When returning to the game there are a number of players that are finding themselves returning to a leaderless or completely abandoned guild. While it is possible to start a leaderless guild vote to elect a new leader from one of the officers, if the player is only a member there is no process to recover a guild. At this point the only recourse for them is to either pray that someone higher up in the guild structure will return to the game, or more likely just.. leave the guild and start over. This is really sad for people that want to recover the guild that they were a part of. My feedback is to allow the Customer Service team a process to pass leadership for a guild along to the most senior active person in the guild, regardless of officer status provided officers and leadership have been offline for more than a year. Personally, my guild has been inactive except for me for well over 4 years and it's just.. sad for me.
this same discussion was on the forum before, do to some miracle I was able to obtain leadership of the guild I was playing alone in for over 3 years, and I was not an officer. I guess I was lucky, I put in a ticket stating how long the guild was leaderless and ALL guild members got to vote for a new leader.
I don't mean this to be rude but I'm sure it will come off as rude. It isn't your guild. What right do you have to take control over it? The guild leader and officers are usually the one's who created and nurtured a guild. They leave and it's sad and all but why does that mean you should have their guild? I was a founder of my guild. When we all started leaving, we made every founder a leader that way if someone came back, they would have that option to keep the guild going. Sadly, I was the only one who came back and after over 12 years of me leveling and building the guild up solo, I finally removed the other members who had not logged on since before Guild Halls were created. As a founder and a guild leader, I had the right to the guild. If I had not, I would have joined another guild or created my own. I don't understand this it's my guild since I'm the only one left but I wasn't important enough to be even an officer. Once again, I apologize for the tone but that's how I feel on the subject.
I 100% understand this position. You do not have to apologize for taking that stance. Unfortunately, the leader of my guild hasn't logged in for over 5 years and did not grant trustee rights to others. He wasn't even the founder, but it was passed onto him (as I understood it.) As a 10-year member of the guild, I'm the currently the sole player keeping the fires burning. I don't have the trustee privileges but have just enough to squeak by and make use of things. I'm far too casual a player to leave the guild resources behind and attempt to recruit other players to start over. As it's currently set up, I'm quite comfortable with the crafting amenities and large cache of harvested items. Basically, I'm just running a crafting guild now, I guess. Really, it would just be nice to be able to move things around and make things more efficient. And it would be good to potentially add additional features to the guild hall, but I cannot do that. An abandoned clause would be nice. Say 5 years? Haha. It is what it is.
when I took over the gild years ago the leader and officers where notified and had a chance to take it back, I had a conversation with my former guild leader and she was ok with me taking over , as long as I did not kick anybody I too wanted to be able to decorate the guild hall and keep the guild name living on. I put stuff in the guild hall, and I invite all my unguilded toons I have on that server. As somebody with no rank I could not invite anybody. It's been 12 years now that the guild was abandoned and 9 years that I took it over
I can kinda see the point that Evilary is making though. This game is old enough now that if you really want, you can leave a guild, start your own (either with free alt accounts) or by asking in general chat. I did that and I was even an officer in my guild. Reasons? I got to name it whatever I wanted, I could decorate how I wanted, and I could have access to everything I would need. All one really needs to do is complete the Reign of Shadows timeline and such to level said guild. I have a couple alts in my old guild, but pretty much all my characters are in one I have made. (I even made two guilds, lol)
You failed to understand the point of this thread. These guilds have been abandoned by the leader/officer class, with *some* active players. If someone wants to continue the guild as it is, why shouldn't they be allowed to do it? Personally I think that that if, after being offline for xxx days and no officers has been offline for xxx days, open up the elect new leader to any active player. To be honest, if someone has not logged in for xxxx days, and you are logging in daily, it IS your guild, you just dont have leadership of it.
and it's not like the leader and officers don't get notified and the whole thing comes across like a hostile takeover, every guild member get's a message that the guild has been found leaderless and that they get one week to elect a new leader.
I get your point to some degree. That said, what really is under discussion here (in my opinion), is what constitutes a 'guild.' You need 6 people to start a guild in this game, not one person. And guilds are typically "built" by a lot of people over time. When "leaders and officers" elect to check out of their guild and are gone for years and expect to return like nothing happened with a "this is all mine," is where the problem begins. As guild leaders and officers, you abandoned the guild and its membership--essentially saying "I don't care about any of this any more." In my view, you abandoned your guild and "your rights" in doing so. Those all became forfeit. The remaining guild members have two choices--leave that guild or stay and keep building on to the new one. There are mechanics in place for doing either. If a group of people care enough to stay and keep the fires of that guild burning, then they have earned the rights to run it as leaders, officers, and members. I know some will disagree with this perspective and that's fine. My point of view and experience is that being a leader is about who you are, not the position you hold. It's the difference between leaders and managers, but that's a whole different discussion. What I'd be curious about is the status of guilds who have no active members. Do they sit there sucking up server resources forever or do they eventually disappear from the game after a period of time.
Most people that want to take over a guild, want it because of either the guild level, the amenities like guild hall, or a combination of both. In some cases, the person in question put a lot of work into the level of the guild. But in other cases, the guild was built and established before the player came along. It probably isn't in all cases but it feels like a "I want something I haven't earned because someone else isn't using it" argument. The game gives you the tools to make multiple leaders, multiple officers, and you can even log in for free if you wanted to transfer control. I could see them making it a little easier by putting a button in the guild window to send an email to leaders that have been gone a while to request guild transfer. That would automate things and make it easier on the support team and a faster way to try to get guild control if the leaders are ok with it. I came back in July from a 5 year or so absence. I honestly would have liked to have come back sooner but there were issues that kept me away. I was a leader in my guild when I left and honestly, I expected to still be when I came back. I put the work into the guild from day one. I spent countless hours building the guild to the point it was at. Would I have come back and my guild been gone, I would have just left again. FFXIV lost me when they took my home. WoW lost me when they took my levels. I am an old school gamer who feels your time should not be taken away from you. On the other side, since July, I have managed to go from the mid 60's to around 130 in guild level so to me it seems starting over would be faster than waiting to hear back from a guild leadership on if you can have the old guild. I would like for them to relax or remove the 6 man restriction on creating a guild. If anyone asks in general for help creating a guild, I will jump to an alt and offer to sign and maybe stay a few days and help with a few starter levels if they wish.
If you abandoned you guild, and left members to fend for themselves, you should lose it. If you're expecting to leave the game for an extended period of time you should remove everyone. It's your responsibility. There needs to be a /voteleader for regular members. If the guild leader has been AWOL for 1+ years the assumption should be that they're never returning. Daybreak needs to reconsider its position on this. Guilds are made by many people, not just the leader. However, the leader should at least get an email notification that a vote has begun. Give them 7 days to log in and rectify the issue. How many guild leaders died to C19? 1.2 million Americans have died so far. And that's just the US. We are the survivors. It's time for Daybreak to recognize this and pivot its policy.
I think a voting policy would be good, like ZUES said. I can also understand the nostalgia thing. Honestly, I agree with the idea that a guild isn't really yours if you abandon it, but the thing is, they made it easy to get status in the game now (thank god, I hated doing HQ after HQ) and timelines, etc for levels. So I can see both sides. But yes, send an email or something like a year after to the leaders/officers of the guild. I would say not so much "take the guild away" from the original leaders, but maybe send an email and say, "This person will be made a leader along with you," or something like that. That way, leaders still keep their position and the active members get access to what they need to as well.
Zues, I just said about 4 posts up there is an election taking place and everybody in guild get's a message announcing it
Frankly, if I'm the leader of a guild and decide to take a break, it's still my guild. I don't care how long I'm gone. If I wanted to appoint a caretaker, I would have. If the leader didn't make you an officer, then it's not your guild. If I come back from a break and find that someone has stolen my guild, I'd be pissed. If I spent my time and my money to build the guild and you don't like how long I've been gone, then you're free to leave and go somewhere else. You don't get to vote to justify stealing from me.
You still don't get it, do you? We are talking about guilds that are dead (or almost dead). Where the active player/players have been abandoned by the leadership of the guild. All they want is the ability to run the guild, pay upkeep etc for the guildhall (if they have one). I took control over a guild where I was (fortunatly) officer in, and kept the old leadership in leader/officer capacity. I never kicked them. I just wanted to keep it going, purerly for nostalgia. Not to mention I accidently leveled the guild from 30 to 100. Hell, I had a short break from 2013 to 2023 and I did NOT expect to still be officer in that guild, I was surprised I wasnt kicked. Nor would I have expected to be leader of a guild I founded with that long of a break.
No. You don't get it. What you're describing is the way the system is supposed to work. You were an officer and there is a mechanism for officers to become leaders. Others in this thread are talking about random members being able to vote themselves into that position. If the leader of the guild didn't make someone an officer, that's the end of the story. My guild is my guild and my guild hall is filled with rare items and decorations from buying premium versions of expansions. I bought my guild hall with real money because that's the way prestige guild halls work. You don't have any right to steal from me no matter how long I'm gone.
Which is exactly why I made my own guild and have no one but me in it. The thing is, an actual guild like everyone here is saying, requires more than one person. EQ2 is luckily the kind of game where I can do that kind of thing, but when you decide to have more than just yourself in the guild, you run the risk of having foul play. Prestige stuff or not.
