Gaia Guilds

From: The Gaiapedia, the community encyclopedia about Gaia Online

Guilds (sometimes mistaken for Clans, especially when talking about zOMG!) are a means for Gaians to get together in a private place, away from outsiders, to do their own business. Most Guilds are for just talking, spam, making gold, etc.; however there are guilds specifically for people 18+ of age, people of certain races, roleplay, speakers of specific languages, fan clubs, and many other groups. However, the fact that Guilds take a lot of Gold and time to maintain and the fact that many die out quickly has been a small concern.

[edit] Starting a Guild

To start a Guild, a user must first build up 20k, whether by posting, selling items in the marketplace, selling to NPCs, or receiving donations, and then go to the Guild building in Barton Town. Once there, the user needs to create their own Guild, paying the 20k for it, and create a name, description, and tag. Then they have a guild; however, there are some steps that still need to be done.

First of all, they need to create the first threads, usually Rules and/or Introductions. There should also be at least two Sub-Forums, which cost 2.5k each. The Sub-Forums are for talking about things that branch away from the main category, or for roleplaying Guilds, to roleplay something privately. There are even sub-forums for when the main forums get too big and need to be split up. The last thing to do is invite friends, make a banner, and start recruiting.

[edit] Criticism

Naturally, as with everything else on Gaia, there has been criticism of the Guild system. Major complaints are that the Guilds cost 20k, which is quite a lot for a non-item; however, this is offset by the fact that Guilds are meant to be started by a group of people, not only one person. There are also complaints about how each sub-forum costs 2.5k; even with donations, smaller guilds might have a hard time raising enough money. Glitches, of course come in, such as when Guild searching went down, and a few days when Guilds were completely down.

Another criticism is the discrimination in some Guilds. Some Guilds are for users 18+ only, while others are for religious or ideological groups, and some are discriminatory against other beliefs or Guilds for petty reasons or just because they can get away with it. Because a Guild is just a group of people gathered around one subject, such behaviour usually isn't frowned on by the admins.

Some minor criticisms include the amount of time it takes to manage a guild, the gold it takes, and the fact that if a moderator invites all of his friends to join a guild, it can get spam-filled and messy because of abuse of trust. Another concern is that some members post inappropriate things on the Guilds, hoping they won't get caught because of the large amount of guilds.