How to create a successful guild

[Black sparrow]

What is this guide?
Certainly, it is hard to tell someone how to lead. So there will be no advice of this kind. There will be organization advice though. Especially some things that work on PG.

Why read MY guide?
I am not an expert but I have some experience. Plus, there are no similar guides!

Step 1: Determine what your guild philosophy is
You need to be able to explain to you and all the rest what your purpose as a guild is. The common philoshophies found in PG are:
Pirate Guild, Merchant Guild, Top guild and Training guild.

Top Guild
Since one needs time to become a top guild, we can say the most are aspiring guilds. Guilds that try their best to become the best.
These typically are guilds that are all arounders. They do everything. They won't hesitate to war with other guilds. They want profit, respect and power; they want it all.

Training Guild
These are guilds run by veterans who mostly look to train newcomers. Their success is often reviewed on active players produced. They are non-aggressive and avoid wars with other guilds.

Merchant Guilds
These guilds are mostly compromised by merchants that wish to protect their cargo and ships from thievery. Their primary interest is to maximize profit by increasing revenues but most importantly limiting losses.

Pirates Guild
Run by bloodthristy warmongers. They commonly target the Merchant Guilds but mostly everyone. Profit is not as important as their thirst for blood.

Other types
More types can obviously exist. I just bundled the most common ones.


Step 2: Determine rules

You will need to assemble some rules for your guild. The most important rules to define is what your guild will do in important events such as:

Rules of Engagement and Protection
These describe what your guild tolerates. There can be personal RoE but guild RoE is the best thing to form and have. Especially in PG, things can be very fluid so strict RoE's should be avoided unless you are looking for trouble. One thing is certain: You must keep your RoE at all cases or else your word will be without value.

Examples:
Will you allow solo vs solo? solo vs guild? Or you will protect your members at all cases? What happens if they are the aggressors?

An easy system you can use is the:
I attack you, I play by your rules.
You attack me, you play by my rules.

Here is an example RoE for starting guilds:
-Skirmishes are allowed
-Offensive voodoo are an act of WAR

War can be defined. You should name as WAR a timeframe of at least 24hours of pounding. At the end of the time, hostilities should end (any voodoo should not be canceled unless an agreement is reached). 24hours will work good when dealing with other guild members but they will not work well with Pirates. Deal with them on per case basis and according to how pestering they have been in the past. You should have resources (as a guild) to keep a pirate locked for at least 15 days.

Remember that you can have 2 RoEs, one for attacks on your guild and an internal one, to lead your mates on what is expected (or allowed) from them.

Recruitment Rules

You need to have a recruitment plan. Will your guild be invite only? Will you accept just any player? Will there be time,strength,type limits? How many members you plan to have?

There is no golden rule of a thumb here as different guild types have different needs. Recruiting newcomers works for all however. Inviting about 20 players per day will ensure that your guild will stay above 35 active members at all cases.

Activity Rules

You need to know how long you will wait before you kick someone inactive. Having a lot of inactive players in the guild is and looks bad so you should avoid it. A good policy is to kick out newcomers at 7 days and all the rest at 30. Unless they have warned you. Feeding on kicked members should be allowed for starter guilds.

Step 3: Get HELP

Now that you have defined your philosophy and rules, it is time to share your plan with someone else. You will need HELP to run a guild. Ideally, you should look for 2 more people and all three start the new guild. You should always be in the look for extra helping hands. Anyone who is loyal is always a good choice. Remember, anyone can turn inactive for a short time but the rest of the guild will keep up. So, you cannot rely on a single leader or even two.

Here are the most important things when running a guild:
-Training
No matter if you are a training guild or not, all new members will need training. The very least is to guide them on how the guild works. There should be someone to help them with this. Recruiters can play this role. Some guilds use mentors for newcomers and I hear it worked well. My personal experience is that is you go with a mentor system, you should always look for new mentors to keep continuation.
-Recruitment
Recruiting newcomers is something that every guild, regardless of type, can do with no risks. Just keep an eye on the numbers of players that are flocking in daily. The best is to keep an eye on last joined and invite everyone who has a few points of fame. Most guilds use a reward system for newcomers (ie 150K to 1M gc) that is advertised on their invitation.
-War Organization
You need to have war leaders. Do not start a guild unless at least one of you knows the basics of how to beat someone with voodoo. This certain someone should always take initiative and plan offensives against guild enemies. YOu must NOT rely to this person when you are on the defensive; The defense is best carried by those that are online on the time of the attack; Defense tactics that are announced in your guild pages work better than a war leader on the defense.
-Diplomacy
You need someone to conduct external affairs with other guilds and players. It is a very important part that is often neglected in PG.
-Ranks and promotions
These can pay out exceptionally well as they can act as an inside-tutorial. A hidden one. For example, tell them that you are going to promote them once they build their first 10 ships. The more thinking you put into promotions the better their effects will be.
-Communication
You need to keep communication active. A guild that no one talks to each other, is a failure.

Some advice
-Do NOT start a guild if you are clueless. Join an existing guild first.
-If you really want to START a guild FIRST, then make sure to be really active. Still, seek guides from existing guilds. Most will share them.
-Always follow your OWN rules, even if this means your DOOM.
-You can be destroyed at any time. So this is not really important. What really is important is to keep fighting.
-A guild that is not ready to fight to the end, should better disband now than later.
-Profit is not everything. But most will do everything for profit.
-The most important element of the guilds in PG, is communication. The second most important element, is protection.
-When protecting a guildmate, you should not value expenses. By the time you are in a position to help, you must do it.
-Taking members by the hand can be very beneficial when you are building a guild.


Remember, it's a game so take risks!
If you fail, just try again.

[Sebena]

Nice guide I like it

[Shadowood]

Nice job!

[Admiral Nelson]

Shall I do how to wreck a guild?

Both being the guild leader, and not?

[Dejanira]

Kudos

[Haron]

Nice post!

As always in posts with lots of advice, there is a point or two I disagree with, bur in general most of this seems like good ideas.

[Ralf27]

How much is the cost, and at what level, must a player have to create a guild?

[Meliva]

There is no cost to create a guild, nor is there any restriction. you could have just started playing 5 minutes ago and you can already make a guild. But like Black Sparrow said, best to join an existing one and at least learn some of the basics before doing so.
Honestly I think making some sort of cost for guilds would probably help keep new players from starting one unprepared. but that's a discussion for another topic.

[Ralf27]

ok, thank you, I thought there was some kind of level a player had to obtain first.

[J. price]

ok, thank you, I thought there was some kind of level a player had to obtain first.

there are no "levels" in pirates glory. it is a continuous flow of gold, influence, ships, and fame. people gain a lot and lose a lot constantly. people will be reduced from riches to nothing in a heartbeat. that is the joy of this game