Cataclysm: New 600-member hard cap imposed on guilds
by Fox Van Allen 
Oct 5th 2010 at 3:00AM
Blizzard was keenly aware of the problems that these large guilds suffered, promising earlier in the summer to address them for Cataclysm. Well, not-so-great news, members of giant mega guilds: Blizzard is effectively throwing in the towel on large guilds and imposing a hard cap of 600 members effective the moment patch 4.0.1 goes live.
While the official blue post by Mumper says this will have no effect on 99.9 percent of guilds, this move could effectively devastate the remaining 0.1 percent. The full text is available after the break.
Guild Member Caps for CataclysmWe will be introducing a new, hard cap of 600 members in a single guild for Cataclysm. This function will go live with patch 4.0.1 and is already live on the beta and PTR's.
As most of you already know, we have supported a soft cap of 500 members in a guild since World of Warcraft launched. We have allowed guilds to exceed the 500 limit up until now since being in a guild really just amounted to ranks and chat channels. With the advent of the new guild system in Cataclysm we are tracking many more things on each individual player in a guild and in order to support that, we need to limit the amount of members to a reasonable level.
The new cap of 600 members is fully supported in the new guild system and that means that everyone will be visible in the ui and able to contribute to all guild functions like experience and reputation gain. We have pulled a large number of statistics to get to the 600 member cap for guilds and we are happy to say that this value covers more than 99.9% of all the active guilds in World of Warcraft.
The small number of guilds that are over the 600 person cap will be able to keep their guilds intact (and fully supported in the new guild system), but they will not be able to add new members until they fall below the 600 member cap.
As most of you already know, we have supported a soft cap of 500 members in a guild since World of Warcraft launched. We have allowed guilds to exceed the 500 limit up until now since being in a guild really just amounted to ranks and chat channels. With the advent of the new guild system in Cataclysm we are tracking many more things on each individual player in a guild and in order to support that, we need to limit the amount of members to a reasonable level.
The new cap of 600 members is fully supported in the new guild system and that means that everyone will be visible in the ui and able to contribute to all guild functions like experience and reputation gain. We have pulled a large number of statistics to get to the 600 member cap for guilds and we are happy to say that this value covers more than 99.9% of all the active guilds in World of Warcraft.
The small number of guilds that are over the 600 person cap will be able to keep their guilds intact (and fully supported in the new guild system), but they will not be able to add new members until they fall below the 600 member cap.
World of Warcraft: Cataclysm will destroy Azeroth as we know it; nothing will be the same! In WoW Insider's Guide to Cataclysm, you can find out everything you need to know about WoW's third expansion (available Dec. 7, 2010), from brand new races to revamped quests and zones. Visit our Cataclysm news category for the most recent posts having to do with the Cataclysm expansion.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 9)
george Oct 5th 2010 3:31AM
so what does this mean for AIE
Dom Oct 5th 2010 3:54AM
What this means for AIE is they can keep their bajillion members, but they can't add anymore. Which means they'll have to make AIE-1, -2, -3, etc to add members.
It stinks, yeah, but Blizzard realized the mistake of the past with guilds and decided this would be the best way to fix it.
John Oct 5th 2010 4:38AM
AIE WILL NEVER DIE.
No thanks to you, Blizzard.
Doc McFish Oct 5th 2010 6:51AM
What it really means is that people who dont raid and dont contribute much to guild level/progress, cant leach bonuses.
They can always make a custom chat channel to connect multiple guilds if they need to.
"/join AIEGLOBAL"
Ricohardt Oct 5th 2010 7:01AM
You break the guild into leveling, raiding, etc. or whatever segregations you like. There are chat addons like the ones used by the Stonewall guilds on Proudmoore, which keep all the guilds in the same chat without having to join a '/newchat'.
And seriously if this in any way improves the experience for the vast majority of the population of WoW, I don't see how super large (see: bloated) guilds can complain.
Hiwa Oct 5th 2010 9:34AM
Sorry for being ignorant, but what's AIE?
My biggest question, though, is how do the big guilds weed out members? How do they decide which members stay and which ones go?
Faith Trust Oct 5th 2010 10:03AM
they dont have to Hiwa
Sinapsis was misleading, read the blue post to the end and you find
"The small number of guilds that are over the 600 person cap will be able to keep their guilds intact (and fully supported in the new guild system), but they will not be able to add new members until they fall below the 600 member cap."
Nagaina Oct 5th 2010 10:03AM
AIE is Alea Iacta Est: http://www.aie-guild.org/
They're big. Like, REALLY REALLY big.
Hiwa Oct 5th 2010 10:37AM
Thanks for the answer guys. I had read the last paragraph, and I just kept wondering how the large guilds are going to manage to get below that 600 member cap. I know that technically they can stay at their size and not be penalized, but I wonder if they will feel pressured to downsize anyway. And if that's the case what will be the criteria?
Perhaps if I was in their shoes I would make a sister guild for leveling alts, another guild for raiders, a guild for social activities...at any rate makes me glad I don't have to be faced with those kinds of decisions.
Andy Oct 5th 2010 12:28PM
Honestly, AIE and guilds like it are the main reason why this 99.9% of guilds unaffected stat is bogus. The question isn't how many guilds are harmed, but rather, how many active players, and since these affected guilds have the most players, (by necessity of the change) and the number of guilds is bloated by players with vanity guilds with one person in them, far more than 00.1% of players are being affected.
And in reply to Hiwa, I'm sure they will feel the pressure to be downsized. Part of the nature of guilds that large is to continue accepting new members, and if you can't do that (until you reach 600, an impossibly low number for a guild that size) your main function as an all inclusive meeting place is destroyed.
Phaelan Oct 5th 2010 1:08PM
AIE is Scott Johnson and Randy Jordan's guild (of The Instance) it's the largest WoW guild in the world, something like 5,000+ members
Piper Oct 5th 2010 2:21PM
This will be good for AIE. It should help them move from a mob, warm-body guild to a number of guilds that are might just be more enjoyable to group with. While I have grouped with some very nice people from AIE in randoms, generally their members are quite mouthy about non-members in random pugs. An unfortunate fact of human psychology (that is, their being in AIE makes them the _in_ people), but annoying when you just want a smooth, drama-free run.
FYI, just watch some the AIE people down vote me because they don't like it when it is mentioned they have some problematic members. ^_^
Eirik Oct 5th 2010 2:22PM
WoW Armory says: alea iacta est, Earthen Ring, 6792 members
Which may be more people than on all of Chromaggus put together, horde AND alliance.
Quark1020 Oct 5th 2010 7:39PM
Its really easy to pick what toons to cull in guilds, remove all the toons that have been inactive for the last few years or so. Probably things like alts and whatnot.
Herman Oct 6th 2010 6:40PM
actually that makes sense, last time we heard about it, wow had 12 million subscribers active, if we consider that at least 11million of those are probably in guilds, then the few mega guilds like AIE of which there are probably a couple dozen, would make up maybe 50000 characters(not accounts, and probably a huge amount of inactive accounts still in guild) so probably 30000 active subscriptions, then 30k/11m is 00.27% of the total population of wow players. even if theres 100000active members of mega guilds, thats still only 0.9% of the total members in guilds.
i'm just pulling numbers out of my head, if you have real numbers please prove me wrong.
kaminari Oct 5th 2010 3:10AM
i demand at least 66 more >;)
Auker Oct 5th 2010 3:11AM
So will the extra players be auto-kicked from the guild? This seems like a very player unfriendly move by Blizz, they must have some serious backend problems with large guilds to pull a move like this.
e1tiburon Oct 5th 2010 3:15AM
"The small number of guilds that are over the 600 person cap will be able to keep their guilds intact (and fully supported in the new guild system), but they will not be able to add new members until they fall below the 600 member cap." - Mumper
Belfonisis Oct 5th 2010 3:15AM
"The small number of guilds that are over the 600 person cap will be able to keep their guilds intact (and fully supported in the new guild system), but they will not be able to add new members until they fall below the 600 member cap."
Dea ex Machina Oct 5th 2010 3:15AM
The blue post said that guilds that are already over 600 strong won't be cut, but they won't be able to add any new members.