Running a guild is very hard work. Make sure you have some trusted officers to delegate to or you'll burn out fast and end up quitting.
I'm not guilded in WoW, but some of the stuff we used to do for light relief in Everquest was:
- set up buff stations in newbie zones (less useful in WoW but still..)
- treasure hunts - make sure they don't just buy things!
- naked L1 gnome races across dangerous terrain, bragging rights and a cookie for the winner
- guild-run quests for new applicants (that was fun.. macroing the responses, organising some basic kit and a little cash for rewards, other guildies helping the applicant along a bit if our directions were a bit obscure.. parking highlevels as "NPCs" in the bottom of newbie dungeons and stuff...)
- hide and seek, hide the officers in various places with some worthless tokens to hand out, first to get back with (say) five tokens gets bragging rights
- same-race noob nights (eg everyone create a dwarf, no twinking, rampage!)
- don't use large monetary/high end kit rewards, or people will cheat. Yes, they will. And there will be tears before bedtime.
Not sure how well this stuff would translate to WoW which works very differently and has a different demographic. Get the guild involved with thinking up ideas (one of our problems was always that everyone would apparently look to us - there would be loads of people log in and sit around saying "So what are we doing tonight") You will probably also find that it'll be the same small group that participate every time, and nobody else will care, so make sure YOU have fun with it or you'll feel grumbly and resentful.
As far as end-game raiding, we never used DKP but kept track of who'd had what, who'd contributed what in terms of time and attendance, and handed out raid rewards accordingly. This will not work with a group that aren't already familiar and trust each other, or with a very large guild. Officers have to be ruthlessly fair as well. Whatever rules you choose, ensure everyone is clear on them and then stick to them without exception.
The thing that seems to do most for guild spirit is to have lots of lively guild chat, lots of in jokes, always acknowledge another guildmate you bump into with a /wave or a cookie, always help out, encourage others to do the same. Get shot of the freeloaders and leeches. Organise real life meets, if you can, if there are enough folk within reasonable striking distance. Have everyone turn up in a white hat, or something, to aid recognition and break down shyness barriers - or get some tshirts printed up with a suitable guild slogan.
Feel free to PM me if you like! |
