and society in microcosm. Guilds are in no way responsible for how people choose to behave any more than parties, squads, or servers. Humans: Good or Bad?

As long as i don't need to join one, they can be whatever.

@AgentMoore.9453 said:Humans: Good or Bad?

In forced multiplayer? Lazy or competitive.

@Svarty.8019 said:

• Guilds are a fun way to make a small, cozy, community of like-minded people,

Can be.

• Guilds are a great way to get things done. They focus the goals of several individuals with the exclusion of distractions,
• I find that guilds become ghettos where community members disappear to and barely participate in the non-guild activities,

Really poor choice of words to me. If they didn’t participate in ‘non guild activities’ then you wouldn’t see people at festivals, in WvW solo or other than guild activities, in open world activities etc.

• I think that Guilds take players AWAY from the community as a whole, obviously becoming a smaller entity that doesn't communicate with others,

Within WvW it’s actually allowed me to meet more people from multiple guilds. It’s been a greater variance of backgrounds in my experience.

• It seems that Guilds turn inwards, becoming self-reinforcing cults, justifying their own beliefs and activities with the approval of one another and a lack of detracting voices.

Any ‘group‘ has that potential. GW2 as an entity experiences that in regards to other games.

What do you think? Am I wrong or not? Let's see your comments.

I accept that the responses will be opinions, and that ultimately we won't come to a conclusive answer. The discussion is worth having, however, because it could help Arenanet decide whether or not to put effort into Guild-oriented content/mechanics.

Well, they haven’t put any effort into anything guild related other than a new guild hall per expansion or a few decorations since HoT.

I wouldn’t expect them to do anything anyway...

@Strider Pj.2193 said:

@Svarty.8019 said:

• Guilds are a fun way to make a small, cozy, community of like-minded people,

• Guilds are a great way to get things done. They focus the goals of several individuals with the exclusion of distractions,
• I find that guilds become ghettos where community members disappear to and barely participate in the non-guild activities,

I'll concede that point, the wording could be much better.

@Strider Pj.2193 said:I wouldn’t expect them to do anything anyway...

Isn't an expac when expectations go out of the window and you let optimism in?

@"Svarty.8019" said:

Isn't an expac when expectations go out of the window and you let optimism in?

Heh... Reference this: https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/26547/world-restructuring#latest

But more seriously, yes. I just don’t tend to think some of these are even on their radar any more.

@Svarty.8019 said:

• I find that guilds become ghettos where community members disappear to and barely participate in the non-guild activities,
• I think that Guilds take players AWAY from the community as a whole, obviously becoming a smaller entity that doesn't communicate with others,
• It seems that Guilds turn inwards, becoming self-reinforcing cults, justifying their own beliefs and activities with the approval of one another and a lack of detracting voices.

I think these are pretty weird and mostly unsupported by facts claims that for some reason try to paint guilds in negative light despite them being mostly irrelevant for an average player, who still keep doing whatever they want.

@Svarty.8019 said:

• Guilds are a fun way to make a small, cozy, community of like-minded people,
• Guilds are a great way to get things done. They focus the goals of several individuals with the exclusion of distractions,
• I find that guilds become ghettos where community members disappear to and barely participate in the non-guild activities,
• I think that Guilds take players AWAY from the community as a whole, obviously becoming a smaller entity that doesn't communicate with others,
• It seems that Guilds turn inwards, becoming self-reinforcing cults, justifying their own beliefs and activities with the approval of one another and a lack of detracting voices.

What do you think? Am I wrong or not? Let's see your comments.

I accept that the responses will be opinions, and that ultimately we won't come to a conclusive answer. The discussion is worth having, however, because it could help Arenanet decide whether or not to put effort into Guild-oriented content/mechanics.

It's pretty obvious that having guilds doesn't cause everyone to focus only on guild activities and ignore the wider community, because you can see people all over the game who you can tell are part of guilds (because you can see the tag) but who are doing activities with people from other guilds, and people who aren't in guilds at all. There might be some people in some guilds who have chosen to play only with their guild members, but if it does happen I think it's safe to say it's not affecting the majority of players.

It sounds like you've had a bad experience with a guild recently and you're concerned that your experience is representative of the entire game. If that's the case my advice is to pick any meta-event, or WvW map or Fractal or whatever it is you like to do, go there without your guild and look at the players around you. See how many different guild tags you can see. If your assumption is accurate then any given group will be made up mostly or entirely of people from the same guild - since they're focusing on their insular little communities and not mixing outside of that. But I can tell you now that's very rarely the case (outside of guild missions of course, which are a very minor part of the game).

@"AgentMoore.9453" said:

• Guilds are only as good as the people in them.

This. :+1:

You can have organized content with guilds and still do solo play if you want. A good guild isn't a "cult", as the OP suggested. ;)

@AgentMoore.9453 said:Humans: Good or Bad?

EXTREMELY TERRIBLE!!!!

@Khisanth.2948 said:

@AgentMoore.9453 said:Humans: Good or Bad?

Well, not necessarily. It all depends on how they're prepared.

@kharmin.7683 said:

@Khisanth.2948 said:

@"AgentMoore.9453" said:Humans: Good or Bad?

Hey, that's not how we prepare meals around here!

https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/comment/1413339/#Comment_1413339

@Fire Attunement.9835 said:RULE NUMBER ONEWe do NOT eat the sentient creatures of Tyria.

@"Sobx.1758" said:Hey, that's not how we prepare meals around here!

https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/comment/1413339/#Comment_1413339

@"Fire Attunement.9835" said:RULE NUMBER ONEWe do NOT eat the sentient creatures of Tyria.

Except for that time the commander ate Choya right in front of a Choya chieftan.

Guilds don't seem as important as they once use to. Back in the day the first thing you did on starting a game was look for a guild and that guild became your family. I don't bother with them these days they feel pointless

As I read the post I wonder what guilds are you in, with what people.Those things you say do not depend on the guid but on the members of the guild, I've being on a lot of guilds on a lot of games and I can totaly say yeah to point 1 and 2 but no to the others.

It's easyer to ask for help to the guild since you share a common chat and you can talk to them all the time they are in game, not like the mate you run 1 lfg dungeon.Also you can meet ppl mind like since, again, you share chat and can talk to every time they are in game so you can have your group/team to do things, but it's up to you if you want to close in with them and leave the rest of the players outside, totaly up to you.

For your last point, it's part of social psychology dynamic, it happens with religion, politics, towns, heck even with your group of friends at the school, your hood... everything realy. That doesn't mean it's ok nor it's bad, it's just something that happens, and if you want it to be good you must accept or refuse if you don't.

I for my part like to be in guilds because its makes the game easy and fun, if not, I'll be playing an rpg, not a mmorpg. Also, I for my part refuse guilds that request 100% rep, I don't like to feel someone controling me. If the game allows me to be member of more than 1 guild, I'll totaly embrace it (that's something I love about GW2).

When GW2 was released one of it's core philosophies was that you should be able to play the game as you want. So nobody should be forced to play with you. Some prefer to play only and exclusivly with a guild and this is fine to me. If that is what people want, it is the way it is. People should not be forced, period....

but..There are ways to force people and there are ways to guide people (influence people toward a desired way of playing). This is done, but it is delicate as it should never become a force and people should not feel manipulated in any way. To do so, it is important to not focus on the negative, but on the positive and highlight this. People dislike any bad talking about guilds, specially those who are wrapped into them and use it as a nice and cosy blanket. So instead of doing so I advice to give positive feedback and proposals to improving random encounters and pug play. Think about how the negative elements there could be removed and how people would be more happy to join them again without feeling forced to it.

@AgentMoore.9453 said:

@"Sobx.1758" said:Hey, that's not how we prepare meals around here!

https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/comment/1413339/#Comment_1413339

@"Fire Attunement.9835" said:RULE NUMBER ONEWe do NOT eat the sentient creatures of Tyria.

All Choya are cacti (I guess), but are all cacti Choya? This would seem to indicate they are not: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Cactus