The guild system needs to be more meaningful

[Riba.3271]

This discussion is going to be little bit controversial, and definitely too late, but I feel that 5 guild system with equal standing is terrible. All guilds feel meaningless since each player there is in multiple ones, and cares very little if one of them disbands. Recruiting people who are ready to be all-in with commitment is impossible. People represent when it is time to group up, and that is all they will give for the guild. They're just not invested enough to show real effort for the wellbeing of the guild or to be ready to partcipate in heavy conversations. It is like joining a table of strangers just so you can participate a quiz game. Maybe you will have 1 friend with you, but thats about it.

Now is it possible to go back to 1 guild system? Probably not. Lot of people already have multiple guild halls upgraded, and some are even asking more guild slots. And even if it wasn't so, players mentality about guilds would take years to mend and those years would be chaos of people crying about wanting to freeload multiple guilds again. BUT it is probably possible to improve the system by making a clear severance between guild you're repping and all the content filler guilds you don't put any investment in.

For example adding a main guild slot that can only be changed once per week and it is the only guild that you're allowed represent would go a long way. It would add a meaningful choice between what guild is most important for you with clear concequences . You could still use guild system for guild banks or friendly raid groups, but it would be clear to everyone that you're not very invested in them, and you would know to direct your efforts towards your real community. The system could go even as far as having to have the guild leader specify what slot the players are allowed to have the guild in. So filler guilds would know they identify as filler guilds from already before they start recruiting, and it would be very clearcut to players those guilds will be more laidback and only focused on content whereas you should look for more wholesome experience from main guilds.

Now I do not expect lot of people to symphatize with my train of thought because they haven't experienced beauty (and ugliness) of monoguild system or have simply forgotten what are truly meaningful guilds where everyone had very strong connection with each other. But please do understand that humans capable of such feeling of being connected. It is just impossible when choices with consequences are absent.

For the people who love having multiple guilds just for content and no meaningful relationships or conversation, I would like to offer a compromise. You will have 1 more guild slot, 6 total. So 5 side guilds and 1 main guild: almost everyone should be happy with this. Especially guild leaders as they will truly see improvement in player investment and guilds won't be just 1 friendcircle shows.

Edited October 3, 2023 by Riba.3271

[Grumpy McGrumps.8504]

How to tell you play WvW without saying you play WvW.

Guilds are for a lot of different uses, and having different guilds for different content is why you would want to not have one "main" or whatever. And for your "no meaningful relationships or conversation", meaningful relationships or conversations would actually be the reason some of them even exist.

Edited October 3, 2023 by Grumpy McGrumps.8504

[Riba.3271]

14 minutes ago, Grumpy McGrumps.8504 said:

Guilds are for a lot of different uses, and having different guilds for different content is why you would want to not have one "main" or whatever. And for your "no meaningful conversation", meaningful relationships or conversations would actually be the reason some of them even exist.

It is possible for 1 main guild to have players that do not participate in all content they're interested in. Yes, guilds would be more diverse and there would be necessity for fewer of them but that isn't necesarily bad thing as you would play with same players more often.

24 minutes ago, Grumpy McGrumps.8504 said:

How to tell you play WvW without saying you play WvW.

It literally says I play WvW at my signature? Isn't that where you got that information 🤭

[Grumpy McGrumps.8504]

2 minutes ago, Riba.3271 said:

It is possible for 1 main guild to have players that do not participate in all content they're interested in. Yes, guilds would be more diverse and there would be necessity for fewer of them but that isn't necesarily bad thing as you would play with same players more often.

It literally says I play WvW at my signature? Isn't that where you got that information 🤭

Uh. You're clearly not getting what I am saying.

And I literally logged in to reply to this, I didn't even SEE your signature before I logged in to reply. Didn't notice before you mentioned it even.

[illuminati.8453]

I think the intent was genuine, allow players to have guilds with different interests and you in theory have more participation in those guilds, but like anything ANet does they didn't keep at it and refine the system as the years went on and let it decay to the point that guilds have less value now.  

I don't see them ever making any significant changes to anything core to this game.  At this point, it is what it is. 

[Hesione.9412]

What does "with equal standing" mean?

[Panda.1967]

I wish they would roll back to one of the earlier systems for guilds in GW2… the current form supports large guilds and punishes small guilds… before we could atleast progress our guild with only a couple active members representing and playing the game as normal… now we are required to do organized guild activities to progress and most of them are impossible without adding more members to the guild… we have like 1 guild activities that can be completed with our member count… worse yet the conversation to the current system reset all of our guilds progress…

Edited October 3, 2023 by Panda.1967

[Marikus.1875]

does someone have a TL;DR for this dissertation? 

Edited October 3, 2023 by Marikus.1875

[Astralporing.1957]

53 minutes ago, Marikus.1875 said:

does someone have a TL;DR for this dissertation? 

"I want Anet to force other players to rep my guild, or else...". Or at least i think it was about it.

[Riba.3271]

1 hour ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

"I want Anet to force other players to rep my guild, or else...". Or at least i think it was about it.

It is more about joining a guild where all people are all-in together. It is great that GW2 doesn't enforce grind regarding gear and levels, but they could at least keep people invested. After all MMORPGs are about communities and guilds are at center of it all.

Also to be clear, my suggestion entails that you can still choose to join a guild or not rep the main guild, you just cannot swap the choice to another guild that easily. You must admit that guilds or clans in other games of the genre, do hold more value to their members. And that value of new members has dropped drastically to guilds since there are very few public recruit messages anymore.

Edited October 4, 2023 by Riba.3271

[Riba.3271]

4 hours ago, Hesione.9412 said:

What does "with equal standing" mean?

It means each guild is basically the same. Since if you join 5 different guilds, and participate in all of them, you will end up in average 5 times less activity in each. This means people in each guild will get to know you 5 times less and spend time with you 5 times less compared to other guild based games. You can see how this leads to you being less comfortable and invested in group activity.

Now of course in ideal world it doesn't matter if you spend 5 times less time with these people you like, but just the fact that friend groups exist shows it just doesn't happen in reality. Even if you have the will and limit yourself to 1 guild, the other players will be investing 80% of their time to other guilds, so there will be very little time for you to actually connect to them.

Edited October 4, 2023 by Riba.3271

[Chichimec.9364]

5 hours ago, Riba.3271 said:

...All guilds feel meaningless since each player there is in multiple ones, and cares very little if one of them disbands. Recruiting people who are ready to be all-in with commitment is impossible. People represent when it is time to group up, and that is all they will give for the guild. They're just not invested enough to show real effort for the wellbeing of the guild or to be ready to partcipate in heavy conversations. It is like joining a table of strangers just so you can participate a quiz game. Maybe you will have 1 friend with you, but thats about it...

Wow, there are some massive, heavy duty generalizations in that paragraph without anything that suggests those generalizations are actually based in fact, not just someone's personal opinions. Let's break those generalizations down a bit...
1.".All guilds feel meaningless since each player there is in multiple ones, and cares very little if one of them disbands."

I cannot speak for "each player" but only for myself. On my main account, I am in four guilds. One is a WvW guild that I run with for two hours a day, five to seven days a week. One is a tiny guild made up of a handful of people who have become friends ingame. We get together once a week as rl allows, just to hang out together for an hour or two. One is a brand new guild just set up by some folks in the WvW guild to run together in the Lab this Halloween. The fourth guild I'm in is a farming guild that puts out a lot of info on the best ways to farm ingame. I am friends with people in three of those guilds and I would very much care if they disbanded. The farming guild is only an information source for me.

2. "People represent when it is time to group up, and that is all they will give for the guild. They're just not invested enough to show real effort for the wellbeing of the guild or to be ready to partcipate in heavy conversations."

Again, I can only speak for myself, not for all the "People" who play GW2. I do what I can to support my WvW guild. Every time I run with the squad, I stick around after the run to share my full home instance with with guildies who would like to harvest there. Nor am I the only one who does that. Several members of the guild also share their full home instance after every run. I donate needed supplies to the guild, as the guild leaders indicate they are needed. Many of the folks in the guild do that, donating mats and gold as needed. There is one guildie who cooks ascended food that is put out at every run. There is another guildie who runs trainings for fractals on a regular basis and who gathers guildies to help anyone working on tough achievements. Throughout the day, guildies can call out for help as needed for anything they are doing ingame. 

As for "heavy conversations" a two hour WvW run is not the place for those, particularly since our squad tends to run 25-50 people. depending on the day and on who else is tagged up at the same time. Still, I've had serious conversations one on one with folks in that guild when it seemed appropriate. The tiny guild I'm in very much offers support to each other, both when we are together as a group as well as individually, one on one.

Yes, with the farming guild, I generally just read their latest info and don't do much else with that one. The guild set up for Lab runs is brand new so I can't say much about that one. Overall though, my personal experience with guilds is very different than what the OP describes in their generalizations.

14 minutes ago, Riba.3271 said:

...You must admit that guilds or clans in other games of the genre, do hold more value to their members. And that value of new members has dropped drastically to guilds since there are very few public recruit messages anymore.

Again, let me break these statements down a bit..
1. "You must admit that guilds or clans in other games of the genre, do hold more value to their members."

Hmm, don't know about you but I don't have to admit that since I have no idea what values players in other MMOs give to their guilds or clans.

2. "And that value of new members has dropped drastically to guilds since there are very few public recruit messages anymore."

Once again I can only speak from my own experience and once again, my personal experience does not match what the OP is saying. I'm on a NA server and as an old, retired guy, I get to play a lot every day. I'm in and out of the game in the early mornings, mid-days, and prime time. I see guild recruitment messages every day. Most of them are in or near prime time but I have seen guilds recruiting in WvW earlier in the day.

TL/DR I'm playing GW2 for five to six hours a day, in WvW and open world PVE. In the guilds I am a member of and in map chat on a wide variety of maps, I am not seeing the problems the OP sees, which is why I don't see any need for  their suggested solutions.

[Riba.3271]

5 minutes ago, Chichimec.9364 said:

6 hours ago, Riba.3271 said:

 

Wow, there are some massive, heavy duty generalizations in that paragraph without anything that suggests those generalizations are actually based in fact, not just someone's personal opinions. Let's break those generalizations down a bit...

5 minutes ago, Chichimec.9364 said:

1.".All guilds feel meaningless since each player there is in multiple ones, and cares very little if one of them disbands."

I cannot speak for "each player" but only for myself. On my main account, I am in four guilds. One is a WvW guild that I run with for two hours a day, five to seven days a week. One is a tiny guild made up of a handful of people who have become friends ingame. We get together once a week as rl allows, just to hang out together for an hour or two. One is a brand new guild just set up by some folks in the WvW guild to run together in the Lab this Halloween. The fourth guild I'm in is a farming guild that puts out a lot of info on the best ways to farm ingame. I am friends with people in three of those guilds and I would very much care if they disbanded. The farming guild is only an information source for me.

I am glad that you found useful guilds that provide you activities. Nothing here seems however something you're very invested in however and I guess this disconnect comes from how your attention is separated in different groups and rather than building 1 central hub where all kind of activity is welcome. What is that the guild allows you to express yourself in? Do they provide you, a regular member, players or resources for something that they also care about? Did they give you a role and reach out to get to know you personally? Because this is all what guilds used to do, each new member was special. Anyways  I never suggested "useful guilds" should be removed, just that representing should be reserved for what you have emotional investment in. I just feel like there should be space for something greater and more full time, like guilds in the past.

15 minutes ago, Chichimec.9364 said:

2. "People represent when it is time to group up, and that is all they will give for the guild. They're just not invested enough to show real effort for the wellbeing of the guild or to be ready to partcipate in heavy conversations."

Again, I can only speak for myself, not for all the "People" who play GW2. I do what I can to support my WvW guild. Every time I run with the squad, I stick around after the run to share my full home instance with with guildies who would like to harvest there. Nor am I the only one who does that. Several members of the guild also share their full home instance after every run. I donate needed supplies to the guild, as the guild leaders indicate they are needed. Many of the folks in the guild do that, donating mats and gold as needed. There is one guildie who cooks ascended food that is put out at every run. There is another guildie who runs trainings for fractals on a regular basis and who gathers guildies to help anyone working on tough achievements. Throughout the day, guildies can call out for help as needed for anything they are doing ingame. 

As for "heavy conversations" a two hour WvW run is not the place for those, particularly since our squad tends to run 25-50 people. depending on the day and on who else is tagged up at the same time. Still, I've had serious conversations one on one with folks in that guild when it seemed appropriate. The tiny guild I'm in very much offers support to each other, both when we are together as a group as well as individually, one on one.

Yes, with the farming guild, I generally just read their latest info and don't do much else with that one. The guild set up for Lab runs is brand new so I can't say much about that one. Overall though, my personal experience with guilds is very different than what the OP describes in their generalizations.

Well, sharing home instance resources isn't exactly what I had in mind as meaningful activity or connections. What you're describing is more of a symbiotic relationship to fill each others ingame greed. Anyways, getting mats or gold donated isn't something I have experienced trouble with either, it was more about fellow guild mates distributing so much of their time to elsewhere that they felt like strangers. Getting help is easy too, you can even get that from strangers in this game. Issue is, it is mostly mute gaming.

But you know, I guess it is just that you're new generation GW2 player, and don't have experience with games that have solo guilds, so you don't understand what true keeping boat afloat is. True connection comes from sticking around the hard times and evolving as a group rather than just hopping to play with another guild in the list. Having 1 general guild you put lot of effort in, also gave any regular member the tools to arrange any content for rest of the guild. But as guilds became more and more specialized and centralized, this right is lost cause. You already listed all your guilds "and what they are for". Surely you see allure of a guild that allows you to arrange anything without the restriction of "what they are for".

25 minutes ago, Chichimec.9364 said:

 

2. "And that value of new members has dropped drastically to guilds since there are very few public recruit messages anymore."

Once again I can only speak from my own experience and once again, my personal experience does not match what the OP is saying. I'm on a NA server and as an old, retired guy, I get to play a lot every day. I'm in and out of the game in the early mornings, mid-days, and prime time. I see guild recruitment messages every day. Most of them are in or near prime time but I have seen guilds recruiting in WvW earlier in the day.

TL/DR I'm playing GW2 for five to six hours a day, in WvW and open world PVE. In the guilds I am a member of and in map chat on a wide variety of maps, I am not seeing the problems the OP sees, which is why I don't see any need for  their suggested solutions.

Well yes, recruit messages do exist but there really isn't very many like in the past. But it is natural that guilds put about as effort in new members, as the new members put in the their 5th guild. Recruiting isn't about connections anymore, just finding new firebrand. Hardcore PvX guilds that existed in the past, were the symbol of coexistance and how people with different interests could come together and find their preferred activity from same space.

This day and age, the more specialized and content focused your guild is, the better the results from recruiting are. But in the past, guilds tried to be accommodating to all kind of activities. So you got to experience more and joining a guild was an adventure with multiple people with various interests on top, not a gate to join certain content. The mixture of those people created a concoction you cannot find elsewhere. It wasn't just WvW commander or Raid leader + couple of funny guys, but lot of important guys.

[Astralporing.1957]

6 hours ago, Riba.3271 said:

It is more about joining a guild where all people are all-in together. It is great that GW2 doesn't enforce grind regarding gear and levels, but they could at least keep people invested. After all MMORPGs are about communities and guilds are at center of it all.

Those things cannot be forced. If you want people to feel like they are part of something greater, something that binds them together, that something needs to be worth this. Just enforcing an artificial, external restriction will not make it so.

Think of it like a diffeence between a close-knit group of friends, and a workplace. You do not want guilds to degenerate into the latter.

[Riba.3271]

1 hour ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

7 hours ago, Riba.3271 said:

 

Those things cannot be forced. If you want people to feel like they are part of something greater, something that binds them together, that something needs to be worth this. Just enforcing an artificial, external restriction will not make it so.

Think of it like a diffeence between a close-knit group of friends, and a workplace. You do not want guilds to degenerate into the latter.

Do you think humans can have 5 close knit groups of friends at same time and would you care about each of those 5 group as much as you would care about the only one? And would you rely on other people doing the same while juggling 4 other groups?

But yes, monoguild system is less casual but it is precisely because we are online and not connected otherwise, we need something meaningful to bond us together. Which could be combined effort to make 1 guild flourish. I am not saying we should go as far as other games, but we could at least give space for something greater than what is currently available.

Also guilds were never "workplaces" even in monoguild system, it was just splitting very very small responsibilities. As they had to be more diverse, it allowed for all kind of creative expression from its players to entertain others and be entertained.

Edited October 4, 2023 by Riba.3271

[Astralporing.1957]

2 hours ago, Riba.3271 said:

Do you think humans can have 5 close knit groups of friends at same time and would you care about each of those 5 group as much as you would care about the only one? And would you rely on other people doing the same while juggling 4 other groups?

5? probably not. 2-3? Easily. And demanding that everyone in one specific group of friends should care about that group more than about their potential other friends is a good way to make that group far less close-knit. Forcing a friendship never works.

2 hours ago, Riba.3271 said:

But yes, monoguild system is less casual but it is precisely because we are online and not connected otherwise, we need something meaningful to bond us together.

Then you should work on providing that "something meaningful" instead of trying to somehow force it into existence by introducing artificial restrictions.

And it's not about being more or less"casual". Monoguild systems are less social. Or, to be more precise, far more restrictive as far as social behaviour goes. Which is something exact opposite i would expect for something that wants (or at elast claims to want) to become a close-knit group of friends.

Let's just say that in current system a guild requiring representation is an immediate warning sign for me,  because it usually represents a leader on power trip or a really twisted social structure i'd rather not have anything to do with.

Hint: monoguild structure is usually  something pushed by big guilds, that are so large they no longer care about any of their individual members. It's all about the guild fulfilling (or not) the individual goals of the guildmembers, and with guildmembers fulfilling the goals of guild leadership. Being bound not by commonality of characters and personalities, or by ties of friendship, but by pragmatism. Those types of guilds lack social bonds to tie their members together, so they need some enforced restrictions of other kind to replace those. I don't see that kind of an approach a good fit for GW2.

Edited October 4, 2023 by Astralporing.1957

[Farohna.6247]

I really don't see guild recruitment messages as a good marker of how guilds are doing.  They're more just annoying spammy screen garbage.  

Guilds are what their members make of them.  That's as it should be.  I will say even from playing another game where you only had one guild that participation varies widely from player to player.  There are those who dedicate a lot of time, mats, and helping other members and then there are those who just use the benefits of a guild.   Being in one or in five does not change that.  

Most conversation seems to happen in Discord, and the guilds themselves are largely silent.   I see in WvW some friendly chatter and banter amongst guildmates when I join a tag, but otherwise they are quiet (or in Discord) and following the tag.   I am sure there are many deep and engaging conversations going on in some guilds.  

Even within a one guild system, you will have it break off into sub groups.  You will have people who only PvP, the raiders, the ones who are just there to socialize, etc.  It is impossible to fill the needs of every single player.  GW2 hopes to help that by having five guild possibilities so you can fulfill all those aspects of the game if you so choose.  Does that create a less deeply personal impression ..possibly.  Does it prevent guild hopping...yes.  

[Vilin.8056]

The main issue doesn't lie in the guilld system, but rather in the skill gap within majority of the playerbase.

Given that in the form of casual guilds, the majority of member are economy driven rather than gameplay driven, since web timer and megaserver has all the major loot events taken care of, it's practically impossible for guilds to infuse a common goal, let alone constructing any structured, cooperative scenarios outside of competitive event.

Therefore the casual guilds today are merely only chat channels, as a social gathering feature, it's somewhat serves its purpose, but in order for guilds to evolve into anything more meaningful, both the game and the community need to find ways to convert their players.

[XenesisII.1540]

That isn't a problem with the guild system, it's a problem with the people invited to join the guild. 

If you want a certain standard for the guild, you need to set it at the front door before they walk in.

[Cuks.8241]

Having the option of multiple guilds is not a problem in itself. If you want meaningful guilds, make meaningful guild content and meaningful guild perks that you only get if you represent the guild and take part in the guild activities.

But yeah most guilds I've joined over the years were not really guilds. More like an additional lfg. Exception is my wvw guild. Otherwise my other guilds are mostly there because they are focused on specific type of content and they run that content often and are proficient in it. I wouldn't like to lose my non main (non wvw) guilds though because they are convenient. I think what really ties guilds together in mmorpgs is content that is either hard enough that requires lots of cooperation and working together and this we will never get in gw2. Or large scale pvp made for guilds. Here we do have wvw which is good but lacks ways for guilds to prove themselves. There is gvg but there is nothing in game to distinguish good gvg guilds vs other gvg guilds so it's all pretty much driven by a small community of players that organise by themselves. The sad thing about wvw is that winning is counter productive. There is no real reward for winning, best rewards are participation rewards. And getting to tier 1 is more of a punishment than a reward so you have guilds rather tank or transfer away once there is a possibility of getting to high tiers. Now if winning a matchup and getting to tier 1 and being in a guilds that were responsible for it would elevate you over other players and guilds (could be just bragging right rewards) guilds would actually start to play for the win and maybe start to ppt. 

But again this is nothing against multiple guilds. This alows you to have guilds for different content types, family and friends guilds, personal guilds. This is all good. 

 

[Nietzsche.5870]

I like the multiple guilds like others have mentioned as each has a different purpose. I think aNet could do more to facilitate community feel in your guild though -- we need reasons to hang out in the guild halls, like player apartments (hide behind instance but everyone goes to same spot to access and like home instance can invite others), mini games (imagine arcade machine decorations that keep track of high score of guildies), crafting stations, etc.

 

Players can take care of actual details of community building in a good but aNet needs to improve that infrastructure to congregate more naturally and the players to actually see benefits in doing so in the guild-context before we can elicit that level engagement from players. If it's not convenient and valuable to do, people won't.

[Tuna Bandit.3786]

Simply put: No

1 of my Guilds is my own private Guild that I use as my own home, decoration location and for Guild Bank for my 4 accounts.

So if I want to do something with one of the other Guilds I am member of, and want to rep them, I loose access to my own FOR A WHOLE WEEK by your idea.

That alone should show you how bad and not well thought through your ideas are.

FYI I am member of 5 guilds including my own, and I am invested in all 

[Mistwraithe.3106]

I am an active member of 4 guilds each of which I have a good reason for being a member of and gain significant benefits from. There's the small friends and family guild, the WvW fight guild, the big does everything guild based in Australia, and then a slightly smaller more raid and fractal focused guild in NZ (my timezone). I run with each of them at different times and would miss it if I had to drop one (there's a temporary hiccup with the WvW fight guild but I still want to be a member of a fight guild so the slot is necessary even if I end up in a different one).

So I have to disagree with OP.

[Sugar Min.5834]

...And yet there are guild leaders who created 3 ~ 5 guilds and bragged about having a guild strength of 2000+ members but... only 1% ~ 2% of them are actually active and less than 0.5% ever chat or participate in guild activities 🤷‍♀️

Edited October 5, 2023 by Sugar Min.5834

[Alester.7063]

I always found it abundantly stupid, that guilds were enforced in other MMO's for lots of activities like raiding. I think the GW2 system.is among the best ones out there. I'd like for it to have a wider variety of activities you can do with guilds like new Guild Missions, but overall I'm happier with this system than with any other Guild system I've seen so far.