Draft for a guild / a Tremulous player manifest

[zybork]

Hi people,

as far as I can see, there is still no guild out there, so here is a draft of such a guild's manifest:

The guild

guild – an association of persons of the same trade or pursuits, formed to protect the mutual interests and maintain standards.

I play Tremulous to relax, for the excitement… in other words: *to have fun.* My parent's generation played cards, snooker, darts – my generation now plays computer games in a similar fashion. Some games are now better, some are worse, Tremulous, being a ingenious blend of ego shooter and strategy game, is, without a doubt, one of the best out there.

Membership is informal and does not require payments or playing regularly or mandatory participation in any special forum or chat, the only requirement is that somebody officially declares to be willing to follow the rules of the guild and actually *does* follow them.

As members of the guild

• We are at any time aware of the fact that Tremulous is a *game,* and do not see it as a substitute for an empty life, a lack of self-confidence or anything in that matter.
• We know the manual.
• We understand that Tremulous is not a dull ego-shooter, and honor the strategic element of the game.
• We have have already played all of the different alien classes and used all the humans' weapons several times.
• We know all the standard maps and do not get lost the moment we step out of the base.
• (This implies that) we have some experience in the game, we are not newbies.
• We have a basic understanding of building, and we already have built any structure available on both teams, and also successfully moved the base several times, this means:
• We have a basic experience in building, we may not be the best of the best of builders, but are able to create a base that will do its job.
• We help repairing the base.
• We warn before moving the team's main structure (this is, the reactor or the overmind).
• We do NOT teamkill (except for self-defense or to defend our team or base against players gone mad).
• We do NOT leave the base undefended when there is a possibility that it is to be attacked.
• We are careful not to hurt our own base, no base-luci, base-nade or base-slash, if we want a building out of the way, we'd rather ask a builder to do that.
• We understand the neccessity of defense, but yet are not afraid to leave the base: we do not camp.
• We do not give the opponent frags needlessly, this is: we do not feed.
• We cooperate with other players of the team.
• We are not perfect players, and do neither expect ourselves nor anybody else to be.

“Membership” would be informal, members of the guild would have to submit their (most commonly used) ingame name, their age/year of birth and their geographical location, and – if they are willing to share that information – their gender and profession, so in my case, this would be:

…a real darling, '79, Vienna, male, Vienna/Austria, printer

Membership would be gained by just sending a mail to the guild-maintainer, it would have to be approved by at least two other members of the guild (we could start with a few people known to keep to all the rules mentioned above), and “membership” would just mean to be on a publicly visible list, no "membership-card", no tag.

THIS IS INTENDED TO BE A GUILD, NOT A CLAN, as mentioned in the draft, the only requirement is to stick to the rules.

Mind that this is a draft, I just wanted to coin a set of rules that guarantees somebody being a casual, non-moronic player.

If you got any suggestion, please make it, I just think we could really use a guild in here, not just clans.

[Pazuzu]

I like this. Especially this:

no tag.

[Conzul]

You should call it the "BTB"
Better Tremulous Bureau

[CreatureofHell]

Aren't there some guilds? 

[your face]

Aren't there some guilds?  

Mercenaries Guild? xD

[Teapot]

There is also dTrem

What is dTrem?
dTrem is a community of Tremulous players. It is not a clan and does not have a clan tag.

It's pretty much exactly as you describe.

[zybork]

Hm, hm, hm, those guilds are guilds alright, but they are focussed on projects, community, and not on the “standards”-part of the definition of a guild:

guild – an association of persons of the same trade or pursuits, formed to protect the mutual interests and maintain standards.

Both dtrem and MG are rather “associations”, where this one is intended to be more like a guild in the narrower sense of the word, more comparable to a craftmen's guild than to a community, for instance, all carpenters in the carpenters' guild are required to, I don't know, not sell plastic for wood and such, this is, to keep to the basic standards, but in all other concerns, are free to do or not do whatever they want.

Also, there is one thing I want prevented, this is, a lot of “on this website an amazing project is to be born soon” which actually never see the light of day; I'd rather have one thing, but this thing done, and neither in MG nor in dTrem I have seen any manifesto like the one I presented here.

See this guild rather not as a community but more than a commitment to fair and non-egotistic gameplay, maybe we could change the wording from “I am a member of the guild” to “I signed the Tremulous Player Manifest”, maybe this would make more sense, I think.

… Yeah, I think we could do that.

PS: Just changed the title of the thread accordingly.

[Teapot]

Hm, hm, hm, those guilds are guilds alright, but they are focussed on projects, community, and not on the “standards”-part of the definition of a guild

Members should be:

• Mature
• Active
• Friends with Members
• Reasonably Skilled
• Play with Members Regularly
• Capable of Working in a Team

...

That means if you frequently get banned on servers, you're out.
If you frequently aggravate people, you're out.
If you don't listen and work with clan members, you're out.
But most importantly, if we don't know you, you're out.

Don't call us, we'll call you.

I think that's a decent manifesto. I think it's unfair to say that neither MG nor dTrem have quality standards for their members.
This comes from Increment's old website (dTrem's official clan) and mostly applies to dTrem as well. Should probably put that on the new website now. Thanks

dTrem and MG have contributed to many projects which have seen "the light of day". [W]onderland and dHumans (hvh gpp) are the most prominent dTrem/Increment examples (also Wrath Newbie is strongly related, though not created by us).

I think you were a little unfair in your judgement of guilds that you only learned of today.

I will agree, however, that at least dTrem is quite project-oriented simply because that's how we like to spend our time. I get the impression MG is too but I can't speak for them.

[KillerWhale]

There's DRU, albeit it has been a bit dead.

There's also a lot of clans that behave very much so like guilds.

[Silence]

SoH turned into a guild after a while but I think they've died out. Isn't FA also a guild or are they still a clan?

And as for a name, why not just "The Guild"?

[mooseberry]

NO, quash this before it starts. I have seen where guilds lead, even if not firsthand, and it's not very good. You are creating an establishment which by its existence is inhibiting free market capitalism and discourages, often aggressively the type of newcomer entrepreneurship that is needed for success by setting caps and rates on all items you can. This makes an unfair environment for anyone not associated with the guild who wishes to partake in activities or pursuits mandated by the guild. Tremulous will flounder in a setup like this and you are seriously damaging the natural flow of wealth within this game. Boycott!

[zybork]

Actually, “The Guild” is a good name, altough I more and more tend to skip that guild-part and just go for the idea of a manifest that you can sign.

Teapot:

• Mature
• Active
• Friends with Members
• Reasonably Skilled
• Play with Members Regularly
• Capable of Working in a Team

My idea is a (public) commitment to rules that, well how shall I put it, well, that show that you're not a jerk, but some of the points here are not necessary for that. It is not necessary to be active (because somebody who doesn't play for a year and then comes back for a year may still not be a jerk), it is not necessary. Also, what in all world is “reasonably skilled”? I've seen people who actually were not that good but who cooperated with others excellently, (maybe they took a year off, to come back to the earlier joke), and about playing with members regularly, well – why? There are times I play an hour each day, and there are months I don't play at all, depending on workload, private life, mood, and so on, for it is a game, played for fun, not out of a sense of duty…

Another thing that interests me, what do you guys think of the “rules” I wrote into that manifest? Are they too specific? Are they too un-specific? Is there a rule that can be omitted without loss? Is there something missing?

If there would be some kind of actual guild behind it, it would be the people simply keeping an eye on that the people who want to sign that manifest really actually care to keep themselves to it, but this would be all. For other activities you may rather want to get engaged in dTrem or MG, while signing the manifest shows, hey, I play fair, I play reasonable.

mooseberry: Your understanding of “free market” means, that for instance a weapon manufacturer who produces guns that don't shoot calling those factories who actually care that their stuff works “establishment”, especially when they dare to verifiy their commitment to functional products…

[OhaiReapd]

NO, quash this before it starts. I have seen where guilds lead, even if not firsthand, and it's not very good. You are creating an establishment which by its existence is inhibiting free market capitalism and discourages, often aggressively the type of newcomer entrepreneurship that is needed for success by setting caps and rates on all items you can. This makes an unfair environment for anyone not associated with the guild who wishes to partake in activities or pursuits mandated by the guild. Tremulous will flounder in a setup like this and you are seriously damaging the natural flow of wealth within this game. Boycott!

Free market capitalism? Look at America's economic state. Getting too political. Anyway, The Guild is too generic, how about Tyrants of Tremulous? (ToT)

[zybork]

Oh, I want it to be generic, because the things mentioned in it should actually be self-evident

[Teapot]

So zybork, people want to join your guild to show they're not jerks and they're not jerks because they're in your guild?

Credit: xkcd

Seriously though, if you're not a jerk, that should speak for itself.

Sidenote:
That list was Increment's (note: the clan's) entry requirements. You can't enter if you're inactive at the time you're being considered. Also, active doesn't necessarily mean you play the game regularly. Just that you communicate with members (as we do often on irc).

[zybork]

Teapot, maybe I didn't explain it sufficiently, but you obviously did not understand what I want with this manifest, I want people to enable them to show their serious commitment to fair and friendly gameplay in the easiest way possible.

Got it now?

[Teapot]

Okay, and how do they show that without a tag?
/me still thinks it was a fun xkcd reference

[zybork]

Why tags? Being in a public list should be enough.

Btw, I would really appreciate if you looked over the rules/statements I made. Did I mention something unimportant? Did I leave something important out?

[Teapot]

The list looks good.

I do think a descriptive optional tag might be helpful for spreading the guild's objective and even reminding the members themselves when they're online. Something like "Fair|PlayerName" (poor example but I'm sure you understand).

[OhaiReapd]

Their honor of course!

[zybork]

I got an idea, I'd use the “ellipse” a.k.a. “...”, so I am not “a real darling” but “… a real darling”, the manifest would be “… the manifest” and any possible guild would then be “… the guild”. If the list looks fine, I'll still spend some more thought on it, and then I guess I'll go and set up a pre-version of it.

[Celestial_Rage]

A potential step two would be to create a forum or IRC channel where all the members could come together and socialize/get to know each other. A guild without solidarity will lead to squabbles and drama, neither of which will fulfill the aims of the guild.

[zybork]

I am more and more convinced that the guilds who are already in place suffice for the needs of socialization, I more and more tend to put up a public manifest which people may sign to address their commitment to the respective standards.

[Tremulant]

so I am not “a real darling” but “… a real darling”

Hah, so you're the twat who rages and gets abusive every time you play against meisseli? Yeah, you seem the perfect guy to head a bunch of certified non-jerks...

[zybork]

There are several reasons why commitment is a good idea. Ever seen me on Wrath-Newbie (when I still played 1.1)? Do you now understand now? And yes, I am convinced he has no life. Just check / compare online times, this at a time when I have not much to do workwise and can realy not say I am online not often myself. But such a discussion is off topic and would belong in another thread.

Besides that, “every time” is nonsense, I am known to be a friendly guy who sees the common good more important, and Meiss. is just killwhoring a bit too much for my taste, and yeah, I really don't like people abandoning teamplay and making matches a one-man show.

Btw, I guess a “paragraph against killwhoring” is included in the manifest

I think I can bring up a pre-version of the manifest pretty soon.

[Tremulant]

And yes, I am convinced he has no life. Just check / compare online times.

Oh, so you're stalking him now? and what's this whole ZOMG NOLIFE thing about anyway? Isn't it possible that some players are just better than you?

[zybork]

Well, I just took a quick look at the stats, and: There are also players worse than me, I don't killwhore in that case either. There are people running around I just don't slash or shoot when encountering them, or, if I happen to realize I have slashed guy X for the n. time in a row, I don't hold back with advice, how they can do it better. And someties – what do you know – people even listen.

In my honest opinion, a game is for all who play it, ever played fooseball against a leet player? You don't, because it's no fun, and when you happen to be the guy who can bomb them all away, you usually switch to a position where you are not that good, or even mix teams, just to keep balance and make the game more interesting.

Gaming is like sex in that matter: It's only good if everybody enjoys it.

…and all this brought up an important point I possibly missed in “…the manifest”, altough I hope to keep the number of paragraphs down, making it so simple and clear as ever possible.

[Pazuzu]

Slight nitpick:

I got an idea, I'd use the “ellipse” a.k.a. “...”

An ellipse is an oval. You probably want ellipsis. Really, though, "The Ellipse" would be a nice name for a guild of well-rounded players.
Really though, "The Ellipse" or "The Ellpisis" would be a great name for this guild.
Don't kill me.

[CreatureofHell]

Free market capitalism? Look at America's economic state. Getting too political. Anyway, The Guild is too generic, how about Tyrants of Tremulous? (ToT)

What's this got to do with America?

NO, quash this before it starts. I have seen where guilds lead, even if not firsthand, and it's not very good. You are creating an establishment which by its existence is inhibiting free market capitalism and discourages, often aggressively the type of newcomer entrepreneurship that is needed for success by setting caps and rates on all items you can. This makes an unfair environment for anyone not associated with the guild who wishes to partake in activities or pursuits mandated by the guild. Tremulous will flounder in a setup like this and you are seriously damaging the natural flow of wealth within this game. Boycott!

SET CAPS?!?!? I CAN SET CAPS!!1!1!1

[Qrntz]

Gaming is like sex in that matter: It's only good if everybody enjoys it.

What if I enjoy BDSM and dominating, eh?