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Guide last updated: February 2005
Review last updated: 2007-10-13
The Professional Guild Management Guide is a 51 page ebook written by "Dragons", guild leader of the Syndicate which is an MMORPG guild with more than 500 members that has been around since 1996 and has a presence in many games in addition to wow.
As such, few people should be more qualified than "Dragons" to give insights on creating and running a successful wow guild. However, after reading the wow professional guild management guide, I feel that the author must surely have more tips to share than those in the book.
About two thirds of the ebook are all about the technicalities of setting up a guild and how to use the guild management interface. That’s kind of nice to know, but the other sections should be more extensive.
At page 35 the author gets into "Hints and tips for creating a successful guild". This is where he conveys the knowledge and experience he has gained as a wow guild leader and gives suggestions on basic rules and fun guild events. The next chapter deals with some guild marketing, such as getting a website and advertising your guild in forums. And the very last chapter is a short checklist of tips to get you and your guild through a crisis.
So far, so good.
But where are the sections on DKP, loot rules, recruiting and keeping top players, addons to track dkp, addons for signing up for raids, or how to set up a web based raid sign up system, suggestions on rules for the guild bank (i.e. how much money people should send and how often), how to distribute items such as tomes and books that teach new abilities (some guilds only give these to players that have deserved them), how to keep people in the guild so you don’t gear them up just to have them go to a competing guild, and so on? Not much ink is given to those topics, even though I feel they’re much more important than learning the basics of setting up a guild…
I’m sure Dragons can give advice on a lot of these questions, and his discussions of them would be invaluable to any guild leader. That’s why I’m a bit disappointed with this guide.
Other sections, such as the one on establishing a web presence, could have been more in-depth. Are there any tools for building a basic website suitable for a wow guild? How do you set up a forum? Are there paid or free services for this? Any examples of good guild sites to model?
To be fair, many suggestions in the guide are very good and innovative, such as events and activites (other than raiding) for the guild. And you get a clear picture of how you must act to be a fair, respected, and just guild leader. But come on… couldn’t you have given us some more insider tips on the areas I mentioned above?
I think the guild management guide should be expanded to include my suggestions. Until then, I will give it 5 out of 10 stars. Click here for more information.
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