The Guild Hall Feedback Thread

[Mikkahl]

Rothgar wrote:

Pheep@Unrest wrote:

I've a question and I really hope it won't get lost...well, actually two...Selling out of the guild hall, can that be done?  Using it as a central place for all members who broker items?

Currently I don't beleive you will be able to sell from a guild hall like you can with a player house.  I beleive the sales crates are flagged as player-house only.

Well, if we can't sell from the guild hall, then what are the 2 brokers for, particularly the intra-guild broker?

[Kurindor_Mythecnea]

Felaris@Kithicor wrote:

Rothgar wrote:

The harvesting supply depot is a new type of container. You can drop items into it and they will automatically stack with similar items. It will work similar to selling on the broker window although there are no crates or slots, just a window that you drag items to. Buttons at the bottom will allow you to remove an item, remove quantity or remove a whole stack. Currently you'll only be able to store harvestables in it, but its been designed to be more flexible so we might use it in the future for other features. Jindrack would be the one who would set the limitations on it, like how many items it can hold so I can't answer that.

Sounds awesome We currently use 2 of our 4 guild bank accounts for a simillar purpose but its a pain to administer and set useful access limits on. Will the depot come with any kind of withdrawal limit system or could one person just go in an grab everything? And while we're one the subject of amenity descriptions, is there any chance you could tell us what a Commodities Exporter Hireling does?

Purty sure a CEH (Commodities Exporter Hireling) is for selling trash items to. Nonetheless, I'm sure if they implement permissions appropriately, that the Harvesting Supply Depot will be adequately accomodated! n_n

[feldon30]

Malcor@The Bazaar wrote:

I can imagine when Rothgar came home from Fanfair. Tired but still charged up, he logs into the forums he sees the discussion of the Guild Halls in full swing. Like a wildfire uncontrolled. He even posts that he is back and has barely scratched the surface of reading ever growing mass of posts made on the thread. I can imagine at first he was, "Jumping Lucan on a pogostick!!!". A little ding to the personal pride of the Dev's for what they thought was a job well done. Because I am sure like anyone else who takes pride in their work, the Dev's probably had cussed and discussed every single one of these issues during the "creation process" in making these Guild Halls for the community of Norrath.

They knew there would be some concerns. Why would they have whipped up that survey with questions about the cost of the guild hall, amenities, and upkeep of both? I don't think they expected the unanimous howling chorus of "holy *!@$%#@ crap!", "you've gotta be kidding!" and assorted comments though. The upfront price change was right in line in my opinion. The initial status cost on amenities is a bit steep still. The weekly cost is going to hurt but we'll manage. I have no problem with writs. My problem is the 40-50 million status it's going to take to start out is going to drain all our reserves. We won't be able to "rest on our laurels" at all. We'll have to start doing writs almost immediately.

[Lodrelhai]

To those talking about rallying the guild for the meager upkeep with group writs, instances, etc (and yes, I am including the devs), you seem to think that we do not already have some experience with this.  That this is a new and novel concept.It is not.My guild used to have a weekly writ day.  Every Friday, we'd log on together, everyone'd have a char of the same tier and alignment, and we would grind writs.  I think we maintained it for two months before it completely fell apart, but the first hiccups were happening in the first few weeks.  People's work schedules interfered.  People's personal lives interfered.  This week one person couldn't make it, next week another couldn't.  Two weeks later four of us were gone for a conference.  And god knows we got bored of those writs in a hurry, which really cut down on the motivation to show up.  As an occational rally, yes, we can talk to everyone, schedule a day, and grind our little hearts out for a goal, but maintaining a weekly schedule of such is impossible.So we gave up on the guld writ days.  People could solo writs, so we left that to individuals as their time allowed.  However, we still wanted to do things together, so we'd have a weekly guild day.  Everyone show up and we'll group!  Do HQs, hit the instances, accomplish a few goals.  These went worse.  People logged on.  What shall we do?  How about this HQ on our alts?  No, not that AGAIN, we've already done it three times each.  Hrm, this quest line?  Or how about this instance, I think we're high enoug to take it now?  Something was decided and we gathered.  Wait, soandso has to go afk.  Okay, they're back.  Get a little distance - whoops, sorry, kid needs a ride someplace, back in a half-hour.  Okay, the rest of us proceed if we can, or mess with other stuff if we can't.  Someone else needs to get dinner in the oven.  Another guildie just logged on, he had to work late, where is everyone?  Oh, he's got that quest but isn't as far in it, let's backtrack a bit to catch him up.  Get some more progress done - sorry folks, but it's 2am in the UK and our Brits need to get some sleep.  Shall we finish up tomorrow?  No, wait, soandso's taking her kids to grandma's and this other person has weekend courses, that's why we didn't schedule guild day for tomorrow in the first place.At least when it was writ day, we could just leave the folks who went afk out of a round and add in new folks incoming as they showed up.  Except that they were dull and repetitive and no one wanted to do them anymore.We still have guild day.  Everyone logs on as they can.  We'll gather together for small projects - help this person level, get that person through this quest line.  Or we'll solo and talk in guild chat and just enjoy the company.  We keep goals simple, and instead of trying one big zone and failing, we'll accomplish a dozen little tasks each.  Some people are on all day and some only a couple hours, but we all get to do stuff and have fun doing it.This is the reality of the small guild.Can we rally the troops together, get everyone online at once, and accomplish one or two major goals in a single sitting?  Absolutely, but it can take weeks to agree on the objectives, coordinate the schedules, and get everyone their prerequisites, and one unexpected event can derail the whole thing.  And when I say major goals I mean things like running Unrest (still haven't managed it), or Karnor's (same) or class hats (nothing here), or Blackscale (managed it twice), or most HQs (we have the most success here, managing as many as 4-6 people completing 2-3 of them in a day - but we can't do them repeatedly to maintain the guld hall, as they are once-per-toon).So here we fall back on writs which, while often dull, are soloable and repeatable and steady status income.  Sometimes that coordinated event we schedule is still a writ-grind in order to ding the next guild level.  But even writs are done in fits and spurts, and yes, many of us have regularly had one or more of our characters locked out of their houses for weeks because we didn't have the status/coin to pay the rent and joining up for a two-three person group to play in whatever zone was higher priority than grinding writs in their limited play time.  And this is not a problem when it is a person's home, because it only affects that person.  In a guild hall it affects the whole guild, because others must either fill the gap or go without.I think you also underestimate the administrative headache of not only getting the upkeep, but getting it into the guild escrow.  We already have guild dues.  We've had them for over a year, saving coin to pay for guild heraldry upgrade and the guild hall (see, we weren't expecting it to be free).  And getting people to pay it is an exercise in frustration - not because they're unwilling, our guildmates have always been very generous.  Just because it's not automated.  There's no reminders unless I or the guild leader send them.  And when we do it's "oh right, I'll get that next time I'm at the bank" - which could be another day or two, or another week if the reminder being responded to is rl email as opposed to in-game.  And if they don't/can't pay their dues?  Their penalty is a loss of privelidges to themselves - privelidges they're not using anyway obviously, or they would have remembered to pay their guild dues when they tried to pull something out of the guild bank and couldn't.  But again, this only affects the person not paying the dues, because this is a savings, and if they have to wait a week or three before they can turn it in, we know they're good for it because they always pay eventually.  But when this is the state of the guild hall, a single person's absense/delay of payment affects the whole guild.  Or more likely, affects the next officer who tries to go to the guild hall and finds the rent past-due and the escrow insufficient.My guild's main goal in a guild hall is a tradeskill hall, because we are all crafters.  We want a place we can gather together, make things for each other, share harvests if one person's short - someplace we can all get to easily and enjoy some time together.  Secondary desires are a place to quickly and easily rally for the days we do manage to gather everyone up for a big goal run, and someplace for our rabid decorators to go nuts and let the whole guild enjoy their work.  We are willing to work our tails off to obtain the amenities that will make this possible.But make no mistake, the maintenance of the hall and those amenities is going to be difficult, time-consuming, and in the end fall squarely on the shoulders of the guild administration, who will likely end up footing most of it themselves rather than harping on our guildmates every time they make it on for an hour or so for their share of the cost.Give us something we can work towards.  Give us something we can accomplish.  But please, don't give us something we have to constantly maintain, that makes everyone pay the penalty when a few can't keep up their end, that will result in frustration and ill will and less, rather than more, desire to sign on.

[Chickenlady]

Kendricke wrote:

You don't have to keep working at it. If the total cost of amenities you want cost around 6 million status, just donate 12 million status right up front...and you just covered the first TWO YEARS of status upkeep. Seriously, if your guild is level 80, that amount of status should be nothing at all to worry about (since it takes FAR more than that to get to level 80 in the first place).

If it's the platinum costs, that's even easier to deal with. For one thing, you don't NEED 30 amenities in a Tier 3 guild hall. Pick the top 5-10 amenities you want and a Tier 2 guild hall, and you're only talking about 2-4pp per week upkeep at worst. So, just dump another 100pp or so into the escrow account up front and you just covered a couple of years worth of upkeep.

Honestly, it's not nearly as hard to acquire platinum as some people seem to think it is. Even without raiding, I'm pulling in 2-20 platinum per week on average between my characters without ever counting a single coin or drop from raiding. Just soloing in Jarsath Wastes or Kunzar Jungle, I typically pick up enough trash to make 40-140 gold every few hours (and that's without metal chests).

Really, instead of looking at how "impossible" this may seem, start breaking down the numbers to realize it's not nearly as difficult as some people are saying it is.

Use the calculator we have up at www.clockworkgamer.com to come up with some numbers for the barest necessities you want and work out a plan that works for your guild.

oh so glib to just say "just donate 12 million status" when people are scrabbling to find the intitial status cost for the amenities and are also worried about asking their guildies to donate regular amounts to the upkeep too (thus grinding writs when they won't be leveling the guild and/or possibly themselves too) - yes in some guilds who have exactly the same members who have taken them from 0-80 there is plenty of status available to be donated, but some guilds don't even have the same membership that they had 4 odd years ago when the guild was founded - I know mine doesn't - the vast majority of regular players in my guild have joined within the last 6-12 months....  some of us just don't HAVE the status to be able  to contribute to 12 million in the escrow.... but we have still worked and contributed towards our guild hitting 80 - some of us have worked our socks off getting the plat we need to buy a guild hall, and yet we may well still fall short on the status contribution.  Is it our fault some of our founding fathers left who had far higher status than we do?? NO!  so why penalise those who are working their [Removed for Content] off to make their guild great but didn't join the game 4 yrs ago? (BTW I joined 2 days after release, but I am a very casual player - family pressures and that sort of thing - my children are more important to me than moving pixels round on a screen and also this is not the first guild I have been in - I left my first and moved to this one when I changed servers after I emigrated)the plat cost worries me far less than the  initial status cos of buying the very basic ameneties we will need (such as the beacon to allow guild members to call to the hall as we are planning a T2 house and have members norrath wide) - it is the initial status cost combined with the crushing repeat weekly upkeep costs that will be a real killer.

[Valirmon]

Rothgar wrote:

Filraen@Najena wrote:

But six months down the line, will it have helped the game or hurt it?  Will people still be eager to log in and do the maintenance?   If the answer is "no," it will be too late.  The damage will have been done.  EQ2 will have become less fun, and maybe people won't even quite realize why.  They just won't play as much.  And that hurts the game.

Lets worry about "six months down the line", six months down the line.   Most of us that were around when EQII first went live remember what it was like when we finally amassed enough silver that we could combine it into... OMG... A GOLD COIN!  Anyone else remember that feeling?  =)The thought of maintaining a 5-room house back then at 20g per week seemed impossible, and for a long time no one had a 5-room house.  Nowadays, people have 5-room houses on all of their alts.Speculating what things will be like six months from now when you have no idea what we have planned won't get you very far.  Have some faith in us instead of convicting us before guild halls are even live. 

This is only because the costs of the 5 room houses were reduced considerably because those initial estimates were insane - like now.

Guild status decay looked like a good idea on paper, too...  Tedium does not equate to fun.

I am surprised at some of the support these costs are getting, especially from the devs.  The raiders and grinders I understand; the "I want the best to the exclusion of everyone else" mindset has come to be expected, but why ask for feedback if it's perceived as being "convicted"?  Of course the prices are too high.

EDIT to add that you absolutely rock, Tock.  You nail it with every post.

[Lady Shai]

Mikkahl wrote:

Rothgar wrote:

Pheep@Unrest wrote:

I've a question and I really hope it won't get lost...well, actually two...Selling out of the guild hall, can that be done?  Using it as a central place for all members who broker items?

Currently I don't beleive you will be able to sell from a guild hall like you can with a player house.  I beleive the sales crates are flagged as player-house only.

Well, if we can't sell from the guild hall, then what are the 2 brokers for, particularly the intra-guild broker?

My understanding is that the 2 brokers are as follows :

1) the intra-guild broker is to ONLY sell to the guildies..people can add stuff they wish to sell , ie repair kits, potions etc that they normally would put into a guild bank tab and ask people to leave moneys for etc so only guildmembers can put in and only guildies can purchase. I assume the moneys go to people who put stuff in or to escrow but not sure there

2) the other broker is a WORLD broker...just like a normal one so people can buy and sell from the character. (in other words keep your house and sell from there...but you can add stuff and pick up moneys just like a normal broker.

If I am wrong someone please correct me....

[Barq Bandit]

Lodrelhai - Very well well written post. I agree wholeheartedly. You've described the reality beyond the numbers, what it's actually like for a small family guild. Devs, if you skipped this post, go back and read it carefully. Lodrelhai's really shed some light on things you should keep in mind about the lives of the players you're asking this much plat and status from on a weekly basis for the guildhall they'll have access to. Even getting a small or medium guildhall could be prohibitively expensive if they get all the amenities they want and have to struggle to keep them active. What if a guild can only choose far fewer than they would otherwise because of the recurring cost? Who decides which ones they'll get and which ones they'll do without? Can't you see how this would cause arguements and frustration?Tajhia - Also very good points! A guild who makes it to 80 is almost always not going to have in it's membership the members who generated the vast bulk of status that got the guild there. Everyone feels a great accomplishment for having gotten the guild there, but everyone understands that they're standing on the shoulders of every writ grinder, etc. that came before. Devs, keep this in mind. Not every guild that reaches 70 is going to have huge reserves of status and plat amongst it's current members. Gamers move on. Take extended breaks, etc. But if the leadership of a guild approves of the newer members enough to invite them into the already successful guild, don't they deserve to keep a large guildhall if they can swing the purchase price together?Klumpp - I'll say the same about your posts too.  Your posts really ring true with me.  I find myself nodding in agreement with every word.

[Chickenlady]

Rothgar wrote:

Pheep@Unrest wrote:

I've a question and I really hope it won't get lost...well, actually two...The harvesting depot...how large is it?  Max capacity?  Infinite capacity?  Will we need oodles of boxes for it?Selling out of the guild hall, can that be done?  Using it as a central place for all members who broker items?

The harvesting supply depot is a new type of container.  You can drop items into it and they will automatically stack with similar items.  It will work similar to selling on the broker window although there are no crates or slots, just a window that you drag items to.  Buttons at the bottom will allow you to remove an item, remove quantity or remove a whole stack.  Currently you'll only be able to store harvestables in it, but its been designed to be more flexible so we might use it in the future for other features.  Jindrack would be the one who would set the limitations on it, like how many items it can hold so I can't answer that.Currently I don't beleive you will be able to sell from a guild hall like you can with a player house.  I beleive the sales crates are flagged as player-house only.

OK the harvesting Depot - please, please, please allow some sort of function for it to sort the raw materials by tiers (maybe separate tabs/boxes within for each teir)  if you don't it will get entirely too confusing with everything mixed up together - if you have to scroll through stacks of mixed items from every tier it could take ages to find what you want!Also, if you can't sell from a guild hall like a player house what is the point of having the world broker amenity for guild housing?  it would be far cheaper all round just to maintain your house and keep your sales boxes there......  otherwise, if you have to log into your house to maintain your sales, you might as well deal with them there or visit the broker in town.

[Mikkahl]

Lady Shai wrote:

My understanding is that the 2 brokers are as follows :

1) the intra-guild broker is to ONLY sell to the guildies..people can add stuff they wish to sell , ie repair kits, potions etc that they normally would put into a guild bank tab and ask people to leave moneys for etc so only guildmembers can put in and only guildies can purchase. I assume the moneys go to people who put stuff in or to escrow but not sure there

2) the other broker is a WORLD broker...just like a normal one so people can buy and sell from the character. (in other words keep your house and sell from there...but you can add stuff and pick up moneys just like a normal broker.

If I am wrong someone please correct me....

So if the world broker is just like a broker in town, then if you click the Sell tab you WILL be dealing with the sales crates in your own house, wherever that is.

But for the intra-guild broker, where is the storage for the stuff we are putting up for sale to our guildies?  Is this broker going to have built-in the same "bottomless" storage that they are talking about for the supply depot?

[Barq Bandit]

My intuition tells me the world broker would be like any other broker except that opposite-alignment purchases would not carry an additional markup fee.  So, a Qeynosian could buy from a Freeport, Neriak, or Gorowyn character and only pay the standard 10-20% fee instead of 20-40% like a Qeynosian broker would charge for those purchases.

[Mikkahl]

And I thought that one of the advantages of having the crafting tables bought as amenities, is that they would automatically draw materials directly from the supply depot.  Now that they have eliminated those amenity tables, will our own purchased tables somehow magically connect to the supply depot, once they are placed in the guild hall?  Then, when we hover over a recipe, it should show us the entire quantity of each needed raw that is in the supply depot!

[Kendricke]

feldon30 wrote:

They knew there would be some concerns. Why would they have whipped up that survey with questions about the cost of the guild hall, amenities, and upkeep of both? I don't think they expected the unanimous howling chorus of "holy *!@$%#@ crap!", "you've gotta be kidding!" and assorted comments though.

Careful when you use words like "unanimous".  Where I was sitting, we didn't hear the same.  To be honest, most of the people around me marked the prices as fine.  I know I marked the guild levels as too low (I'd have preferred 40, 60, 80).

[Bratface]

Kendricke wrote:

feldon30 wrote:

They knew there would be some concerns. Why would they have whipped up that survey with questions about the cost of the guild hall, amenities, and upkeep of both? I don't think they expected the unanimous howling chorus of "holy *!@$%#@ crap!", "you've gotta be kidding!" and assorted comments though.

Careful when you use words like "unanimous".  Where I was sitting, we didn't hear the same.  To be honest, most of the people around me marked the prices as fine.  I know I marked the guild levels as too low (I'd have preferred 40, 60, 80).

Now that is funny cause every single person I have spoken to that was there says the same thing as Feldon./ponder

[Qandor]

Everyday when I run around Norath I cannot go 30 feet without tripping over Lady this and Baron that. It is surprising how many actually bought these tiltles and yet now we have all the Lords and Ladys crying poverty.  We have folks telling us that they didn't get the guild to 80, other people did who no longer play. Well maybe those other people deserve the guild hall and since they are no longer here - oh well. If you have been riding on the backs of the faithfully departed all this time perhaps it is time to suck it up and actually earn what you want. The faithfully departed are no longer here to earn it for you. This is probably the best argument ever to include upkeep so that those benefiting from the guild hall are the ones who actually have to pay the freight in the future and not have it grandfathered on someone elses efforts. I'm beginning to think the devs had it right when there was guild level decay. Maybe when those guild levels dropped when the hard workers left, some people would have gotten the notion that they actually had to go out and do something.

For those who view any type of effort as a second job, the answer simple. Do not get a guild hall. Problem solved.

[Kendricke]

Bratface wrote:

Kendricke wrote:

feldon30 wrote:

They knew there would be some concerns. Why would they have whipped up that survey with questions about the cost of the guild hall, amenities, and upkeep of both? I don't think they expected the unanimous howling chorus of "holy *!@$%#@ crap!", "you've gotta be kidding!" and assorted comments though.

Careful when you use words like "unanimous".  Where I was sitting, we didn't hear the same.  To be honest, most of the people around me marked the prices as fine.  I know I marked the guild levels as too low (I'd have preferred 40, 60, 80).

Now that is funny cause every single person I have spoken to that was there says the same thing as Feldon./ponder

I had 13 guildmates in the room with me, and we were speaking with members of at least three other guilds that had brought 6+ members, as well as several other unguilded players.  Frankly, I'm not going to get into an argument about what was said at a panel that I was at that you were apparently not.  The fact remains that words such as "unanimous" are false, since it indicates a complete and utter adherence to one opinion or the other - and the fact that ANYONE who was there says otherwise immediately disproves the "unanimous" aspect of the statement.  In other words, I could be the ONLY person disagreeing with Feldon's point of view, and that's still enough to invalidate any claim of "unanimous howling chorus". 

I could get into more detail in other ways the argument fails (probably by showing how he's utilizing an Appeal to Popularity fallacy), but hopefully you get the point I'm making without that being necessary.

[Kurindor_Mythecnea]

One thing forgotten in my recap... Jindrack wrote:

We are not really high on the idea of implementing a tax system for guilds. We want escrow deposits to be voluntary where the system and game are concerned. We have talked about a "dues" tracker where the guild leader can set a visual marker that says how much is due and who has paid dues that week, but enforcement of that payment would be up to you, not the system to collect. This idea, if we went ahead with it, would come later after guild halls have gone live.

· Include the guild dues system to monitor and set either objectives or requirements for guild status contribution  A. Ensure a tab for modified permissions is also added, to penalize or reward those who succeed or fail in the endeavor of communal sustenance    I. Tab 1 -> "Dues"      - Aim: XX,XXX Status every "Week/Month" (drop-down with tier-specific categorization included if the option is checked, default disables tier-specific definition)      - Submitted: XX,XXX Status (shows personal donation)      - Remaining: XX,XXX Status (shows amount left to fulfill dues objective)      - Fulfilled Guildies (with drop-down to see those who have fulfilled the specified benchmark and how much they've granted, automatically divided into the relative tiers if such an option is enabled)      - Remaining Guildies (with drop-down to see how much each guildy has added to the escrow, automatically divided into the relative tiers if such an option is enabled)      - Option to disable the "Dues" feature      - Option to enable exclusive "Benefactor" permissions (guild rank specific values included)      - Option to enable specialized "Bystander" treatment (guild rank specific values included)      - Default disables dues and "Benefactor"/"Bystander" optioning      - Option to elect for tier-specific dues    II. Tab 2 -> "Benefactors" (subset in "Dues" )      - Duplication of the typical amenities permission tab for exclusive treatment of donators    III. Tab 3 -> "Bystanders" (subset in "Dues" )      - Replication of the typical amenities permission tab to give a specialized response for those unable to "adequately" aidI also advocate splitting the Harvesting Supply Depot into tabs for the multiple tiers. Anywho, good enough that alll of this thread's content is in a magically delicious, bulleted format on this and the 42nd page! It is also recommended that amenities permissions and the dues tab exist on tabs in the typical guild menu ("u" ), as accessing and modifying this while adventuring on the fly will help for when a particular guildy deserves one-time grace usage.Remembering the need for widescale accomodation is a must, as highlighting the significance of customization is a plus that always appeals to administration and even the individual. Though taxing hasn't been considered in a positive light, giving guildies the option to comply with a 10% personal status tax is the avenue beckoned for complexity, compromise, and choice, as mentioned in my retrospective evaluation on the 42nd page.I would suggest allowing tier-specific objectives for escrow dues, but that might be off-putting on terms of "all those drop-down menus" (you know, the little plus signs that expand into full lists, turning into minus signs to contract). In my opinion, it would be more than acceptable as another welcome aspect of modulation. Relative to that, all that would be required is making the "Aim", "Fulfilled Guildies", and "Remaining Guildies" have drop downs that automatically separate by tier.It may seem like I'm trying to levy for pet projects and their implementation, but keep in mind what I've addressed has only been done to fully accomodate as many as possible, with no burdens to those but the developers. lol. Well, unless we have those overachievers as coders, in which case it would be their pleasure to tool a service to as great and amiable a depth as possible!

[Barq Bandit]

I've used excessive kitty-smilies in this post to attempt to lighten the mood a bit, keep things friendly, and to also attempt to make up for the length of this post. I'm not even sure it'll all fit in one go... So be warned! Kitties incoming! OMG, take cover! They're everywhere!As I've mentioned earlier in this thread, I've never really gotten the concept of upkeep. Forget about simulation of RL factors. Upkeep isn't really upkeep anyway. If I don't pay upkeep on my house, the only result is that the door is locked and I can't get in. The grass doesn't grow into a jungle out in front of my house. The windows don't break and fall into disrepair. There is no infestation of pests. I'm talking from a pure gameplay perspective. How does paying a chunk of coin every week for something I supposedly already earned access to and purchased make the game more fun for me personally?    ?Answer: it doesn't. Not one jot.Never once, in all the years I've been playing Everquest 2, have I ever paid the rent on my houses and grinned with joy at having done so. Never once have I paid the rent on all five of the five-room homes I keep open for various purposes (guild's tavern, two crafted house item display galleries, a storage warehouse for extra house items, and my Provie's eatery) and said to myself, "YEAH! Another week of being able to step into my digs and use them and stuff! Woohoo! OMG! /cheer o/"Show of hands of any players who've actually had this experience.*crickets chirp*...Yeah, I thought so. Truth is, if we didn't have the upkeep facet of the game... my gamplay experience wouldn't really change at all except for having a bit more coin each week. And that's about it. It has zero impact on the fun factor.Upkeep's purpose is, I suppose, just to take coin out of the server's economy. And that's fine for individuals. But when you ask it of an entire guild... it then transforms from a personal choice I can make from week to week, into an obligation that my online friends expect me to fulfill, and worse yet, one I'll be expecting them to fulfill.Choice. Obligation. Which one sounds more like a buzzkill to you? I bet I know... : ) I, along with many of the other posters in this thread, forsee the chore of keeping up with weekly upkeep (and it's kinda funny that's it's called upkeep, since that's exactly what so many will be struggling to do: keep up) causing arguements, frustration, hurt feelings, broken friendships, folks disbanding from the guilds they'd otherwise be happy with, and more. I think that the reason why some folks are saying they're happy with the upkeep prices comes from the desire to have the "expensive sports car" experience. They want to have the expensive toys that they know not everyone can afford, regardless of having access to them or not. They want to feel *special* amongst other players in other guilds. Who's that fun for? Them. Sure. I really wouldn't call it fun, actually. It's more like a sense of satisfaction and feeling special.And I so get it. I've enjoyed feeling special, too. It's a thrill! It's about having that Master I pet that's so hard to find and costs 400p if you've managed to catch it on the broker at all! Awesome! It's about having the neato LoN mount or effect showing on your character when almost no one else has it because it's so rare and no one's willing to sell it for less than $120 worth of booster packs! Sweet! It's about having your mythical epic weapon and enjoying the feeling of random players stopping in their tracks to check out you and your freakin' awesome sword/bow/scepter with the moving parts and neato particle effect! /strutI can see the thrill in that, and that's great for individuals. And I understand it. However...Which sort of fun - on the scale of entire guilds - would you, the developers, like to promote more in your game?It's a simple choice between two kinds:A.) We have cool toys, and it's even so much better because those other guilds over there don't. We're so awesome compared to that bunch of newbs. *smug grins to each other*

or...B.) We have cool toys, and it's so great because we worked long and hard between the few of us and managed it after all. Yay us! *enthusiastic friendly grins all around*

- I love you guys...

Of course, I'm not saying that all players who are happy with high-upkeep prices as they are are smug elitists or anything... Come on, you guys. You know I'm not like that......It's only most of them! *badda [Removed for Content]!* *audience laughs*Heh. Seriously, though. I think you get my point. If you want to encourage the sort of fun in this game that gets players to willingly colaborate on a huge project, great! But anything heavy after that? That's not fun. The guys that can afford it? They're not going to be paying that upkeep and obtaining fun from that. They're going to be obtaining satisfaction from knowning that some of the smaller guilds of equal level cannot pay what they pay on a weekly basis. There's a big difference.And that just doesn't seem to make the vast majority of players smile in anticipation. If guild populations are a concern, minimum active accounts sounds like a much more reasonable way of heavily discouraging single players from attempting to use guildhalls as their personal uber homes than unreasonably taxing the often limited playtimes of players who just don't usually generate the amounts of coin and status you're asking of them on a weekly basis for what they're obviously going to want to get along with their guild. If you make a large guildhall something every guild, regardless of population, can look forward to eventually obtaining after much work and effort, and then feel free to enjoy from that moment onwards, and I guarantee you that the ecstatic smaller, high-level guild players will vastly outnumber the mildly irked uber plat-farming, awesome raid-mob takedown-machine guild players by droves and droves.*imagines*They are the few, the elite. It's all a drop in a bucket for them. That's their advantage. That's their benefit. Awesome island fortress with every single option they want? No sweat. Done. They had all the coin and status ready to spend months ago, and got everything they wanted the moment guildhalls went live. Being one of the first guilds to have all the cool tools and toys is a great source of satisfaction and pride for them.We are many, and care more about the smaller things in our gaming lives. We're slow to achieve, but eventually, we get there after lots of work, each of us in our own ways, contributing, pooling, helping each other out. We take the slow road. Awesome island fortress with every single option we want? It's going to take a lot of sweat (though hopefully not nearly as much blood and tears). But it will be done someday. We may have to get the place, and then slowly add features as we can afford them, but each purchase will be a major victory, and boy, we're gonna feel great about each and every one! Because now they're ours to share and enjoy from this point forward as long as we play the game. The sense of accomplishment is secure and everlasting.This the guildhall system I want to be able to participate in with my guild. Thanks for reading!

[Kurindor_Mythecnea]

People don't like to consider things beyond their impulse because that's what lives are led on, first impressions and the innate nature to overlook minor concessions for instant gratification (okay, so the generalization may be moderately offensive to those without an ability to tolerate truth, but it is what it is). Think about this. Here I have my aims for 19 amenities and a Tier Two guild hall optimized for a guild of at least level 60 (with 17 amenities allowed at 50).In three months time, I alone, as an individual, can accomplish the procurement of this end for my guild of the 43rd level, as it is a guarantee that such an acquiring of status would push my guild to at least level 50. In my eyes, the current situation allows for a perfectly respectable lifespan to the longevity of this content, on terms of achieving it. I'm a level 80 Armorer, and though I have 18+ active guildies to contribute, I haven't figured their guaranteed commitments, just to show with how great an ease this can be accomplished. Even aside from all of that, I currently have 5.2 million personal status.Tier Two Guild Hall-----------------------Guild LVL Requirement: 60Number of Amenities: 19Purchase Cost:601 p 70,750,000 status (50% -> 35,375,000 -> 97.586 weeks worth of upkeep [AKA 87.13% of 2 years] if the devs wage an appeal to the masses)Upkeep:9 p 52 g 462,500 status· 2160 hrs/90 days -> 720 hrs of sleep/90 days (at 8 hrs/day) -> 1440 hrs worth of living/90 days· 70,750,000 divided by 15,521 (T8 writting as an 80) -> 4,558.34 writs (50.6482 writs/day for 90 days) -> 8.44136 (AKA 9) writs/day from 6 reliable, top-tier guildies· 27,350 min at 6 min/writ -> 455.834 hrs -> 18.993 days -> 31.655138% of 1440 waking hours in 90 days -> 5.06482 hrs (303.8893 min)/day spent writting for 90 days1.) Druid Portal HirelingPurchase Cost: 25 P 5,000,000 sUpkeep: 50p 25,000 s2.) Fuel Merchant Hireling GuildPurchase Cost: 10p 2,000,000 sUpkeep: 20 g 10,000 s3.) Cloak DesignerPurchase Cost: 10p 2,000,000 sUpkeep: 20g 10,000 s4.) Guild Hall BankerPurchase Cost: 25pp 5,000,000 sUpkeep: 50g 25,000 s5.) Guild Hall World Market BrokerPurchase Cost: 12pp 2,500,000 sUpkeep: 50g 25,000 s6.) Guild Market BrokerPurchase Cost: 12pp 2,500,000 sUpkeep: 25g 12,500 s7.) Guild StrategistPurchase Cost: 100pp 20,000,000 sUpkeep: 2pp 100,000 s8.) Guild Translocation BeaconPurchase Cost: 1p, 250,000 sUpkeep: 2g 10,000 s9.) Harvesting Supply DepotPurchase Cost: 25p 5,000,000 sUpkeep: 50g 25,000 s10.) Localized Guild Hall TeleporterPurchase Cost: 25p 5,000,000 sUpkeep: 50g 25,000 s11.) Magic Carpet to Sinking SandsPurchase Cost: 10p 2,000,000 sUpkeep: 20g 10,000 s12.) Mariner's Bell: Shattered LandsPurchase Cost: 10p 2,000,000 sUpkeep: 20g 10,000 s13.) Portal to Member HousingPurchase Cost: 10p 2,000,000 sUpkeep: 20g 10,000 s14.) Status Executor HirelingPurchase Cost: 25p 5,000,000 sUpkeep: 50g 25,000 s15.) Tradeskill Rush Order AgentPurchase Cost: 10p 2,000,000 sUpkeep: 20g 20,000 s16.) Teleportation Spire to the OverrealmPurchase Cost: 10p 2,000,000 sUpkeep: 20g 10,000 status17.) Commodities Exporter HirelingPurchase Cost: 12p 2,500,000 sUpkeep: 24g 12,500 s18.) Hall Guard (20)Purchase Cost: 1p 500,000 sUpkeep: 2g 2,500 s19.) Creature ConjurorPurchase Cost: 5p 1,000,000 sUpkeep: 10g 5,000 sSure, I haven't factored time into generating the platinum to provide for the purchase price and raws for writs, but I am one affiliated with prosperity in good measure. Nonetheless, as one person, I can fully outfit my guild with every noteworthy, neat, and novel amenity within a period of time I find completely adequate for such an awaited, interesting inclusion to this hobby of ours. As a guild of 6, my "5 hrs of writs/day" becomes 56-72 mins of top tier writs/day...for 6 people...for 90 days. It's just like SOE introduced a fitness plan to a new you in 90 days, except designed for a group of 6, relative to rennovating their in-game experience for uniquity and unity.None can act like these benchmarks are too high, nor this luxury of leisure unattainable. Developers create their video games, and MMOGs specifically, with modes of injecting stimulus. If you are too careless to commit yourself or your guild in the recruitment of other guildies, then obviously enough, this struggle will certainly be such, and a worthy hurdle in its demands. Even despite my figure of 6 min/writ, I often complete them in 4 or 5 minutes, so the estimate given is on the high-end, relative to the writ crunch. In lieu of that, the figure actually ranges from 3-4 hrs/day of writting, for 90 days.

[Barq Bandit]

You've done some great work with the math here, and although the yellow text hurts my eyes to read, it's very well put together and thought out.However, no one's really arguing whether or not it can be done. They're saying that they'd like to base their day to day activities around what they feel like doing, not around something they feel they must do because otherwise, the door to the guildhall gets locked or they get disgruntled looks from their guildies because they're not pulling their weight.This isn't about what's feasible. It's about moods, feelings, and friendships.  It's about casual gamers taking the slow path feeling like they're being shut out of getting a guildhall and all the toys they'd like for their guild due to the impact they know it would have on their sense of freedom concerning what they want to do that day or week in the game, and on the casual atmosphere of their guild.This isn't about numbers. This is about people.

[Kurindor_Mythecnea]

Tock@Antonia Bayle wrote:

You've done some great work with the math here, and although the yellow text hurts my eyes to read, it's very well put together and thought out.However, no one's really arguing whether or not it can be done. They're saying that they'd like to base their day to day activities around what they feel like doing, not around something they feel they must do because otherwise, the door to the guildhall gets locked or they get disgruntled looks from their guildies because they're not pulling their weight.This isn't about what's feasible. It's about moods, feelings, and friendships. It's about casual gamers taking the slow path feeling like they're being shut out of getting a guildhall and all the toys they'd like for their guild due to the impact they know it would have on their sense of freedom concerning what they want to do that day or week in the game, and on the casual atmosphere of their guild.This isn't about numbers. This is about people.

TBH, it really is about the people, and that's nothing I've detracted from, even displaying the calculated figures. If your 6 guildies are unwilling to put forth 56 - 72 minutes/day for writting, then it's perfectly acceptable that gaining these massive benefits will come in 180 days instead of 90. Sure, you may want to focus on recruiting more dedicated and free guildies if they have issues with setting aside 56-72 minutes of their day for such a game-changing feature, but the fact is that the only trouble comes when people act like this content hasn't been developed to be accessible for them, and therein concede the capacity to cope to being offended.Even having a x 2 force, 12 people, who can set aside only 28-36 minutes/day for writting, gaining this guild hall is a guarantee within 90-180 days, depending upon how many are already top tier tradeskillers. If you want expediency, you better be ready to be a proactive and concerned leader, and in MMOGs, this is shown through communal care, exhibited by avid recruitment and the knowledge that incentives and rewards are what draw people together, whether spiritual or material.For my guild, I provide Adept 3s from 1-39 and capped AAs by adventurer levels 10-15, and my highest level adventurer, EVER, is 56. My providing is, of course, done through a frame of guidelines meant to instill discipline and commitment to the guild as a collaborative, coordinated team. And yes, you PvErs, I do pay 2 platinum per person ON TOP of my original provisions for guildies, so long as you are 1+ year veterans able to prove your seasoned experience and consistency in concern for EverQuest II as a hobby.(P.S. I also provide Advanced recipes and Draughts of Ingenuity [restoration of 100% vitality] for avid tradeskillers, but my offers have their disclaimers [see the "WWW" button to gift my website your purview]. )

[Megera]

First, i applaud Tock.  Great post.  Second, i stopped reading the pontificating of the guy with the yellow text ages ago - because i already know from the first post that i disagree with him and reading further will just make me laugh at the language and scoff at the content.  I'm not reading most of the posts after one by the pro-high cost factions - its a waste of my time since i already know i disagree and nothing they say will change my mind.Just one more plea to the Devs.    My guild is like family.  Not a business.  Our guildhall is like a dream for a family home - something we really can share.  Like an ideal of wife or mom.Except you want to make mom a [Removed for Content] we have to pay for every week.I get the point.  Maybe you didnt' intend to make that point but that is the one i am getting, intended or not. 

[Barq Bandit]

It's not the purchase price we're bothered by. Those are fine. Big goals are great, as long as we can take our time with them. It's the upkeep. The week after week after week drain on our playtime. We want to just have the guildhall and toys after much hard work and scraping together of coin, and enjoy it all from day forward without having to feed it weekly just to keep having it. Understand?We're entirely ready to spend the time needed to get the best of the best. It's just that after we get everything we want? A week goes by and now we gotta pay some more. And again. And again. And again. This is the thing we forsee as putting a strain on our playstyles and friendships. This is the problem. Keeping up with the upkeep, when all we really want to do is relax and enjoy the game without feeling as though we have chores waiting for us.It's frustrating, the system that's in place. A smaller guild finally gets to 70, and technically, they could get the island fortress, but they decided that, as fun as it would be, they know that they'll not be able to keep up with the upkeep, and still cultivate the laid back, casual feel of their beloved guild. That's the issue. Dangling access to toys that some guilds, by their very nature, cannot obtain and keep.Having a smaller, family type guild with a casual playstyle atmosphere should not be a hinderance to keeping a guildhall open, ever. And this isn't even about just the island fortress. Upkeep on the amenities alone would make either of the smaller two halls a matter of contention within guilds. Which features do they buy and which do they pass on due to their limited means of weekly income? Who decides? Arguements are bound to ensue, and the entire purpose of the guildhalls to begin with, to provide fun for guilds, fails miserably.

[Kurindor_Mythecnea]

Megera wrote:

First, i applaud Tock. Great post. Second, i stopped reading the pontificating of the guy with the yellow text ages ago - because i already know from the first post that i disagree with him and reading further will just make me laugh at the language and scoff at the content. I'm not reading most of the posts after one by the pro-high cost factions - its a waste of my time since i already know i disagree and nothing they say will change my mind.Just one more plea to the Devs. My guild is like family. Not a business. Our guildhall is like a dream for a family home - something we really can share. Like an ideal of wife or mom.Except you want to make mom a [Removed for Content] we have to pay for every week.I get the point. Maybe you didnt' intend to make that point but that is the one i am getting, intended or not.

The trouble comes when people aren't willing to compromise. People like Megera want the luxuries but they don't understand, let alone even care, about the merits of the achievement. Acting as though their miniature sample of a guild deserves ease in providing itself with such a grand item of leisure, it doesn't seem that those of this type are even willing to initiate a plan for proactive guild recruitment. It isn't that small guilds don't deserve big guild halls, it's that small guilds with no ambition don't deserve big guild halls. Nonetheless, I can only rebuke the lacking restraint with which you've chosen to denigrate the legitimacy of my stance, describing me as one who pontificates.Those like Megera can't overcome the impression and the hindrance of immediate daunting, allowing themselves to limit their scope in a self-centric manner. The idea of upkeep is so emotionally, pathologically persuasive as a put-off to them that they don't even want to consider the server health that can be added by having this feature bolster the basis for recruiting. Asking 60 top-tier writs out of each 6 reliable guildies every week is too much, just because its recurring. Keep in mind, this is an option, as many have stated, and acting as though this has been dangled before everyone for years is folly and a strawman.Guild objectives are exactly that, goals decided upon as a group. If your guildies (presuming you have at least the baseline value of 6) don't want to devote 4 1/2 months of doing 60 writs/week to pay for a T2 Guild Hall with 19 amenities and 97.586 weeks worth of upkeep, then that's perfectly okay. As a family guild, the completely unique T1 guild hall can accomodate your needs at LESS THAN HALF of time's demanding. IMO, 4.5 months of an ULTRA-LIGHT BURDEN (placed upon guildies who voluntarily agree to it) is such a little asking price for the freedom to return to the casual "log on and do whatever-the-fudge" playstyle everyone likes to galavant about, especially with the added game-changer of guild halls. Consolidating your guild as a mini-community, let alone one the entire public will be able to access, is something more than worth the difficulty in achieving the aspiration, for such a holding is an unmatched morale booster when you can just log on and only be subject to your very own town.Tock@Antonia Bayle wrote:

It's not the purchase price we're bothered by. Those are fine. Big goals are great, as long as we can take our time with them. It's the upkeep. The week after week after week drain on our playtime. We want to just have the guildhall and toys after much hard work and scraping together of coin, and enjoy it all from day forward without having to feed it weekly just to keep having it. Understand?You must've overlooked the observation of mine where I bulleted "Public praise and appeal to the masses".We're entirely ready to spend the time needed to get the best of the best. It's just that after we get everything we want? A week goes by and now we gotta pay some more. And again. And again. And again. This is the thing we forsee as putting a strain on our playstyles and friendships. This is the problem. Keeping up with the upkeep, when all we really want to do is relax and enjoy the game without feeling as though we have chores waiting for us.It's frustrating, the system that's in place. A smaller guild finally gets to 70, and technically, they could get the island fortress, but they decided that, as fun as it would be, they know that they'll not be able to keep up with the upkeep, and still cultivate the laid back, casual feel of their beloved guild. That's the issue. Dangling access to toys that some guilds, by their very nature, cannot obtain and keep.Having a smaller, family type guild with a casual playstyle atmosphere should not be a hinderance to keeping a guildhall open, ever. And this isn't even about just the island fortress. Upkeep on the amenities alone would make either of the smaller two halls a matter of contention within guilds. Which features do they buy and which do they pass on due to their limited means of weekly income? Who decides? Arguements are bound to ensue, and the entire purpose of the guildhalls to begin with, to provide fun for guilds, fails miserably.

Digressing to those who think discussing the desired effect of guild halls and their target sample of the populace isn't feedback, reconsider in lieu of the fact that this is a concept of substance directly relative to conquering yet another dynamic hurdle in a MMOG.

[Caethre]

Tock@Antonia Bayle wrote:

It's not the purchase price we're bothered by. Those are fine. Big goals are great, as long as we can take our time with them. It's the upkeep. The week after week after week drain on our playtime. We want to just have the guildhall and toys after much hard work and scraping together of coin, and enjoy it all from day forward without having to feed it weekly just to keep having it. Understand?We're entirely ready to spend the time needed to get the best of the best. It's just that after we get everything we want? A week goes by and now we gotta pay some more. And again. And again. And again. This is the thing we forsee as putting a strain on our playstyles and friendships. This is the problem. Keeping up with the upkeep, when all we really want to do is relax and enjoy the game without feeling as though we have chores waiting for us.It's frustrating, the system that's in place. A smaller guild finally gets to 70, and technically, they could get the island fortress, but they decided that, as fun as it would be, they know that they'll not be able to keep up with the upkeep, and still cultivate the laid back, casual feel of their beloved guild. That's the issue. Dangling access to toys that some guilds, by their very nature, cannot obtain and keep.Having a smaller, family type guild with a casual playstyle atmosphere should not be a hinderance to keeping a guildhall open, ever. And this isn't even about just the island fortress. Upkeep on the amenities alone would make either of the smaller two halls a matter of contention within guilds. Which features do they buy and which do they pass on due to their limited means of weekly income? Who decides? Arguements are bound to ensue, and the entire purpose of the guildhalls to begin with, to provide fun for guilds, fails miserably.

OOC.

All of Tock's posts are well-written and punchy, this one just smacks it home.

The question SOE devs have to ask themselve is: What is the objective (for SOE) with guild halls? Who are they aimed at?

- Are they only really aimed at the minority hardcore gamers (who actively want high costs, to keep everyone else away from them, so they can feel smug, and the rest of us get to ignore their existence)?

- Or are guildhalls being added to this game and aimed at everyone, and therefore at normal casual players as well (who are mostly telling you that high upkeep costs that go on forever are not what they want)?

Because that is what this debate about upkeep prices comes down to in the end, to my reading anyway. It's your game, guys, it's your call.

[Barq Bandit]

Kurindor_Mythecnea wrote:

Digressing to those who think discussing the desired effect of guild halls and their target sample of the populace isn't feedback, reconsider in lieu of the fact that this is a concept of substance directly relative to conquering yet another dynamic hurdle in a MMOG.

I have absolutely no clue what you just said. Wanna break that down into something us simple minded folks can understand?I read all your posts, and looked at all your numbers. Nothing you've posted has convinced me that making a guild continue to pay, week after week, for things they worked hard to collectively achieve and obtain, will not sour the feeling of accomplishment, cause friction within guilds, and ultimately cause guildhalls to be a source of animosity and frustration for many guilds who attempt to keep the doors open on theirs.When you're talking about this much coin and this much status, the vast majority of guilds will almost certainly want to pay once to own, and then have it. Make the hall and the amenities expensive, sure. Great! But recurring costs will only cause recurring difficulties of feeling obligated, being chained to a money and status black-hole from which there is no escape, and quite possibly discouraging players from even logging in to the characters of theirs in that guild or into the game at all.Yay! EQ2 time! Let's log in and make coin and status, and then chunk it all into the black (but very shiney and nifty) void that is our virtual guildhall complete with amenities, for which we've already parted with a great deal of coin and status for! Woohoo! Fun!As I've posted earlier: paying rent contributes nothing to the fun factor of this game. It's not necessary in order to support enjoyment of the game. Rent on houses is fine for taking coin out of circulation, because it's no big deal, and the player doesn't feel pressured by his entire guild to keep his house open week after week. But paying upkeep on a guildhall is an entirely new ball of wax by the very nature of involving an entire guild of players in the activity, which I'm sure you're finding very interesting in a fiddly and Sim City sort of way, it seems to me.But we, the casual players who take the long path to guild advancement, are not here to crunch numbers and micromanage our guilds. We just log into this game to get together, have some laughs, roleplay a great deal in my case and Klumpp's, and generally relax and have a good time. But when we ding guild level 70, we want to feel that if we're to spend that much coin and that much status on getting what we want, we want to keep those things, enjoy them, and carry on enjoying the game as we did before, without having to constantly work at encouraging our guildies to help to keep the things we bought available to us.No one enjoys chores. If you can't see the difference between an achievement and a chore, then I'm afraid there's just nothing further to say. You look at the numbers and you see that it's feasible. I look at people's feelings, conceptions, and haphazard playstyles, and I see trouble ahead. I'll let you know if anything you post gives me pause for thought, but as for now, we just aren't seeing things from the same perspective, and I don't see that changing any time soon. So that's that. : )

[Vonotar]

All the high figures being banded about makes my head hurt!Is it time to invent a new coin?  100pp = 1... At least then the T3 Guild Halls will only cost 10 and that looks far more reasonable I agree with everything Tock says regarding the effect on guilds.  However I truely believe that Guild Halls are seen as an opportunity to take money out of the game, so until the 'uber elite' have lost a large chunk of plat I doubt the prices will come down.There are some truely rich people out there.

[Kurindor_Mythecnea]

Tock@Antonia Bayle wrote:

Kurindor_Mythecnea wrote:

Digressing to those who think discussing the desired effect of guild halls and their target sample of the populace isn't feedback, reconsider in lieu of the fact that this is a concept of substance directly relative to conquering yet another dynamic hurdle in a MMOG.

I have absolutely no clue what you just said. Wanna break that down into something us simple minded folks can understand?

Lol. This was just a response I meant to give someone who was claiming (on page 34) the entire thread was ruined after Rothgar posted 2 pages earlier (on page 30) about moving "all the other debates to another thread if possible", and I made this footnote because the deliberation on content usability we're all a part of here has likely taken up half of this entire thread. Dreadzwench wrote:

I now know why the devs wouldn't want to come in here and read a lot of the feedback.

This thread was to discuss feedback of the guild halls and how they have already made some changes based on what we voiced as concerns. It has almost completely degrated into a what is a real guild and what isn't a real guild thread, and anything else that allows everyone to have an [Removed for Content] contest

Rothgar actually politely asked people to keep this to feedback about the guild hall and the items related to that, but most people ignored it and any real discussion going on about the feedback is getting lost.

Why not take your debate about why someone who has been busting their collective butts for 4 years and is only a level 30 or 40 guild (small guild) about the benefits of being in a large guild and the joys a new player gets if they do that to another thread so the people who have valid concerns can talk in this one. I want to see what devs have to say or any valid concerns. I don't want to have to read through 8 pages of I am better than you childish bull _____.

Thanks, to all the people for making this thread absolutely useless now.

[Chalmo]

Hi (first post here on off forums ,1) I think the initial figures for guild halls + amenities look very good as they are now. This is coming from a leader of a small level 64 guild that has players from all tiers. I'm not expecting we could and we should be able to buy tier 3 with 30 of the most expensive amenities right away. That's what goals are for, right? 2) While I understand that there are common sentiments towards the end-line hall and amenities being expensive to keep up, I'm actually hoping that there will be space for even more expensive extensions later.I think it's important to be able to have further, tougher goals for achievement and advancement as you progress - and what I've so far liked about EQII is that there are different ways for that than just grinding for better gear, even when you're maxed out. Just something to keep in mind for future updates, maybe?3) Is there a cap to status points and plat a single individual or the whole guild can deposit on the escrow? I'm thinking of scenarios where an active player needs to take a longer break - getting a child, going on a long vacation, moving houses, just having different kinds of RL fun, whatever - for a few months, and wants to chime in whatever he has.Our guild has had people who've left for a few months, or even longer, and put all their plat on shared bank (and still returned later).4) I think the status point requirements, by themselves, are not bad. What I'm worried about is that the quickest way to gain status points, for a small (non-raiding) guild at least, is to do rush orders (and maybe adventuring writs as a sideline while harvesting). That's pretty much solo content. Being able to craft together in your guild hall, and do crafting missions (will those include SP rewards?), is nice, but not everyone likes to craft.The heroic instance status point boost is very nice, but it doesn't scale too much. Neither do the heritage quests, really, when you have a bunch of level 80/80 adventurers/artisans. Is it possible to implement some kind of "group writs" in the future? Stuff where you don't get necessarily get massive amounts of loot and XP and AA - the stuff that people primarily go to instances for - but that's rewarding AA-wise?5) I think it's great that guild halls are getting the size-scaling feature for furniture. Is this going to be implemented for regular player houses too?I don't think it necessarily should be. After all, lots of people have spent a lot of time doing all sorts of clever stuff with the current material at hand - that is, building new stuff out of the current constant-sized decoration. I think that if, say, instead of building a massive throne out of other furniture, you could just scale your standard throne to whatever size you like, it would cause "inflation".

[Kurindor_Mythecnea]

On page 21 of the "Guild Hall Preview from Fan Faire up at EQ2TC!" thread...Rothgar wrote:

Hey guys, I literally JUST walked in the door from Fan Faire and a 6 hour bus ride. I haven't read all 21 pages of this thread, but I have skimmed over some of the posts and see that some people think the prices are a bit high.Keep in mind that we wanted people to have to works towards purchasing a guild hall. We added the Tier 1 hall as an additional option to allow smaller guilds to get into a hall relatively easy and access amenities. We even made it so that the purchase price of your amenities transfer to your new hall so you won't lose that investment. The only thing you'll lose is the purchase price of the hall.If your guild doesn't have the funds to buy a guild hall on Day 1, thats ok. We want these to be something that people come together and work for. Just like leveling a character from 1 to 80, purchasing a guild hall might take your guild time. Every single amenity is available to a level 30 guild that is available to a level 80 guild other than the zone-specific decorations.Even the smallest guilds should be able to run instances, get masters and sell them on the broker to earn 100 plat. Do you guys really want guild halls to be cheap enough so that everyone can buy the biggest hall on the day they come out? Would you feel the pride of owning the best guild hall if it were that easy to obtain?Keep up the discussion because we want to hear your feedback, but please keep it respectful and civil.

For a small guild...:Guild LVL Requirement: 35Number of Amenities: 7Purchase Cost:158 P 21,750,000 status (50% -> 10,875,000 -> 64.92537 weeks worth of upkeep [AKA 1 year 2 months] if the devs wage an appeal to the masses)Upkeep:2 P 66 G 167,500 status· 2160 hrs/90 days -> 720 hrs of sleep/90 days (at 8 hrs/day) -> 1440 hrs worth of living/90 days· 19,500,000 divided by 15,521 (T8 writting as an 80) -> 1401.327 writs (13.9595 writs/day for 90 days)· 8407.9634 min at 6 min/writ -> 140.1327 hrs -> 5.8388625 days -> 9.731439% of 1440 waking hours in 90 days -> 1.55703024 hrs (93.4218144 mins)/day spent writting for 90 days A. Alternatively, dividing this objective among 6... I. 12960 hrs/90 days -> 4320 hrs of sleep/90 days (at 8 hrs/day) -> 8640 hrs worth of living/90 days II. 21,750,000 divided by 15,521 (T8 writting as an 80) -> 1401.327 writs (13.9595 writs/day for 90 days) -> 2.326583 (AKA approx 3) writs/day from 6 reliable, top-tier guildies III. 8407.9634 min at 6 min/writ -> 140.1327 hrs -> 5.8388625 days -> 1.62190625% of 8640 waking hours in 90 days -> 15.5703 min/day spent writting for 90 days between 6 reliable, top-tier guildies1.) Harvesting Supply DepotPurchase Cost: 25p 5,000,000 sUpkeep: 50g 25,000 s2.) Guild Hall BankerPurchase Cost: 25pp 5,000,000 sUpkeep: 50g 25,000 s3.) Guild Hall World Market BrokerPurchase Cost: 12pp 2,500,000 sUpkeep: 50g 25,000 s4.) Guild Market BrokerPurchase Cost: 12pp 2,500,000 sUpkeep: 25g 12,500 s5.) Tradeskill Rush Order AgentPurchase Cost: 10p 2,000,000 sUpkeep: 20g 20,000 s6.) Fuel Merchant HirelingPurchase Cost: 10p 2,000,000 sUpkeep: 20 g 10,000 s7.) Guild Translocation BeaconPurchase Cost: 1p, 250,000 sUpkeep: 2g 10,000 sThe reason I mention 50% of the status required for the upfront amenity cost is that the figures I've generated (on terms of time/writ commitments) would be able to pay for extreme lengths of time if the devs modify amenities with concessions to those who have aversions to upkeep.