commitment musings

Much of my weekend was spent in game at one thing or another.  I get a lot of interesting wispers back from the guild spam, but recruiting was going slow so I began mass recruiting.  It was a way to increase membership by quite a bit.  Pretty sure I did not get my target, but right now, more people playing is valuable.  As with all guild people will wash out.  A few stick around because I have helped them in one way or another.  Often its how to make gold.  To help the guild out since it has no other perks, and no raiding or PVP agenda, Monetizing membership with gold seemed a reasonable means of maintaining membership. 
level 20, 20 gold
Level 30, 40, 50 and 60 100 gold
Level 70 500 gold
Level 80 1000 gold
for recruiting, I reward both parties the gold. (i.e. you recruit "bubbagump" the rogue and he hits level 20, I reward both you (for recruiting) and bubbagump 20 gold)

I think next weekend or maybe mid week I will do another random mass invite and get the numbers up some more, because I fully expect attrition, and see it a lot already.  Its part of the nature of guilds and much more so with this one as we do not have the attraction of perks as guilds are now hitting level 14.  Time will tell how the project evolves, I only plan to stick to the initial guiding principals.  Build a guild where there is some level of commitment for no other reason than to have that ground in common with all players that are high level.  As I ponder over that, the question comes up in my mind of "What are the threads and commonalities that bring players together in guild, and more importantly, what drives them apart." 

There is a percieved shared goal in guilds, but my experience has shown that is a fragile element.  For some guilds, like world first and even server first it is clearly defined.  Most others seem to project that they are going to be the next big guild, however the failures at achieving this are many more than the successes.  Those that have some level of success still have issues with commitment from players as they still have a largely rotating pool of raiders.  This is the element I hope to defeate.  If there was consistency in the players, and they start out so low a level to PVP or raid with the guild there will be the hesitation to leave the guild looking for something better, since the idea of comming back will not be an option.  Raiding guild often have an element of casualness to them.  People just don't play a game to get bossed around that way in most cases.  So if someone is decent and leaves the guild, there is rarely a hesitation to get that decent player back in the circle of old friends.  I don't expect amazing turnouts or a changing element to the overall player base, just looking for a solid group to change it with a small group that share something in common, and share some goals that are similar.