Starting with a hard question... Well a guild should meet guildies' expectations. People in the guild must feel that they are taking part in a community, that they are in a friendly relationship with the others. I was always aiming for recruiting friendly players only, because an environment with nice people make alot more fun than the others. There might be some players that join a guild only to have the access to the alliance system, but i am quite sure that most players expect getting new friends and meeting new people by joining.
A good guild should also be organized. An unorganized guild is like a mass of people, it has no point, there is friend list just to keep contact. It is not a 'must' but good if it is natural, that guildies help each other. I am trying to make people more open-minded and make them feel comfortable with asking the others for help, because -in the end- this is a guild's most important goal.
What is a good guild master like? (GM - guild master now)
Uhh... okay. I think the guild master title shows that a GM's main focus should be on his guild, to lead people, help them, keep things organized within the community. A good GM is online as much as possible, for this, when i am busy i always leave my character logged in and check it every 10-15 min, so people can contact me if they had any problems or questions.
A good GM is friendly. It is terrible when someone is like a dictator or is unbeliveably selfish. Pfff. It is a game, so it is for making players have fun. An unfriendly, selfish person (that acts like an @ss) takes everyone's motivation to play. Personally i really like to talk to friendly people, meet new personalities, hear others' opinion. I try to keep the direct contact with everyone to make them trust me, however its important to leave the things going as it would, sometimes. So in the end noone feels stress and have the freedom and free time to do some own things. And a last thing for the GM topic, a good guild master is always opened to recieve his guildies' feedback about the guild or about himself aswell. :)
What about guild activities?
A guild should have activities, a mass of people doing nothing has no point. The goal of these activities -in my opinion- is bringing people closer to each other and making them feel more like a big family. :)
These activities shouldnt be too often because then the events loose their speciality. However guild members shouldnt feel bored, so these activities can turn a hard day into a funny evening and make people have some fun.
What are these activities?
Well you know we are doing some dungeons (which was a bit unorganized nowadays, but will get better after the exams are over for some people), and there are some guils events aswell with minigames.
How do you prepare for an event?
Well first of all i ask people if they want it or not. Nothing is a 'must', these events are only additional activities, worth to make only if there is enough motivation. For these events, i have made a storyline for those, who like the feeling of some kind of roleplay. With this story, participants know why they are doing what they are doing, and it is not just like a random task. The story alone can be interesting as well maybe, i dont know. >.> The storyline and the organization aswell as the required items, characters or rewards are made by me, sometimes with the help of a friendly guild mate. <3
What is the goal of organizing events like this and what do you do for it?
Three words: fun, fun and fun. :D Well there are some additional goals aswell. I am quite sure, when a player is leveling a character, his first goal is reaching lvl60 as soon as possible. The developers know that aswell, so nearly a year ago they nerfed a lot of monsters, quests, some areas were just deleted or the quest was deleted that used to send players to the area. (island of Dawn, Arcadia, BAMs, Dragonfall, Fane of Kaprima, BTHM, ACHM, etc.) Tho players can lvl up now extremely fast, this speed has some disadvantages aswell.
Tera world is beautiful.
I noticed the little details and things after a year of gameplay and i was amazed. My goal with the 'find the signs' events is to make my guildies go out into the world of tera, to travel a bit and not just do the same Bastion>WH,SF,KG>Bastion>KN>Habere>Vault>Kaiator>Bastion circles over and over again.
I am trying to place these events to the most beautiful parts of tera world. I always travel around the place myself before deciding to make an event there. I make sketches for the events on paper, find out the position and texts of signs and also travel around again to measure the time how long it could take. The story must also match the game environment, that is why i have to prepare for the event long before.
All in all, some days of work, some minutes of fun for guildies, totally worth it ofc. =)
Thanks for the questions, and i hope you agree with my points. Please leave a message, give a feedback or argue with me, if you feel like something is missing or you just have any other thoughts. :)
Thanks for reading, see you in game :)
-shadow-