Guilds, Community/Citizenship, Event Organizers - How Do We Maximize Our Efforts?

I am curious on what everyone is doing to build their slice of the Verra pie. The social aspect to this game will be critical. It's more than just guilds finding rival guilds or hardcore groups forming to roam pvp and slay all in sight. Ashes has the potential to bring out the very best of what MMORPGS were intended to be and it is our job to make sure this happens.

We have plenty of in game mechanics to discuss as Intrepid continues development but I feel this may be the most important (and often overlooked) aspect of AoC so late in mmo genre history. Especially considering the social aspect has devolved with many developers overlooking it as time went on. We all want and need the population to grow or Verra will indeed be empty and dominated by the largest alliances. Guilds should be nervous to piss off their citizens and citizens should look to well organized guilds to hold it together. Strong nodes *may* require a symbiotic relationship between the two.

All this being said, what are YOU doing to ensure you have AND provide an enjoyable experience? For players who have yet to find a guild, are waiting for launch, or solo players who want nothing to do with giant groups, what do you expect from guilds/alliances and from the community in game? What would make your experience better?

*Disclaimer* Please don't turn this into a guild recruitment thread. Also, I realize that sharing "internal" secrets may scare some people but I would argue that at this stage, sharing those secrets will simply help the community grow (which is a great thing!). I'm going to lay my approach out and leave nothing off the table. Use my ideas that you like and share your own.

Guild - As a guild leader I am consistently recruiting and chatting with players 1 on 1. I'm sharing AoC information all over other games, discords, and social media outlets. I'm motivating my members to participate on the forums as well as in the recruitment process. Together we will grow not just a guild but a solid community in discord and in game. I carefully selected our guild and loot rules to prevent drama and toxicity. A healthy foundation from the ground up.

Community/citizenship - From an in-game perspective. One thing I did in WOW and will continue to do in AoC is build on the community (outside of my guild) by being active in chat and adding unique types of fun whenever possible. In-game giveaways via trivia questions in a Tavern (or local chat) will definitely happen. Class officers in guild will be encouraged to help players in the community with min/maxing their class. This will be very helpful when it comes to citizens defending their node!

Event Organizers - There are endless ways to elevate the experience for you and the community in game.....it just takes an effort from individuals to organize an event. I intend to stream gameplay on twitch only during alpha I and alpha II to bring additional awareness to AoC. I honestly will probably stop after that. In game I will encourage guild members to organize local fishing events, roaming PvP and farming groups that include non guild members, hiring of mercenaries to attack/defend caravans, exploration groups early on and whatever else we can think of once we know more about the final product. The sky is the limit.

Anything we do will grow this community. Please share your thoughts.

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Comments

Nicotine03

As an avid mmo player I feel like we lost the community aspect of mmos with Google and other ways to find what information you need without having to ask fellow player further driving that community fun experience that truly brings that immersing experience that I have come to crave from any mmo that I can possibly play..

Ideas I would always say is not to turn away those who ask questions build that community and work to being a server that cares and makes people want to stay and be part of the world.

Just some small 2 cents I have not the best worded but hopefully gets the point across!

Khronus

Nicotine03 wrote: »

Ideas I would always say is not to turn away those who ask questions build that community and work to being a server that cares and makes people want to stay and be part of the world.

There is literally nothing worse than playing an mmorpg where nobody communicates at all! One of my favorite quotes - "Be careful whose toes you step on today, they may be attached to the asses we have to kiss tomorrow"

Asgerr

Having no friends who are gamers, I have always played MMOs alone.

My goal in the game will be to be efficient at whatever class I end up playing and be kind and communicative, so as to find like minded players with whom to potentially join forces and become a mercenary guild.

My main focus in game would be to help defend others and their caravans/nodes/castles etc. Perhaps even try to establish some sort of holy order with that goal (depending on how religions turn out).

I have attempted to join a pre-established guild, few have similar ideals, but I also don't want to commit to activities in other games etc until Ashes comes out. Nor do I wanna compromise the area I desire to head to and develop upon launch.

In the meanwhile I help answer what questions I can, both on the General Discussion forums, and on the monthly Q&As. I have a dream that the veterans of this forum could play together on the same servers, but most people here already belongs to other guilds, or are in different regions than my own.

Khronus

@Asgerr I love it. You are paving your own path and creating a better environment for those around you. This is amazing and I hope to run into your merc group if we end up on the same server. I may very well need your services haha.

RsMadeMePhat

For me, I always go 115% on the release of anything I'm excited for. I love being completely indulged into a game for several weeks where I live breath and sleep whatever game that might be. I only get to do it every few years and it's my true vacation and I want to get lost in it. A lot of the friends I have could truly care less for video games and definitely do not play the style I do so I often am in the search for a group to play with. I always look for groups that no matter what they are doing, they are trying to the best at whatever that might be. If that's raiding I want to do the best I can do, if that's picking flowers, I want to be the largest florist in Verra. And having like minded people around that I enjoy their company and time with only accentuates my playtime.

Asgerr

Khronus wrote: »

@Asgerr I love it. You are paving your own path and creating a better environment for those around you. This is amazing and I hope to run into your merc group if we end up on the same server. I may very well need your services haha.

I think us forum "vets" should have a thread closer to release disclosing which servers we'll be playing on. Keep the community as together as possible hahahaha.

But thanks for the words of encouragement @Khronus They are very appreciated.

Khronus

@RsMadeMePhat It's funny that you mention a games launch being your true vacation. I completely agree and have felt that way for a long time. Vacations are great but have you ever taken a portal into Verra with 100 other guild members on launch day!? : ).

3 comments so far and it's consistent that the people wanting to play AoC have felt the sting of developers losing touch with building something for a community. Hoping to hear from some guild leaders on what they are doing to reverse this.

tautau

I am trying to make some friends here on the boards and, perhaps, gain slight name recognition for when launch happens. I am also trying to learn and understand as much as I can about the parts of the game I find most interesting.

I have only been active on the boards a few weeks, but I have been delighted at the quality of the posts and the posters here (with exceptions, of course).

Asgerr

tautau wrote: »

I am trying to make some friends here on the boards and, perhaps, gain slight name recognition for when launch happens. I am also trying to learn and understand as much as I can about the parts of the game I find most interesting.

I have only been active on the boards a few weeks, but I have been delighted at the quality of the posts and the posters here (with exceptions, of course).

If you're a EU player I'm happy to party up with you hahaha

tautau

NA, but usually in EU a couple months a year....an I would love to join up. @Asgerr

Khronus

tautau wrote: »

I am trying to make some friends here on the boards and, perhaps, gain slight name recognition for when launch happens. I am also trying to learn and understand as much as I can about the parts of the game I find most interesting.

I have only been active on the boards a few weeks, but I have been delighted at the quality of the posts and the posters here (with exceptions, of course).

I recognize your name from the forums so what you are doing is working!

neuroguy

I think AoC has great potential to make interactions between guilds and the server be meaningful. If node mayors can declare war on individual guilds that's great. If merchants can prevent buying/increase prices for specific guilds (there is a recent thread about this) that would be really cool too. With mechanics like that, reputation will matter a lot, and when reputation matters a lot, interesting in-game social interactions will be in abundance for those who have the time to experience them.

Khronus

@neuroguy I really missed Vanilla wow when classic came out so I gave it a shot. It felt great the first day. Day 2 I realized how cancer the community had become compared to when it first launch all those years ago. The internet over time just became an anti social trollfest arguing over stupid things. Being a troll is the cool thing to do and nobody can do anything about it really.

Who you are on your server should have meaning. We will literally feel like a community and I absolutely cannot wait for this. Sure, blood will be spilled, enemies will be made and sieges will cause drama.....but damn, will it be unique and enjoyable.

neuroguy

Khronus wrote: »

@neuroguy I really missed Vanilla wow when classic came out so I gave it a shot. It felt great the first day. Day 2 I realized how cancer the community had become compared to when it first launch all those years ago. The internet over time just became an anti social trollfest arguing over stupid things. Being a troll is the cool thing to do and nobody can do anything about it really.

Who you are on your server should have meaning. We will literally feel like a community and I absolutely cannot wait for this. Sure, blood will be spilled, enemies will be made and sieges will cause drama.....but damn, will it be unique and enjoyable.

Yeah I'll never forget in TBC when I was denied a spot on a 5man while leveling because my guild (unbeknownst to me, I was new both to the game and the guild) had a bad reputation. It just caught me so off guard and really annoyed me hahaha so I had to honestly sit down and think about what the best move would be for me and for the next week would make small talk with people I ran dungeons with to see which guilds were known on the server and what they were known for :P.

Dygz

I don't expect anything from guilds.
Seems likely that the TheoryForge Discord group will have a guild - simply because there are guild perks, so why not. The only expectation is to have fun in Ashes like we do when we play other games. Also seems likely we will have a loose alliance with the DOPcrew who follow the Revival devs, Snipehunter and Ombwah.
Even if we are just in the same Node, rather than in the same guild.

My hope, is that primary community will be the Node community. We will be working together to construct and defend our towns/cities. We should be able to know who in our town plays at the same time we do and also know precisely where their homes/freeholds are. Finding fellow citizens with similar interests should be fairly easy. Even when we're not in formal groups, we should be able to recognize those who were nearby when we defended the town from some random monster attack.

In addition to carebear affairs, like costume parties, house decorating contests and flash mobs, it seems likely that social orgs (Scholar's Academy, Thieves' Guild and Trader's Company) will likely have social gatherings as well.
(After-Podcast/Livestream soirees are also fun.)

Scubamesteve

I'm a solo player at heart. Even back in my old guilds I was always off alone and would be the member to meet everyone there and not usually stick around if there were photos. Community and the world at large has never been a big engagement for me in these games ever since they canceled True Fantasy Live back in 04. They always just seemed like fun games that I could use to hang out with my friends, but I could do that in call of duty or any game in the FGC with a lobby system back in the day. The challenge of the content and the excitement/smoothness of gameplay has always been my driving force. Eventually WoW grabbed my attention and I found a guild to play with back in Vanilla that forced me to heal on my feral druid because mages too lazy to decurse blah blah whatever and then a guild in TBC that become home and I became MT and made lifelong friends. Beyond that though, nothing else seems to cut it.

With this game, however, I'm looking at it differently. I want to witness this world grow like I do my own child. It sounds weird, but the first time I entered GTAV and I saw the half built Skyscraper and thought to myself, "That'll look real cool when it's finished". To this day it's still half built. Other games are improving like the BR titles that are evolving their maps instead of just making separate ones so the playerbase can feel like there world is evolving with them. But sadly those only happen with major updates and are drastic alterations like the Cataclysm in wow.

This one... We will actually get to watch the world evolve in real time and know that we are directly responsible for the contributions. I haven't cared this much about an in game world event and the effect it had since my small contribution to the Ishgardian restoration in FFXIV. Point being... I'm excited and all over the place.

Which is exactly what i'm hoping the average newcomer that comes into this game blind from a random youtuber can feel. I want them to have an experience akin to the first episode of Westworld. Where they truly feel they've entered a different reality and they begin to question everything they've understood about the genre.

Can't wait to learn more and experience it at all.

Jamation

I like chatting and seeing familiar names on the forums. I honestly hope that I'll pass by someone in game and say "hey! I recognize you from that one forum thread about bees!"

Also, as an avid reader of these forums random sentences of threads will spark an idea for an in game event idea. As I have no idea how these things will play out in practice, I've been making lists of ideas with various ways to reward them. I don't mind sharing them as the more community held events the better and possibly even combining efforts to make a huge community/server event:

1: Mount races/Boat races - this one was sparked about the ability to have an interactive guild map. Could set a course and have various markers and the first person to make it around the track (and maybe put some obstacles, like a person flagged casting slow AOE spells or something).

2. Trick or Treating/Parade at the various freeholds - this could be for a holiday event or after a big victory in battle or to celebrate a town upgrade, but basically you get some of the homeowners/freehold owners together and they give out a small goodie to all the passersby that come to their door for trick-or-treating or for a set course parade. Would be a neat way for people who own property in certain areas to show off a little.

3. Treasure Hunt/Scavenger Hunt - Depending on how maps work you could totally have a player waiting at a certain spot and they get a clue about where this person is waiting or send them to the wrong spot where another clue is waiting. If the map can be interacted with perhaps an X marks the spot, if not maybe a riddle about the surrounding area.

4. Fishing Tournaments - Reward for person who fishes up the most fish/rarest fish/biggest fish depending on how deep that system goes. This would rely a lot on the honor system, but would be a fun day and afterwards could have the people optimized in cooking fry up all the fish and give it to the participants(as I assume they'd provide some sort of buff) with the winners winning something nice

5. Training Days - Basically these would be days where veteran players familiar with certain mechanics, bosses, or systems would work with those less familiar. Such as PvP training days, certain boss training sessions, or learning the tricks of the gathering/fishing/crafting

6. Costume/Decor contest - As there will be lots of armor and costume sets, as well as furniture there could be a themed event where a certain character/place/building is named and all participants try to make their character or house/freehold look the closest and the judges would determine which one won.

I know this isn't exactly socializing right now, but just some fun things that could work in the game once everything gets going. I'm probably going to be spending too much time in game doing these random things hahaha

Vhaeyne

I try to have a silver tongue, but some days it is just lowly human flesh.

What I mean is that when new people come around here with ideas that I think would be bad for the game. I try to oppose them in a way that does not make them hate the community or the game. I am not always successful in this endeavor. Personally I am trying to find that magical balance of being able to change peoples minds and not making them upset. There are a lot of bad ideas that ruined other MMORPGs that people want to bring over to Ashes. Lucky for us the DEVs seem to have a pretty good idea about the game they want to make, but some ideas slip through the cracks. As a community we were successfully able to fight off the "login rewards" crowd without things getting too out of hand. I am glad to be a part of that. There is likely many more such battles ahead of us.

I feel like if someone comes on the forums with a bad idea, and I am able to help change their mind without upsetting them. That is good for the community. Until I can be active in the actual game, that is the slice of the Verra pie I am working on most.

TacVik

Jamation wrote: »

5. Training Days - Basically these would be days where veteran players familiar with certain mechanics, bosses, or systems would work with those less familiar. Such as PvP training days, certain boss training sessions, or learning the tricks of the gathering/fishing/crafting

I love this idea, and it's something I've tried to get going in many of my guilds over multiple games. New players these days seem to come in and their primary focus is to get to raid level, so by the time they make it there, the mechanics and rotations are still unknown to them. The "Training Days" fill in the gaps in knowledge so by the time they are levelled they are also aware of how the class works practically, not just in theory.

Dygz

"Endgame is the real game!"

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