Cataclysm Press Event: Guild talents and currency scrapped
by Robin Torres 
Jun 13th 2010 at 5:30AM
Guild leveling
Guilds will gain experience when their members participate in the following:
- rated battleground wins
- dungeon or raid boss kills
- completing quests
- unlocking guild achievements
Guild rewards
Rewards will be unlocked when guilds earn achievements. Once unlocked, guild members can purchase them with gold as long as they have the appropriate Guild Reputation. The original plan was that guild currency would be used to purchase rewards. The rewards will include:
- mounts with flags that display the guild tabard emblem
- heirlooms
- tabards
Guild reputation
You will gain reputation with your guild the same way you help the guild level. The reputation is per character and not account-wide. Gkicks and gquits do not wipe your reputation right away, just in case it was a joke. But it's not clear if there is a finite window where afterward the rep will be cleared.
Guild achievements
Guild achievements are by guild, not by member. So if all members that earned a guild achievement leave the guild, the guild will still retain the achievement. However, the members who earned it will be memorialized in the achievement when viewing it. Raid achievements don't have to be earned by groups made up of only guildies. But you have to have at least 7 guildies in 10-man achievements and 20 guildies in 25-man achievements. There will be realm firsts for guild achievements just like there are for individuals.
Guild UI
The Guild window is being completely overhauled. It will include upcoming events, the guild experience bar, your rep with the guild, latest guild news (generated by Blizzard) and stickies of major accomplishments (also generated by Blizzard). The roster will include professions next to member names. Clicking on them will show what recipes the member has and can be viewed whether the member is on or offline. Personally, I am hoping that the roster will no longer bug out when the guild is larger than 500 members, but there is no specific indication that this is the case.
Overall, it seems that the loss of the talents and currency doesn't affect the new guild system much at all. Guilds will still level, receive rewards and perks and gain achievements. The new system will still be great for raiding guilds as well as PvP-heavy guilds and the more casual ones.
World of Warcraft: Cataclysm will destroy Azeroth as we know it. Nothing will be the same. In WoW.com's Guide to Cataclysm, you can find out everything you need to know about WoW's third expansion. From goblins and worgens to mastery and guild changes, it's all there for your cataclysmic enjoyment.Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, News items, Cataclysm
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Rajinnu Jun 13th 2010 5:43AM
Yep this actually sounds better than they had it before for all you QQers
Josh Jun 13th 2010 3:58PM
I'm just glad they're using very clear language and saying that these ideas are officially off the table.
However I'm sure there will still be QQ from the guy that desperately wants the guild talent point granting access to the Path of the Titan's Glyph of the Dance Studio....
Marc Jun 13th 2010 5:48AM
Aww, I really liked the idea of Guild talents and currency, but I welcome ANY improvements on the current guild system.
OOOOOoooooo it's getting close boy's & girl's!
Kovah Jun 13th 2010 5:51AM
Doesn't sound that bad. Could be worse I guess.
Oz Jun 13th 2010 6:08AM
The new Guild UI sounds really cool. I'm liking that it will show profs and recipes. But i wonder how it will interact with UI changing addons like carbonite...
kyusswren Jun 13th 2010 6:20AM
That sounds... bad.
Much much worse than the stuff they had planned.
I suppose it will make it easier for sites like wowprogress and wow-heroes to track guild progress now, but on the same note... the old stuff sounded so much better than this new stuff.
Is this another case of them withholding content for fine tuning and replacing it with a lesser version that isn't nearly as cool? (Heroic Leap and Spirit Link just to name a couple, for those of you that say "that never happened". Those two were in the Wrath beta, now they're in the Cataclysm beta, and they'll be in the beta for the next expansion as well.)
Galestrom Jun 13th 2010 8:55AM
It's the same stuff, it's just going to be less complicated to obtain now. I dig these changes; alot. =)
Dart Matsuraki Jun 13th 2010 10:22AM
It's the exact same system, you just don't get to pick from different talents. You automatically get all the bonuses as your guild levels.
Think about how player talents play out these days. Every class and spec has a cookie-cutter build that the majority of players use and has proven to be (even if very slightly) better than other builds. They didn't want that to happen to guild talents. They didn't want to see most guilds following the same builds just because they gave you the best rewards.
This system works much better and with the addition of Guild Reputation, it promotes a sense of belonging when a players realizes that "Hey, I'm exalted with my guild. It feels good to be a part of a second family, and the things I do within my guild actually mean something for all of us!"
Cyanea Jun 13th 2010 10:55AM
It's the SAME THING, but this implementation is better.
Instead of drama caused by GMs choosing talents that people in the guild don't want, instead of rifts forming between guilds that are focused on PVP and ones that are focused on PVE, you get this instead...which gives you the rewards anyway.
devilsei Jun 13th 2010 4:22PM
""Hey, I'm exalted with my guild. It feels good to be a part of a second family, and the things I do within my guild actually mean something for all of us!""
True, but there's an obvious downside to this. We don't know how bad the rep-gain will be, and for all we know it could be "Original Sons of Hodir" bad. Which, would hurt players who have hit exalted, only for the guild to take a sudden shift in directions and they no longer fit. I don't know anybody that willingly did the Sons of Hodir grind twice, and I've seen more than a few guilds pull 180s, 270s. and even 450s in their "goals".
Personally I think its an unneeded addition, if anything the "Guild Rep" should simply be a secondary form of rank, you don't grind the points, you get promoted through the rep ranks. Which the guild leader and officers could handle easily. If I join a guild that is solely my friends, why should I "grind" my reputation with them when I know I'm already exalted...? =P
Ata Jun 13th 2010 6:18PM
@devilsei
I suspect the 'grind' will be setable by the GM, and might not take long at all so a friends and family guild can all be on equal footing, but a more serious guild that wants you to earn your level can have it pull out longer. At least I hope so.
devilsei Jun 13th 2010 6:57PM
Eh, I highly doubt that's how it'll work ata, just sounds prone to exploits. Besides, if the guild leader can set the "rate" at which you gain rep, why not just do what I suggested in the first place, and allow them to promote you as they see fit from friendly up through to exalted?
Vivian Jun 13th 2010 6:31AM
Actually doesn't sound as bad as I initially thought. It's just that the GM of a guild now doesn't wield the power to pick and choose 'talents'. I guess it'll still be exciting to see how this works. :)
Azizrael Jun 13th 2010 6:33AM
Guild Talents would have been cool and allowed tailoring to what your guild is doing. It also would have seriously divided a lot of social guilds. It's great if you want to spend the points on advantages for progression raiders, but if you're in a guild that is ruled by your raid team and you only really do PvP, you're going to leave for a PvP-talented guild.
Valt Jun 13th 2010 7:27AM
Well as long as we still get:
Mass ress
Mass summon
Lower repair costs
No regeants to buffs (or was this just general change?)
I just get very disappointed they just bit dumped it down just to make it another cheaply thought goldsink (mount flags: 5k gold? You cant have everyone jumping around with these babies!).
varilhigh Jun 13th 2010 10:14AM
I agree, the PVE and PVP specific rewards that were talked about earlier seem to be missing from the description here. I had planned on having one mage in a Raiding Guild and one mage in a PVP guild so i could get the benefits or each. The reward they talked about earlier seem much better than tabards and heirlooms. I was also hoping there would be ranks you could earn as titles with PVP.
Irem Jun 13th 2010 10:52AM
"I had planned on having one mage in a Raiding Guild and one mage in a PVP guild so i could get the benefits or each."
If they have removed the non-cosmetic stuff (I'm not sure that they have; they just didn't mention it), I'm going to guess that this would be the exact reason. Players will take any advantage they can get, no matter how minor and no matter how miserable it might make them, and there would eventually be people upset that they want to be in a guild with their friends, but they have to join a PvP-specced guild to get the benefits, or have their characters in different guilds for their different roles, or leave a guild they liked because they started doing PvE more often than PvP, ect. That would negate a large part of the design philosophy they've been moving toward more and more, which seems engineered to make sure that you don't feel like you have to do things you hate or spend less time playing with people whose company you choose for reasons other than "I have to spend 3 nights a week raiding with them" just to stay competitive.
crsh Jun 13th 2010 9:47AM
Sounds decent, and also it'll encourage people to be in guilds; I don't know how it is on your servers, but I see an awful lot of guildless players because "you can pug almost everything, so why bother".
Hob Jun 14th 2010 1:56PM
And what's wrong being guildless?
I'm so surprised at the negativity being shot toward solo-players... if you like being in a guild, go be in a guild. Why does anyone care if someone prefers to solo play?
Did I miss a memo or something?
theRaptor Jun 13th 2010 7:41AM
Losing guild level will add extra spice to guild implosion drama, but it might make the dummy spitters think twice before they have their next tantrum. My guild is the oldest raiding guild on my server so I am good.